Support for those in emotionally abusive relationships:16

[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 jeez fly just seen your posting re: night time wake up caller! very creepy and non-existent boundaries, I sincerely hope it was the last-ditch attempt that you suspect it might be with him how disembling beds now. horrible financial worries fingers crossed this will work itself out.

Pony !!! What a bloody FW wrt the house!?!! Speaks volumes doesn't it? and so does your ring removal, nice one! a big shift.

TCM that dream, changes afoot!

btw Pony was meaning to say, v.v. good bout the work xx

Thank you Fairy and Breathe. It's so hard to keep a clear head when he is like this. I start to feel so guilty, and just want to agree to anything to stop him hurting. But trying to keep my dream in my mind, and how mice it would feel to sit down and watch crap tv in the evening with a glass of wine and my laptop.

Thanks Fi! (on both counts ) Yes, it does speak volumes. I saw him earlier and let him chat away pleasantly about the house while just saying 'mmm-hmmm'. Felt good!

TCM - part of the reason he's being like this now is so you can't keep a clear head. You are not hurting him. He is choosing to be how he is (whether it's nicey-nicey or nasty). If you leave, I can't promise it will be easy, but there's the hope of things getting better. While you stay, there is no hope of that. Hope you have a good eve with him in his nice phase, but please remember what he's like the rest of the time.

Lehti, hope you are not getting grief over the letter. He will be suspicious, because he'll sense that you are hiding something, so be on your guard.

I mean Lahti, o'course.

He hasn't mentioned the letter again, I told him it was a reminder for a smear test before he mentioned the card.
I feel a bit sick at the moment as I have been trying to think of reasons to justify leaving. His behaviour was just diabolical prior to his EA but following that I felt that it wasn't as bad. I just really regret the RELATE sessions now as I realise that he manipulated it all and up until recently I have just been grateful that the EA had stopped. I feel like I need to forget his behaviour prior to RELATE as it us in the past but I just can't and I keep getting flashbacks now such as... We had been married a couple if months and were in the car on the way home from Saibsburys when I accidentally bit a mouth ulcer (prob from stress). I said OUCH as it brought tears to my eyes, he said "WHAT IS IT!" I explained and he laid into me saying "is that your way of getting out of sex tonight?" I have just remembered this 10 years later. Is it unfair to not let go of this stuff when we have been through counselling? Or am I minimising it? I was devastated at the time but you know what? it bloody worked for him. He hardly ever get turned down (I am sure he would disagree though).
We are going out tomorrow night to a show which is his way of treating us but I just don't want to go.

lahti I am almost sure a smear reminder these days comes with a handy card with useful women's healthcare numbers on them

lahti if by justify you mean find a way where he will accept that what you are doing is a reasonable response to unreasonable behaviour he'll never see it .no matter how justified rational and right you are he will hear what he wants to hear and nothing else. if after counselling and trying to make it work you are not happy and the damage is irreparable then that is all the justification you need.

Something you said really chimed - you said he hardly ever got turned down not that he would agree. Ex was same. used to say cannot remember last time you gave me a bj. I'd say it was a week ago Saturday but as it was clearly totally forgettable i may as well not bother

ex used to accuse me of not doing all kinds of things he wanted help with i would think but i did help...what is the point of doing anything when the things you do are not remembered. it was always 'you never this' 'you always do that.

His pet peeve was i never helped fix his house up (the one me And the kids didn't live in that the kids couldn't play in because it was like a building site) i used to try to explain that i was helping by looking after the kids so he could get on with it.

When i did help out he pretty much sulked, barked at me, criticised everything i did and said i might as well not bother.

did not thank me afterwards and then denied i had ever done anything. not much incentive!!

I remember once i went to help him do his garden with the kids. everything i did was wrong. the kids started getting under his feet. they were trying to help dead head one of the plants and he was going mad at them doing it wrong. he ended up screaming at me 'get out, get out of my house you fucking c*nt'. (The neighbours heard him and told his ex wife and her kids found out about it and mentioned it next time they were up.)

But before i had even got home he phoned me up to say, sorry for shouting at you but you shouldn't have let the kids do x,y,z' i told him that if he had just phoned up to have another go i was not really interested and that we were not coming to his house to help again.

silverlahti he might ask to see the smear card. better to pick something you can produce like a blood donor card or something and say the smear thing was the day before and you got envelopes muddled. I.e that envelopes, i thought you meant the other envelopes...silly me...

Of course if he looked at return address you are sunk.

My inclination would be to say 'my post my business'. but as you can see from above ^^ my ex was a royal pain but i could 'back chat' him without risking anything worse than a row... I don't know your situation well enough to know whether you would get away with that.

Lol though silver i like your thinking

Lahti, if he asks to see the card, you know for damn sure that he's controlling. But not that this realisation will help you in the moment!

mink, another FW script bingo - mine would be the same with sex: It's been ages, that means you don't love me/want me. I'd then remind him that we'd done it x number of times over the weekend, ie just a couple of days ago. But it never made a difference. We averaged 2-3 times a week (sometimes much, much more but rarely much less), but it was still never enough, it was still a problem if I was too tired or didn't want to initiate sex at 5am. Even the weekend we did it about 7 times, he still went into his normal 'you must not love me' the first time I refused him in the week after that.

But this is because I wasn't the problem. He was. But I struggled to believe someone, someone who I loved, could be so selfish, self-obsessed and so uncaring about me as to behave like that. And so it was much easier to believe that I was the problem, than to believe another human being could be like that towards someone they professed to love so much.

I'm starting to realise, as I remember back a lot of stuff, just how much I minimised at the time. I guarantee that those of you still insitu are doing the same. Otherwise, you'd go mad.
Thinking of all you ladies tonight, with much love. Maggie, hope you are safe.

No, no coincidence, Leclerc. And none with the thrush reoccurrence, either. Knobber.

pony i suppose if they are determined to feel hard done to then they will...and he did.

Trying to gently train the hard done too attitude out of DD2.
She had total melt down earlier. got herself in a right state and would not back down even though she knew she was digging a hole. ended up sobbing it is all dad's fault. he taught me this.

In a way true. if she doesn't get her way she calls people an idiot. that is him. but then again she has to learn to be responsible for her actions. and also my fault cos she has heard me saying to him she learnt that from you. so explained to her gently yes he does do that and in general it gets him into trouble and we are going to help you learn not to do it because in the end its not going to get you what you want.

Glad i remembered that gardening incident tho cos i was starting to think today that although we fought he wasn't actually totally mental.

Btw read his POF chemistry test today...i know bit stalkery...but actually it Ian v therapeutic..and it gives me good hint on what profile types to avoid in future if i ever go down that road again...it had him down as relaxed. honestly if tension and overheating to stress were a sport he'd be regional champion. can only assume the test confuses prefers relaxing to getting off arse with being easy going.

mink, I think it's not just about them being determined to be hard done to - it's about a mindset that genuinely believes they are hard done to (even when faced with evidence to the contrary), and that everyone should be pandering to their needs!!!!

I am totally with you on the slightly stalkerish. I am currently trying to work out if he has put up a profile anywhere (since we met online in the first place). Not sure why I even care. Must stop!!

minkembra thanks for your wise words the other day. I did read as you posted but wasn't able to reply as H was in the room and he'd already asked what I was typing the first time I posted. But they did help. Sure as sure H has shown his true colours tonight. Firstly berating me for not putting on DDs nappy properly last night so she was wet this morning. He made out she was soaking (I was at work this am) but I think as usual he was over-egging it as I asked if he'd put her sleepsuit on to wash and he said no that was dry - just her vest was wet . So then a bit later I changed her nappy after she'd done a poo (sorry TMI??!?) and it was wet through and leaking through at the legs. So seeing as he'd 'helpfully' pointed out my shortcomings in nappy care last night I did the same to him suggesting that her nappy needs changing sometimes even if she hasn't pooed. He gave me a usual withering look and shrugged and I said I'm only telling you so you know. His reply ' Don't tell ME anything'. What an eejit.

TCM I feel sooo like you. I dream/daydream about being married to someone else. Having more children. Actually being able to enjoy the baby stage as I won't worry about doing everything 'wrong' and being able to involve my parents in a normal way without Mr sulky breaking out..... but then I realise how much this will hurt H and I just feel so bad. I feel an idiot but I'm naturally a people pleaser and being the one to stand up and actually say I'm going to hurt you is so very very hard. Yet then I think of the example that I'm setting to DD if I do stay. And I've waster 10 years of my life here already.

Sorry for the rant. It's so therapeutic letting it out as I haven't told a soul in real life although I don't think my parents would be surprised if/when I do tell them

listens, it's his way or the highway, and his rules are for you only, and don't apply to him. Sounds familiar.

I think we are all partially people-pleasers. I know I am. Desperate for approval and validation. Which FW would give and then take away, and then give back, in a roller-coaster situation to keep me dangling. You feel bad at the thought of upsetting him because you are a good person. You haven't even done it, and you feel bad thinking about it. What about FW. Does he feel bad at the thought of upsetting you? What about the bad that he has already done, does he feel sad about that?

I know what the answer is. It's so hard to get away from the idea that this is how you would think and feel in their situation. Baby steps. Do you plan to tell your parents?

I'm sure lahti tossed the card as she already had the numbers...

Hi pony . I think being a people-pleaser is part of most of us perhaps. Maybe that is why we get sucked into the abusive relationship at the start. A totally different subject but I want to find out how to become more assertive to ensure I don't find myself in another similar situation in the future.

Will I tell my parents? Yes, probably. Just not sure when. I am 99.9% sure they will be supportive. They have always been big believers in marriage. But they have had said a couple of very minor things that have just let me think that they feel he can be controlling to me. And they have put up with some strange decisions from me (last minute changes of plan etc to keep H happy) and H being appallingly rude to them on a couple of occasions... and I think in hindsight this is a) partly out of love for me but also b) because they can see how H is and that I will need them at some point. H would like to write them out of our lives. In fact one of his common themes is that I choose them over him. ie I will always choose to upset him over them and not that they never seem to make the unfair demands that he does

But anyway, although they are staunch marriage supporters I think they would agree with my thinking (or what I am coming to think) which is that he has broken the marriage vows and so the contract is nul and void. Not that I need their approval or validation but I think I'm going to need their support and help. (which I know I will have whether they approve or not)

I'm not sure when I'll talk to them. I think probably when I have made the decision that it is the right time to leave, have consulted a solicitor and am ready to announce to H that I want us to divorce and then tell my parents as a done deal. Unfortunately this needs to wait until H is no longer the SAHD and I am hopefully working part time as I cannot risk having to pay him maintenance and child support when I desperately want to be at home with DD.

how sad.

Sat here, feeling I shouldn't be posting about feel glum when all i've got is cold play on the tellly, fixed up the bike sort of and a --very rare- to hand, and this is the highlight of my Saturday night life! Its shit. i can never go out at night. Yes, I do have some lovely friends, but all of whom have families of their own, and have no idea what its like to be in abusive relationship but do not understand the deal. The weekends are my downer. To have no company, to get through the week, for this. and I know I know, I don't have a FW here, 'I am free'! free to sit here alone. Don't get me wrong, I'm so over wanting him anywhere near me, even tho he keeps looking hard at me, like he's boring through my skin to work me out when I have to supervise visits. It makes my skin crawl, I don't want him here. there was a life that came with that tho, instead of being trapped night after night after endless night.

I know this is awful to moan, when I do feel so for the ladies that have such awful crap to deal with from their FWs and are so longing to have some peace, and would probably give their right arm for this.

Yep, I'm just bloody ungrateful. I just can't help feeling that for some its just such a fucking raw deal. Shoot me down in flames.

DD has had a wonderful day (well I think its wonderful because she's been so relaxed carefree and happy, dancing, singing and pleasing herself). Is it all I want? I wasted my life in two relationships with abusers. I can't now get to the sessions that I want to to help my self-development because there's noone else here. Who wants to live life alone, or maybe I'm just not happy living with myself.

It won't be forever, fi.

FWIW I have spent most of the day in bed, feeling rotten while I get used to new dentures, but the last 2 hours were spent hoovering and cleaning the kitchen floor. Something I couldn't have done before I was free, but hardly the high life

Massive hugs Fi, I had coldplay on telly too, some of their songs stab me in the heart you are doing an amazing job, don't be too hard on yourself, look at all you have been through and you are still standing, thousands of others would have caved in by now x

More huge hugs to Nini and all other lovely ladies I know the feeling of isolation, I have no friends here at all and have trouble trying to get my dbro or dmum to come and stay

Fly worried for you and the bedroom situation, could you get a bolt fitted so you won't wake one night with a shock with him next to you? I can identify with the sex pest thing some of the ladies mentioned and this is the main reason for me sleeping on the sofa since sept, it is never enough, he always wanted more and was never really enjoyable tbh. Quite aggressive, rough etc.

Also wished we lived closer, I would be up for having an annual real life piss up commune gathering if others would? Although not sure I know how to communicate in RL anymore as been isolated that long so may have to just sit and text you all instead of talking out loud!!

In other news....FW gone awol last few nights (couldn't give a shit as away from me) but still takes the piss as he keeps banging on about us trying again and then goes awol . Bloody his side of the family going to be visiting over next few weeks too, was a lovely surprise-NOT. How bloody awkward. FIL will be staying for a week-a bloody WEEK. Fecks my plans right up again and will send FW into anxious mode. Also had MIL round today this parents are divorced) for her usual 101 questions-today she asked me if FW ever hit me-i said no. I mean what was I suppose to say? Yes MIL your son has throttled me on many an occassion. If I had the guts I would have told her. I just wish other people in RL would stop getting imvolved. I will get the third degree from FIL too when he comes as he will suspect something is up and FW and his parents don't exactly have normal chats-just small talk so its me that gets quizzed. Not fair.

When taking DD to bed this eve as we were walking up the stairs she stopped and turned to me and whispered "mummy its time to go to a new house now" she is 3 years old just says it all really. I know its time, it really is. Just need this new house to magically appear for us.

Sorry that post got long..sorry that I've missed loads of the thread, I've only been able to skim through. Thinking of you all and huge hugs. I'm going to claim the bed tonight now as he's still awol, despite promising on kids lives he would be home by midnight same shit, different day. However this time last year I would have been in hysterical tears, pacing the floor, peeking out of the window, texting him thinking he had been run over, beaten up etc etc as wouldn't accept someone could be so cruel to me...how times change..how our eyes get opened up to the daily shit we get slung at us night all amazing thread friends xx

Ps-Lahti FW seen my secret bank account card envelope too, I told him it was a replacement debit card as my chip had stopped working on my current one. Oh and Pony horray for wedding ring moment, you are amazeballs! x

Oh dear, I didn't sound v sympathetic did I fi? But I am!

maggie huge sympathy for having FIL staying. These things are a strain even in a 'normal' situation. Have a lovely night's sleep - I hope there's no possibility of FW returning and trying to join you in the bed?

listens I agree about being a people pleaser. I am a massive people's pleaser, though of course according to H I am not. Yes Yes to the one rule for you and another for them, H does this so much, when I pull him up on it he just flat out refuses to acknowledge it. I know how you feel about having 'wasted' 10 years on this, I have spent 9 years on H, going through the crap and trying to sort it. I find it impossible to hurt or upset people, I feel so guilty and anxious if I accidently upset someone, so to stand up and deliberately hurt H and rip his world apart for my benefit is a struggle to come to terms with.

Last night in the 'I can change, can't we try' talk H pulled out all the cards, about me wanting another baby etc I did make one very small step though. Normally I agree that we'll try again, must try harder etc, but this time I haven't. I haven't said no I'm leaving, but I did not say that we can try again either. H has not liked this, it is making him very sullen and upset, and I feel so guilty for putting us in this limbo.

When I do tell my mum I know she will be supportive. She divorced from my father due to horrendous abuse, so much worse than what my H is like. When I told her about how my father was abusive to me, she fully supported me, never once doubted me. Looking back on it, H has never liked her, not since she objected to me moving out to live with him when I was 16, something which I can totally understand now.

I can also sympathise with the feeling of isolation. I have no friends, so no one to talk to apart from you lovely ladies. And I too am not allowed out at night. I went up to London 2 years ago for my birthday with my family to go to a horse show (I used to be very into my horse riding) so I was out from 6am until 9pm. I got so much grief from H afterwards, because I was out so long, I didn't always answer my phone etc etc I was made to feel so guilty for enjoying my birthday treat from my mum, that literally 5 minutes after getting home I was wishing I hadn't gone and feeling so deflated and crap.

Was going to write more, but got to go. DD is now crying as H has just shouted at her to 'stop messing with the fucking stairgate' (he's upstairs).