Support thread for those in Emotionally abusive relationships :15

[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
a check list Use this site for some concise diagnostic lists and support
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

what couples therapy does for abusers

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!!

Oh yes and I have had the comment re my voice having no authority, me having no authority and kids not having respect for me. In fact, they listen to my STBX because he shouts and makes his approval conditional on them modifying their behaviour to his arrogant demands. These emotional abusers work to a pattern and it can be liberating (but freaky at times!) seeing the pattern emerge on here. You're not alone. You deserve respect

Just a quickie to say I'm safe. FWBF and MIL did not have their chats with FW as planned Feel more relaxed for the time being until they are going to see FW again when they will be having their chats. Just feel their 'chats' could ruin my escape plans. Apart from that FW been going awol as usual last night and now again tonight. Am glad he is out of my way but hate not being able to sleep as waiting for that key to come in the door . Had strange phone call with DMum too where she started quizzing me loads about PA and if FW had ever raised his hand to me, I really don't want her to know about that side of things so denied it, but she just kept on and on. Those in RL that haven't experienced it don't understand so I just don't have the energy to explain or justify me staying through it all to her...I just can't imagine explaining the full horror of the last 13 years to any of my family/friends, I would find it too difficult and also feel very ashamed for letting it happen to me and DC, its not just a little slap here and there hey? There is much more to all our situations than anyone in RL could ever fully understand...ugghh...feel I need to distance myself from RL people for a bit and discussing my 'situation' with them, they are just adding to the pressure...need time out....am drained.....back tomorrow for proper catch up...sorry not read through properly past posts. Love to all, always thinking of you lovely thread mates and yippee finally the fecking snow is melting! xx

Maggie I so know what you mean about RL discussions being draining because anyone who has not been psychologically imprisoned cannot understand. I feel like that too sometimes with my family, being on the receiving end of their (supportive) indignation is exhausting.

We've got each other on here thank god and that's our escape route mentally and eventually physically. Hope your fwbf and mil don't eff up your plans with their 'helpful' chats! Xx

maggie, you have to tell mil that a 'chat' with fw could put you all at risk.

if they want ro help, then they need to help get you all to a safe place before they open conversations like that.

you will have to tell her some stuff, it sounds like she's against dv, and/or has no experience of it, so might be horified.

ultimately, you need all he help you can get, but it has to be safe

Maggie never be ashamed about staying so long. People who have been through it will understand, and people who don't understand... well they're lucky, aren't they?

Breathe H always says that I have no authority and let the girls run riot. In fact I find it very difficult to discipline them appropriately because H is so strict about some things and not others, for e.g. he would take a far harsher stance on drawing on wallpaper than on lying, while I would tend to do the opposite. Then there are things like jumping on the sofa, he will go OTT and I feel I have to comfort them so they think that jumping on the sofa is OK with me. When they are on their own with H these incidents don't tend to happen because they are quiet as mice - yy to the poster earlier who said its spooky how well-behaved they are. When they are on their own with me 90% of the time I manage by asking them to please stop .

When I have spare worrying capacity, I worry about how we will deal with them as teenagers.

Have had a talk with the DDs about moving house. I have told them that they will see H as often as they want because he will always be their daddy, but if he's in a bad mood we can go in the new house until he is nice again.

I don't want to slag off H but the bare truth of it is that we are leaving because of his behaviour, there is no way to disguise that.

DD2 says perhaps we will have a new daddy like X (classmate who has a stepdad). What on earth do I say to that?? Don't want to be on my own forever but not the slightest chance of a 'new daddy' ATM

Maggie, so glad you are safe.

listen, I really feel for you in your situation. Could you book some free appointments at a solicitor to see what your options are, and why not phone WA and talk to someone there too? And your doctor and health visitor? The more people you talk to about your situation, the more help you'll get. Could you cut your hours down to part time, with a view to leaving? If you leave and take DD with you, he'll need to apply for contact, and if you've got things in place with WA, HV, etc, he'd need to apply for residency. And he'd presumably need to get a job to support himself if you weren't there to do it, making his availability as a SAHD less. There is a way, you just need to get creative - great that you've detached already.

I also had the voice comments . Mine were usually 'don't talk to me in that voice' - ie that I was talking in a higher voice than normal, as if I were talking to kids or animals and I was therefore being patronising to him.

So, just recording the FWittery this morning, allbeit low-level. He's trying to pretend he's being all reasonable - I offered him some money towards the boiler, he said i didn't have to give it to him now. But then I asked him about DS2's savings money that he pocketed, as he needs a new pram, could I have just £60 from it. Nope, it's all gone he said. He's spent it on the house he said. On what, exactly????There was £500! I pointed out that it was DS2's money, he shouldn't have banked it, and started saying 'Well, my daughters are down about £2k as well' - that's because he spent their savings on paying back a loan to his EXW, because I refused to help him out after he'd already fleeced me and he made me feel damn guilty about it at the time, wanted me to contribute some of DS1's savings wasn't going to happen. He then also started suggesting that I should be contributing to the paying back of this money to his kids through the money he wants off me in the divorce!!!! FW!!!! And he tried to guilt me into not going through the CSA for maintenance 'because it would mean that the girls get less money every month, because I already give them more than I'm supposed to'.

Pony had exactly the same conversations - don't speak to him, and do CSA (it was the end of guilt trips and threats over money for me- the threats and guilt trips don't stop but at least he cannot pull the money from under us, or threaten that any more, and yes I got [marginally] less, but defo worth it ).

Maggie I worry that he will be forced into even more scarey actions by others knowing - Not saying that anyone is doing any 'forcing' here, only that his panic, affrontery, and rage, at being exposed atall will make him feel forced into action. I am pleased to say that I do not know the mind of a madman at that level - I try to stay out of my ExFW madman's mind, but it does seem to be a bit of a pattern that they feel pushed into even worse actions. Who knows what awful thoughts he is having. Hope he's drinking himself into a stupor beyond actions!

Just had a 'flashback' moment - had relaxing music playing down here, and reading, good sunday morning stuff, when I heard footsteps upstairs - had an instantaneous moment of dread/fear and of his bulk moving about up there - after separation I would feel like that all day/night but it went after a few months, taken aback about that suddenly happening, now?! bizarre, but for all those wanting to flee, I shook it off after a few months, but I think if you move house it may well be left behind in that space that he invaded, the space invader!

such a thing for a little one to say nora about their own DF (aka FW). Says everything they desperately need a father, just not that one

I stil have to get mine Leclerc but have you tried Rescue Remedy, I've been recommended it by several now, might help?

mine used to do a turning the volume action down whenever i spoke at all.

they're all so tiringly similar.

Well this morning I told DS that mummy and daddy had decided not to live together any more. I told him daddy was going to move out into a different house. I told him it wasn't his fault...that we both loved him and he would carry on seeing both of us.

He was absolutely fine.. didn't get in the slightest bit upset (unlike me). I had told him it was ok to feel sad...or angry...or anything he wanted to feel. He just nodded and asked if we could go and play now...

The only question he had was about what house daddy was going to buy...I said daddy hadn't decided yet...and that was that.

I guess he will have questions in the future...and may well get upset...but I was surprised at how he easily he accepted it on first hearing...

well said Bertie cheeering for you that its all happening... he probably just can't process what that means for him yet. Weird what they come out with, never what we're thinking or worrying about ! I just kept checking in with mine to keep channels open.

I suppose at that age they can't imagine the future like we can, but this lays the foundation for it to go as smoothly for him as it can bertie.

A step forward Bertie well done I'm sure your DS is thinking about what you said and will come up with some questions sooner or later... may not be quite what you expect - DD2 thought that people took the bath, sink and loo with them when they move house and "How will we do that, Mummy? They're stuck to the wall?" Bless!

look at the numbers ladies...how did we get to 992?

I'm going to have to to 1000 cos i won't be around at 3 in the morning when you are merrily posting away.

so off to post thread number 16

see you there

'tis done lovely ladies...

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When we were newly-weds (awful time), FW used to say I had my "teacher voice" on if I asked him to do anything.

FW has been away long enough on this trip that I've had a few queries from friends about when he'll be back. When I said "Easter," shortly to one (shouldn't've been short with her; she got LOTS of concerned attention from FW recently for being naturally glamorous having a difficult marriage), she said, "Isn't that difficult?" And in reply to my hesitation, "Or is it easier with him not around?" At which DS answered, "Yes, it's always easier when he's not around." I was quite surprised by that, despite being unable yesterday to think of a single time in recent memory that FW's spent quality time with DS.

So I can hope that when my time comes, DS at least will respond as nonchalently as Nora and Bertie's dcs!

nonchalantly, I mean. (Obviously, but I'm a pedant; can't let it go!)