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Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

Why is my ex who abused me treating his partner now so much better. Was it really all my fault?

141 replies

21seconds12 · 11/06/2023 08:57

It’s been 4 years since I left my ex. To me he was abusive. I have moved on and happy in a relationship. I’ve worked through a lot but I’ve just got this one feeling I can’t shift.

The relationship was awful. I can’t decided what happened really other then he had a view of what he wanted, I wasn’t filling it so he treated me crap, like I wasn’t worth being kind or helping me with anything.

He drank and he was aggressive when drunk, he couldn’t control his temper and he smoked weed and wouldn’t stop. He never helped me at home, cleaning was all my responsibility. He promised so many times but he would always come back and say my behaviour led him to need those things because I didn’t love him enough. It was true because I often resented him. For treating me so badly, shouting at me etc etc. I guess it sounds pretty co-dependant. When I left he begged me not to go, would go to therapy etc etc but he had a decade to do something and he never changed. In the end I just didn’t want to be part of it anymore. I couldn’t work after a couple of years became I was just so anxious all the time. I walked on egg shells, I felt so worthless. He treated me like a second class citizen and said I brought nothing into the relationship. So why didn’t he just leave me? I was the one to leave.

So he has moved on and he has stopped all those things he did. Doesn’t drink or smoke and doesn’t shout and put her down. She works and I suppose contributes more. She fulfils his needs much better then I did. But then he doesn’t treat her like he did me. We share a daughter and she tells me these things. Let’s just say it is true. Why has he stopped for her but didn’t for me? I can’t help but think I was the reason to blame. I made him feel unloved and so he took to other things to numb the feeling. The only thing was he wasn’t nice. He never once considered my feelings. My agenda in life was not soley him and his needs I had my own and my own issues etc. He just seemed to stop seeing any worth in me. Unless I was fulfilling what he wanted.

OP posts:
PTSDBarbiegirl · 11/06/2023 09:03

This is only the view of your DD who wants to believe that. People do not change. I have a similar one who was a violent & abusive narcissist for 15 years but most people who knew him would not have believed it as he was so charming to everyone else. He's had a few other partners but no more children he's responsible for. Just be glad you're out of it he won't have changed atall. People like that can't change.

Riverlee · 11/06/2023 09:03

They’re in the honeymoon period. He’s probably being nice to her, or hiding the smoking and weed from her. Also, she showing off and trying to prove to you shes won him.

He was probably nice to you at the beginning. The same pattern will happen to her.

coodawoodashooda · 11/06/2023 09:06

He's not being nice. He's pretending to be nice.

isthismylifenow · 11/06/2023 09:09

He hasn't changed OP.

He may very well be behaving differently in front of your dd though, as a ruse that it's all happy families there now.

Surely he was nice to you when you first met...otherwise you would not have stayed with him.

AttilaTheMeerkat · 11/06/2023 09:09

Such men do not change. You've had a lucky escape.

Rainbowqueeen · 11/06/2023 09:11

It was absolutely not your fault.

He may have changed due to a health scare, maturity, any number of reasons. Or not changed at all. Your DD is not there all the time Did she realise he was abusive to you or was that hidden from her? I’d just be thankful that he is not your problem any more. Even if he has changed she might be continually worried he is going to relapse. That’s stressful.

21seconds12 · 11/06/2023 09:16

It just seems he has everything he wanted with me with her now. They work at the same place. They eat the way he wanted with me, I was not really too interested in his food is my bible lifestyle so much. He goes out on day trips, he just sat at home and smoked with me. He smoked since age 8 so that wasn’t my fault. He has a 1 year old baby with her. She is 12 years younger. She has her own car and house. She has everything so she gets treated so well. Me on the other hand he used to say I made him depressed and I wasn’t worth stopping it for. He didn’t help with our daughter when she was small but he does with his other baby now. His life seems everything he ever wanted. We could have had a nice life but he gave me ptsd and I had a breakdown from panic that just rose and rose.

OP posts:
bozzabollix · 11/06/2023 09:17

I am unfortunate enough to know someone who’s fairly abusive and he’s been in relationships with two friends of mine. The first had the strength to get him gone for his ways but now no doubt feels as you do now. What she doesn’t realise is that he’s doing exactly the same with the next, but she’s being less vocal and putting up with more crap, he’s happier as he’s having absolutely no resistance from the latest girlfriend and she thinks it’s all acceptable because her self esteem is in the gutter.

You don’t know what’s happening in that relationship from the outside but people like that don’t change. They just go on to find people who feel they deserve the crap being dealt out to them.

Be glad you’re out of it, give thanks every day!

Maddy70 · 11/06/2023 09:19

You are not in this relationship so you have no idea what's really going on

But maybe he has changed , maybe she handles him differently a while host of things. But he was abusive to you and your dynamic didn't work and you are well out of it

21seconds12 · 11/06/2023 09:19

He keeps telling our daughter he is sorry. He tells her lies about the relationship. I doubt he actually knows he is lying he just doesn’t realise what he did to me. I’ve developed an autoimmune condition since leaving him. My hair fell out…and it’s grown back curly which is odd. I find it so difficult to come to terms with how awful out relationship was to now how amazing his new one is. Our one never really started off that amazing, it was all about him. What he needed and wanted to do.

OP posts:
21seconds12 · 11/06/2023 09:21

@Maddy70 I’ve no doubt she handles him better. But it from what I gather he thinks she deserves better treatment then me for whatever reason.

OP posts:
Crikeyalmighty · 11/06/2023 09:25

It may be you were just mismatched and he realises to hang on to someone he had to change -

Riverlee · 11/06/2023 09:25

They’re living a Facebook life - only showing you the picture perfect side.

21seconds12 · 11/06/2023 09:25

It feels like all of went I went through was some how justified because if he can have a nice healthy relationship and appear to be doing so well with her then it must have been me all along. How can he live with himself for treating another person the way he did and just move on and not worry he will do it again.

OP posts:
Whatofher · 11/06/2023 09:26

It is true that many men remain abusers but there is also the possibility he just didn’t like you at all. Did you plan on having a child together? I got PG when young and we stayed together and he treated me very badly. It was deep resentment on his part. We broke up and he married and has been in a decent relationship for 20 years now. I have also been in a very good relationship for around 25 years now. We all actually chose each other that time though. When women don’t like something they will often just put up with it or complain in a more reasonable they rarely punch stuff.

isthismylifenow · 11/06/2023 09:27

OP, have you been able to access any councelling post your split?

It seems you are feeling not good enough, so in fact his behaviour is still affecting you.

I don't live in UK so I don't know any organizations that can assist, but I think it's important for you to get assistance with trying to move on.

Perhaps other posters can guide you on where you could access this.

Thesunwillcomeoutverysoon · 11/06/2023 09:27

She handles him better...
Have a think about what that may entail op..
My ex appeared to have changed with his new gf. Couple of years down the line she strayed and married his best mate...

21seconds12 · 11/06/2023 09:28

@Whatofher if he didn’t like me then why not leave. Why sit and drink and shout and swear and throw things at me and tell me how worthless I am and don’t contribute to anything. It was 8 years like this before daughter came along.

OP posts:
Followill · 11/06/2023 09:29

You were in a relationship with him as he was at that point in time. He could well have changed. It sounds like you have also changed a lot as a person OP since the relationship ended. Your ex could have looked into your subsequent relationship and wondered the same things about you perhaps.

That doesn't mean you weren't worthy of his good side. Of his love or the best of him. It just means that he didn't have a good side at that point in time.

I also think you never truly know what's going on in a relationship. Even though DC reports back, how much does she really see EOW? And its also how she phrases it. She might not want to report back that her dad is getting shit faced every night while she's there and have you worrying about her being stuck there with him.

gettingoldisshit · 11/06/2023 09:29

Trust me he most definitely hasn't changed! They never do.

Mehmeh22 · 11/06/2023 09:31

It is possible that the two of you together brought out the worst in eachother. You are well rid though.

I felt the same about my ex. He was AWFUL, constantly moving the boundary of reasonable behaviour. Within a year he had got a girl pregnant- something he was adamant would never happen to me. He was almost paranoid about it happening tbh (I'm glad he was!). He got married to her (something he never wanted to do) and seemed to have had a personality transplant.

It's unlikely he has truely changed. I heard rumblings that he was awful to her at the run up to the wedding but twats like that are very good at keeping up appearances.

One thing I can say.....none of this was your fault!!! You are well rid!!!!

sophmum31 · 11/06/2023 09:32

I'm in a similar situation to this, my ex was abusive and we all walked on eggshells in the house all the time.

He's now in a new relationship and living with her and the children have told me she now bosses him around and he does as he is told. He's also taken on a whole new personality, does the washing up (never did it in 20 years) they have people round (we never did), have a dog (he wasn't a dog person at all), takes our son out here there and everywhere (left it all to me when we were together). Lives this lovely life free from the responsibility of a family except for 3/4 days a month (she's child free). It's as if he has moulded himself into the person his new girlfriend wants and really when I think about it it's all part of the love bombing phase. He's turned himself into a completely different person but I'm certain the mask will slip.

At the end of the day it is up to us to focus on our own happiness and building a new happy life free from the pressure of living with a man like that.

DirectionToPerfection · 11/06/2023 09:32

You don't know what goes on behind closed doors.

How old is your DD? She must be quite young? He shouldn't be telling her anything about the relationship really, I'd guess she's far too young for that.

Sounds like he could be quite manipulative.

PrinceHaz · 11/06/2023 09:33

There is one certainty here: he is not a nice person. A nice person treats others with kindness and dignity.
His new partner is with someone who was unkind to you. No matter how nice he is being to her right now, he is capable of great cruelty. She has chosen to be with someone capable of cruelty.

adriftabroad · 11/06/2023 09:41

I am the second wife of a man like this.

It was great for 5 years. 20 years on, with a DD, I am fighting to divorce him, fighting, spending thosands. He has not seen DD for nearly two years. He is an horrendos abuser.

They do NOT change. What you are witnessing is an accident waiting to happen. Be proud you are protecting your child as much as you can.

(Finally been arrested and found guilty, of pychological abuse. No mean feat)