Forgiving an abuser!?

[Forgiving83]

I’ve done a lot of reading about abuse after leaving my 10 year abusive marriage a few years ago. I sometimes now feel the same emotions like anger and frustration a lot like my husband did towards me.

He was abused by his father and when he was triggered he reacted. I now am dealing with the same issues only he has given these to me. I now deal with traumatic memories and my nervous system is really on edge a lot. His father did it to him and he did it to me. I want people to forgive me when I am triggered (I’m not on the same level as him, I tend to withdraw instead of hit out).

Should you forgive him? He has caused me a great deal of stress and my health has suffered because of that relationship. He was only acting out his traumatic childhood on me. It is up to him to fix his problems though like I am trying to do. It is hard to not react when you have been abused. I still struggle with noise, I can’t take too much noise as it puts me on edge.

He has not fixed himself though and has moved on to another lady. We share a child and he does have this victim issue, he has to be the one who was wronged. He tells our child lies in order to look like the victim. The relationship was toxic. If he felt wronged I was in trouble.

I can empathise with him but I still have feelings like I hate him. I also struggle with the fact I let him treat me so poorly.

@TicketBoo23 my IDVA at the time said don’t worry he’ll give up like all the others do, he won’t go to court and I said back then he absolutely will. He now has this string to his bow to use now and it’s a great sob story. Daughter has started coming home saying her dad is a hero. He told her I stopped contact and she told me I was cruel. It’s breaking my heart all over again. I just want to stop fighting this but it will just never end. He has everything set up like a play to make him look good and me bad.

my IDVA at the time said don’t worry he’ll give up like all the others do, he won’t go to court and I said back then he absolutely will.

He's a narcissist or personality disordered or something, who knows.

You need to go back to whoever dealt with you and tell them what he's doing re your dd.

How old is your dd ..... Perhaps she's old enough to tell that a court denied him access because his behaviour was so bad . . And that that doesn't happen easily.

She should also be made aware of how easy it is to buy stuff.

saying her dad is a hero

Yeah, Chris Watt's daughters said that too.

Tell SS that you are worried his lying and manipulating and character assassination you is going to lead to MH problems for your dd, and that it's causing issues in your relationship.

It is classic parental alienation.

They are not going to be surprised by this.

They clearly realised he's a shit.

Last week she said (and she is only 7) daddy said I can live with him if I want. Is this his end goal, will he have won then or will he do this forever? We were at court for 3 years, only finished before December. He was an angel with all the stepped supervised so they were happy he had gained insight. How can I go straight back.

I'm sure they're well used to it.

Tell them he kept up a facade I til he got full access.

Tell them it's affecting your DDS moods, MH etc

Her behaviour at school has changed, she is in trouble all the time lately, she bit someone a few weeks back.

Ok, write it all down and go back to SS.

Rights of Women might also be able to help you.

As might Women's Aid

He is being clever, he isn’t doing it in front of his girlfriend. He has a flat that he and dd stay in sometimes before going to her house. He is doing it there, getting all the photo albums out etc. There is no proof.

Does your dd not know the truth?

Yes, he probably can't be on his own like many people.

But he also got publicly spanked, as it were, by SS and the courts - sent on courses to change himself etc. Must have been truly humiliating and enraging for someone like him. He had to "prove" they were wrong in his head. He had to win.

That's why he's playing ideal part Dr and daddy to the decade younger girl he picked up.

@BlastedPimples she was only small when I left. I haven’t filled her head with what her father was like. For one I was told that I would be in trouble at court if I had. I thought I would cause more damage telling her her dad was an abusive a hole. Unfortunately he has got there first not having the empathy I do.

*That's why he's playing ideal partner and daddy to the decade younger girl he picked up.

It sounds like you urgently need advice and guidance on parental alienation. How to combat his and how to approach things with your dd.

SS, women's aid etc seem like obvious places to start but I'm not expert.

I think I would be telling your dd, at the appropriate time, that daddy's behaviour was bad enough that a court thought it best for him not to see her for awhile and to go on courses to try to teach him to act better towards other ppl. Also they Daddy use to use a drug a lot that may have affected his behaviour. That his behaviour was scary and threatening and upsetting.

But you need advice from professionals on this.

Op, just remember, as much as he tries to head fuck you and others, sensible people can see through him. There are 3 crucial points that stand out to me as a stranger;

1. In our court system where it is actually very difficult to lose access to your child, he lost his for a while. So his behaviour must have been pretty fucking bad.

1. The course system sent him on essentially abuser courses. Ditto.

1. He's got a new partner and knocked her up, it sounds like, pretty quickly. In his position, having lost access to his child, having to do court ordered courses for his behaviour, being in a mess ..... One would expect a decent person to take a step back and not enter into new series relationships and not bring more kids into the world. At all but especially when, if he gets access to his first child back, that child now has to try to rebuild her relationship with her dad with a new baby and step mum on the scene. Noone with a child's, best interests would do that.

1. One word of this parental alienation, rewriting and lying would make me think nothing has changed in him at all from all of the above. He's still a dickhead and still a bastard, still an abuser.

Get in touch with SS and WA etc .... You need support dealing with this creature, and he needs exposed.

@TicketBoo23 I have found womens aid to have been no help whatsoever. The only advice I’ve been given and that’s by people who are in the same position years down the line is to not really say anything and let her make her own mind up. Otherwise she will end up with two stories and will be split down the middle and forced to pick a side which is damaging. It seems every avenue is damaging. It seems whatever you do he is able to twist and manipulate it to his advantage. When she says things I say that we remember things differently and that when she is bigger she will understand more. I don’t want her to go and spent time with him and be scared. She already says she is on her best behaviour there as she doesn’t want to be in trouble.

He was sent on a DAPP course but as it was during covid they stopped so he went on something similar but not the same. He got points by offering to do it at court before they told him to. Also an anger management course but he only did half those sessions. He came out justified that his problem stemmed from his abusive childhood and everyone felt sorry as he cried in court. I find this odd they fell for it as they sent him on the course for showing no insight into his actions and blaming his abuse on me, on his bad back etc and now they let him get away with blaming it on his dad.

Have you heard of the term Post Separation Abuse? He is still abusing you and abusing his daughter. His preferred method of abuse is psychological abuse, where he alters his victim thoughts and beliefs. You can see it clearly in his he is grooming his child to see things in a false way that makes him look good.
Look up Emma Katz, who researches how family violence perpetrated by men like your ex harm children. Listen to these interviews below with Lundy Bancroft, where he explains that trauma is not the reason men abuse women. Treating men for their past trauma does not stop men being abusive, and men who are abusive come from both traumatized and non-traumatised backgrounds. His background is a red-herring and he is/has making excuses in order to keep you psychologically trapped.

podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkLnBvZGJlYW4uY29tL3RoZWZlbWFsZWRhdGluZ3N0cmF0ZWd5L2ZlZWQueG1s/episode/dGhlZmVtYWxlZGF0aW5nc3RyYXRlZ3kucG9kYmVhbi5jb20vZjQxZjMwNjctMzdjZi0zNmU0LWI3ZTItNzkyZmQzZmE0ZTU1

www.listennotes.com/podcasts/the-audacious-life/narcissists-vs-abusers-with-EY_pVxUm4bA/

Suggest you seek support from women's aid, a really good abuse counsellor and/or join an online support group such as Patrick Doyle's Pathway to Hope for support with your situation with your daughter, which sounds absolutely dire. It is no wonder you feel the way you do and are suffering from chronic fatigue and health issues. He is a seriously harmful and abusive man, and forgiving him is the last thing you need to be trying to do.

In studies of men who grew up in households with family violence, the men who accepted the abusers narrative that the abuse was the woman's fault went on to become abusers themselves. Your ex is grooming his daughter to become a victim of family violence by the way he is brainwashing her. Listen to some interviews with Emma Katz.

I’m confused @3487642I at what he actually wants, what outcome would he deem acceptable?

It is possible to explain a person's behaviour is not okay without putting that person down or attacking their character. It is a fine line to walk but for your daughter's sake it will be better if she isn't taken in by his lies. You can pm me if you need any more resources.

I'm sorry to hear WA did not help you before.

I see some other posters have posted some resources, I don't know if any SW's on here could help with advice.

Forgive but don’t forget and make your own well-being a priority.
You appear to have good insight into your own triggers which is good. Perhaps counselling would help you.

He was sent on a DAPP course but as it was during covid they stopped so he went on something similar but not the same. He got points by offering to do it at court before they told him to. Also an anger management course but he only did half those sessions. He came out justified that his problem stemmed from his abusive childhood

I'd be going back to SS with the above and that he is now perpetrating parental alienation and it is affecting your dd adversely.b