Trauma bonding

[Missmadge]

Hi all,I’m new here and tbh barely holding it together.Long story short I was with my ex for two years,we don’t live together or share children but it was toxic from about 4 weeks in,he grabbed my face so bad he bruised me but said he never hit me so alls good.fast forward to Saturday and he beat me severely in the street after losing it because I dared question him on something.people stood and watched and he simply walked away and left me there.I fled and heard nothing since.im in absolute pieces because he hasn’t tried to contact me but why do I care about the vile piece of shit.Im sat here broken inside and out crying over this loser who made false promises and lied over and over and in my shame I’ve tried to text and ring him and it’s him blanking me,what the hell is wrong with me?? I hate myself for being so weak but I’m obsessing over what he’s doing and with who,I’m a mess xxx

Be very careful. Not sure if I’m mid reading your post but you say he’s been arrested recently for breaching the restraining order.

He could easily show the police and his solicitor your text messages and phone call logs to prove you were contacting him.

This would be in mitigation

That info would be on the way to your SW or it will be at your next core group meeting.

Like I say these types will sell you out. You’d be surprised what the police know and the intel afforded to CP investigations.

Is it domestic abuse and substance misuse?

Is it emotional abuse?

The categories?

They will take the kids. Don’t think that this is just a paperwork exercise. He ain’t important. Don’t take your kids for granted. All it takes is one call to SW and they can act. They just need to believe there’s a risk and they have the power.

Nobody is important to him. He is dysfunctional and sadly always will be. Yeah he might mellow when he’s in his 60s but other than that he’s a risk to women and kids everywhere.

Not least because he batters women, uses illicit substances, does not care about the emotional welfare of the children in his care

This is because he isn’t capable of putting anyone’s needs above his own. He was never taught vital skills growing up and they don’t just magically appear one day.

His priority is survival and instant gratification.

Sure he can love but his view of love has been tainted by his own experiences as a child.

Don’t do that to your kids

Your life reads like the plot of a Martina Cole novel. Now you can write a happy ending, free of the lowlife filth you seem addicted to. Give your DC the greatest gift - a loving, caring mum who doesn't associate with drug dealers, doesn't get beaten up, and doesn't put them at risk of being put into care or orphaned out of your need for a fix of cortisol and dopamine - which is what trauma bonding is.

That’s so true he grew up watching various men beat his alcoholic mother,and now he givers her a “slap” when she’s too drunk he only knows violence and hasn’t kids of his own so he’s a very selfish immature 27yr old,he has no social skills really after spending ten years in and out of prison,I’m his first serious girlfriend and his own mother warned me off him

Sorry had to lol at martina Cole novel ironically I read and love all her books,I blame Martina.seriously though I don’t want him back I want him to want me back and to show me he’ll fight for me when really he’s too stoned to give a shit,

You're making yourself sound worse with every post OP.

But if he did come to you and say he wanted you was sorry loved you etc. You would find it hard to say no. You know it. We know it. You need to work out how to sort yourself out so if that ever happens you do say no

Yes he was arrested Sunday for breaching it in July after I reported him for threatening texts,wether it will go to court I don’t know but he’s being clever because he text me off another’s ohine number so I presume he’s got rid of his old one as the police took photos of the texts?

It’s an ego thing I want him to give a shit then ideally I’d like him locked up for a couple of years and out of my head,I know it won’t happen but he’s said goodbye and left it and I certainly won’t try contacting him so it’s done

You grew up in an abusive home as a child.
It is known that when a parent is abusive to a child (which your Dad was, by beating your mum) the child often end up craving that parent's love, (because developmentally children need love from their parents) and seeking to attach with the abusive parent more, and the child often has an internal sense of there being something wrong with them that has caused the parent to behave like that, and if only they can be better/do something better/please their parent better the parent will love them more.

Does that resonate for you, OP?

Subconsciously the anxious attachment you had with your Dad may be playing out in your relationship with your ex. He was abusive to you but internally you may have translated that as 'if I love him more/be better he will love me more and stop abusing me'. You crave his love as you did your fathers? The themes that happened in your childhood may be playing out here.

Try to take a step back and some distance, think about your emotional responses and think if they relate to your childhood experiences. Try to understand that you need to step back from the intensity of your feelings and apply a more rational mind. When you are in the grip of your emotions switch your phone off so that you don't text him, use grounding techniques (google them) to cope with strong feelings until they pass. Keep your children in the front of your mind and the fact that they will be removed if you have contact with him. Keep in mind how devastating it would be for your children and for you if they are removed.

Take it one day at a time and keep managing your emotions and keep away from him.
Seek therapy. You need to break this cycle long term. If your childhood has affected you then you need therapy to process that and find better ways of coping with relationships and emotions.

Every time you feel tempted to contact him read and re-read this thread.
Tell people in real life who can support you with this - friends, family.

Well then you are in bother if they took his phone on Sunday because that will have texts on from you?

I have been tempted to contact him but I haven’t,what you say does resonate because I adored my dad and craved his approval even into adulthood,he died when I wasn’t 26 and it destroyed me but I always remember feeling confused about where I stood with my dad as a kid because his morals were all over the place so I never had a real rigid structure of right and wrong for example my dad would actively encourage me to fight and stand up for myself,to steal from shops he had a wicked violent temper and would smash things up.Then again if we swore he would erupt,if I had a tantrum and smashed things he’d go mad,he once withheld contact with me for a full year at the age of 14 literally would not say a word to me for a full year and we lived in the same house because I stole a tenner out his wallet.It fucked me up big time

shit maybe they have got his phone

Unless he managed to delete them all? Obviously the police will have looked through it given the reason for his arrest

He’s done you a massive favour with the goodbye farewell thing.

If he was released surely they give you your things back don’t they?

I’ve just read about your dad.

Op can you not understand why SW remove kids from dysfunctional people? It’s because they go on to corrupt their own kids

Their kids grown up and can’t function properly. They use drugs, turn to drink or fail education suffer with mental health problems etc

The ss try to break the cycle

But more often than not they can’t

No they don’t they get kept as evidence. Especially phones and money that can’t be accounted for.

Believe me on a restraining order for sending your texts of course they are going to have seized his phone! They’ll want to look on their for evidence for a start

It depends if he had it on him though

Of course I understand,I am fucked up big time but my feelings are real,I know what’s right it’s just hard sticking to it.I will not get back with him I just can’t accept it’s not hurting him and he isn’t itching to contact me

Thing with his drug phone it’s a cheap throwaway that holds 50 messages tops all the ones he sent will have long gone but the police did take photos of the ones on my phone at the time.I think he’ll just get a slap on the wrists for breaching it however he is on licence for two years so who knows

What’s he on licence for ?

Probably drug and violent offfences

He might miss you he might not.

Why you looking back? Is that the direction you are going in?

He was on licence for the exact thing u aid above when I met him,that ended but after he assaulted me in April he pleaded guilty and was given a further two years on licence

I keep seeing flashes of light out my eye do I think this could be anything to do with being beaten round the head? Think I need to see opthamologist

Missmadge - congratulations to your ds. That's a fabulous result.

Congratulations to you, too, for turning a corner. What your ex did on Saturday was unforgiveable and hopefully you can hang onto the memory of that beating to remind yourself, in weaker moments, what he is really life. As they say - when someone tells you who they are, believe them.

You can do the Freedom Programme online for just £10. You don't have to wait until September. Google it. You could then do it again with other people, which would provide you with an extra support group, but do look at getting started before then. You need support now.

I will not get back with him I just can’t accept it’s not hurting him and he isn’t itching to contact me If he isn't itching to contact you, and isn't hurting, it's because he isn't capable of loving someone in the way that you are. I can understand exactly how you feel, having once been very much in love with someone who was utterly emotionally damaged. I would have walked through fire for him, but in the end I walked away. It was the hardest thing I have ever done, and I took far too long to do it, but like you, I reached a point where I finally saw that he was never going to be the person I thought he was. It took a lot of discipline - I moved right away, changed job and home - and started again, and gradually, bit by bit, things became easier and I thought about him less and less. You can do this. Your dcs will thank you for it - and you will thank yourself too, one day.