Domestic Abuse - Why Do Women Put Up With It?

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I don't usually read the Mirror, this story of a mother of 8, has really made me upset.

www.mirror.co.uk/news/real-life-stories/mum-eight-beaten-death-paving-22504713?utm_source=mirror_newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_content=EM_Mirror_Nletter_DailyNews_News_smallteaser_Image_Story&utm_campaign=daily_newsletter&ccid=397482

I'm so sorry, your battle is far from over.

Please trust your instincts to keep yourself safe. Please don't feel guilty or consider that you aren't enough.

Being brave enough to leave safely is teaching your kids that life can be different. X

What? Think of it as yours. Your house.

Mentally, imagine it, without cameras, you sitting in it without him. New life.

Yes it can happen if you go for it.

@Fightingback16 get it rented out or on the market, you don't want him knowing where you live and you need somewhere that is inherently safe - ask the police but that involves not having easy ways in or out amongst other things. Stamp duty is lower so a good time to do it.

Interesting he's got it cctved up. He's got a pretty dark mind, especially considering he's the perpetrator. He clearly has a degree of fear about what you or someone connected with you will do. Good.

But don't stay in it - get it on the market ASAP. Yes you will lose some money but it will be worth it. Just go for extra on the divorce settlement. And don't forget his pension!

I was told the cctv was a symbol that he sees the house as his. The house was actually my mums family home so although we now jointly own it as we bought it from my mum and dad (half price) it is odd that he won’t bloody leave!

I’ve been abused for 37 years, first my mum and then my husband. I’m adamant it will stop now. Lots of work ahead.

@Fightingback16

Its because he knows that it means something to you. He would probably rather burn it to the ground than let you have it.

I don't envy, you. I'm not sure i would want to aggravate a monster who is allowed to see my kids either.

In fact, I know that I wouldn't, because I lived that fear.

Do you have good support?

Damn right. Fucking cunt. There are ways to get to him - & I think you would probably be willing to do what you needed to. Unbelievable that hes taken your Mums home, there are no levels these people wont sink to.

If it were me I would be looking to get someone very large & very angry to keep in touch with him. Its amazing how being terrified changes these people.

You know I have just had a quick look for ways women can protect themselves against DV. And all I can find is ways for them to run away from it.

The only thing I know about (from an army ex) is Krav Maga which can be hard core but takes time to learn. You could probably get lessons that are less focused on 'self defence' & more focused on how to disable him.
www.kravmaga.com/krav-maga-why-its-the-best-self-defense-for-women/

@EvelynBeatrice

I hasten to add that this is in no way intended to be victim blaming. It is clear where the blame lies. I’m just interested in trying to understand what has happened mentally to some women and if and what in society is conditioning them to end up in this awful trap. Are women being set up from childhood to be vulnerable to abuse? “Be nice” etc messages.

I was emotionally and physically abused as a child.

He groomed me.

His lasting words to me and it haunts me were “I will make you suffer, you had better watch yourself. If you bring any lawyers into this I will take you both down, I don’t care if I go to jail as you have ruined my life”. I hate the silence now, it worries me. But if I walk away I will loose a lot including half the house my dad gave me. Why should he get it, he doesn’t care about it, it looks terrible, the weed are a meter high out the front.

But then I’m terrified that if he does have to leave it and sign it over he will then decide to go to court for contact and make me suffer via our daughter. The last time he had her she was taken to hospital via ambulance.

@Fightingback16

But then I’m terrified that if he does have to leave it and sign it over he will then decide to go to court for contact and make me suffer via our daughter. The last time he had her she was taken to hospital via ambulance.

Ok, how old is your youngest with him, and what does your instinct tell you is the right course of action right now? Not your fear, not your wanting it to be over sadly it doesnt work like that but your instinct - based on years of knowing him?

She is 4 and I don’t know what to think anymore. I was completely brainwashed so I really feel nothing but fear towards him. In my marac assessment last year I think I scored 20. I truly believed he loved her and I’m struggling to come to terms and work through all of the gaslighting. He is a former drug addict, self harming, criminal record in his home country, very angry man. I was told by my support worker my fawn type response built up from childhood probably saved me from being severely hurt. He is unpredictable but I feel scared, I dream about it. I used to say to him after arguments that your eyes looked like they wanted to kill me, that’s what stays with me.

He came to my door before lockdown, banging and shouting (I called the police) he stood outside the window and shouted “when this divorce is over I will do anything to take my daughter away from you”. Was it just a threat or real...I don’t know.

@Fightingback16

You do know. That is the problem. You know he means you harm. If he cannot harm you, he will harm her.

Do you have any support?

He sounds dangerous. However he is also not bothering to hide it. The police should set you up with a panic alarm & I know they have a personal one too - you probably know this but then you are on a register & if he comes anywhere near you they will get to you. Assuming you have a non mol order?

Get the house, get it covered in your own CCTV, & sorted, & put it on the market. And move away where he cant contact you.

In the meantime he will say everything & anything. You cant & wont hand your daughter over & so this all becomes 'not an option'. Hes not going to tip over the edge over the house if he hasnt your daughter. You arent going to get him off your back by giving him your house & keeping your daughter so whatever way this goes you are in this. You have done a fantastic job & now is not the time to doubt yourself.

You may think you are escalating, but that ship has sailed. Theres a trail of evidence & previous behaviour. Keep calling the police, & get recordings of him threatening you (a crime!) & then move. They do get bored & move on.

😬

I have the support remotely from our local DV charity, but they can’t really do much. All the real support I have is if he comes them call the police. Not much help really when it can be over before you know it.

didn't the police or anyone refer you to Social Services.

My experience was hard but the outcome was positive. For now. He will never move on. Ever. I know this.

@EvelynBeatrice, in my experience he picked on my weaknesses. He new how to hurt me and did it repeatedly. At times I did get angry and stand up for myself but this would be used as an excuse for him to get angry and to start physically intimidating. So I either shut up or tried to get him to see how he was being unfair which would result in him hitting me to shut me up. Afterwards I was not allowed to be on my own incase I tried to leave and the times I did mange to get away he would hunt me down and the fear was sufficating. He would go to my friends houses and some did lie and others would tell him to just leave me and calm down. He would go as he knew where I was and then come at me from another angle saying he loved me so much and just to come home so we could talk about it etc and in the end I would do it as I couldn't stay at the other people's houses and I couldn't see no end to it. I once left and went into a local refuge. The worker collected me and my son from the end of the road after he had gone out and dropped me off and that was all the support I got. The refuge was unstaffed most of the time, no one talked to me about what I could do to get my own accommodation or if I needed counselling. One of the staff was a prison officer and knew him from prison, she was the one I met before they had a room for me and she encouraged me to leave as she thought he might kill me but they still did not provide any emotional or practical support. I was 21 years old and had been getting abused by him for 5 years and at this point once the initial terror had gone away I would start feeling alone and lost and would crave the feelings I had with him when I was feeling happy. It sounds mad, but the only way I can explain it is to say it's like an addiction. You blank out the bad shit in the hope of good feelings. When I fell pregnant for the second time, I left him and moved back to where I was from and had my mum and some other family as support and that helped break some of the control he had over me but he still lived in my head, I still thought that he really loved me so I let him still be a part of our lives and after 18 months let him move in with me. During this time he had still been abusive but not like it had previously been. Once he did move in, the abuse started again and he knew that i would hide it as everyone hated him and I was trying so hard to make people think I was right to give him another chance that I trapped myself. It's so complicated and messed up that it's hard to explain exactly why women stay with these type of men.

Fightingback16

I know just what you mean and I can see why you are taking the measures you are taking. I can see that you're trying to remain alive.

Have you ever tried to employ grey rock? Make yourself very, very very boring, whilst still being (only seemingly) agreeable and non-threatening? The goal is basically to make him so very bored that he'll wander off to find someone more interesting to torture. It's not a stand alone option, but it's an option to think about using, amongst other things.

@PicsInRed I have not engaged with him since mid December when I tried to find out why he brought our daughter home mid allergic reaction and did nothing to help her. His counter argument was that I put ham in her sandwich and I was a stupid Fucking mother who was trying to give her cancer with the ham. From then I stopped all contact and have only responded very formal through the solicitor. Social services have stepped back because they are happy that contact has ceased. It’s in his court to apply and defend himself as being a capable father. I tried to get there support because he was smoking weed but they weren’t interested. He has tried multiple attempts to stop me applying for financial proceedings, lots of begging, the emails get forwarded to my solicitor. He is getting no reaction from me at all.
Tomorrow our form E’s are supposed to be lodged with the court and sent to each other’s solicitor. Mine is ready to go but my lawyer can’t get a response from him. I know he won’t do it.

Fightingback16

It sounds like you're employing grey rock already and doing an excellent job of it under exceptionally trying circumstances.

Christ, these men are frustrating and terrifying in equal measure. Ham cancer. Golden twat that he is.

It was just a tactic he always used to get me confused and focused on what shit he was saying and not what he has actually done. Another example, me asking him why he dropped his coffee on the floor and walked off, his response to go and get our daughters toothbrush and tell me how bad a mother I am for using a dirty toothbrush. And I lived like this, and people ask why do we put up with it...... leaving is in a way harder. When I was there I had some control because he wanted to keep me there, he used restraint not to scare me off....now the mask has slipped and he doesn’t have to pretend to like me anymore, he knows I know who he is.

@Fightingback16 He has tried multiple attempts to stop me applying for financial proceedings, lots of begging, the emails get forwarded to my solicitor. He is getting no reaction from me at all.

Excellent. you have found his weak spot. He wont do it - but then the courts come down pretty hard on people who refuse. DO NOT STOP. You are nearly there.