50 shades of idiot: silly tales of the abusive ex (meant lightheartedly but also could be triggering)

[Cakehanded]

Namechanged in case any of this outs me but something I had to do today brought back loads of memories of my abusive exH, some that are very deep 'kind-of healed' wounds but some that seem like silly little things but things that I never got to have a go at him for and never told anyone in RL as I didn't want the pitying looks. I'd still like to be able to talk about them somewhere though and get it out into the virtual open, maybe even have a laugh about it if I can so going to do that here.

Anyone else is more than welcome to chip in with tales of the idiot they've left (or even if you haven't if you want to!), I hope nobody finds me starting the thread too triggering/offensive.

1 - When I left, leaving virtually all of mine and baby ds's worldly goods behind but taking what I thought was a restrained 50% of the cash in our current account (which was not a lot at all) to support us he emailed that he thought I was unreasonable as he didn't understand why I'd 'drained' the account as he couldn't see what I'd need it for. 'Dear' ExH, shall I write you a list? Nappies, food, shelter, bills, any of that ringing any bells? Considering you haven't paid any maintenance for 6 years I assume you're still confused and think ds and I live in a field sustained by the smell of flowers.

2 - He said I had 'strange eyes'. No more explanation mind, that was just listed as one of the things I'd done wrong in our relationship, had 'strange eyes'.

3 - Another thing I'd done wrong was that I was 'obsessed with psychology'. Could almost seem a vaguely rational point until I say we met at uni, when I'd just started a degree - anyone like to guess the subject of the degree?

Feeling better already!

He accused me of "working just to line my own pockets" when he didn't have a job and had never had one throughout our relationship. We lived together and I paid all rent and bills while he pissed about playing playstation and guitar.

He also said, in the manner of someone revealing a royal flush, that some random dickhead he worked with at the time one of his workmates had said a new album I had bought and was really enjoying was shit. So...?

I gave birth in 53 minutes from waters breaking to baby in arms. No pain relief obviously as no time. I think I did bloody well.

After 20 mins I got the shakes and went cold...."I'm gonna be sick" I said as I started to retch. He sat and looked at ms (I was holding the baby) and said "you're such a drama queen"...as I vomitted down myself, turning my head to avoid the baby. I had to ask him to take the baby and then started to wipe myself clean :(

What a cock.

I've joined just to post this. So many familiar stories on this thread (and similar ones).

Here's my sample list of evil-ex foibles. Please be assured I LTB years ago and now have a lovely DH.

On the night we first kissed, I was a virgin and asked him to stop. He cried and self harmed so I agreed to go out with him. Fell in love, determined to "fix" him, was repeatedly dumped/lured back over the years but he never let me go IYSWIM.

Frequently made people uncomfortable by encouraging them to laugh at me for: the time he gave me a nasty staph infection and I thought it was a cold sore; waiting for him in the cinema lobby instead of outside so we missed each other; looking like Liza Minelli.

Went cottaging George Michael style and frequently gave me scabies or crabs. Like Karenblixen's ex he acted as though it was chickenpox, just a fact of life for both of us.

Furiously shouted at me for:
Chopping a green pepper in the "wrong" way
Not following the exact instructions on the mouthwash bottle
Not walking at a "reasonable pace"
Laughing when he died on the first screen of Super Mario
Missing the first 20 seconds of a TV programme I recorded for him
Wearing my hood up when it wasn't raining
Being "disrespectful" for asking him to repeat himself instead of "listening properly" (he often mumbled to facilitate this)
Not bringing enough money out with me to pay for everything he wanted to do/eat
Not popping the spots he couldn't reach on his bum

Regularly berated me for not being on a career path (was temping in my mid 20s). If I mentioned a house I liked I would get a VERY long, angry lecture on "YOU WILL NEVER LIVE ANYWHERE AS NICE AS THAT AS YOU REFUSE TO GET A PROPER JOB LIKE AN ADULT"

Shagged people in my bed while I was out

When I finally got a new bf he pressured me into being unfaithful with him, and eventually bullied me into leaving bf because I clearly saw him as "like a loyal dog and not a person". Projection..?

He would regularly make a false start to cross the road when there was a car coming, then laugh at me for almost crossing over. I would always fall for this because if he was genuinely crossing the road and I didn't keep up with him I would get shouted at.

Pressured me into buying a store card so I could buy approved (designer) clothes instead of using charity shops
Violently yanked non-approved headgear off me and hurled it across the room saying "I don't recognise you"
Told me I should do sit-ups to make my tummy flat - I was 1 stone underweight

Tried to isolate me from my friends by having sex with them, bullying them or propagandizing me into abandoning them

Would let me know if he thought I wasn't acting naturally in public by repeatedly saying "It's OK, you're with me, you can be yourself" until I was in a frenzy of self consciousness and had no idea how to act.

Would never come to my family's house or my flat because "there's nothing to do there" - I'm now sure it's because he couldn't treat me badly in front of my friends and family and get away with it.

Called me and let the phone ring for a very very long time because he knew I was being "disrespectful" by ignoring.

Flirtatiously asked me to suck his finger and then shuddered and said it felt "weird" because my teeth are crooked.

Any other new romantic prospect in my life would "coincide" with badly faked suicide attempts, or sometimes an apparent "breakthrough" which I would see as a sign that he had finally changed and was ready to commit to me. It was worth all the above because he was so funny, thoughtful, loving, talented, gorgeous, and was my best friend; and only I had the faith, patience and understanding to change him! Y'see?

He never understood why I cut off contact and I once agreed to meet him to make peace. He had no idea what he had ever done to upset me so I picked the most obvious example which was the time he'd date raped me while I was crying. He burst into floods of tears... of self pity. He was a bad person, he was so messed up, it was all about how damaged he was. I clearly still wasn't a person to him. And he wasn't upset for long anyway.

I:
-socialised with people who smoked
-would not leave work/lectures to call him every 2 hours
-was ungrateful when he'd turn up unannounced at my flat
-my friends would hate me if i left him (and he killed himself... never happened)
-I dressed in a way that made me look 'loose'.
-Oh and he told me he was 3 years older than me when he was 13. Even more significant when we started dating when I was 16 !!!
...I could go on.

Also all physical contact was weird. He would kiss by pressing his open mouth against mine as hard as he could so his teeth would literally be pushing my head back. He couldn't do anything 'sexy' without crying and getting weird about me being young and pure (in between trying to knock at the back door IYSWIM), wanted me to be more devout religiously than I was (so I'd marry him) but also be some kind of teenage sex slave.

What a fecking weirdo. Thank goodness I didn't marry him.

Oh yes - the shit I was married to for 20 horrible years (he was banging my 'best friend' and other women throughout).

I was a journalist, did pretty well. But he used to laugh when telling friends that I was 'no more than a glorified typist' and anyone could be a journalist, it was just a case of 'putting words in the right order'!

Prick.

Oh and once in the middle of a guilt-inducing meltdown he deliberately slammed him own head in a window, to show how much he empathised with me having caught my thumb in it the day before.
This was to 'prove' in front of people how he was the BEST DP EVER. They looked at him like he was nuts. It was also to distract me from lies/weirdness and make me feel guilty/evil because I had tried (and argued back) to wear a vest top with a union flag in sequins on it to a sporting event where people would be wearing such things not to work or anything because it was common and low cut.

Being "disrespectful" for asking him to repeat himself instead of "listening properly" (he often mumbled to facilitate this)

Oh goodness me that one! Yes.
Would whisper "I wuv you" (yes, with the wuv not love honestly!!) very very quietly. Then become sulky or showily "hurt" himself leaving me puzzled then asking "what did you say... what did you say..." while he would go all "no, no nothing..." and eventually say what he'd whispered and I'd say "I love you too". It got such a routine that this would happen. This makes me sick a bit. I couldn't say "I love you" for a while to anyone (family, new DP, friends) after that. Sooooo creepy.

That's awful that he tainted that specific phrase for you. All these behaviours sound so bizarre and yet the same ones keep coming up from all different people. I just remembered mine graduating from mumbling to glancing at things - if he glanced at something to draw my attention to it, and I didn't notice (sometimes because I was facing a different way), there was an enormo-sulk. And he thrust his finger in my mouth when I yawned to "teach" me to cover it properly.

People think my DH is really odd because he says things like "I'm inordinately fond of you" etc' because I was so thorny about the L word when we first met!

I remember when I tried on something pleasantly normal DH disliked in a shop (just a 'preferred the other one' face no comments) and went to put it back, the little drama of "how come you're putting it back? I thought you liked it and it's half price?" "Yeah but you didn't, you liked the other one." "OMG sorry I didn't mean to put it back, buy the one you like best!"

There should be some kind of flashcards showing "normal bloke" for people with weird exes! Yes! You can wear the leopard print dress even if he prefers black and white one! Diagram of man looking not that bothered.

Ohh totally. It's hard to shake the anticipation of nutterdom. I unexpectedly cycled past lovely current DH on the way home just a couple of years ago, and instinctively didn't stop because I thought he must have been waiting for OW and didn't want to anger him. This thought process was over in a split second but it happened. And of course he had been standing there to look for me because he was locked out and there is no OW ffs.

My ex had been planning to fly over for a couple of weeks (we were staying in different countries temporarily). A few days before he was due to turn up, my little sibling died suddenly/unexpectedly.

The first thing he said when I rang him to tell him was, "Does that mean you won't be in the mood for having sex?" And when I was silent in disbelief/shock, he said I should think about it and let him know when I thought I would be ready so he could change his flights.

Many more issues, but that right there was the beginning of the end for us.

My ex was quite stable compared with a lot of these. few things stick in my mind, though.

I pronounced various words incorrectly (yeah, we're from different parts of the country, you dingbat)

My parents never did Christmas the right way because they were atheists (his mum went to church twice a year).

My kid sister was visiting and he took the piss out of her the entire time.

While she was there, we all played Uno. He wasn't winning, so threw all his cards on the floor and stormed off upstairs.

He had an old school friend visiting, before we got married. In front of his friend, he ripped my clothes off me. I somehow laughed that one off, despite being furious. It was so humiliating.

A couple of years before I'd had enough and LTB, he spent £500 on a massive 19" trinitron computer monitor. When he'd had it all of a month, he whacked it, in a rage, whilst playing a game. It ended up blurred all down one side. He insisted that it must be my eyesight because he couldn't see it. Eeejit.

He misplaced his debit card, amongst his piles of shit, so rather than cancel it or even look for it, he borrowed mine - so he could buy me a birthday present.

First boyfriend - used to expect me to call daily at 7pm if we were apart, when I got free minutes. We would then have to talk for minimum 30 minutes. I had to end the call with 'I love you, I need you, I miss you' or he would get the hump.
He once told me he was abused as a child, then admitted he made it up, couldn't work out why I was pissed off with this.
Accused me of shagging several of his mates.
Developed some MH issues at university, connected to smoking weed plus pre existing I suspect. Took medication for 2 weeks then stopped it because it meant he couldn't drink or smoke weed.

Yup the old prescribed phone call... Ugh.

And still you get posters on other threads saying there's no such thing as "spying" as true lovers share/tell everything... With no idea of how controlling and soul destroying having ZERO privacy (or you don't live him) actually is.

I would love to think that a thread like this would have helped my younger self, or some current posters on here, but denial is so powerful. Ghastly ex once told me he'd had words with his brother about the way brother was treating his gf, and brother had replied "what about you and arowhena?" which shocked him. And of course I pretended to be shocked too because I was in minimisation/denial mode. It's a revelation seeing this thread and realising that all these brilliant women who I warm to so much, fell for the same thing I did (and worse of course, I got off lightly).

I really hope this thread encourages some people of whatever gender to ditch a crap relationship

I was taken to hospital by my Mum after spending 2 days in bed in agony. I had an abscess on my fallopian tube and spent 5 days on an antibiotic drip and then had to be sterilised, I was gutted. On my first night back home I dragged myself to the toilet at 2am, ExH was downstairs watching TV. He ran upstairs, I thought he was checking I was ok, he actually came to tell me that Tevez wanted to leave Manchester City

While I was recovering I put a thread on Facebook to thank everyone for all the cards, flowers and messages. His friends had absolutely no idea that I'd been in hospital - he had actually been in the pub with them while I was in hospital and never mentioned it!!

I took painkillers and antibiotics for the next month, I felt very low after my operation and the shock of having to be sterilised so I booked a house in Wales for us and our DC for a week and my ExH spent the first few days telling me to 'shut up' (nothing new there) and generally finding fault with everything, we ended up sleeping in different rooms and I told him when we got home I wanted to separate. When we got home I started the separation conversation and he looked at me like I was mad, what on earth was I talking about? I told him that he already knew I wanted to separate and he said 'well we're not, I've decided to give you another chance'

One of the first things my first boyfriend asked me whilst "chatting me up" was if I was a virgin. I was 16 and the answer was yes. Later told me he would have walked away if I'd have said no. He then spent 3 months pushing my head towards his crotch every time we were alone and finally got me to give it up by threatening he would go elsewhere.

Told me all about his rich, beautiful, blonde (I have the blackest hair on earth) ex girlfriend pretty much all day long. Had a picture of her in a bikini on the wall next to his bed.

Gave me an STD within a month of my losing my virginity to him.

Shouted at me for 20 minutes in front of all of his friends because I couldn't get into a nightclub. I was 16, he was 22. Later after I took my hoodie off and he saw I had quite a low cut top on he proudly told all his mates to check out my "sweet rack" then later that night called me a slag for wearing it

Used to breathe in sometimes when I spoke to indicate that my breath smelt

When driving past an attractive girl he would honk his horn and then do this weird motion with his hand that replicated him groping boobs and then tickling a vagina. One fluid motion.

Used to insist he picked me up from college every day in his car (regardless of what I wanted to do) and then charged me petrol money weekly

Every time I went to the bathroom he would stand and listen at the door to make sure I was only doing a wee

Once I initiated sex with him and he told me not to do that again as only dirty whores actually wanted sex, sex was for men to enjoy only apparently.

He's married to a girl now from a culture where the females are traditionally subordinate to males...poor lass.

I only meant to write one thing here but I just kept remembering more classic examples...it took me years to realise that that wasn't a normal relationship. I met one of his close friends about 10 years later who told me that their whole group of friends used to spend nights out with us trying to deflect his attention away from me as they felt so embarrassed by his behaviour.

STBX, on being challenged by me over a long distance online EA which had gone on for several months and loads of messaging of random women on FB, said it was "payback" for an event that took place literally on our second date when at a club he went to the loo, came back and was disgusted that I was dancing about a metre away from a bloke. Didn't shag the guy, didn't kiss him, speak to him or even make eye contact. But apparently that made it alright.

My awful nutter ex called me a "gold digger" which was interesting seeing as I was working as a solicitor and living independently whilst he, though six years older, was unemployed and living with his parents. I had to send him £50 notes so he could pay the train fare to visit me. If I were a gold digger I was a pretty rubbish one!

And another choice one: for years I would ask him what he wanted to do at the weekend and he would say we couldn't do anything because the house was filthy and needed a clean -- he refused every single invitation and suggestion on this basis for years. Saturday morning would roll around and I would set about cleaning while he slept in then by about 3/4 in the afternoon he would go out on some spurious "errand" and invariably come back six or several hours later pissed. This routine repeated itself almost every single weekend for three years.

When I challenged him about why all our weekends ended with him going to the pub he would say he was depressed because I took no pride in the state of the house.

If I hadn't wasted so much of my life on this it would be funny.

"If I hadn't wasted so much of my life on this it would be funny." Yes that! Although having read this thread I no longer berate myself for staying with him - I was deluded, not stupid. Just remembered another one - he would suddenly reach to grab e.g. an eyelash off my cheek and if I flinched I would get a long lecture on how it hurt him that I would flinch from someone I loved. So I used to try really hard to sit still on the offchance that he might suddenly put his hand in my face. Purely as a headgame, I realise many years later!

This is the most depressing thing I have ever read. Why are there do many abusive arse holes? They must be everywhere.

I wish there was a website that listed all the twats so other women could avoid them ;-)