Support thread for those in Emotionally Abusive Relationships 30

[CharlotteCollins]

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!!

Should I delete them?

That's up to yourself Madi, whatever you need to do to feel safe.
Would he look for you on Mumsnet? Are you using Incognito browsing (or similar, if not using Chrome), which means your history isn't saved? I used that all the time when with my FW.

Na I clear my history he don't even think I can use internet that good!

I was here a loooong time ago, under a different name. But I remember so many of you - Charlotte, mink, nini to name but a few.

I left my H, but then went back and was so embarrassed and scared of people saying I told you so that I didn't come back again.

With me, things are better than they were, but a long way from good. Maybe FWs really can never change, even when they appear to do so.

I don't think I'll be as frequent a visitor as before but I hope I will see how you all are doing.

I've missed you all.

PS I was a freezer based confectionary

Hmmm... I've been here quite awhile, but can't place the name. But then I know very little about freezer based confectionary. Although now, of course, I want ice cream.

Please don't be embarrassed - nobody here is going to say I told you so. We're all painfully aware that people often leave or separate numerous times before a final split. Loads of us have certainly done it, myself included.

I think they rarely change, to be honest. So sorry that you're struggling with your FW. Please don't feel you can't post - everyone's input is valuable.

The problem is that I'm not sure I want to split again. I want it to all work out, to wake up and be out of this nightmare, but I'm not sure there can be a happy ending and I don't want to wake up and find my life has gone and I've wasted the best years.

Sorry, being melodramatic. Had too much

Thanks for your kind words alice . I think I'm disappointed in myself and then am projecting that on myself from every one else.

hi.. i wish i could recall your name too fox as alll i'm thinking about is ice-cream now too!

there is a quite shocking average of something like 11 atempts at leaving.

The point of coming here is for the support, regardless. No matter what your situation if you need the support then its all that matters. I certainly couldnt judge anyone for going back! but certainly understand how it can make you feel. the main thing is you came back here .. welcome again

Thanks sugar that's really nice. I've just had this stupid thought for the past year that I've let everyone down and that somehow they'll all be thinking that I'm deluded for going back. I genuinely 100% with all my heart thought things would be different. That he was the one in a million that could change

its what has kept us there.. Hopes and dreams lovely.. We've all had them. you have enough to deal with day to day without worrying about that.

heelllloooo!! Fox freezer confectionary!

back. Hellooo :)

• at freezer-based confectionery. I should coco(nut). Am I on the right lines? I've wondered how you were for ages. You shouldn't have felt embarrassed - I went back and forth so much with FW. I was so invested in the fantasy of what it could be like if he'd just blimmin well sort himself out that it was really hard to detach from that. It's part of the process. How are things now? Is there ongoing verbal/emotional abuse, are you still on eggshells? How's DD?

How are things with you, Alice?

pony oh, I'm personally okay. Lots of upheavals, but it's not FW related. He is living in cloud cuckoo land IMO, as he now has a NEW girlfriend, who apparently has children the same age as ours, and he's going to move abroad to live with her in a couple months. I can't even be arsed to care. He's not seeing the dcs (they're not a priority in his life obviously) - has only seen them for a few hours in November, and then not since August. Not even bothered to see how they are. Not paying maintenance since last year.

As far as I'm concerned, the sooner he moves abroad and pisses off to a new life forever, the better. Dcs don't seem to be fussed either. They don't know where he is or what he is doing, as I don't want them to feel horrible that he's basically abandoned them, especially not to play daddy to someone else's kids. Twat.

pony and how are you?

I think the detaching is so hard. You spend all that time invested in their lives and trying to make them see that what they're doing is not only destroying you and the dcs, but themselves as well. But they don't care. I still get angry sometimes at how shitty he has treated the dcs, but I remind myself that they're better off away from him if he's going to treat them that way. Once the abuse got physical that really steeled my resolve, but they still sometimes can get in your head anyway.

I haven't seen CurtWild in quite some time. Is she okay?

Spot on pony :) Things are better but a long way off right. With DD things are much better - he is a good Dad I would say now. Kind and genuinely loves her. Walking on eggshells a bit. I/we have been quite open with a few people at the church we go to, and it is true that silence is the great enabler. Some of the things that I wouldn't have dared stand up to are better now that there are people supporting me and behind me telling him that he is wrong. The issues now are less that I feel isolated and frightened but more that he seems unable to change some of his opinions even though other people that are 'neutral' have said that he is out of order, and that he feels judged and unfair that he is the one needing to change, which kind of says to me that he thinks he is right.

That has come out really jumbled. Hope it makes sense.

Still catching up with others. alice I think I might remember you. Were you here 18months ago? I have to admit that the sooner a FW leaves the country the better. Are things ok with you pony?

I should coco

its good to hear you are getting so strong Fox

I could only dream of your situation with FW out of the picture Alice its very odd isn't it! It hurts bad either way it seems

Hi all how was your day,went out early today with my sis and kids came home gone out!doing he's own thing like a single man typical.

Fox that still sounds hard. Glad it's better though. What would you like to see happen, what changes would you like to see (in him, or in the general way of things)?
Things are good with me - DS sees FW once a week, no overnights yet. (thank god) There have been some ups and downs but (for now) it's mostly civil. Divorce is proceeding. We have a lovely new house (bought! get me!) and I have a 'proper' job now which I love. Life isn't perfect but it's good.

Alice, can completely understand what you mean - for your FW to only have seen his kids twice in six months, it beggars belief.

Madi better out and away from you. Just be safe for when he comes home later.

I'd noticed there had been nothing from Curt in a while too. Hope she is ok.

pony yes, and I am pretty sure that he has told all and sundry that I'm "keeping the kids from him"... when that is utterly untrue. I offered to take them over to visit him and MIL on Christmas Eve and he said no. (MIL was very irritated with him about it). His new gf and her kids are priority (just like his last gf). I'm not fussed for me, mind you, but while the dcs are oblivious to it at the moment, when they're older, it's going to really upset them. That's what makes me angry. Other than that, yeah, I just don't care.

Ah they all lie Alice - I'm sure untold lies are being told about me to FW's girlfriend and others about me. I know some of the lies about why we split, but not the recent ones. I imagine I'm the big bad ex-wife who wont let him have his son overnight. (He doesn't want his son overnight cos it will cramp his lifestyle, so he's not pushing for it, but they are not to know that.)
FWs miss out, but really it's the children that suffer. But the hard realisation about one of their parents is less of a problem than the alternative.

its a trait of abusers to completely slate their dcs DM. I guess they would have to, otherwise what else could explain why we wouldnt want to be with them, because they are sooo fantastic after all? It could only be because we are total nuts right, and abusive and just simply hell and they are saints because they managed to stop themselves from killing us!

Well that would be about the size of the lies that FW has been spreading about me, and all my intimate details too.. just lovely. I had some girl screaming them at me in the street (thought, ooops.. i've turned the wrong corner and walked onto the stage of Jeremy Kyle). But no, pinched myself, i was awake and this was actually really happening in broad daylight for no apparent reason that she wanted to shout crap at me. This told me everything i needed to know about FW and lies. Its cringing to have all your intimate stuff shouted in the street and exposed for all the world (well the people you know in the area) to comment or speak about. So, I know he's crap and he's a BFLiar, and have to build shields.

So, he's been gone a week now, it all seems to be real.

I'm gonna talk to the kids this morning trying to think of the best way, i know my DD will get upset, he wanted to speak to them together but he keeps saying he will come over then never does, so I'm gonna just do it myself so they have some time to digest before they have to go to school tommorow.

Any advice on this?

i remember having to do this Bizkit

maybe you have already spoken to them. I just said simply that he will be staying somewhere else, but will be over during the week to do family things with them (that, btw, didn't work out for very long, but it gave DC a sense of normality for a bit).

It wasn't really until i started actually physically moving stuff out of FWs that it hit really bad because DC saw these things as ours and that he shouldn't have them because he never had anything to do with us and these homely things! they know how they feel! even if they don't understand it all. At that point they did get the separation fully and it was kind of delayed but provided opportunity to ask anything.

Great news Bizkit - keep it simple, and just be as truthful as you feel you can (without slating him), and it depends on how much they already know, eg having seen/heard stuff. Something short and gentle to start with, and let them ask a few questions. Don't be afraid to let them see you a little emotional, and don't be afraid to say 'I don't know' to a question. I'm sure you'll be fine, you are not going to go wrong as long as you let them know you love them and are there for them. Hope it goes ok.