or am I genuinely causing his reactions and over reacting?
I don't know where to start really. Me and my boyfriend have been together for a number of years and I think he may be emotionally abusive. Stupidly, my friends have been mentioning it from time to time for the past yer and a half but I thought they might just be over reacting but I looked the other day to find out the criteria for an emotional abuser and he fits almost every point. He controls what I do, he looks through my phone in what he now likes to call his 'weekly checks,' he says some disgusting stuff when he gets angry (fat, ugly, slag, c*nt, disgrace etc) and the list goes on.
I see how, if that was my friends relationship, I would call it abusive but I genuinely worry that how I've behaved during this relationship makes his behaviour acceptable. Before we were officially together I met up with an ex-fling late at night and he found out and now accuses me (almost 3 years on) of lying to him and saying that we must have had sex or at the very least kissed. I've then danced on a night out with a guy, which I shouldn't have done and I apologised (I know it doesn't make it better) but he still brings that up. I work in a male dominated field and he hates that I have male friends at work and accuses me of fancying them or wanting to sleep with them. The worst thing I did was lie to him about booking a hotel room with one of my friends at work for a conference. He didn't want me sharing the room but both me and her were fine with it and it meant the room was half price essentially. I shouldn't have done it but I felt so guilty and told him the day after and made me message the girl to say I couldn't share.
I just feel like I'm trapped staying with him because I'm not allowed to go see my friends sometimes. He doesn't like my best friend because he thinks she's a slag so he threatened to break up with me if I didn't agree to see her less than once every 2 months. Today I told him I'm going to the pub tomorrow with some of my work colleagues and he told me outright that I'm not allowed to go and he wouldn't come visit me if I didn't say I wouldn't go. I held strong for a few hours demanding a reason for why I couldn't go and what was so wrong about it and he couldn't give me an answer but I caved and said I wasn't going but he then got pissy that I said I would go to the gym with the colleagues (1 girl & 2guys.) He called me a 'goddamn slag' because the guys would be there too.
I just don't know if I have a bad moral compass and deserve this or if it's irrational of him and it's abusive?