I don't know what is normal anymore :( I need help but I'm finding MH service utterly shite

[craftyknickers]

I have come out of an abusive relationship but because I was in it for a few years and it was constant abusive in one form or another I don't know what is normal behaviour for me or for new partner.

I am finding myself being so jealous over everything, I'm getting upset or paranoid at the slightest thing. When I get paranoid over something like he is annoyed with me as he hasnt called when I know damn well he has had to work over I can't eat, I cry a lot, my anxiety is terrible!

He isnt an abuser, I know him very very well and he has been nothing but nice to me and has given me no reason to suspect foul play.

I know these are my issues, I don't know how to be normal in a relationship I dont even know what normal is

Trying to even see a GP is a nightmare in my town, I have just moved doctors in the hope I can be seen.

Do you have any advice? Where else can I turn?

You recognise your behaviour is happening because of what went before, and that has to be a massive part - the biggest - of changing it into healthier, happier patterns of behaviour. I think it's brilliant that you've got this far on your own.

I don't really have any useful advice except to visualise how you'd like your relationship to be and then act that way, even if it feels false, until it becomes normal. Catch your DP being nice and trustworthy and really appreciate it. Even write it down. Catch yourself trusting him and staying calm when you might have been irrational and emotional, and give yourself a pat on the back for it. Again, some people find writing stuff down helps.

I don't have any experience of what you've been through, and hope other people will come on with advice. These suggestions are just from stuff I've been taught about how to break unhelpful patterns of behaviour in different areas of life and they might work for you.

Good luck. You sound really nice and thoughtful of your DP, and as though you want the relationship to work.

Thank you Racingheart I am certainly going to give writing it down a go.

After being through such a terrible time I think I have found happiness in someone who is decent and kind and I really appreciate the small things now.

He is so patient with me do I am desperate to work though my issues and learn to be in a normal relationship.

I might never get back to 'normal' but I know this isn't how I want to be so I will do anything to work through that

Can you afford private counselling? Working through self-esteem issues and the fears of abandonment that probably stem from way before your abusive relationship is bread and butter work for a good therapist. Don't mean to minimise what you are going through but it is very common and a good therapist can help you work through this.

With hard work and time, there's no reason you shouldn't get back to normal. I'd do some googling for now on jealousy/abandonment and find some good articles to inspire you...

I think you should let him be patient with you :)

Do you find yourself getting angry with yourself for feeling insecure & anxious? Is there a part of you that fears he will leave you or punish you for feeling that way?

Remind yourself it's perfectly all right to feel whatever you're feeling, at any time. If possible, sit with it for a minute and let it wash over you. Feelings can't be wrong (no matter what the ex said), they're always telling you something. Sometimes it's even helpful to thank your anxieties for trying to protect you. Just let them go, they will.

I agree with racingheart's positive reinforcement ideas, too :)

Hope all goes well for you!

Crafty, I think it'll take a while for you to relax and understand what 'normal' is.

ideally you ought to have had a bit of alone time to work stuff through before getting involved again, but life isn't always like that.

What I would advocate is to get yourself some counselling, to use WA as much as you need to and to find out if there are any DV support groups around you. If you could get onto the Freedom Programme too, that'd help.

What you need is safe places to speak about what happened to you, you need to let this stuff out, deal with it and remove it's power over you.

As dear ol' garlic says, your feelings are totally justified. at all times.

I think I would suggest that you speak to DP and be honest with him, say you freak out at stuff he may find strange, but that there are valid reasons for this and that you are working things through.

Keep talking to us here, OK so I'm pretty clueless as to what normal is, but there are many MNers here that DO know, so ask away, sound us out and eventually you will get there.

To be fair you should have resolved all your issues before embarking on a new relationship, I feel you are not ready.

These issues are yours and will cause you to have problems with your partner which could ultimately cause you to split up.

Read all you can about abusive relationships especially emotionally abusive ones. Try to get on the Freedom Programme or some kind of counselling. You need to process what was so wrong with the past relationship, when you subtract that then 'normal' may be what is left afterwards. Don't think there is absolute normal but there is a wide band of 'normal' and the important thing is to recognise when someone has gone off that band. So great for you for knowing your reactions may be a bit extreme.
Lots of advice threads about relationships here are good too as you can gauge a spectrum of opinion.
Perhaps draw back from NM a bit. If you explain and he understands then that's a great sign.

Thank you so much for your advice it all means so much.

fabby I am taking things very slowly and I put a lot of thought into whether this is a good idea but then I thought there is no way I was letting 'him' ruin a chance of happiness.

I think I need to look into a support group and work through this, my partner is someone I have known for a very long time and he knows everything, he finds it hard to understand everything but is very understanding. He is willing to take things very slowly.

I think I may contact WA and see what advice they can give me.

It's all so complicated it makes me so angry the fact that this experience will stay with me forever, I would give anything to change it. I hate him even more knowing he will have an effect on any future relationship. It's like he still has this hold over me and I'm determined to break that.

I'm ranting now but I have so much on my mind and I just want it to go away.

crafty, I am with you on thinking about the experience lasting a life time. A week ago I TOO was ranting about wanting this ALL to just go away, and destroyed at the idea that i couldn't make any of it go away. I pretty much wrote everything in your last paragraph only a few days ago. Some here will testify to this too!

HOWEVER.... I AM going to therapy, I AM on the Freedom Programme, I DO have a network of online friends who have walked in the same style shoes as me, and I DO attend a local DV support group.

I have chucked a shit load of resources at this 'experience' and I can tell you that now that I have wraparound support for my fears, ramblings, wobbles and epiphanies, I am feeling stronger in myself.

I have just this last couple of weeks started online dating, and it's very early days, but it IS helping. I'm not sure I'm READY ready for a relationship, but I'm going really slow. I've had a coffee, it went well, but I'm not sure it'll lead to anything. There is another lovely guy that is interested/interesting too, we'll see what can be arranged meet up wise in January.

I spoke to X on Christmas Eve, a very emotional day for me prior to the call, once I had talked to him, I realised how much more detached I was, how his apologies and niceness had little or no impact on me. In one ear and out the next.

OK so I have worked HARD to get to that point, but you are VERY recently out of your relationship, you STILL need to go through the same phases I did, and we ALL do to get to the point where the past no longer poisons the future.

It won't go away, but it will stop mattering.

2012 is the year you PUT YOURSELF FIRST. You need to pull out all the stops to get yourself surrounded with safe support. Explain to the DP if you like, that this is not a slight on him, but that you need to explore stuff that he may find hard to hear, not about him, but about you and YOUR stuff, and that a neutral, trained person needs to be in place.

Go to your GP, ask about counselling, call WA and talk to them, they will have DV outreach workers, they will get you on the FP near you, it's free.

Thing is to remember love, that this monster put you here, but YOU are the only one that can get YOU back out. He will FOREVER be that sad little shit that forced you down so he could feel better. He will never change. You however will ALWAYS rise to the top. The fact he had to put you down to keep you there is proof of this.