Support for those in abusive relationships - thread 6

[ItsMeAndMyPuppyNow]

Welcome!

This is the latest instalment in a series of threads for those who are in abusive relationships, those who have left abusive relationships, and those gearing to leave.

Come vent, share, give and receive support.

The first question you may be asking yourself as a new visitor to this thread is:

Am I being abused?
Verbal Abuse A wonderfully non-hysterical summary. If you're unsure, read the whole page and see if you're on it
Emotional abuse from the same site as above
Emotional abuse a more heartfelt description
Signs of Abuse & Control Useful check list
Financial abuse Are you a free ride for a cocklodger, or supposed to act grateful for every penny you get for running the home
Women's Aid: "What is Domestic Violence?" This is also, broadly, the Police definition
20 signs you're with a controlling and/or abusive partner Exactly what it says on the tin

Books
"Why Does He Do That?" by Lundy Bancroft - The eye-opener. Read this if you read nothing else
"The Verbally Abusive Relationship" by Patricia Evans ? He wants power OVER you and gets angry when you prove not to be the dream woman who lives only in his head
"The Verbally Abusive Man, Can He Change?" by Patricia Evans - Answer: Perhaps - ONLY IF he recognises HIS issues, and if you can be arsed to work through it. She gives explicit guidelines
"Men who hate women and the women who love them" by Susan Forward. The author is a psychotherapist who realised her own marriage was abusive, so she's invested in helping you understand yourself just as much as helping you understand your abusive partner
"The Emotionally Abusive Relationship: How to Stop Being Abused and How to Stop Abusing" by Beverley Engels - The principle is sound, if your partner isn't basically an arse, or disordered
"Codependent No More : How to Stop Controlling Others and Start Caring for Yourself" by Melody Beattie - If you a rescuer, you're a co-dependent. It's a form of addiction! This book will help you
But whatever you do, don't blame yourself for being Co-dependent!

Websites
So, you're in love with a narcissist - Snarky, witty, angry, but also highly intelligent: very good for catharsis
Dr Irene's verbal abuse site - motherly advice to readers' write-ins from a caring psychotherapist; can be a pain to navigate but very validating stuff
Out of the fog - and now for the science bit! Clinical, dispassionate, and very informative website on the various forms of personality disorders and how they impact on family and intimate relationships
Get your angries out ? You may not realise it yet, but you ARE angry. Find out in what unhealthy ways your anger is expressing itself. It has probably led you to staying in an unhealthy relationship
Melanie Tonia Evans is a woman who turned her recovery from abuse into a business. A little bit "woo" and product placement-tastic, but does contain a lot of useful articles
Love fraud - another site by one woman burned by an abusive marriage
You are not crazy - one woman's experience. She actually has recordings of her and her abusive partner having an argument, so you can hear what verbal abuse sounds like. A pain to navigate, but well worth it
Baggage reclaim - Part advice column, part blog on the many forms of shitty relationships.

FOTH, this crap stuff will pass, you are sleeping already, the rest will follow. You need time to let all that poison out.

You need to tell his parents that their helpful emails are misdirected and if they really cared, they'd be taking their monsterously abusive son, the man THEY created to task.

TELL them that they may NOT contact you on any subject concerning him.

Oh and email them back and say your X has until the end of next week to come and collect his stuff or you will be hiring a skip, and he can collect his belongings from it.

Mean it.

FOTH, you are not going to crack up, in fact dear love, you are about to enter the most lucid phase in your life so far! Had you have stayed in that mess, yes, you could have ended up losing it, but you are free now, try to relax and just be.

thanks Hissy. Do you have any experience of WA?
have been calling our local and national number for 2 weeks now..never got through. today I have emailed them...think i could do with some extra RL support from people who know especially with Sworkers....heard nothing back so far. Glad i didn't need their help in a hurry!

The time I called them, they were awesome, perhaps try the national DV helpline too?

oh, same number.... keep trying, they are easier to get through to at night funny enough so I've heard...

oh foolonthehill I know how you feel. my H hasn't even told his mum yet - but I've told him he's got to. I know he'll tell them his side of the story (which is a completely deranged view from what I can see), and for some reason it is feels so important to me for everyone to know that he is mad/wrong/abusive, but maybe I just have to accept that I can't convince everyone of this. And I hate his mother so perhaps I should be glad she won't be in my life anymore.

yup..having had my moment of revelation i somehow feel that everyone ought to know and to recognise him for what he is...not very realistic as I've been with him for 13 years and only just twigged...and he can be Sooooo "nice".

Currently working on it not mattering what everyone else thinks! holding on to reality myself (in my better moments anyway).

Sadly H's dysfunctional parents have 4 grandchildren living with me...so I guess I'll have to make some kind of effort [smiling thru' gritted teeth emoticon]

Yes see the benefit Beattie, MiL out of your life...room for someone nice!!!

Just wafting in to drop a random personal musing on the link between abusers and pets.

I have a puppy - the clue's in the name! - and I realise that I treat her very much the way stbxh treated me, minus the raging, name-calling, blaming, and threats (I don't do any of those). Essentially, all the positive ways in which he treated me are the same way I treat my dog:

• I call her things like "pretty girl" and "sweet thing". Stbxh also called me pretty girl and sweet thing, and similar (when he wasn't calling me a stupid fucking bitch)
• I marvel at her cuteness. Stbxh would marvel at my cuteness.
• I buy her toys. Stbxh would buy me toys.
• I expect her to quietly keep to herself when I'm at work or socialising. Stbxh was affronted that I wanted to spend time with him at other times than the rare occasions where he chose to; work or drinking or fucking about on his computer always took precedence over me.
• I choose the rules for her behaviour. Stbxh also decided how I "should" behave.
• I do not expect her to independently strike out on her own, ever, because she's a dog. Stbxh went into complete denial that I could choose a life away from him.

Basically, I like having her around as a pet. Which she is. And which, as a human being, I am not.

Still think I'm going to try to find new terms of endearment for her that never fell from stbxh's mouth, as it weirds me out to sound like him...

Hi Puppy nice to see you about. You have been doing good work directing so many new folks in our direction. I am sad that there are so many women living with abusive partners and that this thread seems to be so necessary in enlightening so many.

My exploits this week meeting up with the MN poster who lived near me and had just woken up to the treatment she was receiving have shaken me a bit. She was so young and lovely and so was her baby. I am glad she got away and hope she is alright and doesn't weaken and go back.

Do you think maybe what you have gone through is making you question things that actually aren't that hard? I know my confidence took a knock over many things. I have got my baking mojo back and have been thoroughly enjoying creating lovely things in the kitchen.

Enjoy your lovely dog.

Are the things you don't feel confident about things you were criticised for, LittleHouse? Or do you feel your confidence just generally took a knock, which has stayed?

Personally my confidence just keeps getting better, the further away I am from the influence of abusers.

Puppy - Did your ex used to criticise your cooking/dislike it/undermine your skills? what's your dog like?

LittleHouse - I think my cooking question was to you after reading your post.

Good question Puppy

My H didn't overtly criticise me but did a number on me by projection. I wouldn't have said I had lost confidence as I was so numb and tough I didn't feel much at all. But since I have left him and allowed myself to soften and feel more I have realised I don't feel confident in quite a few areas. Maybe I was bluffing before, or maybe the confidence level did drop when I felt I had "failed" at marriage IYSWIM.

It has affected me at work, where my performance has been rated excellent while I THOUGHT I was struggling. It has affected my enthusiasm for entertaining, cooking, organising stuff in my sport and writing about it. Also I have questioned my ability to have a healthy relationship with anybody. But the VeryNiceMan is reassuring me over that.

I agree the more time goes by the better I feel about myself. With occasional pangs!

It is raining so hard here I am relieved I don't have a dog that needs walking today!

Oh I have just dug up some suppressed memories of H:

"You don't make guests welcome when I bring people from work home to supper"

"You are better at every day cooking I will do the special occasions"

"You don't like parties do you?"

It goes both ways though. I used to accuse him of using ten times as many pans and not clearing up, and always doing meat and boiled vegetables! He has become a very lavish and enthusiastic cook since I left.

Well, bells, since I can't resist to brag you ask, my dog is absolutely gorgeous and wonderful. And there just might be pix of her on my profile...

I lost interest in cooking and I think I started to believe that he was a better cook than I was. He wasn't and never had been; he just liked to occasionally cook things which I wouldn't class as everyday family meals. But, I know now that I was always the better cook/that I am more skilled, and, I now am back to enjoying trying lots of different, more unusual ingredients and recipies. He undermined my cooking - choosing whether or not he'd eat particular meals/turn his nose up at them/say 'I'm not eating that!', and whenever he cooked, he would tell me/other people how good it was and keep asking 'is it good, is it good?' and then keep stating - 'It's good isn't it?''Isn't it a nice meal'.............

How do you look at at a profile?

Puppy - just looked at your puppy - cute.

Hi all will catch up soon, been struggling with RL atm tbh, I'm a lot more aware of pulling people up on their arsey behaviour, did so to a bus driver the other day, & got a lot more rudeness back in return. My confidence has had the stuffing knocked out of it over the years so it took a lot for me to say something to him normally I leave them to it, I complained to his head office but now my brain keeps doing that silly thing of replaying the incident! :( x is still being a prize twunt he actually

put on a spectacular show in front of a taxi driver this morning Came round to see both DC's who are currently laid up with illness, went to run some errands and was 15mins later than planned even the driver looked stunned the poor soul! and I said to him "this is what I haven't been missing about you?" what he said? 'the fact you manage to make everyone's life a misery! :o' I made him say sorry to me and the DC's before he left! he then rang this evening to apologise to me again x

Hi Pixie
I think it takes a lot of courage to change. One of the reasons we are on this thread is we are in general very tolerant of being treated badly and put up with it when more assertive people would not have. Hence the need to escape eventually from an abusive relationship. So to try to assert yourself in the face of rudeness or cavalier behaviour goes against years of conditioning.
"Nice girls don't make a fuss"

When I do what you did I feel quite ill and upset afterwards, as if I was being unreasonable. If they retaliate with more rudeness it begins to trigger worse feelings. I think you should be proud you didn't just suffer in silence, and remember it is the driver who has the problem not you! Well done, have a Friday night

I'm cooking up a storm tonight as it's my best friend's birthday party tomorrow
and I'm feeding everybody!

re challenging being badly treated
Loving my children's primary school at the moment ( partly because thay have been amazing at telling me the kids are better now OH gone) but mostly cos they are really trying to break out of the "good girl/good boy" syndrome. they actually do lessons on "good assertiveness" and being yourself withoutbeing mean or undermining others!!!!!!!. I wish they would let me join in!!!!!!

hello
may I come in?

LWH should my ears be burning?? Not planning on going back

True assertiveness is a wonderful skill to learn, fool. And definitely a skill that would have served us well with abusive exes... because we might have noticed a lot sooner what irredeemable wankers they are, since the first underlying assumption of true assertiveness is that you have a right to your own feelings.

Borrow your kids' workbooks on it

Hello there, Weeble!

puppy just had a quick peek at your lovely little pup - sooooooo cute - want to swap for a grumpy, critical fortysomething man who has just kissed me on the lips. Nice I thought, then he said "you dont smell as bad as normal - you not had many fags today"

IWBF xx

Saturday hell.
Sorry about to splurge and weep all over the thread.

OH contact in house Sat am (kids don't want to go out....) He was good ok with them today but still insisting on talking to me about the big stuff. Went from "if you make me stay away beyond Christmas I'm divorcing you and suing for custody..get ready for a court battle" through all shades to "let's work on this, yes I can see the difference between "egocentric" counselling and one that takes readings from the outside (abuser's programme)." AAAAAAAAAARRRRGGGGHHHH.

oh and apparently we need to get a babysitter so we can go for a long day out to a "lonely part of the coast and talk about these things in private" [never in a million years!!!]

Brought washing
took his computer speakers
invited self for sunday lunch
and dds birthday monday [ok reasonable]
kids suggested breakfast every day!!!!!!!!!!

Apparently he's missing one meal a day as he is staying in his brother's house and he and wife feed him at dinnertime but not lunch time...suggested he used the fridge and bought some bread!!

Our finances are still joint...we both qualify for legal aid...his solicitor does not take it???!!!! Mine does.......................

Oh wise women of the web: is there any advantage in starting divorce proceedings myself rather than letting him (other than finances)?