A bit of advice....

[catjorum]

Hello everyone,

I have been lurking around in the background before deciding to actually create an account. I am not good at these things so please excuse me.

I am in my late 40's, and I filed for divorce 8 years ago as she was abusive and controlling which went through the courts without any challenge from her. I have an autistic son who I raised by myself as she was not interested in dealing or understanding any of his challenges. My son is now 20 years old and we have an absolutely amazing relationship. He is at university now, and he is starting to make his own steps in life - I could not be prouder of him and the man he is becoming. He has refused to let his autistic challenges hold him back. We talk constantly and we are incredibly close. He is one of only 3 people in my life that is incredibly important to me.

The other person is my partner of 5 years. However, in the last few years, I have started to notice a side of her that is concerning me. She is completely incapable of regulating her emotions and is very much like a switch. I have told myself that maybe its her peri-menopause and hormones just running wild with her but that seems to be wearing quite thin now as the consequences, regardless of her hormonal state, is hugely impactive.

She has become absolutely brutal in anything she says. She has no empathy in any way and just seems constantly miserable and consistently speaks negatively about everything. She had an awful sexually abusive childhood where she lived overseas and was basically sold by her family members for the other male members to "practise" on. Needless to say, this has caused some quite significant mental difficulties for her. She is also divorced from an abusive ex husband.

Overall, we get on really well, but our ability to communicate is significantly hampered by her sheer brutality of any response and the anger that normally acompanies it. Unfortunately, she sees anything she doesnt agree with as an attack on her personally no matter how well I try to phrase it which invariably ends up in her shutting down for days on end, withdrawing any form of connection, challenging the relationship, saying I am better off without her etc.

She gets upset if I dont finish my food off. Or if I try to discuss finances for us both. Or if the counter top isnt spotless constantly. I often feel quite invalidated when I try to express a feeling as it somehow gets turned into me attacking her or she reads into something that isnt there and says I am controlling.

Now this is going to sound sad and pathetic, but I need to be honest - I have always believed that I do not deserve love so I guess I have always been able to put up with it, maybe more than I should have. Part of me is scared of being alone again. I will admit that my self esteem isnt great at the moment.

My son is home from uni for Christmas and she continues to talk to him in a blunt and brutal way. For example, earlier today, she took a packet of biscuits out which hadnt been folded over and handed it to me. I immediately, and instinctively, if I am honest, just said "oh that was me". To which my son stated "dad, I had them last". Her response was one of a huff before stating "well if I was going to eat those, I would lose my f*king s*t." My sons head basically exploded. He didnt know how to react and afterwards said to me that he feels unwelcome in the house and doesnt want me to leave him there alone with him.

He is admittedly damaged by his mother as she was very controlling and he has chosen to no longer have her in his life but the damage is still there.

My boy also said that he feels that he is just in the wrong all the time with her.

Now - as above - treating me badly is one thing - but my boy....my need to protect him is now strong again. Hes my boy, and I am the only person he has in his life that has ever had his back.

I need to talk to her but truthfully, I am scared of her reaction. I do not have the strength or energy to find the perfect word to say or to deal with her inevitable strop afterwards, especially a few days before Xmas. She lives in my house, she has no right to my property and has a house of her own which she rents out. I take comfort from that.

Not sure what I am asking - but I would appreciate some thoughts and honest opinions.

The fact that you're afraid of her reaction to you raising this with her speaks volumes OP, you realise she's abusive right? Leaving her would be the very best thing you could do, both for your boy and for yourself. You sound very self aware about why you've stayed this long but you're right, you have to protect your son now, both from direct abuse from her and from having to watch her abuse you, that's not the model of a relationship you want him to see. I wish you could see that you don't deserve her abuse any more than your son does but if protecting your son is the motivation you needed well you have that now, it's time to act on it.

Yikes. You've gone from one controlling bully to another, by the sound of it. This often happens (I did it, too), especially if there was abuse in the target's childhood. Basically, we've been trained to accept unacceptable behaviour. Our relationship templates are unhealthy. It takes a fair amount of in-depth therapy to learn how to do, and expect, better.

Your son, who presumably is even less emotionally resilient than most, has suffered years of abuse by his mother and now by his stepmother. If you aren't able to believe you deserve to be treated with love and respect, how about your son? Doesn't he deserve it? By failing to remove the second abuser from his life, you have essentially saddled him with similar issues to the ones that led you into this predicament.

Remove her from your lives. If not for yourself, then for your son. Afterwards, I strongly recommend you both find counselling and/or a recovery programme so that you'll recognise what is healthy and how to set boundaries.

Thank you and that is what is I think changing it for me. I didnt feel loved growing up, my old man was an abusive individual so I learnt from a young age to be quiet as it was the safest thing to do. Having a voice resulted in a risk of attack, be that verbal or physical. The no voice thing later continued into in my marriage too.

I divorced to protect not only me, but also my kids. My eldest, as above, I have raised and I am the only one he trusts. To feel I have to protect him again is a hard pill to swallow but if I am honest, I have felt that recently anyway that I havent been wanting to leave him alone with her because he is pretty much helpless against her if she loses the plot again.

It makes me sad. And I feel weak and a chicken.

My mum loves her and they are close to each other. I know it would break her heart if we ended things especially since I lost my sister who my mum misses terribly and almost sees her as a daughter again

I'm sure it would break your mum's heart more to know how you and now your son are being treated OP, and the inevitable long term effects on you both if you continue to suffer your partners abuse. I'm assuming your partner doesnt do this stuff in front of other people? So your mum likely only ever sees her nice side, I'm sure her feelings towards your partner would change pretty swiftly if she knew the truth of how she treats you.

As for feeling you're somehow weak or a chicken, I can tell you categorically that you're neither. You suffered unhealthy conditioning as a child yes, and that has naturally led to unhealthy adult relationships but it's not weakness, just learned behaviour which can be unlearned with the right help. You are actually anything but weak or cowardly, you have escaped abuse already and protected your son from his toxic mother, not to mention raising and supporting your boy to become the impressive, independent young man you describe, does that sound like a weak person to you?

This is a crossroads though and the path you choose is going to be pivotal for both you and your son's future. It's about what you want to teach him about how he should allow himself to be treated as much as protecting him from her direct abuse. You can't expect your son to have good self esteem or healthy boundaries in his relationships unless you show him what that looks like by example. You may not feel strong or brave but I think you might have to 'fake it til you make it' for now and let your son see you protecting not just him but yourself as well. Decent therapy would be massively beneficial to help you unpick your childhood trauma but right now I think your priority has to be getting yourself and your boy away from your partner.

Hey everyone,

Thank you for the responses and apologies for my delay in responding. I didnt want to think about it over Xmas and then was overseas for the first week of January

I hear what everyone has said above so thank you. I just wanted to give a bit more information and see what your thoughts are.

I have medical issues at the moment which are affecting my speech and memory. She tends to hang onto one word, or a sentence I have not structured together and no amount of trying to explain in more detail what I was trying to say is enough to calm her down. I sometimes forget things that have been said to which she gets very angry over and holds it against me for days saying that I do not understand her and how could I forget something we have discussed. I feel punished for being ill as I am not forgetting things or struggling with my verbal speech on purpose.

So she also has pretty high standards - one of them she got upset about with my son over the Xmas period was the washing of hands. Due to my medical issues, and what with this new superbug thing flying around, I said to her if it would be a good idea in the new year to speak to her work to make them aware of my medical stuff in case someone there gets ill from it which would subsequently affect me, and us - the results of which are unknown due to my weakened immune system. As we all know, Covid destroyed many people who had pre-existing medical conditions. Her response was one of frustration and anger, stating that she cannot dictate to her work about others being sick and that she is careful etc. She completed her sentence stating that how can I ask her to do that when my son is dirty and doesnt wash his hands. I stated that this is not about my son (I was going to continue and say that because he does not live here long term), however she stormed out when I said it wasnt about him.

After a short time, I approached her and tried to communicate with her. She was upset because she feels 2nd place - she feels that I have no respect for her and she doesnt understand why he doesnt wash his hands when he gets in from work, empties the dishwasher, opens the fridge etc. She often cleans constantly and she always has - I have often thought she has OCD.

I tried to reassure her - that she is never 2nd place but the relationship between her and my son are different relationships and not comparable. She stated that I do not respect her, and neither does my son (as we cannot meet her standards all the time) and that, moving forward, she is putting a boundary in place stating that when my son is next home, she will leave the house and go stay somewhere else until he leaves again.

She states that I speak to everyone else with love and compassion yet speak to her with anger and hatred - of which I do not - as mentioned above, I grew up monitoring every word I use.

She doesnt like it that I am not overly strict on my 20 year old son, and has also stated that he needs to pay rent if he is going to visit us for a few weeks or whatever from uni - which I refuse to allow that to happen. I feel like I am a terrible parent and feel judged. My son is a part of me, there is no way I can seperate the two.

She stated that I am trying to control her and I do not respect her needs of him cleaning his hands etc which really confuses me.

To me, what I am hearing is - choose between me being in the house with you, or your son. If you choose your son, I am going to stay elsewhere until he has gone. To me, this suggests that she is only willing to accept certain elements of me, rather than the entire package as such, and whilst the words arent exactly - you have a choice, him or me, it feels a very much implied ultimatum. Am I reading too much into this?