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!!

I think we often find it far harder to forgive or understand in ourselves what we would so easily empathise with in others.

YY and Y mink. I am not sure I have forgiven myself just yet, but I am a lot closer to it than I was. I will get there. Lovely post - this book sounds good!

And to GS too. More

there may be kind words and good advice needed here

although it is quite a distressing thread. and I think it may get quite choppy over the next few days

s0 if you are lurking, hi. feel free to post or just to read the links but you are most welcome here and we are here if you need us

A very upsetting thread there mink. I recognise a lot of myself in the OP. I hope she comes here, I think we'd be able to help. How a man (or anyone) can behave the way her partner did is beyond me.

Not a good morning here. DD is not sleeping well. FW has gone back to pushing the cat off the bed and swearing at me if she wakes him up in the night. This morning when DD woke at normal time he took her downstairs, I meant to get up but somehow managed to drift back off to sleep for half an hour (). I was woken by him crashing dishes in the kitchen so loudly I heard it all the way upstairs. I came down and was sheepish about falling asleep but he just carried on crashing the dishes. So, feeling a bit ballsy I asked him if there was any need to crash them around like that. His response? "I wouldn't need to if someone had washed them up last night."

Ok, so they were dessert bowls from last night that I didn't do (having done the dinner dishes). So sue me. I snapped a bit and told him to fuck off. He told me not to swear at him. I told him I didn't appreciate being spoken to like a child in the first place.

And round and round we go. He brings out the worst in me but makes it look like I'm the unreasonable one all the time.

Solicitor's info arrived for me today so going to read it over lunch.

Oh dear, I read the first wee few posts the other day but haven't gotten round to catching up. Will pop over and post.

rose - I don't know if it's the co-dependant you, possibly, but maybe it's a bit of panic as well, cold feet. It's all getting close and real. Stand firm. You know you need to do this, for both you and DD. This is your chance. Read your posts back from before you knew you were getting the house.

Nini - I know, I sometimes used to bite and tell FW to FOTTFSOF (well, not quite). I felt awful on the rare ocassions I muttered some derogatory comment under my breath, or (on one spectacular occasion) told him to shove the gift he'd just bought up his arse. He always would pounce on it and have a go at me for swearing at him or tell me I was being abusive, which made me feel just awful. But if I suggested to him he was being abusive, he'd laugh or get scary. You are sad and upset that you sunk to his level and swore at him. He doesn't care in the slightest if he swears at you, it's his right. That's the difference. Hope reading the solicitor info is bolstering - have you found someone else to go and see yet?

nini it is so hard to just respond and not react - I just can't be near FW, I know that is not the answer but he pushes it to the absolute limit with me using shock tactics, pre planned and yes pony is right because he sees it as his right but not ours to even respond. I know it is really hard and you have every right as ask that he doesn't crash the dishes but if you can try and not say anything, allow the noise to have no effect on you, take his power away.

"I wouldn't need to if someone had washed them up last night."
no actually FW you don't need to crash them about all. you want to. you may need to wash them you don't need to crash them.

nini sorry he is being a FW. don't let him make you feel guilty for sleeping. but although I too would have bitten I think the others are right. ignore ignore and ignore some more. my FW brought out the absolute worst in me and made me think i was a totally different person then the person that every other person I know reflects back to me. (except maybe my mum who still thinks I am 14)

Totally - ignore ignore ignore is such a regular mantra on here yet I tend to forget it and bite! Even ignoring it doesn't make him stop, which brings me back to thinking 'this can never work' all over again. Argh they are such a headfuck aren't they!

Rose, Curtis is right, many many times I've gotten cold feet (which is prolly why I'm not out yet!), you just need to be strong and the feelings will pass. Regardless of what happened in your past, what matters is how he treats you NOW. Stay strong, don't give in.

Solicitor info is interesting but my God is it expensive. I might go and see someone else as well (the three quote rule, right?) but tbh I really like her. I think she'd fight for me if needed. Curtis, have you had any better luck yourself yet?

Bollocks, I meant to ask Charlotte not Curtis. Got my C's confused. . and for all!

Waves back to everyone

Nini like everyone else has said, ignore.... tis the only solution. Not followed the thread properly for ages but hope the fact that you have received solicitors' info means that you are on your way to freedom.

Rose I don't know your backstory, but maybe if you tell yourself that you could always get back together if leaving was a mistake, it will help you to go? Then once you've left you'll have more space to think things through and make the right choice.

Sorry nini, I got confused too, I realised as soon as I posted that it was Charlotte who had seen a solicitor who was no good! But yes, it's expensive. I am sticking my fingers in my ears about my bill so far, and I'm not even started on the divorce proceedings.

Rose - of course you have issues - you are in an abusive relationship, no-one comes out of that situation unscathed, no-one.

When I finally left, that's when I went properly downhill. I had been keeping it all in and coping, and pushing everything down. I got properly depressed once I left. It wasn't that I was depressed because I'd left him, but I think the enormity of what I'd been through, the enormity of not dealing properly with all my emotions and fear at the time, my guilt over the DSs and the shame I felt, worry about everything to come - solicitors, finding a new house, etc - it all just piled on top of me in a oner. But I have been on anti-ds for over a year now, they helped enormously.

It's good to talk about this before it happens, that way if it does happen, if you do get the shakes or feel terrible in the first few weeks, it wont take you so much by surprise, and you'll know that it's part of the normal process.

Sorry, only quickly, to Rose, when I left I was horribly anxious, when I had to talk to him or anyone regarding the situation, I would start to shake and hyperventilate, I literally could not breathe. That passed, but I still had the anxiety for a good while, and a bizarre thing where if I talked to anyone about it, I would feel like literally my mind was going out of my head, detaching from me. Up until then, I thought going out of your mind was a turn of phrase. But I also got post-split harrassment and he did not accept the relationship was over. I have a good solicitor and things have calmed down for the moment.
Whatever you feel when you leave, will pass.

If you saw me you would think I was a mad woman. I often end up in hysterics, and have even vomited on a few occasions because I have got so upset.

We have had discussions on here about this very thing, Rose. Lots of us can identify with what you are saying here, I'm sure. I suspect I appeared certifiably deranged to my DSDs on various occasions. Literally howling at some points, I was crying so much and so hard, thrashing about, screaming and shouting with frustration snot flying everywhere, lovely!. FW would threaten to get an ambulance/get me sectioned, which just further convinced me I was losing my mind. He would goad me into this state, keep coming to find me and wind me up more when I tried to go to different rooms, then finally would come in and be all lovely and supportive, which just finished me off and I'd end up sobbing and shaking as he comforted me in his arms. Poor Mr Reasonable and his deranged mad-woman-in-the-attic wife.

I hadn't had any episodes of crying like that before I met FW, and none since I left.

Rose, FW here was like that, cool and provoking at the same time, totally what that says. I would think it was me if I had not seen him do it to DD as well . I will try and come back in more detail later. It is not you. If I had a crystal ball to show you your life in six months time, I would give it to you. You would never want to go back.

yes to that Pony
And how about sniveling, huddled in a corner of the bathroom? Taking a not so wild guess that we have all been in that place with FW with ADs at the ready :( but more

Pony yes, too, to no one coming out of an abusive relationship unscathed :(
The 'rising above it' and 'leaving it all behind' arguments are all other forms of victim blaming.
We get out. We rebuild. We even become stronger and happier - but that is only by going through what it takes to heal - not by the pretending it never happened or was not as bad as it was.

Rose Some time ago we set up a funny farm here on this thread
The company was great and life was good :)

YYY arthritic, that's it - getting out, rebuilding, gathering yourself.

What I am trying to say Rose is that you don't need to worry. You will be fine. It will not be great at first, it will be an emotional rollercoaster. Sometimes you will doubt, you will want to go back, you will be all over the place. But sometimes you will realise the simple things that have changed - for me it was being able to yawn without feat of that starting a tirade! But life away from him will eventually be so so much better than life with him. You just need to leave in order to get to that point. It's a long journey, not an instant transportation unfortunately. But you can do this.