Am I being dramatic?

[Serenity21]

Hi all,
so I was single for 10 years after some pretty awful relationships. I met someone over a year ago and things were good. A few red flags at times which I’ve put down to me looking for things.
On Sunday we went out for drink. It was going great until at the end of the night he took my phone into the toilets and read some of my messages between myself and my best friend. There was something written in there about a friend of mine (who I have slept with years ago, which he knows about and was tears before I met him). All that was written was a joke about me having some of his gym stuff in my garage (which I don't!) I don't talk much to this guy anymore, even though he has been one of my best friends for years, as after my boyfriend found out we had slept together in the past he wasn't happy. His reaction on Sunday night was extreme.
He didn't say anything at first, we just left the pub with him actually a bit strange.
He went to buy food and wouldn't let me wait outside for him, he said 'no, you're coming with me' and pulled me in. We walked down the busy road with lots of people about, him still holding my hand.
When there was no one about anymore he threw my hand away from him and confronted me about the message. I told
him it was a joke but he continued getting angry. He threw his food across the path demanding to know if I still spoke to this guy. I told him 'not really, but that he was still my friend: This is where he lost it. He started shouting at me, calling me a bitch, a c*nt, and a slag': Telling me that we were over. I walked away and told him to walk home and that I'd follow behind.
He apologised a lot and so I started walking with him again. Then he lost it again. He walked ahead and started kicking the metal bollard over and over.
He turned and started walking quickly towards me. I started walking backwards and he said 'yeah you can run' I put my arm out to push him back but he grabbed my arm and started turning me, where I lost my balance and started to fall. I managed to get away and I ran. I hid for a while and he tried calling me about 40 times. I answered and told him I'd be home in a bit. He text me to say he had packed my things and put them in my car.
When I got back he was sat crying. He asked me if there was a way back from
this and I said no. I put his key on the table and I walked away to the front door.
He threw a pint glass against the wall in the room he was in and it smashed everywhere. I went back in to check on him but he told me to get out so I did. I waited in the hallway. I could hear him shouting to himself and smashing things up. He was saying I was manipulative, that I ruined his life and that I deserved the abusive relationships that I'd been in in the past. Things went quiet for a few minutes and then started again so I went back in to tell him someone would call the police if he wasn't quiet. I told him I heard what he said about the fact I deserved the abuse I've had in the past and he laughed. Hysterically laughed and said that I was even making that about me. He then threw his belt across the room and said 'I can't even kill myself properly' and went on to tell me how he had just tried to hang himself with the belt when I left. I ended up staying as I was scared to leave him. In the morning he was very sorry and full of remorse. He said that he tried to hang himself because he knew I couldn't get back in so it wouldn't be me to find him.
He has also told me yesterday that he got into my car and switched on the engine and revved that night when he put my things into the car. (He was very drunk)
We have put this down to him having too much to drink that night but I am concerned and confused.
I'm sorry that that is all very muddled.
Is this just a normal blip that happens in relationships? As it’s kind of what I’m used to in the past. My friend was horrified but I just said it was one of those things.

If you’re not ready to go that’s fair enough, and it’s widely recognised that it takes many many occasions of abuse for someone to find the strength to leave. What you absolutely shouldn’t do though is minimise a very significant domestic abuse incident. You haven’t made it sound worse than it was, you just want to believe you did as then there is the less reason to leave. It’s much like how your brain is trying to persuade you that keeping an abuser around your daughter is better than cutting him off and how you’re painting him as a poor victim of his experiences rather than a grown man who is capable of making choices not to abuse you. You must also be alert to the fact that domestic abuse escalates and goes in cycles so it will get worse, he will then beg forgiveness and be an angel for a while before tensions build and things explode again. Also be aware the longer you stay the harder it becomes to leave. You would therefore be wise to do the freedom programme online and read why does he do that, despite staying in the relationship. I’ll be thinking of you and I wish you well.

I feel guilty for doing so as people are in such a worse position than me.
This is really a normal response, but theres always going to be someone with something worse than you so you can always use it to justify anything. I try to think of it in really simple and crude terms, like just because someone had both feet ran over, doesn’t mean I have to be happy and pretend I’m not in pain because I only had one foot ran over. Things can still be bad for you and that’s ok to feel that, even if it’s worse for someone else.

I really do think your daughter won’t be that upset, she barely knows the man after only a year, I think that’s more about you, and that’s ok if you’re not ready to leave and if you’re already at emotional capacity leaving your daughter. But you haven’t blown this out of proportion, you’ve only been with the man a year and the behaviour you’re describing is scary, try not to minimise that just because you’re used to it.

But nothing I’m not used to from previous relationships.
Which is all the more reason to listen to external voices reminding you this is not OK, not normal, and not acceptable. Your boundaries have been skewed by prior abuse, which means you need to reset them, not continue to tolerate abusive behaviours.

He even said himself the other day ‘let’s call it what it was….emotional and physical abuse’ when he was saying how sorry he was. On top of that he has shown other red flags I know.
He's acknowledged his own behaviour yet what is he doing to change?

If I'd abused someone I professed to love, I bloody hope I would take myself out of the situation and sort myself out on my own, not expect my partner to absorb the abuse and play the "victim of my childhood" or whatever card.

He shouldn't be finding excuses and making you feel sorry for him. That's not taking responsibility. That's not putting you first. That's not addressing his behaviour. It's paying lipservice and even telling you who he is, but it's not actually addressing what he did.

btw you haven't blown it all out of proportion - your 2nd thread gave further instances of red flags.

It didn't “make him like this” this is the way he chooses to be. Men don’t rape because they can’t get the sex they want—raoe is the kind if sex they want. Similarly: men don’t act violently and controllingly because your behavior forces them to—this is their preferred way of treating you. He loves to threaten and humiliate you. All the nice words, the love stuff, the boyfriend talk is in service if getting to the ownership phase where he can attack you in public and in private—strike you, hurt you, own you without let or hindrance.

Ok—yes—this all makes it seem hard. But you do hard things all the time. Every day for twenty years! Ten times a day for twenty tears. This is just another hard thing that you must do for your daughter. In order for her to live and thrive. And in order for her to have a mother who can continue to watch over her and protect her from afar. You can not let this manipulative, abusive, man be part if her life. If he is dangerous to you he is deadly for her because she needs you safe.

Don’t ficus on how he was “brilliant “ with her. A toddler will happily eat poisonous berries if they are pretty. A child will play with a vicious dog without knowing the danger. You made a mistake trusting him so she made a mistake too. But your job is to step in and block her from this occasionally charming sociopath just tge way you would take poisoned candy from a baby.

You aren’t blowing it out of proportion: he really isn’t a good partner to you. And you don’t owe us internet strangers anything.

What comes across clearly is that this is a time of major upheaval and that it’s hard to cope with absence on two fronts. Your daughter can handle you telling her that it just didn’t work out, not least because she has seen other relationships end. And she would have been seeing a lot less of him anyway when she went to this new residential setting. It’s just bringing things forward a bit.

But instead of seeing the end of the relationship as being a negative, or too much to handle at the same time as preparing for your daughter to move out, let’s suppose you could view it as an opportunity.

What if you could spend time on WhatsApp chatting with your friends without worrying that he was reading his own feelings into it? What if you never had to worry about him confiscating your phone to read your messages? What if you could see your best mate for more than one night out in 15 months? What if you could choose your own timetable and be responsible only to your own wants? What if dumping him left you free to heal and discover that you’re complete without him, so you only let men into your life in future that enhance it, rather than leaving you anxious and stressed?

There is a lot of what if out there if you think about it. And while I know this is a huge change with your daughter moving out, you’re about to embark on a period of your life that is filled with opportunities to rediscover who you are and what you enjoy and how you want to spend the time you’ll now have. Of course it’s scary. But it could also be wonderful. You have earned this new freedom, even if it’s not feeling like freedom quite yet.

Thank you everyone. I have been very busy with my daughter today so I can’t reply to you all individually. But I appreciate it so much xxx