I endured years of put downs, blaming, name calling and other verbal abuse.
It hurt. I sought therapy in 2003, but I held back from telling the therapist exactly what was happening to me because I could not quite believe it myself, and because I thought that that sort of thing did not happen to men, and even though I was/am a business man, running a business that is doing well, even though I am physically fit and trim, even though I have some skill in martial arts, I cried, I battled with feelings of despair and worthlessness, I questioned my own value to my work, clients, family - my children!
As I realised that I shouldn't be putting up with it, and as I recognised that our three DC should not be seeing their dad being treated the way that he was being, I began to stand up to her. I began to tell her that what she was telling me and calling me was wrong and that it hurt me. I never swore at her, never called her names, never lashed out at her.
For years, in the days after receiving her abuses she would trivialise my concerns, telling me that I listen too much, that she is a human being and that human beings say things when they are angry, that I can't take a joke, that I am too serious, that I need a better outlook on life and that I should have expected it because I made her angry through the tone of my voice, the look on my face. She would deny calling me the names and putting me down. This got so crazymaking that I resorted to recording our arguments. For two years I recorded her. I was recording her the first time that she hit me. She had thrown things at me before, but never came at me and actually him me. After the second time she hit me, and before I walked out, leaving my home and children, I was discussing things with my MIL I was told by my MIL to "get over it", and that even she had "swung at her DH in anger!"
I have a 250 page journal, packed with my feelings and thoughts, recorded over three years. I have my recordings. In the hope that she would understand how hurtful her abuses ware to me I read to her some of my journal, I played some of my recordings, and in response I was told that she was like that with me, because I made her like that, that no one else makes her feel that way and that if we were to have a happy marriage that we BOTH needed to change. She never accepted responsibility for any of her words or actions.
I have read books about verbal abuse leading to DV, but they are all written about abuse inflicted on women by men, and while there is a paragraph on the first pages that will explain that abuse can be inflicted upon men by women, I wished, as I read about the experiences of the women who had lived through what I had lived through, that I could read a story about a man's experiences. There were none. While I felt strong for leaving the situation, while I felt confident in my ability to rebuild my life (and 18 months on I am doing that, with my DC, who chose to spend more than half the week with me), I felt alone, and I felt uncomfortable discussing my situation because there is a lack of awareness that men across the world are living with abuse. I needed to talk, I see the value of communicating feelings and worries, because when one's worries and concerns are spinning around in ones head, it can make one feel worse. I felt very, very low.
Here is a transcription of the first time she hit me...
October 2011 – 9:45pm – Kids in bed
Loud argument in the kitchen about whether to have a family dog
DH – “The next time we have a discussion it’s going to have to be in mediation”
DW – “It’s not a discussion because you’re now saying, ‘we’re not getting a dog’”
DH – “No, we’re not getting a dog, and also I don’t see a future for you and me based on the last couple of years”
DW opens the door to the hall and stands by the open door. The 3 DC are in bed upstairs.
DW (ignores my statement about our future and shouts)– “Well, to be honest DH, when you met me I HAD A DOG, you knew that SO YOU SHOULD NEVER HAVE COME ANYWHERE BLOODY NEAR ME, and I WISH YOU HADN’T NOW!”
DH “Oh, well perhaps we’ll discuss that in mediation”
DW – “I would have been a lot better off WITHOUT YOU AND WITHOUT THREE DC….”
DH – (sounding surprised) “ Oh, oh right”
DW – “SO I COULD HAVE HAD THE DOG AND BEEN HAPPY”
DW goes out into the hall and slams the living room door behind her
15 minutes Later
DW – (referring to a conversation that she said that she and I had in 1996) “You knew I had a dog, you said to me ‘I don’t think we’ll ever be without a dog’ those were your EXACT WORDS”
DH – “I don’t think, I said ‘I don’t think’, but when you think, and as life unfolds…”
DW (interrupting DH) “In fact, you said ‘I can’t see us ever being without a dog!’”
DH – (amused) “Did you write this down?”
DW “Don’t laugh at me! I can remember certain – important THINGS, and having a dog is VERY important to me”
DH – (laughs)
DW (loud) “Oh, ha ha BLOODY ha, you CRETIN” (comes across the room and hits DH around the head)
DH – “Please don’t do that”
DW “ you’re an absolute CRETIN, just fuckin Get Out Now”
DH – “That was a defensive move you know”
DW – “It was defensive? What was?”
DH – “Well, you know my raising my hand up”
DW – “Oh was it, you’re just pointing it out because you’re so bloody pedantic, you’re PATHETIC DH, you’re absolutely PATHETIC!”
DH – “You were swinging at me weren’t you?”
DW – “YES I BLOODY WAS, because you’re laughing at me and making me feel that small!”
DH – “I am not laughing at you, I’m laughing at the situation because it’s better than me getting upset”
DW – “No I don’t think it is, because it makes me feel bloody worse actually, Why don’t you just give me a slap? That would be easier”
DH – “No I would not raise a hand to you”
DW – “no, no you wouldn’t do that, but you’d make me feel that small…. HAVING A DOG IS VERY IMPORTANT TO ME, IT’S VERY IMPORTANT TO MY CHILDREN, BUT YOU DON’T GIVE A SHIT””
DH – “My family is very important to me….”
DW (interrupts) “Your family? Fucking what?”
DH “No DW, you and the children are very important to me but hearing that stuff about how I should have left you alone 15 years ago it hurts me”
DW leaves the room and slams the door
She hit me again four months later, and afterwards she told me how I deserved it, how it should have “knocked some sense” into me. She called me “a wimp”, told me that “actors take it better than you”, told me how she did not care if we never had sex again and many more upsetting things that ripped my character to pieces. After trying to tell her just how I felt and how upsetting this all was to me, and after listening to her (and recording her) for ten minutes I opened the door to leave, and that was when I found my DS (age 10) standing behind the door, quivering and in tears, hardly able to remain standing. As I scooped him up I told him that I was so sorry that he had to hear his mummy and daddy like that and he said “Daddy I didn’t know what to do. You’re not a wimp, you ran a marathon”
Seeing my DS in such a state made me realise that I was not going to be able to make things better by staying and that potentially how my DC viewed relationships could be damaged beyond repair were I to stay in an abusive relationship, and so I left. I reported the assault to the police, who came and spoke to her. To my immense relief (and disbelief) she admitted to the two assaults. She received a caution.
To this day, 18 months later, my soon to be Ex DW maintains that she was the way she was because I caused her to be that way.
Now that this story has broken, while I regret that this gentleman has lived/is living with DV, I feel a little lighter knowing that more people are seeing that DV towards either sex exists, and that women and men are capable of inflicting emotional and physical suffering on someone that they profess to love. I hope the man at the centre of this story can move on and not feel responsible for someone elses choice to abuse him.
I hope that more people who are being abused can feel assured that they will be listened to, taken seriously and supported when they recognise that the abuse they are taking is not their fault.