Support for those in Emotionally Abusive relationships: 24

[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!!

[StuntNun]

Stupid question but what do I do now? I have suggested to DH that we go to therapy but he's very against that idea as his mum had issues with the therapy she had for her depression. I have been more assertive lately about his behaviours that I have issues with, such as calling the children names or threatening to snack them, but realistically that just amounts to nagging. If there's going to be any change it has to come from him because he recognises there's a problem and wants to do better.

[TheSilverySoothsayer]

Take your time, stuntnun, read the links at the top of the thread, and see whether any of it seems to fit your H. if he is EA, couples therapy is usually a bad idea, although individual counselling can be beneficial.

Meanwhile, keep posting [hug]

[ponygirlcurtis]

Rose mine was the same - he's write such eloquent cards, and leave me little notes, and sometimes write poems as well. I would read them and feel special. And the desire to keep feeling that special kept hoovering me back up, when I knew that he was treating me so so badly. I had a fantasy in my head of how lovely our life could be, if I just persevered, if I could just change, if I could try harder to make things work. But a fantasy is all it was. Words are easy to write. They don't even have to be the truth, just whatever they think will get the desired effect. Actions are the things to look at. And his actions show his words to be false.

The grief you are feeling will end. But allow yourself to feel it. It's part of the process. Don't fear it, just go with it, and think about what it is that your grief is about - is it about the fantasy, what could have been? You are nearly there, lovely girl.

[minkembernard]

rose you have yourself to turn to. your own inner strength. i know that may sound lonely but really you have been strong enough to pull yourself through when you have had people dragging you down.
Sometimes it is a wonderful thing to realise fuck the lot of them i can do this by myself.
You will be even stronger without them.
And you have us.

And as teeny says you will meet new people. good people. they will lean on you. and you will lean on them.

I am kt saying it is easy peasy. i a. struggling a bit just now and having my mum to phone does help. but it will be ok. it will be worth it.
just be proactive about making friends. invite people round. cook pizza. have play dates. chat to other students and other mums.

[LemonDrizzled]

Happy Birthday Rose

This is rock bottom for you. It can only get better from now on.
Once you have stopped carrying a millstone round your neck you can begin to live the life you want.

As of tomorrow you will be able to make the decisions. You will be able to plan for yourself and DD. You will be able to choose who to let into your life and who to shut out. Only positive happy good people who enhance your life are allowed! You can budget properly without someone squandering the family money and you can plan for treats for you and DD.

It will get better!

[TheSilverySoothsayer]

rose first rule of this thread - no apologising, and certainly not for being 'me, me,me', and especially not now, when you are almost there, teetering on the edge of the nest and ready to fly...

In the present circumstances, better a birthday dinner you paid for than one paid for by FW IMHO.

[LemonDrizzled]

I feel like I'm in a greek chorus

[minkembernard]

rose also get in touch with gingerbread when you move.

[TheSilverySoothsayer]

Chorus: We're right behind you [steely blue anger]

[TeenyW123]

Hi Rose

Don't forget that the uni will have an excellent support mechanism for struggling students, and I don't just mean academically. First thing on Monday go and introduce yourself, explain how unconfident you're feeling and see what they come up with. That's what I did and I went from being really wobbly and insecure and wondering if i should let this brilliant opportunity go and work for a minimum wage full time to thinking "Right, I'm really up for this!"

The only thing you have to fear is fear itself.

If you don't grab this opportunity with both hands you will always regret not doing it.

Come on, girly. You really can do it. A couple of months down the line I'll take great pleasure in saying I told you so!

Teeny

[crushedpetals]

Who do I turn to when I get those dark sorrowful nights? Who do I turn too when I am literally wracked with grief?<

rose, seriously, my dear, it is so hard for you to believe, but in time, if you are yourself, you are able to discover yourself, you don't have someone taking your energy, you won't be literally wracked with grief. The grief will pass and be replaced by better emotions. And if you have bad days, you will have your own space to find your own coping mechanisms (mostly, I just give up on the day and go to bed, knowing the next day is a new one!).

Give it a chance, go. You get one life. (((((hugs))))) and strength to you.

[CharlotteCollinsismovingon]

pony - I remember the unhappiness radiating from your posts when I first started lurking. You do seem a totally different person now.

petals - love that, about the girl inside. There have often been times over the past year or two where I've been experiencing FWery and while I sat silently enduring it, at the same time I pictured myself collapsing forward onto the floor and lying, still, in foetal position. It felt like despair. I don't suppose it's normal in healthy relationships...

Happy birthday, Rose. Wishing you strength for tomorrow and peace for the following days. You feel that you need him to complete you - but he is taking away so much from you! You will be much more complete without him.

[bountyicecream]

I'm also cheering rose on for tomorrow. You go girl. Uni is such fun you will make lifelong friends there. And I do think that with your experience you will have so much to offer other vulnerable women.

I think life is getting harder. Fw is back ft. Perhaps this is the blast I need to escape.

We've already argued about me staying pt. he says I keep going back on commitments. I asked what else I'd gone back on and he refused to say. I suspect it is not getting fat post babies. But he knew better than to say it but is clearly still thinking it.

How's this for a typical fw conversation

Fw: I'm concerned about xxxx with dd?
Me: really? I thought because of xyz it's ok!
Fw: oh yeah I'm wrong AGAIN
Me: no it's normal in a conversation for me to express my opinion and then you to listen and consider before coming back with your opinion:
Fw: whatever. Walked off and has ignored me whenever he can all day

[bountyicecream]

I mean staying working pt. not staying with him pt!!!!!

[CharlotteCollinsismovingon]

Hi bounty, nice to see you; sorry to hear he's back ft already.

That's a great fw conversation. He should consider lecturing at fw finishing school. His speciality subject could be How to React When She Shows Herself Not to be Exactly the Same As You.

[BreatheandFlyAway]

Hi all,

Stuntnun I agree with others, try talking and if you feel ignored, dismissed or put down when you raise your concerns then you know you have a problem. Same with other things that you find controlling like bath, drink and nap- in some r/ss that might be thoughtful maybe- in others irritating or controlling! My OH, after years of ignoring me or being verbally, emotionally and occasionally physically abusive is now trying to get me back into r/s by doing stuff like that and it's very annoying and off putting - he's assuming he knows what i want! And that 'treating me like a princess' (yuk) will win me over because that's all a woman needs and puts 20 years of EA right yeah right.

However if we had a good history I might find it caring, who knows!

Btw sorry for typos till further notice I am on phone whilst abroad!

I am having to read and post in short bursts as don't have bundle for roaming or whatever I need!

Fw here has been irritatingly and creepily over attentive as mentioned above. Today distracted by friends we're staying with thank goodness so he's less all over me. On one occasion recently he hugged me hard against my will and wouldn't let me go when I pushed him- not until he was ready to let go IYSWIM. Creeped me out.

Oops thread's moved on since I started sausage-finger typing my post!

Rose, once you're rid of emotional and financial leech your coping mechanisms will leap into a life of their own. You'll be great don't you worry. One day at a time and keep posting here!

Greek chorus, love it. Xx

If I have posted twice apologies btw. Sometimes my posts don't seem to go through on phone but maybe they do!? IYSWIM.

Ps bought a bundle. Don't really know what the feck it is. How many MBs does posting on here take do you think?!?

[ponygirlcurtis]

I do feel so different now. I almost don't recognise the person I was a year ago. If it wasn't so recent, so I can still remember it all quite clearly, I don't think I'd be able to associate myself with having been her at all.

bounty well done on calling him in that conversation. You are right, he's still thinking the same way, even if he's not always expressing it. That's only for now though, while he works to make sure he has you properly. Once he feels happy that you are not going anywhere, it'll start leaking out again, you can be sure.

[CharlotteCollinsismovingon]

Oh, Breathe, almost forgot to say: that you weren't hoovered during the holiday. But he sounded so irresistable!

My FW got cross with me the other day because he's been "so loving and thoughtful and generous - no man could've done more - for the past 5 months and it gets difficult when there's nothing in return."

I didn't make the point that we've been married for 12 years and at no other time during those 12 years has his behaviour matched up to that of the last 5 months, so it is obviously shallow, fake hoovering and I'm not interested.

Might've sounded just as ranty as he did!

[bountyicecream]

Glad the holiday was good pony. You sound refreshed!

Charlotte did you see that house today? Any good?

[bountyicecream]

Charlotte - I've had nearly the same conversation. "But I've been trying really hard the last month and you still seem distant". Yeah. What about the last 10 years

[BreatheandFlyAway]

Pony hello, I am very glad and inspired by you saying about looking back. Also Teeny's story is so inspiring. In fact all of ours are, whatever stage we're at, because by coming on here we're boarding the train of freedom as described by Mink!

[crushedpetals]

On one occasion recently he hugged me hard against my will and wouldn't let me go when I pushed him- not until he was ready to let go IYSWIM. Creeped me out.

[BreatheandFlyAway]

Bounty and Charlotte YYY re the 'but I'm being so bloody marvellous and you're so selfish for not responding!' comment from fw. Also by not responding to advances I've repeatedly said are not wanted or appropriate it's apparently now me that's effing up kids by breaking family Cold steely anger!