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Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

Support thread for those in Emotionally Abusive relationships Number *9*

999 replies

foolonthehill · 06/06/2012 15:53

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
why financial abuse is domestic violenceAre 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.
heart to heart a wealth of information and personal experiences drawn together in one place

If you find that he really wants to change
I stay or should I go bonus materials this is a site containing the material for men who want to change?please don?t give him the link?print out the content for him to work through.

The Bill of Rights
bill of rights here is what you should expect as a starting point for your treatment in a relationship, as you will of course be treating others!!

OP posts:
AnastasiaSteele · 18/06/2012 08:58

If I knew the answer to that question LapisBlue, I wouldn't be on here. As it is, I'm out and trying to stay out. I'm using all the resources around me - including this place and my counselling to help me. Being insightful into his behaviour and knowing I deserve better and that I'm not responsible for him are separate things. I don't really know what to say.

ThePinkPussycat · 18/06/2012 09:16

I suspect you may be addicted anastasia. Hence you won't go no contact. You are so right about people with troubled childhoods finding each other btw. If you did go no contact the addiction would subside eventually I think - again I am going mainly by threads on here, but also a bit from my own experience from long ago...

AnastasiaSteele · 18/06/2012 09:21

It is addiction, I admit that. I do find it easy to go no-contact from my end, but if he initiates it, it's saying no that's difficult. So I'm addicted, but my people-pleasing character is difficult to fight. Honestly, I hate to start sentences with 'me and my counsellor are working on...', but I have been having sessions on saying 'no' to people.

cagedcanary · 18/06/2012 09:35

i was in an a long term relationship for 11 years... the last couple of years of it was hell he became extremely emotionally abusive.. he got someone else pregnant and when i tried to leave him he became abusive... he cut my hair one day in a fit of rage.... that was 3 years ago. he was murdered 2 years ago and now my ds and i are trying to put our lives back together.... slowly slowly...it has been hard but were ok..

AnastasiaSteele · 18/06/2012 09:36

Hugs cagedcanary

ThePinkPussycat · 18/06/2012 09:36

I was talking about saying 'no' to people with my DM this weekend. She has a friend who doesn't drive, and asks her to take her places (always health related, so based on need). This friend doesn't drive so doesn't understand how inconvenient this can be for DM! I have a similar friend. DM and I are able to say no if our friends have an alternative they can use, and our friendships do not suffer from this, though friends may be initially a bit put out! But they are friends, this passes, and more importantly, the relationships are reciprocal - our friends are there for us in other ways, so if they really need us we don't say no, but put ourselves out.

In other areas, we used to be more people-pleasing, whoever was doing the asking, but have both managed to grow a pair set healthier boundaries now.

cagedcanary · 18/06/2012 09:42

i feel like ive been given a second chance but at what cost... my ds misses his father and well i ... im currently stagnant... although he was this person in the relationship he was still part of my life for over a decade... i grew up with him... emotionally this is confusing...

AnastasiaSteele · 18/06/2012 09:44

Are you getting much support cagedcanary? I can't imagine what you have gone through and how confused you must be.

ThePinkPussycat · 18/06/2012 09:47

canary welcome and more hugs. No one deserves to be murdered, no matter what they have done. It must have been terrible for you.

cagedcanary · 18/06/2012 09:49

ive been to winstons wish with my ds to support him but for myself i have not sought counselling... i keep my head down and lose myself in work etc.. but its hard.. i am also having to deal with with his not so supportive family... they resent me i think as they reckon i wanted him dead.... which is not the case.. you see they know how he was with me... so they think im smiling about it all, that im happy he is out of my life.... which couldnt be further from the truth

cagedcanary · 18/06/2012 09:56

he was not the easiet of people to get along with and he made my life hell - sometimes i did think what would life be like if he wasnt around... but i never meant it seriously....i jus wanted him out of my life.. he got someone pregnant and still wouldnt leave me alone... he was a bully.. and even went as far as to put petrol through my friends parents letter box and set it alight just to get to me.. they lost the whole of there front door.. he had a water tight alibi but the police knew he got someone to do it we just couldnt prove it.... i loved this man and hated him all in one...

ThePinkPussycat · 18/06/2012 09:59

Did you and his family attend the funeral? Sorry if I am bringing back awful memories.

cagedcanary · 18/06/2012 10:00

yes we all went to the funeral... he had a big funeral.. my ds was completely devastated because he was very close to his father

ThePinkPussycat · 18/06/2012 10:01

How old is DS?

cagedcanary · 18/06/2012 10:02

11yrs

AnastasiaSteele · 18/06/2012 10:09

Just because he made your life hell and you dreamed of a life without being bullied does not mean you wanted anything bad to happen or for your son to lose his father. I think many posters will relate to the love/hate feelings you had.

ThePinkPussycat · 18/06/2012 10:09

So his family don't know whether you were crying for him or DS (if you did cry), or staying strong for DS or not caring that he had died (if you didn't cry). What about your own family, are they are any help? And does DS see his paternal GPs?

ThePinkPussycat · 18/06/2012 10:11

A thought - can you access specialist counselling through Womens Aid? Sadly you won't be the first woman to have found herself in this plight.

cagedcanary · 18/06/2012 10:13

ds GM told me that she was surprised i was upset and crying... and she thought i would be happy he is dead.. my ds has regular contact with GP and family but i keep my distance... my family is all overseas.. they all live abroad..

cagedcanary · 18/06/2012 10:15

i cried when he died for many nights... i did not sleep for 2 weeks.. i cried for the man i fell inlove with, i cried for my son and i cried because his father died alone in the street... he was stabbed and he bled to death alone in the cold on the street..

cagedcanary · 18/06/2012 10:19

i cried because i knew that he may have harmed me and or worse killed me at the rate he was going. my family and friends were worried all the time for me with this obsessive man i had in my life... he was obsessive, possesive and abusive.. the day he cut my hair he told me he was thinking about cutting my face but he thought for now he would cut my hair

ThePinkPussycat · 18/06/2012 10:21

How sad that the very fact that his family understood what he was like is the very thing that has now driven a wedge between you. I think it is still very early days for anyone coming to terms with this. All you can do is know your own feelings, yes love and hate can exist together, but perhaps you can let hate (you haven't labelled those feelings I think, I have borrowed from Anastasia's post) turn to sorrow.

The cage door is open.

AnastasiaSteele · 18/06/2012 10:22

cagedcanary please get some real life support with this. You sound so traumatised by this - and understandably so.

TodaysAGoodDay · 18/06/2012 17:12

More (((hugs))) coming your way canary. What you went through must have been traumatic, and you have tried to be strong for your son. Now is the time to take care of yourself for a bit. Deal with all those feelings, and learn to let go of them. It's going to be hard for you, but ultimately it will set you free Smile

MissFaversam · 18/06/2012 21:34

ive finally done it! my name was totally confuffled on here just recently and this is my real name on here. Im in bits here but, its going to be grief for a relationship that didnt work rather than one I was trying to attain.