abusive men.

[saddest]

There seem to be so many of them, and they are all exactly the same.

I have some questions that have not been answered by anyone yet....maybe someone here can help.

I have been told/read, that they know that they are doing it. But really do they? Or is it just that they are so conditioned that it is almost a pavlovian thing. Wife=abuse. If they really know that they are doing it, in a consious way, that makes them psychpathic doesn't it?

If as I have read, they split off their cut off feeling and personality traits and deposit them in their partner, how do they rationalise this? Do they really not understand that hte partner is a whole individual in her own right?

How does it FEEL to be so cut off from your own personality, do they have an inkling that it may be them that's odd, weird, wrong whatever?

How come they are so utterly convinced of their "rightness". Often they are bright, and I just don't get how someone can be so completely irrational and determined to destroy everything for the sake of never being wrong. Ultimately, they hurt themselves more.

How come they can cope with other human beings but not their partner....although I have read that they can plant their cut off bits into employers, children etc.

If my Psychotherapist could plant trigger words in my subconsious that gave me the balls to stop the relationship....why can't someone plant triggers in these many, many men to get them to get help and stop it.

The thing that really gets me is this. The wall between them and health is very high and very wide, but it is also paper thin. All it takes is humility (which they may have in other circumstances) and a decision to get help.

Why is all this so destructive and so hard?

Gaslighting is where someone challenges your reality to the point where you question your perceptions, your memory and your very sanity.

That's why I asked the gp to refer me to the mental health team....who told me the truth.

It's not me....it's him.

Gaslighting:
www.enotalone.com/article/16907.html
www.psychologytoday.com/blog/power-in-relationships/200905/are-you-being-gaslighted

My (now funny) mind-bending gas-lighting experience: exH and I had gone away for the weekend. He got up to go home early on the sunday saying he had things to do. I had no problem with this.

I rang his mob later that day, to find that his two daughters and his best friend C, who lived in Ireland and I had only met once, were all having a great time at our house. C was only there for the day apparently.

I was angry and shouted at ex 'why the hell didn't you tell me C was coming??? I would have come home with you. I would liked to have seen him again and the girls etc etc...' I got very upset. He said in that horrible, calm, 'you are mad' tone 'but UA, I told you he was coming' Me: 'No you didn't' Him 'Yes I did. I told you 2 weeks ago' Me: 'You did not I would have remembered something like that.' Him 'Well I definitely told you' etc. He sounded so bloody reasonable

I got more and more angry and upset. Confused. Well. I played right into his hands. His friend must have thought I was mad. I thought I was going mad not to have remembered. He must have been laughing his head off inside his twisted nut.

Gaslighting. It's a head-fucker when you're new to it.

Oh my....I certainly recognise this..

I'm always feeling I'm not a good enough wife or mother and do constantly seek reassurance from DH about this. I also apologise a lot and give him a reason for a lot of things...eg if he can't find a vest for DS I never feel I can say oh, upstairs, its oh they are upstairs because I forgot to fold them and put them in his vest drawer - that kind of thing

Also, I have felt when I speak to him about something that is upsetting me, a lot of the time it turns around to me being too sensitive or I didn't deal with the situation properly

There are times though, when DH does praise me and I'm pleased but also feel like a puppy dog awaiting praise iyswim?

And yes, we can be arguing about something and I can feel sure I'm right, but it ends up getting twisted and I start questioning my reasoning and thinking oh, yes he has a point

I really need to watch out for this and start challenging it don't I??

DH can be very authoritarian in the house but he is not like that at work AT ALL. He will not stand up for himself, speak to management about stuff that is stressing him out and in fact, I've often said to him why can't you be as firm with people in work as you are with me when you are upset with me. Maybe its because he just doesn't have the bollocks to do it..and that I guess is symptomatic of his behaviour in that he is like it with me, but not others

This is the utter joy of this site!

I haven't heard, or read that before, but....My h is the biggest victim on the planet when it come to his work.

Work is his life, but, for some reason, he only works for people who are horrible to him. He is brilliant at what he does, but never pushes himself, and seems to seek out fly by nights and nutjobs.

We met at work, I was singing on his stuff , via a third party.

The third party company treat people like shit. (They have a shocking reputation, and go under and reappear with a new name...you know the kind of thing) In the end I told them to fuck off, because they were expecting me to work for 40p...yes 40p. H STILL thinks that my reaction was completely unreasonable. Well of course it wasn't unreasonable....but then again, he went on to do work for them for nothing.

I know that he has a new client, who are so dodgy it's not true....no good will come of it. But he would say that that is just me hating everyone.

It's weird that he seeks out clients who will treat him badly and rip him off, but won't go for good legit stuff that he is perfectly capable of doing.

And...he refused to answer the phone if the number was one of my clients. But that's because I don't exist.

to add....his excuse was that he didn't hear the phone ring, even though it was on his desk, less than two feet away from his ear.

Knowing what I now know....he probably didn't "hear" it once he saw the number. Just blocked it out.

I am fascinated by this. It's too weird.

Its bizarre...reading this thread..even as far down the line as i am...so clear!

"My Mum did it again the other day, Saddest - I had to ring someone up and explain that what she'd told them about me was entirely made up (embarassing, but needed to be done as it was a practical matter.)"

My mother makes stuff up all the time!!

I sometimes wonder if she actually believes what she is saying.

Stuff like, I will tell her something that happened, she will go the rounds and tell other people, then she will tell the story again to someone else in my presence, but it will be so twisted out of recognition it's ridiculous!! She will have assigned thoughts and motivations to me and say that I said stuff I never said. It's like she remembers half of what I actually said, makes up the rest and decides for herself why I did what I did, and tells everyone like it's gospel truth when it's totally fiction!!

It's got to the point where you can't actually believe anything she says any more.

But I know that it's her and not me.

In one way, it's not a bad thing that human beings are kind of hardwired to expect that other human beings mean well, are being fair, and that if they blame us for something then maybe we did make a mistake. Because most people are wellmeaning, fair and basically kind. Human beings are a social species, dependent on each other's goodwill. Unfortunately, there are a percentage of people who are basically mutants, abnormal, who can only function by abusing other people, not perceiving them as human or valid or important, other people are just props in the abnormal person's story.

And the extra sad and messy and infuriating level to this is that to many people, women are simply not as important as men. Women are accessories, dependents, property, and whatever the man says is right and the woman's job is to 'love' ie please, obey and indulge the man. This makes it easier for nasty, selfish, antisocial men to get away with abusing their partners for a long time, the woman has absorbed enough of the cultural myths that she blames herself first, 'stress/pressure/depression' next and the man who is actually DOING the abuse last of all.

Exactly SGB..we are programmed , generation upon generation..that the men come first.
Chivalrous men would dispute this i guess...but chivalry itself is inherently sexist of course.

Just a brilliant post, SGB.

"People who are basically mutants" - never heard it put that way before - and it's correct!

And what you said about gender, of course.

Same here startingtoheal. My XP beat me up then denied it two days later to my face - gaslighter supreme! He constantly made negative comments to me and to the DCs about me....and worse... So glad we are well out of it now and happy.

Please can I join?

H left the house last July, and I have been doing really well. I have been in counselling and have cut down my anti depressants.

But I don't feel strong. I fact I feel raw and weak.

Your 20;20 post on Thursday saddest sums up how I feel.

Certain aspects of my life are easier, and the shouting and walking on egg shells has stopped. I don't self harm any more. The kids are better and to be fair, a lot of the time he is a far better Dad than he was at home. Although it can flare up at times.

I am actually angry, but pathetically so. Because he was the kind of person that could be so sweet and tender and then turn and make me feel like feel shit.

I don't know really what I would do if he decided now but could never understand why if he loved me so much he couldn't make the changes to make things OK. He would cry at times and say he knew he needed help and I wanted him to for a long time, but then he flips into his other mode and is cocky and arrogant and his attitude makes me shrink.
Although we only really have contact for the DC's, he is like this at the moment and I can feel myself shrinking.

Sometimes I want to move so badly and start again that I can't breathe.

And however bad it got, I have to come to terms with the fact that my marriage is over.

I am not sure what I am saying, but that it how it is making me feel.

''Total street angel, house devil.'' I got that Nicknametaken. He has been weird all week and in the house when he was sorting the dc's out was distant and ''hmm'', but when we went on the drive to part company he put his arms out to give me a hug. It sounds so petty and small but it is so symptomatic of how things were.... rosy on the outside but a different story behind four walls.

I don't know why I can't just move on,

Sorry, I found this thread at a really vulnerable moment, and it gets so lonely.

So sorry you're feeling so low Mitsubishi. I do find reconnecting with the wrongness of it all helps.

I am starting the freddom programme on Tuesday, and their book arrived in the post this morning. I have already read it.

I left it strategically placed on the table, with the note from the children's centre, with the local authority header, for him to see.

They have threatened to "report me to ss" for being the devil incarnate you see. I wanted him to know that I am there before them, as are the police and all the health services. Not to get one over on them, but on the advice of wonderful womens aid.

I didn't mean to, but he is so predictable and pathetic....I burst out laughing when he picked up dd.

He looked at the book and the note, and I could see that I had completely thrown him. It made me laugh. And you know what happens when you try to suppress a laugh...it got worse.

Oh dear. Really I couldn't stop. So he got cross and said I was laughing at him and humiliating him.

Actually I was laughing at the first feeling of being me that I have had in YEARS!

Mitsubishi....we can't move on because they controlled us to the point where we are dependent upon them for our very existence.

I can see that now. I still feel like you, but being a bit naughty this morning was so good. I was in control, and now I feel a bit giddy.

Last night however I was in floods of tears turining the air blue with evry name under the sun for him on the phone to my friend.

Friends.....I made from school, that coincided with a deterioration in his behaviour toward me. There is no coincidence there. That's when he started to lose control.

My exe started to lose it bigtime when we got broadband...it was a link to other people(men) that he hadnt anticipated...couldnt dominate..and didnt understand!..new posters,keep it up..xx

Ps..my nickname(one of them)..was 'Jekyll and Hyde'

....for him of course! lol

Phew - you had me worried for a minute there

Another example of that:

He asked ds if he had managed to transfer his songs from his ipod (which went through the washing mashine) onto the new mp4 player I got for him. He said no, and h began to get involved with how to do it.

I said that there was no need as a friend had told me an easy way to tranfer them in one go.

My word....you'd have thought that his world had ended, he didn't say anything, but the look on his face was like thunder. He was almost rumbling with rage.

Funny isn't it? Something so normal and innocent as someone offering a bit of friendly advice is seen as utterly threatening their perceived omnipotence.

It's these little examples that you push aside at first, but collectively, over time, that's how they get you.

Oh for sure..we can't be WRONG..don't you know saddest..if you know something they don't..their manhood shrinks to a prawn..a square mile of rainforest dies,the sky falls in...and God kills a kitten

And even worse.....from a "friend"...my god it could have been .........a man!!!!!!!

AAAAAGGGGHHH!!!!!!

It was two of my mates on the dreaded facebook, which I was never "allowed" on who offered the same advice.

I have 86 now. and I am dead proud of that.

I wasnt allowed on myspace..Im on FB now,its better..love it lol,i can talk to whoever i damn like..and boy do i ever

Hidingfromview, this is a late response but I hope you'll see it. I also married a man from a different culture, and spent a lot of time confused about what was cultural difference v. what crossed the line into abuse.

I found it helpful to keep a diary to track what was happening. Intensely stressful episodes can be strangely hard to keep in your memory. First, I needed to know about what was happening.

Secondly, I realized (well, someone pointed out to me) the cultural stuff isn't really relevant. The question is what behaviour you personally can live with. The fact that a woman from that culture might accept it is irrelevant. He chose to marry out, so he needs to choose to make some compromises for your sake just as much as you make compromises for him. He chose to live here and to marry a woman from here, so he can't claim all the cultural privileges that come with being male in his home country (although frankly, I don't think much of a male who unquestioningly enjoys male privilege wherever he comes from or lives).

Decide what you can reasonably live with, not what you think a woman from that culture would accept. Talk to him about it and tell him what you need from him. Either he respects you enough to meet you half-way, or he thinks you should put up and shut up. In the latter case, I would give serious consideration to leaving. In my case, I left.