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!!

[FairyFi]

Email suggestion: All future collections/drop off will be done outside the front door. These must be done respectfully and without discussions. If this is not manageable I will review arrangements again.

don't worry about how he'll receive this just make sure this is a safe proposal. x

[FairyFi]

Hard when you are still there Nora and it all is so new and strange/empty.

[foolonthehill]

Hi leclerc just to say that it takes a lot to actually believe yourself when you have been so conditioned to making allowances for him. He, like my FW, is super entitled and has a lot of "social credibility" to boost himself. He is on an abusers course...where he may learn and practice more subtle forms of the art of crossing boundaries.
It is hard to make others believe help people to understand the danger that he poses and the lack of boundary recognition that he has. You need to trust yourself and not worry about appearing unreasonable to outsiders (note to self to do same!).

As and when and if you make your decision about divorcing the path you took will be well reasoned and reasonable, because they are, because you are.

[Hissy]

Nora, it is sad, you will feel sad, that's ok. You are giving up on a vain hope that he'll be the man/father/human being you needed to be.

Feel it, think about it and when you can, let it all go. You can't do anything about it, you never could.

Youy've finally made the only decision you could, to save yourself and your DC from a life of damage, harm and misery.

You've potentially stopped them from being stately homers of the future, perhaps even stopped them from having abusive relationships too.

You're doing the right thing, when you're free, in a few more days, you'll soon see.

[Chaoscarriesonagain]

Hi all. Posting here as am struggling still .. 1 month after leaving, see previous post!

I'm sorry to read of everyone else's experiences; past, present, continual...

I just wanted to check in to save my sanity and hopefully you can tell me I have done the right thing over and over, and to get me through the ups and downs!

[Tiggy114]

I am doing lots of soul searching and have decided to join this group and face my problems

[Hissy]

Chaos, love, it's so very new, so frightening and raw.

Of course you've done the right thing! You have hope in your life, you have the possibility of change, of healing. You couldn't have that if you were still with ex.

Remind yourself why you left. Remember the last strawn, the truth, hold onto it, it'll never let you down.

[Hissy]

Tiggy, what's going on? What issues are you having? Can we help?

[Chaoscarriesonagain]

hissy I know it's the truth that sets us free, I feel like such a prisoner and no one in RL can come close to understanding why I have this bond to someone who did that to me.

Occasionally I will see him at work. Work together. Lived together. We're together and I feel I have no home (back with parents), my work is over, I have associations everywhere and awful dreams (PTSD , I think) .. I feel I've had the rug beneath me pulled and I don't know myself.

[Hissy]

Sweety, I felt terrified for weeks, and my ex was back in hell on earth Egypt. I had bad dreams, terrible, terrible dreams.

I changed my room around, moved the bed, bought new duvet covers, and they stopped.

If you've tried this, and if it goes on for another month say, perhaps chat it over with your GP? It will get better.

[Chaoscarriesonagain]

In process of buying new duvets, funny you say that!

I've been going over the truth, it will never let you down from what you said. So true. I'm worried people at work, friends don't believe me. They believe a manipulator. But I know the truth. And in te, the truth always prevails, one way or another

[Chaoscarriesonagain]

*time

[Hissy]

The truth and freedom. Two things that can never be taken from us.

Even at the height of my internment, my total isolation from the human race, I could still think. He never took that from me.

When I saw the truth, it was like a bolt of lightning hit me. Game changing stuff. All you have to do is keep the truth in your head, remember what really happened.

Trust life. It'll make it all up to you in the end.

[Tiggy114]

I'm not in an abussive relationship now but the effects are still with me 5 years on so i guess i'm trying to work through whats happened and put it all behind me. Although the reason i was with this horrid man, i'm coming to realise, was because my father is also very emotionally abussive and draining. So i gues my current abusive relationship is with my father. I have a lot to get my head around in order to sort myself out but i'm taking steps in the right direction.

[Hissy]

Well done Tiggy, for taking the step you took today.

I know that if you don't face this stuff, it never heals, it never goes away.

Most of us have been abused, because of our parents/upbringing. Tbh, that is the bit that hurts the most. But it does reinforce the truth that the abuse wasb't our fault, and never was.

Don't give up on yourself tiggy, you are worth sorting all this out for, once you've made someheadway, you won't believe the trAnsormation in your life.

Be brave, be uncompromising, you're worth it and more.

[Hissy]

Keep going Leclerc, it'll be OK. Try staying off the wine for a week, and see how the citalopram works for you. Give it a chance.

Rescue remedy might help, and it takes like brandy/whiskey.

Good luck at the FP, hope it goes well!

[Hissy]

Tastes, not takes

[kittybiscuits]

Welcome tiggy

Sorry leclerc that he is such a lowlife piece of shit to pull these stunts. I agree that this should be a solicitors letter rather than an email from you, but it costs money of course. Re citalopram - if you drink with it it stops it being effective - so you have a drink, which is a depressant, and it blocks your anti depressant. Bit of a double downer.

[BreatheandFlyAway]

Hi leclerc so sorry to hear things are so difficult for you right now

I am so fucking head burgled right now. FW has read my hastily handwritten statement to court which I wrote a day or so after the big blow up. It is entirely truthful but because fw has rewritten history in his own mind to make it acceptable to himself, reading my account in the official docs (delivered by process server today) came as a big shock because he's so self deluded. Cue lots of furious denials, saying he's going to make his own statement against me, he's written numbers against each para of my scribbled statement (because judge wanted more info, I did it in a few mins standing at a desk in court, but it is TRUE.

I am feeling out-fwerted and spag headed And I am back in family home (but have made fw move downstairs while kids and I live upstairs, so like separate flats) because permanent flat fell through re financials and so I have to wait it out till we can sell our old home (currently rented out). But still free mentally but terrified of what fw is going to do. He found out I am on ADs (doc prescribed since serious fwittery) and has told me he will use my taking of "mind altering drugs" against me, plus my "fragile mental state" (bollocks obviously) but scary nonetheless. Help!

[BreatheandFlyAway]

And now I can hear lots of movement downstairs, feeling very nervous....

[foolonthehill]

leclerk alcohol and citalopram not a great combination ...increases chances and severity of side effects and decreases the effectiveness of the antidepressive bit . The good news is that CHOCOLATE is completely safe .
PS keeping him at the front door was progress...next time the doorstep!

tiggy..."stately homes" might also have some good links for your primary source of abuse (Dad) but you are most welcome here.

breathe re flat but you will get there. Keep on going.