Support for those in Emotionally Abusive relationships: thread 27

[CharlotteCollinsinherownplace]

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’re 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!!

noregrets your daughter is strong though we would never wish them to go through anything. For a young girl she seems to know what the correct behaviour is and that is through your strong parenting. She also trusted you enough and trusted you would not judge anyone when she called to tell you what happening. Lots of hugs to you both. He is being a ridiculous human being saying those things and you are doing a brilliant job at being consistent and I think that is the strongest thing a mother can do in your (all of our) situations.

Yes, I agree about the strong parenting from you. I was reflecting why I never told anyone about what went on in my house, and thinking it was because my mum was also abusive. There was no-one to be protective, which is not a poor me, just stressing how important that your DD has one balanced parent and people she trusts to talk to. All good wishes to you both to find a way through this.

Last was to noregrets

noregrets what a toddler tantrum . Of course he will change his mind. then pretend he never said it..then pretend you said it
FW. His natural inability to take responsibility for anything is preventing him from having any kind of sensible reaction.

But how to explain that to Dd i think it is just a question of repeating over and again that she dude the right thing, she is very responsible and mature and whatever happens it is not a punishment. its a tough one.

Thank you so much everyone this thread is like a lifeline of sanity, full of people who understand. There were some total FW classics thrown in. He actually said at one point that he didn't care how DD felt, the important thing was how he felt [hmmm]

I'm pleased children's services were involved. It's so hard to see the wood for the trees when you're deeply in the middle of it. It's helpful to see how a third party views it, and it's forced me into action rather than fearing his temper. They were really helpful... I think they have no issue at all as long as you can show that one parent is looking out for the child's best interests.

She had real trouble getting to sleep, wants her Daddy. I made excuses... but tomorrow is his birthday. She wanted to go round there early and have breakfast, I said I'd sort it - before his toddler tantrum later on. I have no idea how to break it to her that she can't even phone him. I think the best is to say that he's still angry with me, and we're waiting for him to be in a better mood. I'd rather she blamed me, than see it as her fault.

He may or may not come round and change his mind. He's very stubborn and we won't be able to make any progress until he at least acknowledges there's something wrong.

noregrets I just hope this will be a wake-up call for him. Poor DD, good luck tomorrow , hope she isn't too upset.

arth I am incredulous and despair about this nigella story, how could they? Haven't read up much about it yet but what I have read seems to be all 'Mr Saatchi says...' and designed just to smear her name and her family. I'm hoping there will be a backlash, but he is a pr man I believe. Dickhead.

noregrets, this is not your fault. Don't take it on, even with good intentions, quite apart from it makes no sense, why would he be angry with you. He is angry with the situation, because it is making him have to address aspects of his behaviour. I don't see anything wrong with saying he needs time to reflect, that is non-judgemental and a 9 year old should be able to understand that. If she can't go today, maybe just set the card and gift aside for when she can.

Good advice from quietcoach there. I too really struggle with being honest with the DC about the reasons why they're not seeing their father. But the non-judgemental "needs time to think" suggestion is a good one. As she says, this is NOT your fault, not in any way whatsoever. That's why I think it's a good thing it's come from children's services, because otherwise just think how 'punishing' he would think this was to you, for daring to raise your concerns. Wishing you strength today.

My own errant ex is due to see the DC this weekend. I'm struggling with wanting some sort of confirmation but to send an email just opens me up to no-doubt days of silence before he confirms at the last minute. We have a ballet performance (very amusing, 10 mins at the end of the last lesson of the term for the littlies) on Saturday and the plan was that he would come and watch that with me there, and then take them afterwards. I've not heard anything since he didn't show up to see them on Sunday. Have been working on my Form E this week and feeling pretty snowed under but thankfully almost finished now.

oh! Noregrets so sad for her pain in this, and it is painful for her to see how her father behaves, but it is his behaviour, and she will learn to know who he is through it, and then can make an informed choice about what she wants to do about that.

just a quick post to link to this www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/whnews woman's hour podcast on crime against women featuring the head of CPS, head of WA and several other very intersting speakers.

Covers legal aid, domestic violence and rape prosecution figures etc.

floatingfree with mine, if i do send an email, as he often does the silent trick, I tend to give a deadline e.g. if i do not get a reponse by x time I will assume you are not seeing DC this weekend and will make alternative plans for that time.

it may/may not work but at least it signales your intention to just get on with things if he doesn't make an effort. also these days i now make arrangements for next week at handover. Obviously that does not work if he misses a week.

breathe bounty hope you are both ok.
I might not be about much for a bit so please PM if you have breaking news

I hope you don't waste any more of your valuable energies floating on setting his contact up for him, but just ask when she wants to see him, whether thats soon, or not bothered at the moment, before suggesting any more?

You cannot do all of this, or make him see her, and its evident (from what you say) that he isn't diligent about being consistent for her in any way (store all this in your notepad - lack of consistency on his part, continually letting her down)

Thanks Fairy. We have an 'interim arrangement' (which took 6 months to negotiate..) of EOW Saturday to Monday. So it's his weekend coming up. You are right though; I will not make contact to try and finalise or confirm things; it never seems to help.

Sorry meant to add MrsMink - yes, I've done that before. The trouble is that when he exceeds the deadlines, I really do struggle to follow through with then not letting him see the children (in fact I don't think I've ever followed through with it). I find that so so hard a) because I know they are already starved of contact and b) because he taunts me constantly with saying that I am restricting contact and ruining his relationship. I do actually think that he's trying to push me so far that I eventually do stop contact, just so that he can say that it's ALL MY FAULT and look woe is me, poor poor me who has such a tyrant of an ex-wife this is what she's done to us all. This is why I'm going to court, in the hope to put an end to all this nonsense.

Just had a letter through the post from CAFCASS saying we'll have a phone interview in a week or so. Does anyone know what to expect from these?

surely you can go ahead and continue with your own plans each time he crosses a deadline for confirming? I think if you are clear about when you need to know by and if you don't know by then, going ahead with your own plans seems reasonable?

As you have already agreed an EOW and he is not doing EOW, which causes continual let down to your DD, even the 'interim arrangement' needs revising. Perhaps he would be better able to commit to one a month for example?

If he has only been actually doing one a month anywa? It will be clear whether this is about actually seeing his DD or his opportunity to exert control over this situation?

The thing is Fairy that I'm finding that come a Wednesday for example, I don't exactly have plans made for the weekend if it's meant to be his weekend. Partly because if it's his weekend I don't want to make plans because I can't be sure we'll be available. If it's 'my' weekend then of course I feel free to make plans. So I find myself hedging my bets on his weekends not knowing what to do and if/when he lets down then scrabbling around trying to think of fun things to do for us all that will take their mind off it. Do you know the thing that upsets me most of all... my DC idolise their father, like all children do. And I just can't bear to see them go through the process of realising, at far too young an age, that their father is NOT a god. That's the kind of realisation that should come at the teenage years, not at the age of 3/4. I have told him recently that I am terrified that his unreliability is teaching them not to rely on him and that that's tragic and worrying for them. Of course, he just flew off the handle that I was "having a go at him" and it's been shit ever since. I just want reliability and regularity for our children.

I think I'd be just the same as you, Floating, although I can see that in an ideal world, if the deadline were Wednesday (sounds a sensible deadline) and he hadn't responded, it would be time to make plans as though he weren't going to be around. Keeping the plans quiet from all children involved in case he suddenly turned up at the eleventh hour (hopefully not literally).

And even if you were to call his bluff and say please let me know by Wednesday, we've been invited to a party and if I haven't heard from you by then I'll assume you're not available and say yes to the party... even if you did that, it'd only be a solution for a week!

Big sigh to trying to talk responsibly and having it interpreted as a personal attack. Today, yet again, I had the ol' chestnut that maybe I don't have the DC's best interests at heart as much as I say I do, or I wouldn't've given them a broken home...

Exactly Charlotte.

This weekend will be interesting, as my lawyer has just fired off a pretty aggressive response to the sold house discovery, demanding all sorts of information as to the proceeds' whereabouts by this afternoon, otherwise we will be taking "urgent steps" to protect my interests. I have no idea what these steps are but they sound impressive! It's exactly the kind of thing that has angered him enough in the past to not turn up for contact, let's see whether that happens again. I do hope not. It really has felt like I'm being bullied throughout this whole divorce - "do what I say otherwise I won't see the children. And while I'm at it, I'll blame you for me not seeing them and claim it's all your fault."

yes, that exactly Charlotte staying strong in the face of such FWittery

Noregrets, I just wanted to say that I had a similar thing with DD and ex. Overnights were also stopped for a while. Ex kept up the contact, but laid a massive guilt-trip on DD (who was only 5). He told her she was bad and pretty much implied she was destroying their relationship and it was the end of his love for her. Hideous, hideous stuff.

Things have calmed down again, and contact seems to be going okay. Social services are doing yet another report (as requested by the CAFCASS officer, as she had lingering welfare concerns after her own report).

Anyway, the point of this is that your dd is probably feeling very guilty, so it is very important to keep praising her bravery, and pointing out that we always always speak up when people make us worried or don't treat us well.

I think/hope it is a wonderfully protective thing for their future (both our dds) - they spoke up and were believed and action was taken.

Feeling very low this evening :( Email exchange with FW, yet more blame onto me and the CSA for ruining his life, and now threatening unemployment. He claims to be so overworked from having to avoid being screwed by the CSA that he is too tired to see the DC, he can't say whether he can have them this weekend or not because he is so tired and ill. I'm just so fucking sick and tired of all of this.

He tells me we will have months ahead of us of financial argument, and I am just so fearful of the process, that his insanity about everything is going to cost us everything we have. Every single thing, every single possible thing that could be argued about it, at vast expense every time. How can I just be free of this madman? :( I am sitting here in tears, I'm just so so tired of it all, of the madness, of his constant blame, letting the DC down again and again and constantly blaming me for everything. My poor DC :(

This too will pass. Maybe he is right about the financial arguments, but even so, after months of it, he will be able to argue no more. And that stage of the FWery will be over.

It is exhausting, and horrible to watch the DCs being hurt. But they do have you - and they have the more energetic, more sure of herself you who you are now you're not with him. And all that is a huge thing in their favour.

DD2 (who is 8) had a sudden meltdown about upcoming contact this evening. They are with FW for five nights in a row this time, because of a slight change he asked for and I couldn't see a problem with. Thought the DCs were quite settled with the toing and froing, actually. Tears on and off for two hours have told me otherwise. She just wants her parents to be in the same place, both available at the same time. It's a reasonable wish for a child, poor girl.

Now trying to work out how to word an email to FW. If anyone's around, just tell me: if she wants to come home on Sunday, she should be able to do that, shouldn't she?

De lurking - after reading lots here and the links I wonder if my 'D'H is an abusive FW.

I have the Lundy book and I can see that he can be controlling/obstructive in a PA kind of way but he's not verbally unpleasant, just kind of selfish and manipulative. I have detached from him a bit over the course of this year to not let his selfish behaviours get to me and pull him up on the worst of it (using 'I' statements) but he says that I am the controlling one, that he's frightened of me and I'm just being unpleasant to him as I don't like that he's stopped being a 'cowed doormat'. I feel like I had been the doormat up until now, never calling up on his behaviour.

Examples seem so petty compared to much on here: no time for me but time for hobby, always skint and expecting me to pay for everything even tho' he takes home double my salary, sexually rejecting me in favour of porn, being blasé about his porn habit, sleeping until whatever time suits him at weekends, often going out on short errands (allegedly grocery shopping) but being out for hours without communicating as he's combines the trip out with something he wants to do like buying kit for hobby but won't ever say that's what he's off to do, will never say 'I don't want to do x' but puts up a grumpy wall of resistance until we do what he wants, never asks about my day or job or anything but complains about my lack of affection towards him, makes me feel guilty (sulky attitude) if I go out as he often has to work from home in the evenings, will often be late home when I have something to go to so I end up being late/missing my thing.....god it all sounds so minor.

He just basically doesn't seem to care about me or have any interest in my life. He has no real friends and limited contact with his family. He will come to social events and my family gatherings but tends to somehow absent himself or spends the entire time on his phone or doing something with one of the DC's rather than engage.

I feel like an insignificant nag and worry that I am controlling as I am hyper organised and efficient compared to him.

We did Relate at the start of the year and he said that he didn't like the person I have become, apologised for being selfish and immature and said that he regarded the sessions as a kind of penance. He also commented that I just wanted my 'freedom' from him and to get the house and DC's. Has used very emotive language and talked about suicide and how he'd have to rebuild his life 'from the ashes, somehow' if we split and anyhow I'd still have to deal with all his issues as we'll remain co parents forever.

Perhaps I am the controlling one, but I feel trapped and stuck.

My head is a mess.

charlotte no direct experience but if she wants to come back Sunday (to keep to her school routine? ) it seems fair that her feelings should take precedence over anything agreed... Is it not possible to keep to a regular schedule? I think consistency is so important, but it depends on the dcs involved. Poor dd in tears, could be all getting on top of her, not long until end of term. Hope she (and you and other dc's) ok!

Floating, don't reply to the emails. You are paying a solicitor to deal with this for you. You do not need to reply. Apart from, 'I am sorry that you are not able to see DCs this weekend, please let me know 48 hours in advance if you can see them [date]'. End of.

Your solicitor has already told you to take a hard-line approach, your solicitor should also be able to tell you where the balance is between what it is worth fighting for, and what will cost you more to win, iyswim. Just follow your solicitor's advice; it is not your job to have these arguments.

you can be free, to an extent, by choosing not to engage, by letting your solicitor act on what can be won, and by devoting your energies to you and DC. Ignore him.

Charlotte, I would say if the contact does not suit, then it should be re-negotiated, not that DC should come and go, unless they are all to be afforded that freedom and you in effect have no schedule.
You have 4 DC, I think, so you can't necessarily please them all, but maybe a good idea is to have a talk with them about how things are progressing and what you (and FW) can do to help with things. Maybe him chopping and changing to suit his work, and suddenly having five days of contact because of it, is what is upsetting, (of course the fact that you are not together too, but then you need to find other ways of supporting her through that - they are two separate issues, iyswim). Sorry, writing quickly, does that make sense?

We're hopefully going to get a regular schedule in place in the new year. He hates anything that resembles routine, and expects his DCs to be the same, so I have been allowing changes (ok, tbh I just let him railroad them through) and hoping they were ok with it.

Yes, I do think she's very tired. And before DD3 went to bed, she was listening to the tears and joining in! I had two of them wailing at once that they didn't want to see Daddy. Isn't that just horrible? In the meantime, DS is very clingy and tearful. Which I have not been assuming is a result of contact arrangements, but it may be: this has been a long term and the first term of this strange new life for them.

Have sent an email and am trying to feel strong!

other, welcome - your FW sounds very similar to mine from what you've said in your second and third paragraphs, even just from your nn, actually. Now I am out, I am building a better picture in my mind of what a healthy relationship should look like and it ain't nothing like yours, girl. But what we suffer has a tendency to seem petty to us - it's partly the minimising that we do, partly that a lot of the crap could possibly be seen in healthy relationships, but only as isolated incidents, and apologised for afterwards.

You definitely belong here! Stick around and post as little or as often as you like.