I have written this out 1 million times in 1 million different ways but I am posting it now because it makes me feel like I am doing something to heal by sharing my story.
I was in an abusive relationship for 3 years and I escaped 6 months ago. This person was a textbook psychopath and I don’t use that term flippantly. This story is your classic lovebomb stage to full scale abuse, hence the trigger warning, last thing I want to do is upset anyone who has been through something similar.
3 years ago I was single. I had my own full life, a beautiful child, home, career, friends, family and hobbies. I loved holidays and going out, not a major drinker but I had a great social life. I met a guy through a chance encounter and while I wasn’t really interested at the start, he completely blew me away with his interest. He said I was the smartest, funniest, most beautiful woman he had ever met. I cringe as I write this, he actually told me he loved me on the first date. I laughed and put this down to too many drinks, but I should have ran as fast as I could from that moment on, that red flag couldn’t have been any redder. He said he could sense a spiritual connection between us, like he had known me before in another lifetime, a soulmate who he could see his entire life with.
Things moved incredibly quickly, I moved from Scotland to England to be with him, uprooting my DS to be with this man and his children, to start life as a blended family. Everything was very rosey for a few months. He told me from the get-go that his children’s mother was a complete nutcase, she still loved him to the point that she would still try it on with him when he collected his kids, and how she would try everything to ruin us, I needed to be really careful, she was so dangerous. I now know this is a lie and classic Triangulation to make me a jealous, insecure wreck. At first the abuse was subliminal, he would blow up over my DS leaving some crumbs on the floor, little hand marks on the walls or even the way he sat on the chair was wrong. I would instinctively jump to my child’s defence, and this would result in my ex not speaking to me for days on end, slamming doors and the silent treatment. The standards he held for me and DS did not match to the standards for him and his children, who were allowed to do as they pleased. I would however be expected to carry out all of the housework while working full time, and also regularly looking after his children while he went off to do his own hobbies. At the beginning I nearly felt like this was my duty to make him happy and give him an easy life.
I was fed stories about how his ex had cheated on him, and this left him paranoid and insecure, but that he was working on this and wanted to see a counsellor, he never did. This did not stop me regularly seeing women’s Snapchat names popping up on his mobile phone, he would blow up at me, stating that he was allowed to have female friends (needless to say I never met any of these people in the entire 3 years). He said that plenty of women were interested in him and he couldn’t prevent that, but he had chosen me, almost as if I was lucky.
Once while showing me something else on his phone, he clicked into his Instagram and he had sent a loveheart emoji to his other ex a week prior, who was also labelled “Crazy Ex” coincidentally. When I reacted to this, he said he would like to go through my phone to see the men who I was sleazing with, and how I was lucky that he had not put a tracker on my car to see where I was going during the day (my job takes me all over the country on occasion).
This toxic behaviour would then flip back to the nice early days of the relationship, easy going, loving, laughing, and even encouraged me to go and have time with my friends because I deserved it, I was a great mum and partner and worked hard. HOWEVER this never lasted long- When I would arrange outings or events without him, the mood would change and it would be completely sabotaged. He would create an argument early in the week which would fester straight through to the weekend, where I would either be too frightened to go out and cancel, or I would go on ahead out and he would smash up my belongings while I was away, he once poured my makeup down the sink,or he would disconnect the house front door cameras to make me paranoid that he was doing something so I would rush home. He would have parties in the house while I was out and I would come home to strangers, both male and female, in my house taking drugs and sleeping in my child’s bed. On one occasion a girl (Stranger) was wearing my clothing and had been using my makeup. I rang a taxi and went straight to my mums house infuriated, I was so upset. He told me that the girl was a friend and how dare I make her feel uncomfortable in “his house”.
We earned pretty much the same salary, and the income should have been more than enough. However his salary was used on partying, boys trips away and his own luxuries. Mine was then expected to pick up the slack, the bills, his own existing debts before we met and fuel so he could get himself to work. When I questioned this, I would be shouted down, saying I should be grateful I had somewhere to live and I knew where the door was to take myself and my “effing kid”. If I was eating a chocolate bar, he would say “Oh be careful, just because we are living together doesn’t mean you can let yourself go”. I then found a local female PT in the city centre, because I knew a male would be totally out of the question, and I was really enjoying our sessions and I was making progress. I came home one day and he was in a fit of rage because she had put a video up on social media of me working out, and referred to me as her “lovely client”. He accused me of being in a sexual relationship with her, and I never went back.
I would often have drinks with him and his friends because my own social circle was out of the question. On one occasion after a night out, I woke up to him being extremely aggressive with me. He was claiming that I had been flirting with one of his friends and I was making sexual advances towards him, I had taken too many drinks that night and I had blacked out, but I was completely bewildered by these claims, I loved my partner and cheating is simply not in my nature. I remember apologising profusely, crying and my anxiety was through the roof for weeks. I finally plucked up the courage to message the friend in question, he said it didn’t happen. On another occasion, my ex tried to do the same thing again, I had went up to bed while he and his friends partied downstairs. The next morning he said I was trying to lure this guy up with me in front of everyone, that I had embarrased him so much, but this time I remembered the entire night and I knew it was false, from that moment on I knew I was really dealing with a psycho.
I would regularly find women’s belongings in the home which were not mine. For example labels off clothing that weren’t even my size, when I questioned him he would say I was completely crazy- they were mine and how could I not remember buying these things. He would then repeat the cycle of telling me to get out and leave the house, sometimes I did, but I always came back. You’re probably thinking I’m so stupid, and I am. I just craved the family unit and I was so embarrassed to admit that I had given up everything to be with this toxic monster. I’m an educated woman with a masters degree, how could I be so naïve.
Finally, one day something just snapped and I took my son and we left, it was a massive leap of faith. I had no idea where we were going, no money because I had been financially drained, no plan of “what next?”. But everyday has been a step forward for us, I am not going to say I haven’t looked back, because I sometimes wonder was it me? Am I crazy, unlovable, paranoid? But I know deep down I’m not. I have the emotional scars of that relationship, possibly for life, and I am very lucky that DS seems unaffected. I am going to see a counsellor now in the coming weeks mainly for my co-dependency issues, and I am on some medication for my anxiety.
The ex is relentless still to this day, he has a smear campaign against me since I left him, which interestingly his story entails everything he actually did to me, only the other way round. That I was lazy, financially abusive, emotionally abused his children and abused him in just about every sense. I am now a member of the crazy ex club ,and I’m strangely ok with it all, I am one of the lucky ones, I got out. Writing this has been therapy, I feel a bit lighter, and I hope if someone is in this situation and reads it, it helps and inspires them to leave too, I left without a pound in my pocket. I genuinely never, ever thought this would ever happen to me x