Support for those in Emotionally Abusive relationships: 17

[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!!

I hope counsellor gets back to me soon. It's so hard, Everyone on here is great but I feel so alone.

I also want a cat now!

TisILeclerc - perhaps it's something we are able to rationalise when sitting down and writing it down and perhaps thinking about it in a wider context...and maybe it's harder when we're faced with the abuser actually pointing out how it's our fault and then we're only examining it in our own personal context in that moment instead of including other's experiences too?

Hugs to you MrsMorton

only had time for a quick skim. couple of new names- hi!

bounty yeah. sound like progress is afoot.

nits- Hedrin is chemical but it is good and not nasty chemical like LyClear. One of mine screams if you so much as go near her hair. she had to have a very dramatic bob last time they had nits and her gran was not happy (gran can bite me but that is another story) so combing them out is not an option. ditto my nieces who have the *best 'fros. so we go for the hedrin every time. suffocate the horrors (the nits not the kids ).

MrsMorton hope the cavalry arrives for you soon

My RL gfs brought me flowers, hugs and lashings of ginger beer at weekend.
but I am now starting to feel quite exhausted by the constant emotional trauma. In many ways it (the trauma) is worse than when he was here. when he was here I just minimised it all away and denied it was abuse (the old well he never hit me thing therefore this is just an unproductive communication style which must be partly my fault) (I still do often deny it was abuse as it is not as bad as what many suffer and because I do actually believe he did not do it on purpose or in a premeditated way he is just a fuck up who does not know who to act normally). now every time I have to admit it and start thinking about all the many things that I should not have put up with I feel sad and a bit of a fool for not realising sooner. and it is making me very very tired (and I have so much to do). (ffs mink at least you are not ill! to all of you still poorly ones)

fraying minus the threats of violence that sound just like a description of my now thankfully former life.

All I have to do now is get over it!

Way to go Mink

except you forgot shoulders back and tits forward!

OMG I remember nits seems like we nit-combed for years, every night... it does eventually come to an end, but we did once have a babysitter who caught it from my kids (oh the shame!!) I've not seen any for years but we still have our nit comb. Of course H always blamed me for not looking after the kids well enough!

And apologies for yet another self indulgent rant after my blow-up before the weekend (issues smoothed over and not resolved) but it really helps to write these things down... this morning I was driving H to tube, and I didn't turn where I usually do, so went up another one (parallel) a narrow road and there was a rubbish lorry coming the other way so basically had to turn around (which I did, fine), all this time he was shouting at me for having not gone the usual way then-- he said something to the effect that I was such a sh*t driver to just stop and he would drive instead, so I had to stop in the road and changed places... I think that I should be SOOO angry about this, I really did nothing wrong, driving-wise, he always complains that I am not a good driver. But I just feel so blank about it. But I can't let it go...

thatsnot - what a FW. Just so nasty, demeaning and controlling.

Just when I thought things couldn't get worse, and I couldn't possibly feel any lower...

Out at the park yesterday afternoon with the boys, we all needed to get out of the flat and have some fresh air me more than them. Heading back to the car - DS1 ran on ahead with the keys while I struggled a bit to manhandle a tantruming DS2 ('but mummy, at the toddler group all the bikes and scooters are for everyone, why is it not the same here in the park?').

And who do I suddenly see heading straight for me, hand-in-hand with someone?

Go on, guess.

pony always comes as a stomach lurch shock but hopefully this means he will soon be an SEP (someone else's problem) unless I guessed wrong of course.

arth i shall try to get them in the right order and not shoulders forwards tits back/out/one up one down

if only I really could sing like JA. fly like Mary Poppins and generally martial children in a most delightful way.

No, you guessed right.

Stomach lurch is right. I feel horrible. Crying a lot. And to know that this person has been spending time, unbeknownst to me, with DS2. But the only good thing is that hopefully he'll be on his best behaviour with her there, so DS2 will get looked after better, and the girls will hopefully not be getting shouted at so much.

So much for him loving me so much, being nothing without me, yadda yadda. Didn't take him long at all. And perhaps she was even on the scene before, who knows.

pony It's good that you can look on the bright side... for the kids. But what an utter %^&* especially when it's so quick... was he there 'on purpose'??

Pony :(
I am sure it made you feel like you had been kicked in the stomach. Not logical, but there you have it.
Let's hope they move to Mongolia! Bet they won't, though :(

My thoughts too Pony - at least he'll behave himself, to impress, 'perform' as he always does, so provides a temporary protection. Quick seems to be par for the course, and yes, definitely suspect contrivance! Sorry such a gut wrench maybe that'll help in the 'getting over'? Sorry

I expect KP might be using her recent experiences of a mega FW as a rich source of material? Noticed that.

haha Mink (to march out door, etc..)

Feel for you Dillie mm v. scarey... lets hope for quick, do you have RL counselling/support? like Wa or anything? Can be hugely helpful for this type stuff I think.

trying to work out if I've sustained whiplash somehow without knowing, as it all stil hurting, can't beleive slept all night after so much bedrest yesterday, but like a log... school run angonising ... blurrggh

Thanks all. No, don't think there's any 'accidentally on purpose' nature of it - there's no way he could have known we were at that park, it's a 15min drive from where we both live, although it's one we used to visit fairly regularly when together (another ). But he did know we were there as we were walking towards them, he had passed my car (and DS1, who also saw him), so he had a bit of warning over it, whereas I did feel like I'b been knocked over. I didn't react when I saw him as I was so shocked. He didn't either, but he definitely saw me.

DS1 could see how upset I was hard to hide gulping sobs, and said 'I think FW is not our friend any more'. Last night, he got into his PJs and brushed his teeth without even being asked 'to cheer you up Mummy, because you're so sad that FW isn't our friend any more'. I cried even more. He's such a good boy.

pony aw bless as DS1. what would we do without the kids?
mine have been superb.

I feel a bit sick when I think about ex out with other women. but then I think, looking back, I think it was a good thing for the older kids that I was on the scene. He behaved better when I was there (at least to start with) and I made sure they got days out, were fed at the right times, looked aafter them when he was working and that they had someone to talk to and if need be I fought their corner even it meant I got dog's abuse for it later. (because I loved them very much). although they probably saw us shouting at each other far more than was healthy for them but on the whole I am inclined to think me being there was better for them.

so part of me thinks it is not fair not fair not fair that he gets to carry on as if nothing happened and paint me the bad guy and part of me thinks I hope he finds someone soon for the sake of the kids....

it will be a weird thought my kids being friends with someone else and I hope I take it as well as the dsc's mum did. (she is fine with me just not with him )

mind you the older kids told me that gf before me used to shout at them when he was out of the room and was well known for not liking kids...so only if he finds someone a bit maternal. otherwise she will just be another reason for him to be busy. and he went out with some right weirdoes he met on the net so I can only hope he will be a bit choosy about who he introduces them to...but then he is as he does so I may be expecting too much. he will as ever do what suits him best.

(he did introduce me to the older kids who were 10 and 8 at the time, far too soon- they even said as much but it all worked out in the end we are still friends)

pony and do just let it all out. does not mean you want him back. it is another stage in the grieving process for what should have been your happy life (the one we ordered before we got the greasy bloaters )

mink - are you me??????!!!!!!
Both DSDs said FW shouted at them much less when I was around (because he was shouting at me instead ), and that he was much more shouty with them when I wasn't there any more. His kids were also 9 and 11 when I met them (he rushed me into it after two months).

And YY to thinking 'it's not fair' - I had been thinking a lot about how I would feel if he was seeing someone and she was sleeping in the bed we bought using wedding gifts, eating off my dining table, spending time with my son and concluded that I'd feel pretty shit, given how lonely and crappy I'm feeling at the mo. Bet he's told her I'm some deranged mad-lady. You're right, it doesn't mean I want him back, but it does mean that maybe I'm not as over him and detached as i thought I was. I miss the him that I fell in love with. The thought of him lying in my bed with someone else, watching TV with them, eating nice supper treats in bed together, then going on to do other stuff that i also miss with him... I hope he treats her better than he did me. Part of me assumes that he will, because I still struggle to believe that anyone could be as horrible to their partner as he was/is to me. But that.

He's a greasy bloater!!!!!!!! That did make me laugh, mink.

Sorry I'm a bit me-me-me today. Head hurts, feel sick, constantly on verge of tears. Thinking of you all, and all our awful FWs. We are good people. We deserve so much better treatment.

Sorry. But that - forgot to finish. But that just shows how I'm still minimising, still blaming myself (otherwise, how could he be a different person with someone else, if it wasn't all my doing?). I still can't visualise him treating anyone else like he did me.

rest assured Pony he absolutely will ... yep he will. Because its him you see. He is who he is... if we had the power to 'make' them this way, gosh what power! and wouldn't we have made them another way ;) xx take care xx

Pony I think that is right. We imagine them all loved up and being sweetness and light
I mean, FFS, when were they ever?
It is just another way for them to blame their behaviour on us - 'see how I can behave?' 'My violence and FWittedness was all because of you'
What a load of f*ing bollocks!
Agree with Mink
it is another stage in the grieving process for what should have been your happy life (the one we ordered before we got the greasy bloaters)
Greasy bloaters !

for you pony. I can't begin to imagine that stomach lurching feelig

Thanks as well to arth and MrsM - I have to say it was a weird sensation, seeing someone so familiar and yet someone I barely recognised. That's part of the struggle and the lurching in my head, I think. My husband, the man I can still visualise holding my hand in our wedding pictures, walking hand-in-hand with someone I didn't know, looking as if he didn't have a care in the world (while I was red-faced with a tantruming toddler, and of course it would just be a Sunday, the day I wear scaggy old joggy bottoms and no make-up)!!!!!

I have just about had enough of him. I've been seriously thinking about looking into moving back down south, and he can go take a running jump. Rightmove, here I come (once I've talked to my solicitor, of course )...

I've been seriously thinking about looking into moving back down south, .... and who could blame you Pony after everything he's put you through a life of peace seems a golden dream to pursue..

Keep toying with the idea myself, only so mch a girl can take and they just keep on giving, so generously!