Support thread for those in Emotionally abusive relationships number 7

[foolonthehill]

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.

Have a thread on relationships - 6 year relationship in the loo...

Hello wrenner, welcome to the thread.
I am also making sense of things in my head.

Thanks all. It is so reassuring to hear supportive words on here. He dropped the children off tonight and looked at me as though I'm utter shit. In the old days I would have been so scared. Now I just feel sorry for him.

The analysis just seems constant though in my head ... It's tough.

But I'm so happy! That makes me feel worse! :)

Thanks for the lovely welcome although I am actually shit scared just writing in here as I'm admitting the problem..... Even though I've known there's been a problem from day 1 really.

Evening all, Hope you ladies will all have a lovely positive weekend :)
Or if your not there yet, will do in the very near future xx

wrenner - read your other post, am very sorry you are feeling so very miserable.
I do think from what you have posted you are in an abusive situation,sunrise 65 has given great advice about contacting womans aid.
A break is a very good idea to give yourself some space to think about things.
If you suspect your partner to be abusive, he is unlikely to be honest, so if you do talk, and see if you can work things out - you should watch if his actions back up his words.
6 years is alot better than 26 years in an unhappy relationship... Best wishes xx

used to have palpitations just posting on here...they wore off...now I just can't stop

And just to say to anyone who is trying to make sense of all this.. if you haven't already,please read Lundy bancroft "Why does he do that?" link above. If you are in an abusive relationship I guarantee it will feel like someone really clever has got inside your head and rearranged the spaghetti head mess into neat straight lines.

And it's a surprisingly easy read for something so clever!!!!!

And the truth shall set you free...

OK clearly a quorum and all round then, pull up a cushion and someone find a bar of cadburys finest....

sweep - you earlier post made me smile, I described to my ex he made me feel like "I want to break your face" - I am not agressive but what they do is so frustrating. Glad I'm not there

fool - are you feeling a bit better? I know some threads can be triggers for me also, you are so strong, was sorry to hear you not your usual self.

fool & parsley - The 'ex's' refusal to get the seriousness of the situation makes our reaction seem so out of proportion - Don't let them forget why.

sunrise65 your advice is great - you don't sound wobbly :) And I hope your ex's lack of co-operation isn't getting you down too much xx

big house - glad you are feeling so strong after only leaving your ex 12 wks ago, if he is down or sad not - it is only for what he's losing out on...but didn't see fit to fight for when it mattered. It is not you fault he is choosing to guilt trip you now, when it is too late. Though the fact that you don't like to see him suffering shows what a caring person you are... don't waste it on him, he isn't worth it. xx

thanks bobitsall quiet on the western font. I await what the morrow will bring....feeling more myself, strangely NSDH (Not So DH for newbies as i can't yet elevate him to FWH) has overstepped the mark so thouroughly that I am just and feel entirely justified in everything i have felt all along....there is always a siver lining somewhere!

wrenner hope your discussion was ok if you managed to have it out with him. Lots of hands to hold yours if needed here.

fool - that is the difference between you and him, when you look back you will have experiences and will have learnt the lessons from them & be successful and happy. He will see a long string of mistake after mistake... and be a very miserable, angry old man. Hope tomorrow will bw fine xx

Had a long talk where I was very honest and it was very hard. He did see alot of the points I made too. I just don't know if it's too little too late?! He spoke about grief counselling due to his mums death at 11 which I think is a big block to any emotion he has. Did anyone else go down the counselling route??

fool Thank you so much for starting and doing the technical work for these threads.

yes fool..there is always a silver lining somewhere. IME When he does or says something really extreme, you can feel justified in everything you have felt all along, just as you said.

And, earlier in your (i mean one's) thinking process when still in the relationship, when he does or says something so outrageous, that can be the lightbulb moment. Finally you can understand those little things that didn't seem right yet you couldn't put your finger on. When you feel confused in yourself, things which would seem insignificant if told to someone else....

Further with the silver lining...when they overstep the mark so obviously, (can happen in varoius ways) :-

The people who he might have tried to recruit as potential allies, can be shown what he is like.

And people who love you, (and also sometimes people you hardly know), who can't understand why you don't/didn't try to make things work with the relationship, their eyes are opened.

Hope I've expressed that so people reading can understand.

Wrenner, about the counselling route.

Abusive men often take what is said there, even in individual counselling, and twist it to their own ends.

IME, and, it's explained in the Lundy Bancroft book somewhere.

You can see an example if you go through the link to the book at the top of the thread, then do look inside, and find the bit around

"His version 0f events is worlds apart from hers".

And I think there's more about it somewhere else in the book, (not got my copy any more)

Thanks

Sorry- thanks ill look x

bighouse It's not your responsibility how bad he feels, (though I have had these feelings you mention). It's his fault for the way he treated you.

I was originally looking for the place in the book which I mentioned above because of what you said about mutual friends and what they are telling you about him.

Someone say if I've got the wrong end of the stick here, but the stuff about "His version of the abuse is worlds apart from yours" (chapter 1, I think, and as I said, you can see it in "look inside" through the link) in the Lundy Bancroft book, seems relevant to you, bighouse

He also points the reader to other parts of the book that you cannot see in the preview.

I was looking with regard to bighouse posts wrenner, then yours came up, and I remembered about counselling stuff, and realised what I'd been looking at was relevent to you as well.

And every so often there are posters who can verify first hand that abusers twist counselling sessions to their own ends.

He may well benefit from grief counselling, and who knows, it might help him in other areas of his life. I am loathe to write anybody off in terms of their ability to change. But I wouldn't bank on it, tbh.

I have a friend whose mpderately abusive behaviour (if I can put it that way) is and always has been blamed by him on him finding his father dead, not when the friend's bloke was a child, but when he was a young adult. He uses it as an excuse, then does nothing about it.

I have also had many many talks with ex over the years where he promised to change, even managed to change his behaviour for, oh anything up to a week. I posted about this on your thread last night, Wrenner.

Words are cheap, judge him on his actions, if possible without 'making allowances' for him.

Just need to vent here. Split from my emotionally and financially abusive ex 5 months ago. Adjusting to life as a single parent pretty well and now back to work full-time. Overall life is going pretty swimmingly, contact is ok although stressful for me and importantly DS is flourishing.

Ex texted whilst he was on holiday (it grates a little that he can go away for 3 weeks without a care in the world!), that he still loved me and DS "as much as ever" (so, not at all - I thought)

Now, he is back and I get a text congratulating me on "all my work with DS" (like I had a choice!!!) and that he wants us to "stop fighting and be friends again".

I don't intend to reply, this is obviously manipulation and he presumably has had a fight with the OW or doesn't like paying rent etc.

But he has contact with DS in 30mins (if he turns up) and I need to vent on here before I scream at him!!

Ahhh amItooangry x Vent away on here, don't give him the satisfaction of seeing you cross.

How is everyone today?

I have just updated my thread.

Am ok though. Quite calm. Looking forward to my future wherei am not jumpy all the time and dread what he's going to say to me next just in case I've not been perfect.

amItooangry What your twatface is doing is re-writing history, if he is nicey nicey with you and you are seemingly friends with him, he loses the feeling that someone somewhere HATES him.

These idiots are all about the opinion of/appearance to others... so they present a super charming face to everyone, but meanwhile you are at home dreading the sound of the key in the door.

6m is also the first of our 'milestones' It's a point where many abuse victims succumb and go back.

I agree with you not to dignify his pathetic text with a reply. IF he asks you outright about it, say Yeah I got it, but didn't think it warranted a reply, as tbh, YOU were not the one that started the abusive/shitty behaviour. That YOU were a FRIEND, but he saw to it that all of it was utterly destroyed.

If he says anything more, tell him that you have plenty of GOOD friends and that you don't have any space in your life for one like him.

Or the ultimate, hand DS over, say return him at and then shut door in his face.

Don't let him in your home, under any circumstances, he lost that right long ago.