Support for those in Emotionally abusive relationships number 10

[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
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
should 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!!

Yeah know what you mean, wellies, its quite subtle some of the time. Like I had 2 things to attend this weekend and FW got home 5 mins before both were due to start. Which meant I had to feed kids, get them ready for bed, shower, get dolled up etc while he sat in the pub. He wasn't late as such, but he massively added to my stress by showing up with thirty seconds to spare before his absolute deadline time.
He does that pretty much every time I go anywhere. Its exhausting and often takes the good out of my infrequent nights out.
But as a specific incident it seems petty.
I've started a diary and even reading the last few days has been an eye opener. I'm a fucking idiot to put up with this for so long without realising the extent of his manipulation.
So wellies, I would recommend keeping a little note day to day so you can see patterns and frequency etc. Eye opening stuff.

Ahhhh wellies I get the "it's just an observation" one too!! It is often followed by "I just thought you'd like to learn how to do things better"

Yes, I am doing that (keeping a diary) at the moment - although often by the time I get to writing it I'm too tired even to think; sometimes I think my brain just doesn't want to go there.

Veeee - grr! Yes, that parently "helping you" attitude - despite the fact that they behave like children a lot of the rest of the time.

lost what a demeaning thing to say 'even i know that' its just bullying. its hard when you see whats been going on all this time - its a lot to take in and hard to face the reality. for me, i realised over the past year a lot, but lots happened before that that i thought was my fault cos i was ill, but i realise now none of it was my fault and it really was hell - i am so so angry about all those months i went through all that while not realising it was his fault.

tonight (after my 3rd night of no sleep cos of teething baby) i flopped onto the sofa, and he got the hoover out after dd had her dinner to clean up after her. he commented 'modern dad' and laughed. i said what do you mean, he said oh im just laughing at myself, women usually do all this stuff.

i just feel really down about it all. and confused...i feel like id be betraying him by leaving, i want to have the guts but i am worried i won't. i want someone to know my situation all about it and to be able to say for sure its not my fault. its so confusing.

Good luck hilde hope the copying goes okay.

I also hope poor Amitola is alright.

lemon I do love reading your posts because our situations are so similar...

I also find FWH very creepy now. He is rather in the public eye and I see him about a lot in various ways and whatever he says I think: "God he sounds like a TWAT!" and cringe...

And the non-conseneual sex... well that was my fault obviously for just crying with my face to the wall instead of saying something...

God

And I accept blame for everything too. It's fucked up? Must have been MY fault, sorry!

I was thinking the other day that what really bothers me is that I don't think he was EVER concerned at having upset me, EVER. If I was upset about something, it was always my fault, for being overly sensitive/crazy, and never his fault for being an unfeeling bastard with no empathy for another human. I guess it's all part of his sense of entitlement. It just contrasts with Nice Boy who constantly worries about upsetting me and carries a basket of apologies around with him all the time.

Good luck with the list-making... I have that to come. FWH will go absolutely apeshit - he thinks I've got more than enough to start again. It's the little things that bother me - I only have four chairs... he has 18 (I counted them the other day when I was trying to work out how to have some friends over for dinner...).

He thinks he deserves it ALL! Entitlement, innit....

x

Hi big
I quite like the simplicity of my life now and the fact I just had a chair a sofa and a mattress when I left him. Just like when we set up home together!

I had a weird exchanges of emails with FWH on Sunday. He wants to dictate how we divide up our possessions. Controlling anyone??

He reckons we take it in turns to choose items worth over £500 and owned since before I moved out.

He should be left with "everything he needs for basic living" because I have furnished my house since I left at my own expense and he isn't claiming any of that.
Lastly he doesn't want to have to pay me anything in cash if he keeps the valuable things.

I just get so tied in knots by him that I am going to leave it all to my wonderful solicitor to guide me. The valuables can be divided up equally if he doesn't want to pay me for them. Pictures mainly and bespoke furniture. He can have most of the crappy old furniture his family foist upon us household stuff!

Oh and after agreeing I feed the DC on Sundays he arranged supper with DD2. GGRRRRR

I'm feeling crabby tonight. I'm getting a bit old for PMT!!

"Everything he needs for basic living" includes a £500 coffee machine by the way, and a 43 inch TV with surround sound. He would say they are for the DC...

I am sorry you had such a shitty time big and obviously it wasn't all your fault. But it was clearly all mine!!

That is why MN is great you can be objective about someone else's life when you can't about your own.

Hope your Nice Boy is there to sooth you when the list making time comes.

Sorry for being AWOL ladies, life has been busy the past week or so. Amitola I hope you're ok. . Hugs to all.

This will probably be a long post so I apologise. In the past week I saw my councillor and we chatted, which was good. I also saw the lady at the children's centre, who made me cry (not deliberately, I was just getting so frustrated at being unable to explain things to her). She told me - as my councillor has - that I get no time for myself so suggested NSDH start taking DD to the fortnightly Dad's group at the children's centre (I suggested this to him when she was teeny and he refused). She has also referred us to the Relate councillor at the children's centre, so waiting for that now. NSDH has been receptive to both ideas.

However, things are not great at home. Although he is trying on the larger scale (not shouting at me as much, no threat of physical violence), the lack of consideration for smaller things is still there. It makes me frustrated, which makes me angry at him, then he reverts back to his usual 'I'm a meek little man dealing with an angry unreasonable wife' routine he learnt so well from his Dad. .

Example - we went away for the weekend for a party and stayed with my GPs. We had the same old unnecessary stress while getting ready for this party, with him swearing, crashing around etc, which put me on edge. As always I had to sort out everything for me & DD, he wouldn't help. He even claimed he couldn't collapse the pushchair so I had to (its the little things that tip you over the edge as we all know!). He was angry with me as I deliberately bought a tall pair of heels for this party (I havn't worn high heels for years as it makes me taller than him and I figure enough is enough!), so made me stagger to the car carrying everything. He even shouted at me in the street in front of GPs house. Of course at the party itself he was Mr Disney Dad.

This morning it was my turn to do the early shift with DD (she's been waking us up at half 5 every day the last 2 weeks!). So I decided to take her to the shops to get a bottle of wine to say thanks to my GPs. I left at half 9 and he was still in bed. I had to remind him we had to pack everything up still and tidy up after ourselves etc etc. I came home an hour later to find him STILL in bed. Nothing done. Not even started. I got the hump and he then said he 'has a throat infection'. . So again I had to rush around doing everything, packing, washing, dishwasher etc. My GPs are eldery so I don't want to leave things in a mess. He moped around reading the paper with this horrid little fake cough that makes him sound like a smoker (he's never smoked). And when we got home this evening he sat in front of the TV while I dealt with DD on my own. Seriously, aside from the money I might as well be a single parent!

I have more to say but I'll stop for now. He has the week off (he's angry as I refused to take it off as I don't want to spend my leave with him). So of course he'll be perfectly fine tomorrow, won't go to the Docs and will spend the week in front of the computer relaxing like he always does.

I'm so miserable.

Lemon, well I am apparently menopausal which explains my hot and cold mood swings. I am also an idiot to think that I can leave with the children. sigh
I got pretty drunk on Friday night as I was upset about him showing up late to let me out to meet my friends, then went off on a wine fueled rant and told them probably far too much about what a dick he is. So they poured me more wine! This was also a sign of what a pathetic person I am -the drunkenness and the suffering the next day. Apparently its one rule for him, another for the less superior beings.

Hi everyone. Amito hope you're ok (ish)?

Big I also find FW such a total and utter twat these days, the thought of physical intimacy is totally creepy, even though he's quite a good looking guy. He's in such a prattish, wankerish mood tonight, loads of shouting, when I told him to calm down he nearly lost it, apparently that was VERY provocative. Jackbooting around, shouting out orders. I am standing up to him more and told him it's not a dictatorship and I am in charge here too. He is totally out of touch with any sense of how shouty, controlling and dictatorial he is being, he then justifies himself by saying stuff like "I was just requesting, very reasonably...." when in fact he'd just been shouting "I've said, so many fucking times..." You know what I mean? I am so glad I have made a firm decision. I don't know how it will pan out but September is action time. And my new job starts then.

Hi Nini, God, I sympathise with what you describe. The bloody man flu thing. Leaving you to do everything. Acting up to his own image of himself in public. I often think I wish I could secretly film the FW currently of my abode ("my" FW is not acceptable to me anymore!), big brother style, for a week so he can have the shock of his life confronting his true personality.

So good t b back! Quick question what's this diary u gals have mentioned? To note certain behaviour etc? X

ForSale I was accused of being "hit hard by the menopause", too, even though that wasn't the case - in fact I had just disagreed with one of his dictatorial statements. That was what started this whole break up actually, as after that I got angry at the personal insult and had the temerity to insult him back which resulted in DV.

Hilde well done for finding and copying all this info, you'll need it when the time comes.

BTW re diary, ladies, I have been keeping a private blog of the abuse on wordpress, ie so no-one can see it but me, but it's dated and timed so it's hard evidence when the time comes.

To remember the times when they are vile and you feel your mental?! Ha!

Yeah it's a real eye opener and helpful with decision making too.

He called the cat "that thing" tonight.

I'm going to do it! Most of the time I'm told I take it the wrong way blah blah but my friends have witnessed certain behaviour and have been shocked

He's ' trying' now though. Wish he would Ho back to being horrible then it would make it easier. He does love me but in a way I don't want. I don't want all this responsibility and to constantly read his emotionally dead mind. Too exhausted

Diaries!!! keep them well hidden girls!

Great idea...mine is still a source of "encouragement" that I am on the right path. Also copies of texts and emails...nothing like having it all down in black and white......

wait and see how sane you feel once you look at what's going on.....

love and strength to all...now I'm off to track down pension info...

hilde how much???? [faints]