For 8 years I've been married to C. In that time I've got to the point where I just don't know if I am coming or going.
Yesterday was just one more of those occasions. I was asked by C to do the laundry on Saturday, it needed doing and so there was no problem in that. I did the darks wash because there wasn't much for a whites. Yesterday, after I'd been given "permission" to take our eldest daughter to church I got back and C found a top in the laundry that hadn't been done (and which C didn't need) and flew into a rage. It led to a massive row over the same issue over and over: C flies into a rage at everything I'm "incompetent" with and rather than just ask me to put the other items in the wash berates me for "doing something wrong". It usually involves me being put down and insulted. I object to the way I'm spoken to, but in C's mind the shouting and telling off is justified as is C's anger and I'm demanded to apologise. Whenever I try and argue the point C manipulates the argument to constantly keep the blame on me, if I don't back down C gets aggressive. On a number of occasions I have things thrown at me or am hit if I don't back down. It has even happened in front of the kids.
Yesterday, after the row had simmered we needed to go out. C put the kids in the car and asked me to fetch something from the house. C then drove off with the kids in the car and I could see them crying and looking back in the car. I could see C had stopped just round the corner and I got in the car. The kids were sobbing.
Later that night our eldest daughter expressed an opinion about her favourite colour being the same as her best friend's. C called our daughter "pathetic" and ranted at her about her best friend being a stupid tom boy and then really insulted her. I was powerless to stand up for my daughter without another screaming row kicking off.
C drinks a lot, and can be horrible to me when drunk. The average is to see off 10-14 cans of cider over a weekend, with the bulk being drunk on a Fri and Sun night. A lot of Friday nights are spent with C binge drinking and flicking through the music channels on Sky which C knows grates on me. C usually goes on about how great a taste in music C has and how mine is crap, and how sad I am, and it usually has the odd exaggerated laughing at me along with the insults. C's behaviour become erratic and it's not uncommon for me to be sat there cringing while C starts whooping and hollering at the TV and declaring how brilliant acts like Maralyn Manson and Slipknot are. I feel afraid and anxious at C's erratic behaviour and can't relax. This apparently provokes C's drinking especially if I ask for C to slow down.
I don't go out much. If I do I'm worried I'll come home and C will have been drinking heavily. If that happens I know I'm going to be subjected to an aggressive interrogation about where I've been and what we have talked about, especially if it involves C, and the interrogation becomes more intense and aggressive. C will occasionally go through my phone looking for text messages and randomly deleting things. I've let friendships slide and C constantly tells me I have no friends because nobody likes me. The fact is I've always had a small but close group of friends but over the years have learned that being in a group and being socially gregarious is a route to being criticised by C and facing a long drawn out character assassination on the way home so now I just say nothing and keep quiet whenever we go out.
The way our finances are set up I pay all of the bills, which accounts for most of my income, and C pays for the child care and general spending, but C has all of the family's disposable income. While C spends on clothes and going out and doing what C wants, if I do the same I am heavily criticised. I actually rely on hand me down clothes from C's family.
I'm a catholic C is agnostic. I've been chided about believing in sky fairies. C has done everything possible to get me to sever my ties with the church (I only go very occasionally now). C has threatened divorce if I don't agree with C that God doesn't exist. C plans things to regularly clash with me trying to take our daughters to the parish on Sunday mornings even though most of their friends go to church. I'm usually insulted and called thick and unintelligent for believing in anything more than myself. C knew I was catholic when we met and while I've never pushed my beliefs on C, C has done everything possible to get me to agree I'm wrong and C is right.
I keep a diary of events, here are some extracts:
Sunday 21st July 2013
C had been out on Fri night and had come home so drunk that at one point in the night had got up and gone into the en-suite and collapsed on
the floor and passed out on a pile of towels. On Sunday started
drinking again and I commented C hadn't had any time to
recover and that drinking again so soon after being so seriously drunk
less than 36 hours ago was not a good idea for health. C threatened to
glass me in the face and throw things at me unless I shut up and told me was having "fun" and was going to drink more to spite me and
demanded I apologise for being boring and "abusing".
Sat 13th July 2013
C's parents stayed over I went for a haircut. While out C's mother said
something that wound C up. C phoned me after 45 mins to demand to know where I was. I got home and went upstairs, got down and C told me to put suncream on girls and brush their hair. I went upstairs to do this and C started screaming at me to get downstairs, then counted down from 5 to "totally loosing it". Started yelling abuse at me and sent girls upstairs to get a shower and wash suncream off and go to their rooms as a punishment for my "poor behaviour". Claimed I was upstairs for an hour (15 mins at most) and had been out for 2 hours (45 mins - I timed it). C claimed was ill and that wanted me where I could be seen and told me to sit on sofa and not move. Went to get a glass of water and C told me to tip it away and was only going to let me drink when it suited as C wanted me to suffer. I got another drink and gulped it down and brought a second glass into living room. C claimed to be so ill needed to go to hospital immediately so I told C to get in the car, C threw remote control full force into my face and started screaming "fuck off and die!" repeatedly in my face. Then picked up a small wooden chair and threw that at me while I was sat down. I picked chair up and put it back and got glass of water. C had picked remote up and threw it at me again spilling some of the water on me with the force
of being hit. C laughed at me. C eventually calmed down and went into the garden and left me in the house.
1/12/12
C Going out at 8pm, opened front door and saw the advent wreath wasn't on as C would like. Started abuse - I am a fucking gypo, arsehole with no standards, belong on a council estate, no one else would have me, lucky to be allowed to live under the same roof, claimed I did it deliberately to deliberately did it to annoy C and deserve to be abused, no friends, miserable, no wonder no-one likes you. Told me C wants all the laundry ironed tonight as I won't be allowed to do it tomorrow or I won't be living here tomorrow.
There's more all along the same lines.
Am I loosing perspective? Is this normal behaviour in a marital home? I constantly live in fear and am walking on eggshells at everything I do provoking the kind of responses above. C won't accept that anything is wrong in the marriage unless I accept it is my fault. Sex happens only when C wants and is all about C. If I try and talk to C about how I feel I'm usually shouted down or the conversation is twisted as to why everything wrong in the marriage is my fault and that if I don't like it I can leave because C will just find someone better than me.