Trigger - husband SA. Why can’t I tell him and why do I feel guilty

[ByPinkPoet]

I posted this time last week when feelings/memories hit me like a ton of bricks about my husband having sex with me without my consent 3 years ago. I was pregnant, I cried and he didn’t stop. I clearly buried it until now and I am now an anxious, panicking mess. It’s occupying my mind constantly.

It was a one off. He has a high sex drive but he has not continued without consent since that night.

kind posters suggested r**e (still can’t write the word let alone say it) crisis charity and therapy. I am booked for therapy this week. RC suggested I talk to him about it in the meantime to try and alleviate the anxiety and see if he remembers/ accepts responsibility for it. I am not afraid of his reaction in the sense of my safety but I am frozen with feelings of guilt. Everytime I open my mouth to ask him to talk about it nothing comes out.

Guilt that the very mention of it will destroy him and how he feels about us

Guilt that it will impact our marriage and our 4 young children.

Guilt that I am being selfish and just need to let it be, he deserves another chance etc etc

Why is this?! Has anyone been in a similar situation and a Frank and honest conversation has helped you move forward in your relationships ? Has anyone come back from abuse is it possible?

I feel if I just knew why - why he thought that was ok on that particular occasion then I might be able to recover

I know it is very hard for some posters to understand why I don’t just up and leave but that is not an option at the moment. if you replied to my first thread and find it unbelievable that I’m asking for advice again and still not doing anything about it then I’m sorry. I am seeing a therapist this week so at least there’s that.

Please be kind I’m a fucking mess and feel like my life is crashing down around me

It can take people several attempts to leave an abusive relationship. This is a first step in that OP has become aware that something isn’t quite right. It may have become too overwhelming now and there are a lot of emotions tied up with this man. It’s ok to pause and I hope that OP continues along the road of realisation and in time, is able to make informed decisions about what’s best for her and her DCs.

I feel so incredibly deflated reading the decision OP has made but as someone with extensive experience in abusive relationships I do understand that it’s a process of realisation and eventually breaking free. I just hope one day OP can be free of this person. My heart breaks knowing she’s stuck in this abusive cycle while being raped and sexually coerced on a daily basis.

I think the worst thing for me is that the rapes or the sex seem to be aggressive and to some degree violent with the op being submissive :( very dehumanising that there is no small act of “love” behind these incidents in his actions. She becomes a shell of herself each and every time. When in fact we all know she’s kind, funny, loving and doesn’t deserve any of this.

I was greatly saddened but sadly not surprised. She kept saying that she still loved him so much and couldn’t bear to be without him. Hopefully she will get to the point when she’s ready to break free from her abuser, but at this stage she just wasn’t ready to do so.

I agree. She knows he’s an abusive POS but she can’t accept it yet. She’s still in denial and justifying it to herself.

I hope she continues to gradually see him for the manipulative abuser he is and eventually is in the headspace to walk.

Until that day we’re all here ready to listen

@ByPinkPoet0 if you are still reading don’t pressure yourself. You’ve made alot of progress and have established your husbands behaviour isn’t normal. Coming to terms with that and still feeling love for him is very conflicting for you. So in a way you have chosen an auto pilot mode for now while you hopefully process. Just know that if you come back for help here it will be freely given with no I told you so’s. It should remain a safe place for you to come to x

See you soon PinkPoet, you know it and we know it. Please be safe 💐

I won’t @ Poet because she’s said she’s done with the thread. I will say to any lurkers, take baby steps to plan to try to have the option to leave one day. Planning just gives you the option. For the brave and kind women who shared stories of leaving, my wonderful friend says that in indigenous culture, you’re called sky cutters. Women so powerful you cut the sky, changing the course of all the lives in your family who come after you. I salute you.

This is your life, and your decision. I've been where you are and made this same decision (many times, in fact) so I do completely understand.

Please look after yourself, and if/when things get bad again, please do come back here for support ❤

It’s hard isn’t it to realise that to love an adult is an active choice - you can choose not to love as well choose to love. I thought it just happened and you didn’t have any choice in the matter and were helpless in the face of emotions, but have realised over time that your head can overrule your heart. Not saying it’s easy but….. that big thinking brain can choose another path and keep us safe, not just be swept along by emotions all the time.

Big hugs to anyone who has grappled with this either now or in the past.

Just remember Poet that you're not alone and you can come back here for support any time you need to ❤️

I feel that he is now taking full accountability and his behaviour is showing me that he is truly sorry and that he is trying to make changes

What does this look like in practice? Has he gone to the police station to confess his repeated rapes? Perhaps he has told a friend the truth of what he has been doing and asked them if they think his behaviour is normal? Maybe he has contacted a domestic abuse charity and asked their advice on what he should do? Signed up for individual counselling and a domestic abuser's course? Is it all of these things? After all, he is now "taking full accountability", isn't he?

As he is "truly sorry" he obviously won't be having any sex for the foreseeable. He will be giving you plenty of space and supporting you going to therapy and acquiescing to all of your requests regarding equal access to the finances and so on. None of these changes are particularly challenging. They are not difficult. They do not take up significant time. They are easy to do.

My colleague left a marriage like yours. He repeatedly raped her in her sleep too. Now she's free and her child isn't growing up in an environment where they are learning that this sort of relationship is normal. (As an aside, it's interesting that you agree that your husband learned a lot of his behaviours from adults who were behaving in similar ways around him when he was growing up, yet you deny that what is happening in your children's home now is having any effect on them. Do you see that these things don't match up?)

I do so hope that you are able to break free soon. You have made some huge strides in your understanding of the situation and have taken important steps to help yourself and protect your children. Be aware that your mental health is likely to take a significant nosedive now that you try to force your brain to believe things that you know aren't true. My colleague described feeling completely dissociated from reality, she would sometimes ask me to list mundane things for her like how many different coloured jumpers I owned - to try to ground her. She said it was frightening when the dissociation happened when she was with her child so do watch out for that.

Eventually her husband's violence (and your husband IS violent, he rapes you and throws things which is a way of showing you what he could do to you instead of to the chair or whatever) increased to such a pitch that she feared for her life in the immediate future. She packed a bag and left while he was at work.

If you need to do this you should be able to contact your local women's refuge to get an emergency placement. Don't be afraid to ring the police. Remember that abuse never gets better and it never stays he same. Over time it always escalates. You are in a very dangerous phase now as you are becoming more aware of his abuse, although you are still in significant denial he will be picking up on the changes in you and he WILL respond to these to get you back in line.

We all wish you the very best and will be here for you whenever you want to talk with someone.

OP's decision makes me sad for her: That she has settled for a life with her rapist while telling herself things are better than they were.

That said, if doubts about the husband's behaviour ever creep in, I hope she does return to the thread for guidance/support.

Thank you for all the messages, I know my update was probably triggering for some people. I still feel the same, things have been good.

I do have one more question though , sorry. After speaking to my therapist again yesterday (this is not the specialist SA one as the waitlist was so long just the general psychotherapist with experience with trauma) and for the second time she has suggested that we come for couples therapy. Her reasoning for this is that it might help him to understand my deep upset and anxiety caused by the trauma. And we might be able to find a way to move forward, if that’s what we want.

As I know people will ask - yes I have told her about the SA.

A few people have said this is not a good idea from their experience. Could you please share why? Before I decide …

Be honest , I don’t mind

Here are a few links which explain it. The idea of couples therapy in this situation would be so unusual by a therapist, that I wonder with you have been down playing what happened. I know you said you told her about it, and she said have the intuition that you may be downplaying, but even on here you struggle to accept what happened for what it is.

You may think you are being clear, but it may have come across as more him being sexually pushy, and you consenting albeit and not enthusiastically, whereas he's been outright violently raping you on more occasions and you can remember.

You don't need therapy to solve a relationship issue. Him being a rapist is not a relationship issue.

https://www.thehotline.org/resources/should-i-go-to-couples-therapy-with-my-abusive-partner/

https://kateanthony.com/why-its-dangerous-and-ethically-wrong-to-go-to-couples-therapy/

https://lscpbirmingham.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/Couples-Counselling-No-Place-in-Domestic-Abuse-.pdf

I'm glad though that he's thoroughly sorry and wants to change. I assume therefore he hasn't even mentioned sex in the last few days, and is supportive of taking off the table for a few weeks or months? I assume there's been no further huffing, no further attempts at manipulating you by saying you he control himself? No atmosphere? Is he getting help for his sexual problems? Is he seeing if there is any support program that he can do for sexually abusive men?

Or is life just continuing as it is was before, with him waking you up at 5 o'clock in the morning to insist on sex which you agree to so he doesn't rape you?

I think several of us explained upthread why doing therapy with an abuser is not recommended. But I will say it again: Abusers sometimes use therapy sessions to abuse and manipulate. You'd be going in with different aims: you want him to stop raping, pestering, sulking and stomping about being angry. He wants you to stop going on about his behaviour, shut up and let him fuck you whenever he wants. He'll be hoping that the therapist sides with him and tells you you're wrong. The one thing you have in common is that you each want the other to change a fundemental aspect of their personality.

This isn't a communication problem nor a relationship problem. It is a him raping you problem. And I don't believe it can be counselled out of him. You mentioned "fighting for it" a while back but you seem to be the one doing all the work here.

What happened about the letter the therapist wanted you to write? Did you establish whether she meant for you to show it to her, or to him? (do not do the latter)

To add to this, he will be going into a session with the aim of presenting himself as an innocent party and unfortunately you’ve been trained by him to uphold his public persona of ‘good husband, good dad’.

This means that when he presents things differently to you, you will very likely feel unable to call him out during the session because he’ll put you in a position where you’d have to say ‘no that’s not true, that’s a lie’ but he’s trained you to believe he isn’t a liar and also trained you to protect his ego and image at your own expense.

You’ll be going in with the aim of an honest and open conversation to improve your relationship. He’ll be going in with the aim of maintaining the status quo outside of the sessions because he likes how it is now. And he will manipulate, lie and twist things to do so.

It’s not a fair fight. You’ll be going into a battle completely unarmed, while he’s actually using the session to double down on his abusive behaviour just under the guise of ‘working on things’.

Thank you - these are all really really helpful. I have read them all and it does make sense. I am confused why she suggested it.

The therapist I’ve spoken to 3 times now suggested the therapy. Honestly, I have told her. In the second session I described the SA which I originally posted about. I told her how he had forced sex behind me when I was pregnant and I cried and asked him to stop several times. I don’t know how much more clear I could be. She said I didn’t need to keep describing it and reliving the trauma.

I also told her about the sex & intimate touching when I’ve been asleep. I explained I didn’t realise there was something wrong with this until I started chatting on here.

I’m not sure about the couples therapy after reading that. I think he might be open to it but it may not be a good idea reading those articles.

He has not been seeking help for himself, no. He has however been really loving and respectful. No early morning wake ups or pushy behaviour. He’s been asking me a lot how I am feeling. He says he knows he has a problem and would never want to hurt me. He’s even called it r* (I didn’t) and admitted he does remember and it haunts him everyday. He feels terrible for causing me trauma and knows he needs to earn trust back.

We did have sex last night but that was absolutely reciprocated by me. I felt no pressure at all. It was very loving and it gave me hope that things will be ok again one day.

thank you for explaining
she said she meant write down all my feelings and probably not show him. She said I could show him in the future one day if I felt he would be open to it , but for now just get my thoughts on paper.

I have written some things down in a journal but I find it hard.

so i misunderstood The letter thing I think

This article was recommended to me by my then-therapist a few years ago. I found it really helpful at the time. I think the word ‘narcissist’ has become overused, but I feel that your OH does have some narcissistic traits Poet.

https://www.malahidecounselling.com/why-couples-therapy-doesnt-work-for-people-in-abusive-relationships-with-narcissists/

"Reciprocated" but not initiated by you?

I'm glad he's being a bit better.

Are you not concerned that he has admitted that he lied to you and gaslit you, very recently by pretending it didn't happen that maybe you remembered it wrong. No he says he remembered all along. So when apparently comforting you, he also lied to you. Can you see with what ease he lies to you? Is that not worrying?

You say that you had sex and it was reciprocated, but it also sounds like he initiated it, even though it's supposed to be off the table. He is continuing to have no respect for you. You said it's off the table, he should not be trying to initiate, and if you do he should be very reluctant to take you up on it, because he knows it's not healthy for you at the moment. The fact that you had sex again, despite everything you've said, says to me that nothing has changed.

If you want to know whether he is serious about changing, then tell him you don't want to have sex for at least a month. See how he reacts to that, and whether he truly gives you that space for a month without complaining or creating an atmosphere. A month is nothing in the grand scheme of life.

It is frequently recommended on here and maybe upthread but strongly recommend you read Lundy Bancroft's Why Does He Do That?

It was both of us. We were both hugging each other after another big chat and more tears, feelings etc and we started kissing and went from there. He asked me if it was ok and I said yes.

I felt like I wanted to show him that I still loved it even after all this. He said he would understood if I didn’t and I felt so sad about that

I was concerned about that but his first reaction was he felt so much guilt and shame he says he just panicked and didn’t admit it the first time.

This fits - it is something we’ve struggled with and I think goes back all the way to his difficult childhood. He has a tendency to impulse white lie to protect people he loves if he thinks they won’t like the answer.

Examples like - did you go to the pub after work (when he used to drink) - no I didn’t I had a late meeting. Then admits an hour later that he did . That sort of thing