(TW SA) Continuing support & sharing things…

[PinkPoetAgaiin]

Hi again everyone,

Making a new thread as some of the lovely ladies who have been supporting me for over a month now suggested I can continue to share my thoughts & feelings dealing with sexual & financial abuse (& other things) from my husband who I’ve been with since I was 18 (15 years).

Will be on and off for a bit as young DC is unwell at the moment and that’s taking all my energy.

I am not yet at the point of leaving - please don’t shout at me for being a bad mum. I did get a lot of criticism on my last thread for not getting them out immediately and I just can’t for reasons I explained.

Life feels heavy, but I’m focusing on DC at the moment ❤️

Well - because I guess I always believe in second chances and people changing their lives for the better .

but I’m not totally blind to it anymore. He is VERY good at hiding his true views and will actively talk about how awful the ‘Mano sphere’ is . But I am starting to see that underneath his views towards me/women are still unhealthy.

plus he is my husband and father of 4 children, and I’ve loved him a long time . Since I was very young myself. So that doesn’t just switch off even with all this new info .

It's hard to fool someone into thinking you're a 'nice guy' if you openly condone rape. The trick is to proclaim that you don't condone real rape, while insisting that the rape you're committing isn't actually rape.

Really, it doesn't matter what he says.

He's a lying rapist who sees you as nothing more than a sexual and domestic appliance there to service him, and he's never going to change. You might love him, which is what makes this so difficult for you, but don't fool yourself for a moment into thinking he loves you. He loves what you do for him, not you as a person.

He isn't a changed man who deserves a second chance when he raped you less than a week ago

I just think your love for him is interesting. I mean, you've been with him a long time, surely the honeymoon / attachment period is over? Maybe I'm just showing my own marriage up here but I have an intense attachment to my children now, and less so my partner as we carry out our mum and dad roles. This seems to be the case for most married couples I know too. The relationship takes a bit of a back seat and you become more pragmatic not romantic.

He's still doing the push push push until you give in. Lip-service means nothing. His actions reveal him.

The fact he controls the finances shows he doesn't see you as an equal.

The fact he disregards what you've told or asked him for regarding sex, shows he doesn't believe consent matters.

The fact that he's still using PUA (pick up artist) techniques on you, shows he hasn't changed his views about sex and women.

I'm sure he loves his daughters, they're adorable and his and love him right back, no doubt. All the warm fuzzy feelings, sure.

But whether as they grow up, he sees them as equals or respects their opinions & autonomy as people, I doubt.

I can remember the awful ex with two daughters. The teenager had done really badly in a subject she hated, and someone in her group had called her a loser.
I was very gentle with her and said she hadn’t lost anything, she’d done less well in that subject.
Her dad had told her for women there was no such thing as losers, there were only two types: winners or victims.
When the younger one disobeyed him, once, he threatened to set fire to a £20 note someone had given her for Easter. She was only 7 she was sobbing.
I often wonder what happened to those two girls. And yes their mum did know what he was like.

That’s so sad .
He would not say anything like that (whether he thinks it or not is another matter)
He is very encouraging to them about ‘girls can do anything’ etc etc

The £20 note thing is awful. Poor girl

Girls can do anything, but you can't even have your own bank account?

Well he was very encouraging to them in lots of ways but could also change with the wind.
They never really knew where they were with him.
I do know his ex took a long time to leave him and get over it, but she’s happy remarried now. It was only after I left that I found out what happened to her, and it was awful at the time, but she left and got support. I can remember her neighbours even told her they were always wary of him. He charmed my mum, my dad could not stand him. I happened to know someone who knew his ex, I wasn’t following her life, I was just glad to know she was okay.

Have no idea where he is now.

Wow. I just can’t comprehend it. Maybe a mix of misogyny and narcissism?

I'd also be worried about what he'll teach your boy(s) about women and dating later on.

Stuff that might get them arrested.

Let me correct that for you. A lot of RAPISTS don't get enthusiastic consent.

OP you've said that you don't know anything else and you don't talk to other people about their sex lives, so please don't assume that just because he's a predator, it's somehow 'normal'.

its not like head over heels romantic love after all these years no but there is still a deep love there , like I would be devastated if I woke up tomorrow and he was gone.

We do spend time together , even with our big family, and it’s always nice and we have fun. Please don’t judge me for this I’m just being honest - on a surface level we do.

And we have a lot of intimacy in the relationship, which obviously is not the right kind I am now realising but we are very emotionally connected / maybe I’m a bit emotionally dependent .

I love my kids number 1 but I still love him a very close second.

OP I just wanted to challenge a few things you are revealing in your own beliefs about men on these threads.

You talk about a "classic male" attitude towards sex being a game where women withhold sex from men as a tease.

You talk about the "thrill of the chase" being a phrase for a reason, where men believe women pretend not to be interested when they are.

(Ironically these are also core concepts in The Game, which ultimately treats sexual relationships as a battle - where men work to win sex from women)

You've also talked about how men out there are awful and you'd rather be indoors treated sometimes awfully with this man than out in the world being treated more awfully by other unknown men, as if that is an inevitably.

Perfectly understandable you have trauma related to men given what happened to you and what is still happening to you.

But I wanted to challenge this as somehow you seem to be using "well all men are awful" as a justification for what he does as not that bad. Do you have any male friends or colleagues? Relatives? How about your dad? Do they all evidence the attitude to women above?

I've asked you before and gently asking again - how do you imagine his behaviour to you compares to your dad's behaviour to your mum? Can you imagine your dad controlling and abusing your mum in this way? Does your mum have her own bank account, for example?

Not at all surprised about the book. I think you also said or hinted previously Poet that his dad abuses his mum so your H's views about women were probably shaped very early.

But you mentioned "the thrill of the chase" and I want to pick up on that. There is an awful lot of stuff in popular culture (almost every rock or pop song written by a man about a relationship and many by women), in soap opera and film and almost everywhere that portrays relationships and sex in a really unhealthy way and reinforces the social conditioning of both women and men.

Including but not limited to: That men are meant to chase and women give in, that it is flattering to be chased even when you've said no, that sex is something to be taken (or something to be "given"), that women say no for a bit but then eventually say yes and when they said no they didn't mean it, that men can't stop themselves because women are just so damned sexy, that relationships are hard work and emotional rollercoasters (and if they aren't you're not compatible), that there is a single, perfect "one" for everyone, that love is hard and painful but when it is hard and painful or even abusive you must just keep going because it was meant to be, that obsession, misery, longing and even stalking are normal. (There are still people that think Every Breath You Take by The Police is about a man who is very much in love with a woman, rather than him being a whiny obsessive stalker).

All these tropes are nonsense and also help keep women compliant and in their place and once you see it for what it is you cannot unsee it but many people never see it because of social conditioning, upbringing etc.

As we have all said repeatedly, there really are decent men who don't see women as just a collection of orifices. Unfortunately yours isn't one of them.

Trauma bonding has a big role to play here, I think.

Also, he's all you've known as an adult. Of course leaving is terrifying and would feel like a huge loss.

Your forays put into adult life as a young woman ended up in a traumatic rape, and then into the arms of this manipulator.

And maybe he makes you feel looked after and, not non-coincidentally, like you're not actually competent on your own?

You are being honest about your feelings, just as you are confronting what is going on underneath it all at the same time. I know you may get ‘but how can you love him’ reactions when you say this but I think it’s really important that you feel you can share freely here. I think you are both emotionally and practically dependent on him, and I think with time you will see him a lot clearer, you will feel more capable of the things you have been led to rely on him for, and you in turn may feel differently one day.

Yes, like Trump. He obviously has NPD but he protects his kids (unless they really displease him). Even Hilary said that, when she was asked if there was anything she liked about Trump. But it's not because he loves THEM as autonomous humans, it's because his kids are extensions of him.

I don't think that's necessarily the case. Certainly my love for my husband hasn't faded at all over time. The relationship takes a slight back seat because the kids take so much time, but we absolutely try to find moments for us! My heart still flip flops if I see him across a room, and romance is very important to us (even if it looks very different from 15 years ago due to young kids).

Yes, sorry, when I read my post back it sounded more like I was asking in a nasty way rather than a gentle way!
And totally, I probably wasn't that brilliant in my beliefs and behaviours when I was younger. I would find it very hard to try and disentangle which beliefs were still informing his behaviour if it was someone I lived with and had grown up with.

@Babyboomtastic I suppose each relationship is different. But relationships do ultimately change over time and it's not healthy to be so attached that you become totally passive. I don't think it's love with poet, I think it's fear of change and rocking the boat.

I have been reading up on this bloody book and this is definitely where the ‘pushing’ and the idea of overcoming ‘resistance’ to sex is coming from ! Even if he thought that before reading the book some of his ‘techniques’ are word for word. Jesus

and even from the very very start I still remember some of these things I’m now seeing in black and white! Early over sharing /emotional connection , push & pull, making me feel jealous by making it seem like there were lots of other women persuing him . The first time we met he didn’t ask for my number I ASKED to give it to him after he took a photo of me and my friend without asking and said oh that’s a nice photo of you. Then he said ‘oh you’re trying to give me your number are you…’ or something like that. I still remember that 15 years on! And this is in the book how to get a woman to give you her number and make it seem like it’s her idea.

We slept together on the first ‘date’ and that was ‘my idea’. I can’t remember the ins and outs of that as I’d been drinking (not blackout drunk) but he reminds me sometimes I was the one who took it to the next level ‘on the first date’ - wink

My god. Everything has shocked me but I feel like this is just …. What the fuck!

If girls can do anything why aren’t you allowed your own bank account?

If girls can do anything why does he tell you he knows your ‘no’ really means ‘yes’?

I’m just saying this is what he says to our DDs.
As someone commented they believe that he would see his own daughters differently to say - me or other women and I agreed with that

“Last-minute resistance is just another hurdle.”

“A woman’s ‘no’ doesn’t always mean no… it can mean she needs more comfort.”

“You have to keep moving things forward.” (This is about when she says no or physically resists)

When suggesting the routine to ‘get’ women, “Step 5: Isolate the Target”

And “Step 10: Blast Last-Minute Resistance” - this is about when you have isolated them and already had some physical connection but she doesn’t want to have sex

These are some of the key parts of the book that encourage rape culture.

This is a book your husband had in plain sight in your family home after telling you from the start that it’s how he gets girls / women to like him x