Support for those in Emotionally Abusive relationships: 23

[CharlotteCollinsismovingon]

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 violence Are 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.
Warning signs you?re dating a loser 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 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
What you should expect as a starting point for your treatment in a relationship, as you will of course be treating others!!

Bernard on your behalf.pathetic little 'man'.

I cheered myself up one day looking at vulgar text/phone tones that I could put to ex's contact.

Best one/most apt was 'there is a cunt trying to call you,a cunt trying to contact you (repeat)' .Didn't have the bottle to download but every time I get 'contact' I now think of the cunt ringtone. .

Why can't they all fall off the planet?

alice you?ve got me thinking when you say I do sometimes slip into the ?walking on eggshells? mode around him, then mentally shake myself How do you escape that mode?
STBX finally moved out about a month ago, and I breathed a sigh of relief that I was finally safe in my own home. But I?m still in his grip. I need to try and keep him on side so that he signs the consent order, doesn?t waste any more of my v. expensive solicitors time, doesn?t threaten to move back in the house, or take DD away. So the bills are still in his name (I pay them but he won?t contact them to change the name), I still pay his car insurance, mobile phone bill because I can?t face phoning him to talk about it. A couple of weeks ago he was threatening because I asked him not to do my laundry and apparently didn?t look him in the eyes. So what will he say when I raise everything else?
I feel frankly pathetic and am still walking on eggshells. Any tips?

Hi all, sorry I've been away for a few days. I need to write this down: I agreed yesterday to arrange to talk to EXP, partly because over the preceding few days he'd said he knew he'd been a cunt (!), admitted he was selfish, said no one hated him as much as he hates himself, agreed for the first time ever to consider counselling together, seemed open to listening to me.

So I agreed to talk, made it clear that I needed him to allow me to explain how I've been feeling (Im really really bad at addressing problems). He said he would do this. I thought maybe he was ready to listen, to admit he'd been selfish and look at ways of being different.

So I tried to organise a time to talk, all of a sudden he was reluctant to arrange a time until after his next two tournaments. He has plenty of time to fit me in around these, but said he didn't want to affect his mental state. Said these tournaments were his priority this week. This felt like another slap in the face for me, not least because most of our problems revolve around me not feeling considered, and I felt that agreeing to talk after he'd left home and we've told DS was a very big deal. He got annoyed saying that this was yet more proof that I didn't understand his sport, and didn't support him. A big row followed and he left (he was at home because he had collected DS from school), leaving me in a complete mess.

I decided he maybe will never be able to listen to me. I was so hopeful that we were getting somewhere. I just can't find the words to explain myself to him- I'm clear what was wrong but something happens when I try to explain to him, I can't find the words, I start questioning myself, feeling guilty.

He blames me for not telling him when things were wrong. But honestly there is something about both me and him that made this so hard.

He's texted today asking if I still want to talk, I've managed to reply saying 'sorry I don't think talking will get us anywhere, I don't think you can hear what I'm saying'. It was a huge deal for me to send this message, I feel quite sick & very sad, because I know I've put a great big nail in the coffin that was my hope. I wish I'd thought about which words to use more carefully and now I'm fighting the part of me that wants to send a further text to explain.

I do want to talk, my text was a lie, but what's the point if I can't explain & he won't listen?

This is so hard.

Love to all, will try to catch up on the thread. Sorry for the rant, I needed to tell someone.....

Mink - that text is absolutely disgusting. You poor thing.

Alice- hope that you are feeling better now.

Noregrets - well done on getting through the first month. Great that you are financially independent aswell. It gives you the upper hand - even though it doesn't seem that way now.

My h has been left a week now. We have our first therapy session Thursday. First one is together. He is feeling very sorry for himself. I said that I was exhausted. I'm not sleeping and the phone hasn't stopped ringing. He hasn't had a single call or text from family or friends. So he said that means that everyone has taken your side.
No!! It means that my friends care about me and are checking to see how I am. I invest a lot if time into my friends and family whereas he doesn't.

i do feel sorry for him. How mad is that.

Bounty- I hope you have recovered from your awful weekend. Hugs to you xx

Very sorry x posted.

Your situation is exactly the same as mine.
I know how hard it is.
Fwiw I do think you should try and talk. Even if it doesn't work out at least in your heart you know you have it every chance.
That's what I'm doing with the counselling. I know he doesn't want to go. But because he has agreed I feel that I owe our marriage that much.

My h is also prof sportsman. So I know exactly what time and dedication that takes up. I always felt like single mum.

It's lovely that someone understands fff. I'm sad to think my decision not to talk was maybe wrong- surely though if he can't even be bothered to schedule me in for over a week, that's not good?

I've tried so hard to explain myself already, he just doesn't get it. I tried again yesterday and just ended up in floods of tears with no understanding, just a lot of blame....

Oh dear, I'm regretting my response now.....

Very- I know and I agree with you.

Leave the ball in his court. He will ask you again and then you can agree to talk.

Don't regret your response. It's what you felt at the time and he might get the message. You did well to stand up for yourself.

Hugs to you. Xx

Noregrets Most bills have been moved into my name - there were one or two that said "oh no, we have to speak to him" and I calmly said "you can try. He won't cooperate as he's angry that we've separated. He will not speak to you, he will not pay the bill. I, however, WILL take care of it - but only if you change the information now." Worked very nicely for 2 bills - but obviously those were utility bills that I will be paying from now on. As far as his car insurance and mobile bill, just don't pay them. Give them his new address. If he whinges, just look surprised and say "Oh, I thought I was doing you a favour, updating your address with them."

I think while you obviously want smooth sailing legally, I do think that if you give in to everything, then you just give him incentive to push further, just to see how far he can push you. It becomes a game, a challenge to him. At some point, you are going to have to draw the line that you are not willing to cross and start standing up to him. Clear up some of those concerns (re moving back into the house or taking your DD) with the solicitor - is your STBX even in any position that he could do that? Most likely not - he's probably just threatening.

A few phrases I've been using more and more:
"No."
"Sorry, that won't work for me, it will have to be ... "
"I'm not willing to discuss that."

Not just to H but to others as well. Practice makes perfect, eh?

very please don't regret your response. You did the right thing. he ticks a box for himself `I am willing to talk and have offered it' but then refuses to say when, which is like not really agreeing to do it. keep strong.

very and FFF my cbt guy said he works with a lot of wives of professional sportsmen and said `it is very difficult being married to a professional sports person'

very - I think you are absolutely, totally, completely right not to talk to him. Every time my FW and I have spoken post-"what is separation in my mind but not in his", I have ended up confused and doubtful. It gets me focussing on his emotions and his needs, which is of course exactly what he wants and what he thinks he is always entitled to. He will say whatever he needs to, even admit to cuntishness - it will sound like a step in the right direction... but, as you have seen by agreeing to talk the first time, as soon as you make a move towards him, he starts calling the shots again. Now, I feel sometimes that FW sounds like he's making progress, and then think how far he's still got to go before he could have a healthy relationship with anyone and think probably 2 years minimum. And it would be longer with me, because we would have to relearn old patterns.

For the first two weeks, I only spoke to him about our relationship in the presence of a counsellor. She was able to pull him up for blaming me, for example, when I didn't even see it.

so horrible Mink I have even thought that the new gf will be 'safe' from FWex all the while he continues to blame me for everything (he's even blamed me for his already difficult relationship, apparently she's more than 'highly strung' - he's said that about his new gf?!!! but her sister's even worse? what things to say about someone you are only just in the first throes of 'love [ah ah ha ha ha !!] ' bombing with. I just thought she'd better thank her lucky stars that I get all the blame at the moment, the moment I don't...

I need to practice those too Alice ... I need to say 'no' a lot more

how to take that comment about 'very difficult.. pro sports [person presumably, or only man?]' is he condoning that its ok and to be accepted, in what way difficult.. I hear if they don't have much time to contribute to home life, but its about who they are when they are there, isn't it? Sometimes its an excuse and a reason to be remote and unengaged with the rs, and that goes for every profession/trade... they can all be 100% full on when wanted

Everything you say sounds perfectly reasonable Very

Noregrets fear is just a 'Feeling Expressed As Reality' its only the feeling, not the reality, its an imagining, and jumping ahead to what ifs that stop us acting. Thats one take on it... another is to detach, detach, detach, and just keep ignoring him completely... that his words get swept away in the wind and are lost to anyone, or on here before there was a lot of talk around him being in a bubble where you couldn't hear his muffled words...

I found distance a great wroughter of new perspective. Time for heightened anxieties to calm, soothe, and attachments to diminish. You will find your way to ensure his words couldn't have less effect .

Hope you doing ok bounty, everyone else too, loves and warm wishes for safe keeping and peace tonight xxx

x-posted Charlotte - I hated that thing!! where the onlooker can see the 'snipes' and the put down's, or even the lack of acknowledgements, and I didn't see it... thats horrible. Where the comments are blaming,etc. Others noticed it too and some commented, 'thats unkind' or 'at least Fi does x y z, and you don't' there is something wrong with me

bed now.. v. tired.. xxx

He didn't condone the actions of yes sportsmen at all, he had every sympathy for the women he saw. I know it was a sweeping statement in some ways. He didn't go into too much detail but I think it troubles him what some of the women go through. He mentioned how their feelings are always coming second or disregarded.
He knows all about what I have gone through and he never minimises it. He ensures I never play it down try to work through how it makes be behave moving forward and ensure that that is positive and tbh a lot of people on this board have been through worse than me.

fi I remember talking to a close friend about an incident with FW, she was far more horrified than me. She kept bringing it back up and how bad it was and at the time I was getting a bit annoyed at her for that and now I see just how right she was and just what a great friend she was being. #hangsheadinshame

I think it just makes me glad that it's not all secret any more and I can get that kind of support from others.

The fact that I don't see it myself is helping me at times to stand my ground. I can see just how much adjustment I myself need to do before I'm ready for a healthy relationship.

'Night, sleep well. Good idea; I may do the same.

Sleep well Charlotte and Fi Charlotte you are doing so well.

charlotte YES that's exactly what happens. I don't think he does it consciously IYSWIM, it seems almost inbuilt. It felt good to read your thoughts on it, but I am very sorry that you have been through it too.

Your therapists thoughts are very interesting better. Add to the mix that my professional sportsman EXP has yet to make any money directly from playing his sport, yet practises and plays pretty full time, earning a bit teaching while I earn to make ends meet. This has added extra strain on things..... Added to me taking my place behind his not only his sport but also pub with mates etc etc it has been very hard. If I asked to be a priority I was accused of being unsupportive- but I tried so hard to support him practically, emotionally and financially.....

I caved in and sent this: "What I mean is we tried to talk a bit last night, and it was a carcrash conversation. It was horrible for us both and almost broke me. I can't seem to talk to you without you getting angry & defensive. That makes me clam up..... So I can't explain myself, you take it personally & round and round we go. I have really really tried, but I'm running out of reserves, it barely seems to matter whose fault it is I just know I have tried. If I thought we could communicate, I wouldn't hesitate to talk. I did very much hope we could sort things. I'm so sorry".

I probably shouldn't have sent it and I'm sorry if it is over-sharing to put it here, but this thread is my safe place where I feel understood.

Its so great that this is a place you feel understood Very and that he isn't. over-sharing just doesn't come into it, its what you need to get out and you feel safe to do that, is right thing to do then

just wanted to say that before eyelids bang shut.

very I'll second Fi and say no such thing as oversharing on here :) It can be so helpful writing something out and hearing others perspectives on it.

I'm in a similar position. FW now wants to do some counselling even though 6 months ago he wasnt interested It's funny how the threat of walking out makes them offer the moon on a stick Part of me is very slightly tempted just to show willing and also to hope that the counsellor may pull him up on his behavour. But the majority of me is just too weary. I can't face another round of the cycle. I need to get off and move on now. And at best all it will achieve is show him how wrong he is and how badly he has treated me. At worst it will weaken my resolve and persuade me to give it yet another one last chance. I don't think the chance of (a) outweighs the risk of (b).

I have had an everso minor setback. was meant to see solicitor tomorrow but had a message at 5.30pm today saying that they she is out of the office all day tomorrow at an emergency court hearing. So I need to go the next day. I usually work on a Thursday but my boss has cleared for me to take a slightly long lunch so I can rush out and do it then. It's not ideal as I will be more stressed and I was all geared up for tomorrow, but at least I'm still getting there before FW comes home.

Otherwise I'm ok. Thanks for the kind thoughts. Just wondering if anyone has any experience of organising contact at the very start. My FW is likely to be very obstructive. If he refuses to return DD to me at the end of a weekend, what do you do if there is nothing in writing? How long can it take to get court orders in place? All things I'll be asking my solicitor too but practical advice is helpful from you lot. DD is only 2 so can't really have much of an opinion on this.

alice and fairy what excellent words of advice you've given me, I knew there was a reason I was on here

bounty I have a tiny bit of experience on the 'setting up contact' thing as FW phoned me at work one day to let me know that he and DD were moving out before I got home... I'm not legally qualified etc etc... But in short the advice I had was: no point calling the police they will just check the child's OK. You can get an emergency residence order in place very quickly - they were ready to get me in court the following lunchtime. Then it has to be followed up by a more permanent solution. HTH I like to make the most of the advice given how much I paid for it!

Very - I think we are married to the same man.

Your text message was saying exactly how you felt. Did he reply?
If he hasn't yet I'm sure he will. He needs to be the one apologising.

Bounty- my h has also agreed to counselling. Only now after he has left.
Well done for getting through last few days.

very meant to say I thought your message was very good. Honest, but with nothing he can pull apart and throw back in your face which is usually the risk with being open. The clamming up feeling is awful, sometimes the only way is to send it in a message.

Thank you for helping me tonight ladies .

FFF how strange that our EXs are similar in this way. I wonder if their sport is the same? It involves 18 holes in my case - I absolutely understand if you would prefer not to give too much information though......

Yes he replied, quite a few times- giving his version of events which is bafflingly different to mine .

He is blaming his leaving on me, apparently it was my fault because although at first I said there was no rush to move out after he said he was leaving, I kept asking him if he had sorted anywhere to go. I now feel awful about asking him this, as he is using it to blame me. My intention was really just to find out what he was planning to do, not least because I was afraid for my sanity while we were under the same small roof, knowing that he was going to leave.

I can't get my head around his claims that he didn't mean to leave- he said he was going, sorted somewhere, packed his stuff, told DS with me .

very don't try to get your head round his claims. He's a FW. therefore he ties you in knots and makes you question what you knew was true.
He said he was going, sorted somewhere, packed his stuff and told DS with you. Don't feel awful about checking what was happening!