Thoughts Please - Am I losing the plot or is he reverting to type?

[onestepahead]

I have been with DP for 12+ years. There is history of him being emotionally abusive (for context this was severe, also involved money and for me had lasting consequences). Around 7 years ago all came to a head and we separated. A year or so later we regained contact and he spoke at length about how sorry he was, attributed the EA to his unmanaged mental health issues and lifelong difficulty with self identity and told me that if I was to give him one more chance he would spend the rest of his life demonstrating that he was no longer that person... you get the general idea. Needless to say he was fairly convincing.

Now, we are 5 years on and whilst he has undoubtedly done some work on himself and is to an extent outwardly unrecognisable from the person he was in those early days - and I have put a lot of effort in to the relationship, and trusting him, I am beginning to get the sense of an undercurrent.

Todays example has left me questioning various events of the past few years and feeling very uneasy. However I am not sure if at this point I am over analysing. I am sure that written down this is going to look ridiculous but please bear with me.

I had left a sandwich in the fridge for DP to take to work. I was going to put something else on it (as it needed using up). He is stood next to me as I open the fridge. The sandwich has gone. I am having a look to check it hasn't moved and he makes a point of noting what I am doing. I ask him if he has seen/ moved/ eaten the sandwich. He says, no, what sandwich. I explain that I had left one in the fridge. He looks bemused and assures me that he has not seen it. I have been unwell with pain and for a second actually wondered if I was imagining having made the sandwich. I calmly said, well it was there and now it is not so you must have seen it. I walk away into another room and after a moment he says that the sandwich is in his bag and follows this up with a laugh and ' your face then'.

I stay in another room and before he leaves for work he comes to say goodbye and tells me he hasn't woken up yet. My internal response was that he was still awake enough to play mind games. Am I losing it?

Just thinking it might be worth revisiting the section on abusers changing, it's a bleak read but might reassure you you're not insane for holding out for so long.

It's really good that you are able to just leave. Get your stuff together, get a mail redirection order, and just go.

Can you stay with a friend while you're sorting out somewhere to stay longer term?

@BertieBotts yes that's a good idea. I will revisit this. I know what is going on yet still end up getting irrate and questionning myself, which just serves to make me feel more ridiculous. He is all over the place. Apparantly now I have an anger problem amongst other twisted notions. And I should be nice and remember 'all of his relationships are falling apart and nobody makes an effort with him'. And I wouldnt speak to him this way if I understood that he is depressed, but in the next breath he refers to himself as 'happy in himself'. It is not that it is simple for me to just leave. On a practical level it is not but on an emotional level I recognise that I need to do so.

I told him that we needed to separate and why. His response was that I was just upset that he had his own mind and didn't agree with me or feel how I want him to feel all the time.

Has anyone ever heard such blaitant projection.

Just reply “ok”, smile serenely and carry on with your plans to leave.

Honestly it’s not even worth engaging with him, it’s not like he’s going to have a lightbulb moment or anything. Let him be “right” if that’s what it takes.

Just leave.

Gaslighting is most frequently trivial stuff. They can't help themselves. Ok he admitted it this time but even the "reason" was a bullshit lie. Pathological liar. You never ever know which way is up with these people. Remain vigilant OP you're not over reacting, you've just been here before.

Trust me we are all painted as unstable and unwell with anger or alcohol or behaviour problems or whatever they can project on us when we start saying no. And you're entitled to be bloody angry anyway!

Projection? Oh yes:

• I was incapable of love. He is completely alone and had never even lived with someone at age 49, I had a long, successful marriage, an adult son that I get on well with and lots of friends.
• I was a total loser and a nutjob. He had nothing apart from his academic position, lived in squalor, had no friends and no interests, couldn’t drive, couldn’t cope with paying bills or running his home. I was a successful mother, wife, had a respected and successful role in a senior position, had my own car, my own home and did well at anything I chose to focus on.
• I would be better off dead. He had attempted suicide multiple times and lived as I describe above.
• I was crazy. See above.
• I would never last without him and he was the best thing to ever happen to me. See above.

@IrisAtwood I am glad your post reads was and not is. Hope you are now in a healthy place and far removed.

Your post gave me chills. I sincerely that as the law is, albeit at a snails pace catching up in respect of DV coercive control that some of these people will end up facing the deserved consequences of their actions.

@Connieston

You never ever know which way is up with these people.

Absolutely. This really resonates.

I am still here but 'living' in a separate room. Unfortunately there are not currently any 'spare rooms' to rent in the area that I need to be which are suitable i.e privately offered and in budget, so I am going to have to wait.

He has reverted to being nice. This morning we had 'so are you living in the xxx room now?' 'you are too stubborn' He then told me that he has worked it out 'we are both too stubborn that's what the problem is'.

They say ignorance is bliss.

Your answer to any and all of this is 'yep ok'

Just delete this pointless abusive waste of oxygen from your headspace. Use the headspace for YOU - sorting out financials, looking for a place to stay, focus on friendships and your own mental health.

He'll soon be history.

@FizzyGreenWater thank you, and yes I am trying to keep it that way.

I will not lie, I do wish that after everything things could have been different. That he could have stepped back and REALLY LOOKED at his own behaviour and inner workings - in the way that the rest of us realise that it is beneficial/ normal/ healthy to do. However I realise that in reality that was never going to happen.

in the way that the rest of us realise that it is beneficial/ normal/ healthy to do

He can't. He does not have the capability and he never will. He's deficient. Not even damaged. Just deficient.

You aren't, though. You can see the issues and you might be slightly on your knees right now, but you now know you've given it your best shot and you are now done, at the end of the road.

In a decade's time, he'll be repeating those patterns, and you will be long gone, happier and healthier.

@FizzyGreenWater would you say it is 'normal' for me to feel frustrated when he makes statements such as the above.

We recently had a lengthy conversation about the relationship in which I explained what I felt needed to change. During the conversation I used the word stubborn, about myself to illustrate that it is 'normal' to understand ones strengths and limitations (I can be stubborn however being aware of this I try to channel it into constructive things only and it does not feed into my relationships/ interactions. I am not obstinate stubborn, more perseverant stubborn if this makes sense). Anyway he chooses to take nothing from the rest of the conversation, but clings onto this one word and then twists it (as above), as though it is ammunition.

This has happened for years, leading me to lose respect and trust for him and feel emotionally unsafe. He just cannot see it. He says that I do not tell him anything or open up to him, but never looks at WHY? Each time I share anything remotely insightful about me or my life, or be open/vulnerable he cannot deal with it and shuts down. Either by verbally attacking and twisting the situation to be about him or by storing it up to twist into something it wasn't at a later date. Alternatively he simply seems to 'forget' that I have shared it... again resulting in him making something up which couldn't be further from the truth to explain a situation and me feeling hurt that I have bothered to 'share' something only for him to dismiss it.

I am aware that I probably sound deranged and that it isn't worth the headspace. However it does help to get it out.

I think things are worse than I had thought - or perhaps I am genuinely going mad. I am working from home today. P is out at work. I specifically asked him this morning to leave a door open so that I could have access to a room that is locked when we are both out. I asked him to do this twice, very pleasantly, to which he responded that he had heard me the first time.

I just needed to go into said room and found that he hasn't done it. The door is locked. The thought that he would not lock it crossed my mind this morning but I brushed it off.

I have also just had the realisation that the spare key to this room, which very strangely went missing a few weeks ago and he made a point of 'looking for' could well not have 'gone missing' at all.

I am visibly shaking.

Reading this back it sounds ridiculous that I am unsettled by a door being locked but I hope someone will understand what I am talking about.

I’m sorry this is happening to you. He’s obviously angry about you escaping his control and punishing you.
I have no particular advice, but I wanted to make sure you know you are heard and reaffirm that it’s him, not you.

Please get out of the house and find anyone else to stay with.

You are quite right that the room being locked and the lost key are odd. It is sinister and you know it.

You are still being decent to this man he is explicitly messing with your head to make you vulnerable. Get out, stop communicating and realise that he is thinking a lot further ahead than you.

Anyway he chooses to take nothing from the rest of the conversation, but clings onto this one word and then twists it (as above), as though it is ammunition.

My ex did this too.When he shared his history of mental illness I discussed my own depression, anxiety and insecurities with him. After that he would say ‘You’re not very well/you’re not understanding things because you are ill/ It must be so hard for you with your illness’ whenever I tried to discuss some of his behaviour, my feelings and things that I was concerned with.

He also claimed to be ‘helping me improve’ with his cruel an unflinching statements about how inadequate I was after any social occasions!

You will be surprised at how much better you feel once you are away from him.

Wow. They have the same playbook! I noticed keys missing and looked for them for ages. When I asked him he shrugged his shoulders and later admitted that he had hidden them because he didn’t trust me’!

@IrisAtwood. Blimey they're not the same person are they! Regarding the keys, did he say why he didn't trust you?

Going back to the Lundy book this man seems to have characteristics of multiple abuser 'types' that are mentioned.