Completely bewildered by partners odd behaviour

[Mischiefofmice]

My partner lives with me and is normally very loving and kind and we get on really well. However every so often he acts in the most startling way. Take this evening, we are going on a trip in just over 2 months and they need proof of our vaccinations so I downloaded the NHS app earlier and suggested I do his tonight on his phone ( he gets impatient at IT and I can usually muddle my way thro it).
Job done and I asked him to check to see if it had been approved and simply said we can’t get on the trip without it. Which is true. I said it as it’s a matter of fact , I’m not stressed or worried in any way, but seeing as I’m doing all the organising I just wanted to tick it off the list ( there’s quite a lot of admin involved and 2 months will come round quick and I need to be organised with it) . It was just a completely normal conversation that would have been impossible to take umbrage at.
Except he did, went wild, shouting and ranting at me that I’m over the top and worrying and treating him like a child. Eh! The more calmly I explained I wasn’t worried the tried to defend myself the nastier he got. This happens every few months. It’s SO over the top, I wish it was recorded so I could play it back to him. It’s goes from nothing to 100% nasty in seconds and I’m left baffled.
He projects onto me and tells me that it’s my fault, I cause it, I’m mad, todaywhen I tried to reason and calm him I got told to shut my fucking mouth. He threw his specs across the floor and stormed off in his car.
Meanwhile I’m left dazed thinking what the hell happened then.
5 minutes later he’s back as if nothings happened but I’m not aloud to speak . I tried to calmly say I didn’t think being told to shut my fucking mouth was respectable or nice. His response was he wasn’t listening and every time I tried to say anything he just talked over me and put his fingers in his ears. Every time.
If it wasn’t so nasty his behaviour would be comical. Tomorrow he will be back to normal and I’ll just be expected to be my normal self but every time he does it , it makes me love and trust him less. It’s just so extreme.

Please don’t think there is anything wrong with you. You need space after the abuse has stopped to think things through, see things you didn’t notice before about how he was passive-aggressively abusing you. People just see the image he wants them to see, but he’s not nice, he’s an asshole. My late husband was a very bad person, off the scale psycho, but his workplace described him as a ‘gentleman’. They didn’t know he had been paying prostitutes for 22 years out of a 24 year marriage, was financially and emotionally abusive and the police were aware of the domestic violence in the house. When he died the police said I was lucky he didn’t take me with him. His family of course think I’m to blame, because they are all assholes like he was, drunks, drug addicts and grifters, but each think the other is a ‘nice’ person. So I maintain no contact. OP be glad you dodged a bullet.

Just RTFT - my bf is currently going through a divorce from her dh who sounds scarily similar to your dp (complete narc)

Your comment that "everyone thinks he's a great guy" stood out to me bc as it turns out, with my bf's stbxh, actually she just thought everyone thought he was a good guy when actually everyone thinks he's a complete and utter arse and we were all just biting their tongues for her sake and to try and keep the peace. Turns out her family and friends really can't stand him at all and his family have put on a big show of being supportive to him and painting my bf as the one in the wrong - which is typical behaviour from them - they love to slag others off and never accept responsibility for their own actions - which is obvs the reason STBXH is the way he is. He hated his family and slagged them off/said he had an abusive childhood to my bf, but ironically they are now all he has to turn to. So I wouldn't be worrying about what your ex's family think at all - they don't matter as they aren't going to feature in your life any more!

My bf is slowly realising how bad/abnormal her relationship was (she too made comments when they first split about how he was so good in other ways). She's finally realising how dysfunctional and messed up he is.

How old he is ? I bet there are family members who know exactly what he is like, but for various reasons keep quiet. I suspect he has other failed relationships as a direct result of his behaviour. It is never just you that someone treats like this, this is their modus operandi for life.

Don't go back, it will get worse not better.

So glad you are rid of him. Tell your family, they will believe you. You did the right thing and missed an ugly bullet here. Take care and steer well away from him.

Is he 14 years old?

You understand what he's doing and it's still hard to give up and move on.

But you have to.

My x 's coping mechanism was being an arsehole to me. You have to just accept that this is not what you want from life and make the leap.

Otherwise, with such understanding as you have, the next question will be ''why am I tolerating this?'' and if you have to keep asking yourself that it will erode you.

Unless there was a hefty apology and some background of stress, I would be questioning the future of this relationship.

Oh I see the update sorry.

I know it's hard, but allow his family their distorted perception of you and run for the hills.

You're absolutely right to get the police involved, it's abuse and will likely end with you getting hurt.

There is NO reason to stay around to wait for that to happen.

You will never change him, he lacks the capacity for empathy. He doesn't care about your feelings, he sees you as there to service his needs.

Forget about his family, you weren't dating them.

And you're not alone, you have all of us behind you. We are here, any time of the day or night , to help you through this. So many of us have been through similar, sadly, and you won't find anyone here who says "oh, I put up with the way he treated me but one day he understood how much he was upsetting me and he changed". That doesn't happen. Instead, it escalates. He already knows how much he upsets you, he just doesn't care.

Do you have any real life friends you can reach out to? Maybe friends you haven't seen in a long time? Even if your family loved the person they thought he was, if you tell them behind closed doors he was threatening to you, surely they'll reassess their opinion of him?

You’ve done the right thing. Others WILL know. You know the truth, he will do it again to someone else and probably has done before. Well done for having the courage to get out.

@Mischiefofmice

Just an update, it hasn’t got any better. I have now got a donestic violence protection notice in place , it had been horrific. He maintains he is the victim and I am unstable, his family who are all nice people want nothing to do with me. It scares me how he has absolutely no remorse or guilt . As far as he is concerned it is over, none of it ever happened, he is ‘the same decent, popular, nice man ‘ he’s always been’ and it appears he is right. I regret calling the police after the last attack, I had no physical injuries to show, it won’t go anywhere, he will come out better, with the support of his large family whilst I have no one close by. I am ashamed to tell my family, as although they love me they loved him too as he is ‘so nice’. I feel very isolated and helpless. I should have taken the attack and carried on as before. I miss him to, how pathetic is that.

I know you probably regret ringing the police. But don't.

I never called the police and there were downsides to that too believe me.

Now, he has two options, either live up to the narrative that he's calm, reasonable, wronged, the victim of you.........

if you can accept his distorted perception of you and learn to live with it then his playing up the narrative of the wronged party sounds safer.

If he is stuck in a game of chess of his own making where he has to be reasonable and calm, that must be very frustrating for him!!

He wants to be the bastard he really is but now he has to live up to a reasonable nice guy persona.

Never be on your own with him.

xxxx

ps, you say he has the support of his family like that matters in some legal sense. It doesn't. The support of his family? You mean the people who have to believe his side chose him?

Accept that and relegate them, They're doing what weak people who utilise denial do.

Detach from caring what his family think.

It's not an overnight process I know but you will get there.

and his other option sorry, is to be his real self to you and jeopardise the narrative that he's mister nice guy.

So he's caught in a trap where he has to be reasonable.

If you can engineer it so that you are never alone with him, this could work for you.

If he sends you a barrage of insults reply ''i acknowledge receipt of your text''.

Sad for you but at least it sounds like you don’t have kids . He needs help for his anger management issues . Verbal abuse . If it’s happened more than once , which it has , please don’t consider staying . Fast forward 10 years and you’re on eggshells every time he triggers eg before holidays , any kids are learning “control by temper”, you’re too invested to go easily but resentful and bitter. Wishing you d picked up on the so obvious signs . Sorry.

Bi polar or drugs or an affair?
Or just plain deranged

Mischiefofmice

The thing with people like this is they can hold it together up to a point but ultimately they either explode at a family member or a friend or they do it to the next gf and the next and over time the cracks start to show.
After the 5th relationship break up people start to think either this person is crap at picking relationships or 5 gfs can’t be all out to get him.

Tell people what happened and someone will have noticed something over the years.

Saw recently a report on a guy who sounded like he could have been like your ex just 30 years older

He ended up going completely deranged and murdering his wife.

If you can’t finish with yet ,I suggest tell him , in a note , that he needs to leave for a few days/ week (if it’s your house ) or you will leave for a short time if you can’t get him out . And if he looses his temper again this will happen again . It’s a half way step . And signals this behaviour has to stop. Good luck x

He doesn’t know how to control his emotions

@Mischiefofmice you've done a very brave and sensible thing calling time on this relationship. Of course you're sad now, bad as he was you had a life together and it's hard to let that go and natural to feel low for a while. If you went back it would be worse then ever, he'd want to punish you for leaving him. Please stay strong, maybe re read all the messages from people who left and are now so much happier to give you strength. We're all cheering you on, talk to us whenever you need to and MN will try to help

Yes you miss him because he suckered you in with the love bombing, hoping to firmly ensnare you so that you would stay with him when he hit you up with the REAL him.

The violence and nastiness IS the real him. The rest is just smoke and mirrors to mesmerise you (yes, I do know the meaning of that word and am using it appropriately) into believing that he's genuinely a lovely bloke but YOU pushed him too far and he snapped, but if YOU would only behave properly then all will be well.

It Never Will.

He will get worse and worse, and every time you let it slide, it lets him push back harder next time. You don't say whether or not you have kids - for the love of everything holy, do NOT get pregnant to him as he will then believe he truly Has you and will really show you who he is, instead of the snippets you've seen so far.

You've already been walking on eggshells enough with this one. I know it'll hurt, but think of it like amputating a diseased limb. You don't really want to lose that limb, but if you don't, it will kill you, therefore amputation is the ONLY good option.

Please block him and any of his family who are still in contact and fgs TELL your friend and family that, while he might have appeared to be Mr Wonderful, he was an abusive bastard. More people are starting to realise that abuse isn't just limited to physical bashing - and hopefully your parents and friends will realise it too.
If your mum is of the persuasion that "any man is better than none" then she will not be any useful support to you. But she should still know - and then YOU will know if she has your back or not.

Please please please stay away from him - do NOT go back - if you do, it will just add to his violence because he will know that he can get away with it.

OP, I've been in an abusive relationship. And I was devastated when he dumped me. It takes some time, as in your head you still mostly remember the good parts, and he has made you believe the bad ones were caused by you. And if you only behaved 'correctly', they wouldn't happen. Which is of course not true, you would be walking on eggshells for the rest of your life, his outbursts getting worse and worse.

And I thought as well, that everybody liked him and thought he was an amazing guy. But like a previous poster said - turned out all my friends hated him, had just kept quiet as I always defended him. And his own family was not surprised either.

Sorry just saw up date . So relieved you’re out.
There are many support groups out there, Phone them . Do tell someone in your family , they will love you more than you think . Xx

@Guavafish

He doesn’t know how to control his emotions

Yes, he does. He hasn't behaved like that in front of the police or all these people who believe him, has he? These abusers know exactly what they're doing, it's deliberate.

That's how the abuse started in my marriage. None of it is a coincidence. Give it 18 months and you'll be rehearsing sentences before you speak.

Except he did, went wild, shouting and ranting at me that I’m over the top and worrying and treating him like a child. Eh! The more calmly I explained I wasn’t worried the tried to defend myself the nastier he got. This happens every few months. It’s SO over the top, I wish it was recorded so I could play it back to him. It’s goes from nothing to 100% nasty in seconds and I’m left baffled you probably should have left the first time it happened as it sounds unpredictable and out of control. You have done the right thing to finish the relationship - spend some time alone and read up on the things you have been told about here. You will stop missing him, and you can meet the perfect person for you, who will not ever tell you to shut your f*ckinng mouth or throw things at you.

However, nothing to do with and not excusing him losing his temper and being awful to you, you said you "needed" to do his form - you didn't need to, you wanted to, and you did his without checking with him first. If my partner did that to me I would be annoyed - I wouldn't lose my shit but I would be really annoyed and it might make me rethink the relationship. Also when you see someone is really angry it is worth putting some space between you and them until they have calmed down and you have thought about why they are acting like that, rather than trying to reason with them. You may have then decided that enough was enough for you and that you had to walk away.

But none of this excuses his behaviour, he seems to have some serious anger and self control issues.