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    • #92824
      Byzantium
      Participant

      Hi everyone.
      I have posted here a few times over the last few weeks and after some planning and advice am leaving my partner for good on (detail removed by moderator) with the help of family.
      There is something that I can’t get out of my mind and I’d really appreciate everyone’s thoughts because I keep going around and around in my kind with it.
      My partner of several years and I have been living together for several months. I won’t go into too much detail as I have posted before. He quit his job a good while ago just after we took out the mortgage. I have been putting all of my pay into the joint account to cover the bills which I dud’t mind because I looked at us as a team and couple and we support each other through ups and downs. He does get anxious and messages me to complain if I am a few hours late transferring on pay day. He has struggled to get a job and feels I haven’t been supportive emotionally. When I ask about how his job hunting is going he used to say ‘fine’ or If don’t want to talk about it’. If I asked if he was ok or asked any more he would get irritated and I would leave the topic. Because I left the topic he says I don’t care. I have helped him typing up job applications as well because he says he doesn’t feel confident in doing it. He kicked me out of our bedroom shortly after moving in. He was annoyed I had put something back in the wrong place after doing the dishes and he didn’t like the way I had put the curtain poles, shelves etc up (I like doing things like that – my mum taught me how to be independent. My dad wasn’t around.). He wasn’t around as we were moving things in and putting stuff up because he had a melt down and ‘wanted nothing to do with the house’.
      On the night I was kicked out of our room he was putting up curtains in the spare room and had thrown a bare duvet and some of my stuff on the floor of the room. I had’t built the spare bed yet so I slept on the floor downstairs for the first night rather than the floorboards upstairs (carpet and sofa had been ordered but not due for another week).
      He also asked me for our engagement ring back. We still lived together and he would alternate between talking about children and marriage to telling me he wanted to sell up and he didn’t want me. He was supportive at times and helped around the home but his moods could change suddenly. He disliked my family.
      Here’s what I wanted to ask:
      1. He says I don’t show him affection or that I love him but if I try to hold him or kiss him he pushes me away or turns his head in disgust. If I say I love you he won’t say it back. He says it’s because he can’t say it when it isn’t 100% true. He won’t accept affection from me because he feels it isn’t genuine but I did care and was trying to show him that. Did I do something wrong? Could I have done thing better?

      2. He complained we were not intimate but it’s hard when he pushes cuddles or a kiss away and live in different rooms. I asked once about coming back to the master bedroom but he said no. He says if I cared I would have taken the lead and asked again but when I wanted to I didn’t because I was afraid of rejection again.

      3. He criticised everything I did from making a cup of tea, cooking, cleaning, ironing etc because I wasn’t doing it right. I know he has specific ways of doing things and have asked to sit down and work out a schedule for chores and an agreed way of doing things but he says I do things wrong because I don’t care or show him respect. Is that right? Could I have done things differently? I did get more anxious about doing things in recent months and I would get anxious and doubtmyself when doing basic tasks.

      3. He would call me useless, pansy, stupid, r******d and other names when I got things wrong. I did get more nervous to the point where I was doing things wrong like the cooking recently. Is it ok to call out your partner for doing stuff wrong like that? Am I being too sensitive like he says?

      4. He has thrown the remote in my direction and hot my arm when pushing my arms away from him (I was going to hug him because he was feeling down). Is that abusive or am I overthinking it?

      5. He was very s as bogey that I was on antidepressants (detail removed). He made me give up my medication because he was convinced it lowered fertility and libido and he wanted children over the next (details removed) The medication issue was a big ring for him. He says it’s why he can’t trust me. He said he shouldn’t have to put up with me on them and me being tired etc. I did put on a little weight whilst on them but he never mentioned this to me directly.
      Did I do anything wrong over the medication? This was a big issue in our relationship.

      6. He always talked fondly of his old pets including his cats from tears ago. After moving in together he said he wanted to know when my cat would be moving in (she was with my mum while I was moving in so I could transition the cat in without trying to move as well (detail removed by moderator)

      He wanted us to keep living together as housemates with me supporting us financially but it feels wrong to me. I feel I tried genuinely to work at the relationship but it’s draining me mentally.
      I’m sorry for rambling! It’s just I’m leaving this situation this week and I feel I’m going crazy with it all. I just need to get my head around what has happened so I can start to move forward. Thank you so much everyone!!

    • #92825
      Cecile
      Participant

      oh dear he really is very very abusive. you are absolutely doing the right thing. looks like there is a lot of ‘crazy making’ here from his behaviours to you. try not to understand him, you won’t be successful. his only agenda is to control and hurt you.you are not in a unique situation, every one who comes to the forum has similar stories. I certainly do, and some of the behaviours you have described are identical to what I have experienced with my oh.These men may appear complex and mysterious but they operate within a very narrow range of behaviours and basically are like malicious school boys, immature, b ut capable of immense harm to women.
      You are getting out and not allowing him to do that, well done, it is the only solution.Look after yourself.

    • #92826
      maddog
      Participant

      AAAggghhhh!!! It sounds horrible. You can’t negotiate with an abuser. It just isn’t going to work. At last I understand when people say that abusers see feelings as facts. It’s at the core of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy. It’s like when you smile and wave at someone you know and they don’t respond and you assume that it’s because they don’t like you when you have no evidence of this. You feel as though they don’t like you because they didn’t respond so it must be true. There may be plenty of evidence that you’ve enjoyed each other’s company before and spent good times together, but this time they haven’t responded so it must be because they don’t like you.

      Abusers have very fragile egos and reality based on evidence is another country.

      You are very sensible to keep your cat out of harm’s way and you are very sensible to see the wood from the trees. It’s a shocking sight.

      You are very sensible to be leaving. If you need extra help with safety planning, it makes sense to contact Women’s Aid. Please don’t underestimate your situation or undermine your experience.

      I think so many of us think, oh, he won’t do that to me, or we think we’re somehow different to the previous person. Of course we are different. The abuser is still an abuser and will carry on abusing whoever they are with.

      I’m rambling. Keep yourself safe. It sounds as though your partner is gaslighting you. You shouldn’t be doubting your reality. If it feels wrong to you, it is wrong.

    • #92851
      Byzantium
      Participant

      I stupidly went out and got a gift for him (he has found a temporary job) and a card. It was not something small. I’ve been ill but went out anyway. He said my gift was an insult, shows I don’t know him and threw it away. It was only a card, (detail removed) but I don’t have a lot of money at the moment. He said there was a slim chance of me getting back into his good books then explained with a visual aid how each thing I do to annoy or upset him has to countered by something good I do to balance it out so he’ll leave his barriers down! I haven’t heard of that kind of point scoring before

    • #92854
      Iwantmeback
      Participant

      Oh my God. What a self centred pr..k!!!! My oh was the exact same, always felt and made those feelings clear jyst how much he thought of my gifts or my family’s gifts to him. I’d forgotten jyst how that made me feel, yes it is triggering, but it’s made me more resolute to not go back to him. Sadly that’s the type of point scoring these men do keep, which only becomes more and more apparent as time goes by.
      Stay strong, all you’ve done is show you’re compassion and thoughtfulness. Don’t buy him anything in future, not even at Christmas, he’s going to complain anyway, so put the money towards your leaving fund.
      Best wishes IWMB

    • #92856
      KIP.
      Participant

      Nothing you do will ever be good enough for this man. He simply wants to abuse you and enjoys this. He chooses this behaviour. Save yourself. You did a lovely kind thing and he used it to hurt you and undermine you. He won’t change x abuse always gets worse x

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