I slapped my DP

[Blackisthenewwhite]

As the title says, I slapped my DP.

Back story:

I had an awful childhood, between the ages of me being 5-12 my mother was in an abusive relationship.
Every week without fail, the house would be smashed up, she was physically and mentally abused and I saw things no child should have to see - I saw her being punched & kicked multiple times, I saw her head being smashed through a window, being kicked in the belly whilst pregnant, being dragged across the floor by her hair, being strangled etc etc.
She escaped the relationship because he beat her so badly she ended up in hospital and he went to prison.

Her next relationship was not much better, it was fine for the first couple of years but then the arguments started and in the end he started hitting her. This time she left.

This affected me and I had nightmares for years I still have the odd one now.

I moved out at 18 and aged 20 I got into 10 year relationship with a lovely man, we rarely rowed, a handful of disagreements that whole time, but we decided we were no more than friends in the end and went our separate ways.

I had a couple of years to myself and I have been with my now DP for a year.

Last night we had a row, it came out of
Nowhere really - I was working late and I was really stressed and getting a bit upset,

he just made some stupid comment 'why don't you go and cry about it, grow up' I asked him to leave because I could see the argument brewing, he refused so I got
Up and I pulled his arm to get him up off the sofa to leave.
He jumped up, shouted at me and grabbed my arms, his face was full of rage, my childhood flashed before me and I honestly thought he was going to hit me, so I just slapped him across the face.

I am in no way trying to condole my actions from what happened in my childhood and I feel disgusted and ashamed.
I feel like I need to end the relationship now because I am scared incase it happens again.

My DP promised he wasn't going to hit me and I think I know deep down that he wouldn't.

I don't know what came across me, I've never once hit anyone, never had a fall out with friends, not had a confrontational argument with anyone etc.

I feel sick to my stomach and have been crying all day.

I am no better than the abusers my poor mother was with.

You felt under threat and lashed out. Not ideal but understandable. Male and female violence is not equal no matter how many on here say otherwise. He was aggressive, he is (presumably) bigger and stronger than you, he wouldn't leave your house when you asked him to and he grabbed you while full of rage. Pretty much every man can physically overpower their female partner the power dynamic is different. I doubt he was scared for his life after you hit him, as a woman would have been in that situation. Still, you need to deal with your childhood trauma and I would take a step back from this relationship until you're in a better headspace.

@MarshmallowAra I don’t think it’s wholly understandable that OP slapped him, if a man had done this to the woman I don’t think it would be wholly understandable.

OP - could you explain to your DP exactly what was going through your head when you decided to slap him and just have him see how it unfolded in your head. Let him know how apologetic you are and that you didn’t mean it. If the relationship is strong you both can come back from this. Every relationship has heated arguments and sometimes we wished we had dealt with them more rationally.

I can see you aren’t proud of your actions and remorse is a good thing x

It sounds a bit like a fight or flight type response which you can see in people who have experienced trauma where something triggers an automatic response that Is maybe not appropriate to the current circumstances.
Suggest counseling to try to reduce chances of this happening again.

Does he live in the house? Whose house is it?

If I was having a conversation with my DP which was escalated by them working late and being really stressed, and they tried to pull me off the sofa and told me to leave, I’d be cross as well. If I lived in the house, I wouldn’t leave either!

Also OP you shouldn’t have tried to physically remove him from the sofa to leave the room, instead you should have left to cool off in another room until you were calm enough.

The best way to cool down is always remove yourself if the other person insists on staying. It diffuses the matter rather than escalates it as two people who are equally stubborn will only end in disastrous situation x

In all honesty op, this isn’t great. You shouldn’t have grabbed him in the first place, he shouldn’t have grabbed you. Once things start to get physical they escalate as I’m sure you know.

I’m so sorry for your childhood experience, it sounds really traumatic and that it is still impacting your life now. My advice would be too seek counselling and at least have a break from your partner while you do that.

Hi OP you had a really abusive childhood which has affected you.
Have you ever had counselling if you feel you need it.
Do you feel you carry lots of rage?
It sounds like a one off - it is better you learn to walk away and calm down -+ then go back once you are calmer.
There is also an Alternative to Violence course which you may want to look at.
Look after yourself.
You are not a bad person.
You’ve done well to get to where you have in life given your abusive traumatic past.💐

Physical violence is a rare situation where I do feel that what's sauce for the goose is not sauce for the gander, because the impact is legitimately very different. OP's partner probably felt many things when she slapped him - angry, shocked, hurt, concerned - but it's very unlikely he felt true fear, or felt that the OP could badly physically hurt or kill him, or began to restructure his life around his fear of her violence. But in any case, a blame game doesn't really move anyone forward. It was a bad situation, no question, but IMO the next useful question is what the OP should do.

OP, you know this is bad, but retreating into a shame spiral won't help anyone either. I do suggest you take a break from the relationship, just to cool off and get back on a solid footing. No doubt your DP has feelings he needs to process too. You need to get yourself some professional support. You have a lot to process from your childhood and it's not fair or reasonable to put that on anyone who isn't a professional in this space. If you and your DP both decide that you want to continue this relationship, you need an agreed way of managing any escalations or anything that might trigger your flight or fight. A joint session with whatever therapist you end up working with might be very valuable.

Please go online now, today, and look for therapists in your area who work with childhood trauma and the aftermath of domestic violence. You can search by specialty on the BACP website. Then email two of them and ask for an intro session. It's something productive you can do with all the things you're feeling right now. Good luck.

Grabbing your arms and shouting at you is a terrible thing to do. I’m not surprised you slapped him. Your standards have been lowered by the abuse you witnessed as a child. There are plenty of men out there who won’t ever lay an aggressive hand on you. Leave the relationship.

it isn’t “wholly understandable”
you grabbed him to try pull him off the sofa then slapped him because you said he was being aggressive, by the sounds of it so were you?
you need to get help for your own trauma before anything else and im unsure why your DP is apologising when you hit him?
this dynamic sounds very red flag, there’s an element of blame toward him and instead of taking yourself out of the situation to calm down you decided to try and force him out? None of this is right at all and could be a starting point for DV.

Why did he grab your arms? What were you doing with them?

@Franklyfrost

Grabbing your arms and shouting at you is a terrible thing to do. I’m not surprised you slapped him. Your standards have been lowered by the abuse you witnessed as a child. There are plenty of men out there who won’t ever lay an aggressive hand on you. Leave the relationship.

Is this a a serious post? He grabbed her arms as she was trying to drag him off the sofa. She then slapped him.

Domestic abuse is never ok, and the fact this is woman on man doesn’t change it.

Re you are no better than your abusers - You are better than them because you know what you did was completely unacceptable and you are willing to walk away rather than risk losing control again.

You would benefit from counseling.

@Recessed

You felt under threat and lashed out. Not ideal but understandable. Male and female violence is not equal no matter how many on here say otherwise. He was aggressive, he is (presumably) bigger and stronger than you, he wouldn't leave your house when you asked him to and he grabbed you while full of rage. Pretty much every man can physically overpower their female partner the power dynamic is different. I doubt he was scared for his life after you hit him, as a woman would have been in that situation. Still, you need to deal with your childhood trauma and I would take a step back from this relationship until you're in a better headspace.

She got physical first, grabbing his arm and trying to pull him out of the chair. Don't you think the OP was full of rage when she did that? You say he got aggressive, maybe that was a reaction to being physically attacked.

He is the one who needs to take a step back from an abusive partner not the other way round.

"I have never spoken to anyone professional about my childhood. Only my current and EXdp"

You need to start talking to someone professional; neither of these men would have been able to give you the help you need.

I would suggest you contact the BACP for therapy.

I wonder if you'd all be so quick to brush it aside as just one of those things if the OP was a man?

I feel like I need to end the relationship now because I am scared incase it happens again.

I think that if you were with someone for 10 years and never had a cross word, and now you’re with this man for only a year and this has happened then yes, maybe this relationship is not right.

Why did he speak to you so dismissively in the first place? That really annoyed you. Assuming he doesn’t live with you, he should have gone when you asked him. No way should you have slapped him. The whole thing isn’t good.

@Franklyfrost

Grabbing your arms and shouting at you is a terrible thing to do. I’m not surprised you slapped him. Your standards have been lowered by the abuse you witnessed as a child. There are plenty of men out there who won’t ever lay an aggressive hand on you. Leave the relationship.

She grabbed him first by trying to get him to leave then when he reacted (not the best reaction I agree) she then slapped him. Would you be saying your not surprised to a man if it was the other way around? Domestic abuse is never OK regardless of gender.

Do you know I don’t think it matters either way who started it or whatever. The fact is that good relationships never include violence. They just don’t. My husband and I have argued and bickered plenty but neither of us has even considered raising a hand or laying a finger on the other.

If that line has been crossed then it’s not a good relationship. It doesn’t matter who’s fault it was. Just get out and start again.

I had a similar childhood OP, and I understand the urge to respond in a way that's informed by that childhood. It comes up at the weirdest times and in ways that surprise me even now - I understand finding yourself confronted with the urge to react to things in a way that you think aren't in line with your morals as an adult.

But you've crossed a line and you let yourself react, rather than rationalising that urge. It's a big line, and you need to go the GP and ask to be referred for trauma informed therapy ASAP. Unfortunately NHS funding for MH being what it is, that might be a long wait or a struggle to get, but you should keep pushing for it as long as it takes.

I also think you should take a break from your relationship in the meantime, because you need to understand that the damage your childhood did to you runs very deep and requires you to build back from baseline and the work should be done for and on you, not your relationship - what I mean is, it shouldn't be about making you right for your relationship with your partner, but giving you the skills to cope with intense emotional situations in your own right, regardless of who they're with.

If you don't want to take a break, then you need to set very very clear guidelines for yourself AND how you manage conflict in the relationship that may need to be 'enforced' by your partner if you're not able - for example if you disagree about anything, no matter how tiny it seems, set a buffer period of an hour or a day or a week before you discuss it in person. Physically remove yourself, end phone calls, leave the house, whatever. You have shown you don't have the skills yet to react appropriately when under emotional stress so you need to remove the room for you to react inappropriately.

I know I sound harsh, I don't mean to. I fully get it, the amount of times I used to flash up with white hot anger and want to physically react to seemingly tiny disagreements was horrifying and I spent a lot, a LOT, of time feeling so guilty and sick about what I wanted to do in the moment. The fact is, I never learned healthy ways to respond to conflict. It's taken me years of therapy to recognise the patterns and triggers and coping mechanisms. Good luck doing the same and I really hope you can get the support you need. ❤

You have done something unacceptable and now you need to do something about it. You owe it to your partner and yourself to make sure you get some therapy to unpick what is going on. It is for your partner to decide how he wishes to respond.

Look into working with your vagus nerve and parasympathetic system. It can make a huge difference to those of us with unprocessed trauma and overactive fight or flight responses. Lots of YouTube videos etc on the subject. Also a book called Complex PTSD: from surviving to thriving is very helpful for understanding and managing better some of adult repercussions of childhood abuse.

He has nothing to apologise for. You got physical. You grabbed him and pulled at him. That would make anyone angry. It sounds like he got up and held you, to stop your from assaulting him.i imagine the shouting was along the lines of "stop it". And you slapped him.

Your childhood trauma, as awful as it was, does not give you a free pass for abusing others.

What sort of help have you had? Have you ever tried therapy to work through what happened to you as a child? No one can get through that alone. It's still there, as you've seen because you lashed out now.

But what about the start of the fight? You were upset and stressed over work or something? And he sarcastically told you to go away and cry and to grow up?

That's not ok. Have things been tense for a while with lots of comments like that?

Maybe you both need a bit of a break from each other. He shouldnt be speaking to you in such a nasty way, you shouldnt be crying from stress. You also should never hit; there is no excuse so my comments about him being nasty and you being stressed do not negate how bad hitting your partner is.

What you did, both the grabbing and the slapping were wrong. Not on a level with your DMs partners, but something that needs to be addressed quickly so that things don't escalate. If it happens again you need to walk away from this relationship until you've started addressing the trauma to the extent that you're no longer hitting out.

It's very possible you have something like Complex PTSD as a result of trauma. I'm not sure agreeing not to touch each other in anger would be useful. I mean it should a ground rule but I doubt it would be enough. I'd suggest adding a safe word too. A word that if either of you use the other person will drop the issue and let them leave the room on their own. Most importantly you need to seek help for this now. Don't put it off. See your GP the first appointment you can get and get referred to see a psychologist for your trauma. If you can afford this privately, even if its a stretch go private. You can't fix this by trying harder to bury how you feel. You need to address the trauma and you need help to do that. If you have money to go private find someone who specialises is abuse related trauma. You can get through this,
with help, you don't have to repeat the pattern.

Not an expert but sounds like you'd benefit from counselling over your abusive childhood