Oh @Louise33388. What a heartbreaking update. I know what a painful situation you're in. There is no harder moment than when the scales fall from your eyes and you recognise a man you loved as a horrendous abuser. It's even more difficult, especially if you're like me, having prided myself on being a tough feisty bird, to then have to recognise yourself as a victim. It was the one thing I was determined not to be, and I hated my abuser (in my case my own father) for turning me into one. Sending you a big hug darling, from a sympathetic stranger, if you'd like one.
I recognise your language. You're not in that place of acceptance, and probably don't want to look it in the face. This might take time to process properly. 'The only other thing he's done', you said, as if this was really something inconsequential. What he's been doing to you is sexual assault or rape. When you're asleep you're entirely helpless. You cannot consent. You're not safe in the most vulnerable situation, sleeping in your own bed. And your situation explains a good deal that's already known about patterns of behaviour by abusers and the abuse.
He put his hands around your throat at the time of first physically assaulting you. But he'd been doing that to you in your sleep, each time claiming he couldn't remember what had happened. I don't buy it, but if it's true this makes him more dangerous, not less. He's claiming to be harming you in a serious way whilst suffering complete memory blackouts. At the very least he should be horrified and seeking help. He isn't, and he wants you to keep his behaviour a secret. That's another of many red flags.
There's a phenomenon known as 'boiling frog' syndrome. You put a frog in a pan of boiling water, it will leap out to save itself. You put one in a pan of cold water, and incrementally and very, very gradually you increase the temperature so the frog acclimatizes with it. When it reaches boiling point, the frog dies. This, lovely, is analogous to what he's been doing to you. The stuff in your sleep is horrendous, simply hideous. You can read online about the sort of men who engage in this behaviour. But, because he's gradually been turning up the heat, you haven't noticed it.
I know the boiling frog. I know it well. I'm in my forties. It took this long for me to realize the magnitude of my father's abuse of me. He slammed my head down a door and gave me concussion. He could easily have killed me. Yet, as an impressionable girl, I thought this was 'normal'. He'd convinced me I was a rebellious, bad child, and that he was disciplining me as I deserved. He'd cranked it up over years, so that even as an adult, I was unable to see how wrong his actions were. I believed his version, It took a cPTSD diagnosis and a therapist telling me he was a psychopath for me to face the enormity of what he'd done. It took half a lifetime. And it was the most painful realization I've ever had. I deserved none of it, and I cry inside for the hurting, traumatized child that I was.
I was just a kid. I didn't have an out. You're an adult, you can choose to leave this monster. You can save yourself, from his inflicting serious harm on you or from suffering the years of trauma I have.
I've shared this long story - not to be a self-indulgent 'me me me' whiner, but to help you see the enormity of what's been done to you, the danger you are in, and to help you recognise these patterns of abuse. They are always the same. My therapist also once told me that when you take away the empathy, abusers are always the same. They use exactly the same tactics, approaches, and scripts designed to make you think what's happening to you isn't that bad or (usually) that it's your fault. Don't buy it - it isn't.
I also wanted to reassure you that someone else really does understand your plight. Please, Louise, if you do nothing else for the moment, tell someone.