Dealing with the idea that I’d been abused.

[theblondepud]

Hi there I’m a (detail removed by Moderator) year old women and I just want to be able to talk about my story.
Even to this day I haven’t been able to open up about what happened to me, my close family are aware I was in an abusive relationship but I don’t have it in me to tell them what happened, so even to this day they don’t know.
I just want to note that I’m in a new relationship and he’s an amazing guy and in that sense I have moved forward but I just feel stuck mentally.

When I was (detail removed by Moderator) I met a guy (detail removed by Moderator) and he just seemed so perfect, so kind and he truly seemed to care about me. We clicked and ended up meeting, we went on a few dates which I had never experienced before and It seemed magical. We both paid for our own things as I felt empowered to at the time.
He had told me about his life, that he had been abused from his whole family his whole life and even from the beginning I just wanted to protect him, I wanted to be that one positive thing, I wanted to be his sunshine, his biggest supporter that was always there.
I didn’t have any friends, I had severe depression (I didn’t have an official diagnosis back then, as I refused to deal with the idea) due to incidents that happened to me when I was a teenager, all of these things I spoke to him about and he was so understanding. He was the second person I’d spoken about what had happened to me when I was younger.

When I was (detail removed by Moderator), I was sexually assaulted at a party. It took me (detail removed by Moderator) years to accept that it did happen to me and it wasn’t my fault.
It was the first party I had ever been to, I didn’t want to drink much so I stuck to WKD’s I believe I drank (detail removed by Moderator), at one point I didn’t feel well, I felt dizzy and out of it and ended up going to my friends room who was having the party to lay down.
This guy had followed me upstairs and started coming on to me, feeling my breasts, his hands going wherever he wanted. (At this point in my life I was a virgin and I hadn’t experienced anything sexual) He then started fingering me, I can remember him asking if I was enjoying it and I said no, he then inserted another finger and carried on. He asked again and again if I was enjoying it, I didn’t quite understand what was happening but I told him I didn’t like it. He then hovered on top of me and asked if we could have sex. I can remember him pulling my dress up and I can remember covering myself with my arms as no guy had ever seen me partially naked before.
Before he went through with it, he stopped I believe shortly after he left the party and I didn’t see him again. Even to this day I don’t even know his name, just that he was older than me, as I told him I was (detail removed by Moderator) and didn’t know what to do when he was feeling my body.
After that everything is a blur.
I can remember the next morning I was being sick, I felt so so poorly, but I had never drank before and I put it down to the alcohol, I thought this is what a hangover was like.
Up till this point I’d never spoken about it fully before, but I opened up to him about it.

When I was (detail removed by Moderator), my best friend committed suicide and that day changed me for the rest of my life. I began self harming badly, not eating, not sleeping, I didn’t know how to deal with the grief.

We’d been together for a few months, I’d applied for uni and he couldn’t have been happier for me. I was contacting my future flat mates, getting to know them, we created a group chat on Facebook. Even back then he wasn’t happy I was talking to males, but I just brushed it off as he’s being protective over me and wanted to keep me safe.
We had so many conversations over it and it always came to he just wanted to protect me and keep me safe from other people as he loved me. So I didn’t really think much of it, if anything I was flattered.

Then my best friends death date came along, it’s a day that I grieve and I tend to break down. That was the first argument we ever had, he was jealous of my best friend that had been dead for years. I can remember saying to him “(detail removed by Moderator)” He said something on the lines of, “(detail removed by Moderator)” He ended up turning the conversation against me and I ended up apologising for the way it made him feel, this was my one day to grieve.

I had moved into my uni accommodation, the first week moving there, freshers week. I can remember me and my flat mates having a good time, playing drinking games and we’re about go out as a group. He had been messaging me all day as usual, he rang just before we went out and he wasn’t happy about me drinking. He told me it wasn’t safe to be drinking when there were guys around. All my flatmates were lovely and there was a girl flatmate too, it wasn’t like I was the only one.
I can remember him trying to call me again after that but I didn’t answer.

We all had gotten to in front of a pub and the whole time walking there I can remember feeling dread in the Pitts of my stomach. As my flat mates went in, he called me again and I ended up going home. I can remember crying to him, telling him how sorry I was for not listening to him. The conversation went on for hours even after I got home. I know this as our conversation has just ended by the time my flat mates had gotten back, after a good night out together.
That was the last time we drank or went out together, I didn’t feel safe anymore.

My boyfriend had come to stay with me, it was a normal routine that he would come up to my accommodation and stay a night or a few. This is where I started paying for his train fare and bus fare, as he was coming the whole way to see me afterall.
Whilst he was staying I would buy him food or whatever he wanted to eat and drink.

Me and my friend in my flat were talking about joining the (detail removed by Moderator) club, which I joined. At first he was happy for me as I wanted to get fit. But once he found out my flatmate was doing it together with me he wasn’t happy with me, after weeks of him putting in my head it wasn’t safe and my flatmate was “dodgy”, I stopped going, instead he stayed longer or we would go out to eat at Nando’s which of corse I would be paying for.
To note, he was a uni student too but he was doing it at the college he attended. He was living at home with his parents, he didn’t have any board to pay, he didn’t pay for anything, but somehow he was always skint.
So I would help him, send him money, so he could afford to eat at college, and get himself treats. I thought that everyone deserves something nice, whether that was clothes, or games, or the sets he liked. I’d get it all for him.
That (detail removed by Moderator) I was home and I got a call from my boyfriend. He said that his dad had hit him again and he couldn’t take it there any longer. So me and my family thinking he was in danger had him come live with us. Again he didn’t pay for anything, anything that was bought for him I paid for.
I had to go back to uni and he was living in my room back at home with my family.

He then started telling me about my family, that nothing he did in the house was good enough, how they were nit picking at him at everything he did. I knew how my family could be with me and I believed him. We were looking at other places for him to live, we found a place and I put a £(detail removed by Moderator) down payment that was non-refundable, he decided at the last minute he didn’t want to live there as it wasn’t safe and he didn’t know the area, so of corse I believed what he said.
After (detail removed by Moderator) months of living at my mums he got kicked out as my family couldn’t take it anymore.

I can remember the talk in the car from my family how it was my fault for the way he behaved. How I chose him over them.
But in one ear I would have him telling me how they were lying and they just didn’t want us to be happy, how they were just trying to split us up.

From then I wasn’t welcome home not even on my birthday, he came and lived with me in my uni flat, that night we carried all of his belongings to my flat on the train and he lived with me for a few weeks.
Of corse everything whilst he was there I paid for, I can remember being terrified that uni would find out and I’d get in trouble, but he assured me I’d be fine.

We then found a new place for him, back in our hometown. I again payed for his down payment and his first months rent as he couldn’t afford it. So he moved there and over the summer with me having to come home to my mums, I spent most of my time there when I wasn’t at work.

I genuinely believed that my family just didn’t want me to be happy, that they wanted me to be alone and miserable. He had put in my head that they had control over me and that they would stop at nothing to drive us apart.
He payed for his own rent whilst there a few months, I tended to buy his shopping for him weekly as his money was tight. At this point he would always be pointing out what I do wrong, whether that was when we were out together, or if anyone else started at me that was my fault. Or if his bed wasn’t made, or if his clothes weren’t washed or if he didn’t have enough food in.
At this point is where punishment became sexual. I can remember brushing it off as I was his partner and this is what I was supposed to do, it was my job to keep him satisfied even if I didn’t feel up to it or even if I didn’t want to, I had to, it was my job to make him happy.

He then decided that he had to get out of there as he couldn’t live with the people there any longer.
So we found him a new place (detail removed by Moderator), instead of a house share it was his own space, it was small but it was what he wanted.
I again ended up paying the down payment, the whole time he swore he would pay me back as I stressed to him that I wasn’t made of money.
All the money I had, was either my student overdraft or money I had saved up over the summer.

After staying with him at his place, I noticed he always had the latest tech, the latest phone or tablet, he had multiple phones, he would buy broken stuff like tablets to fix and sell, which when doing so he would break.
Once he had lived in this place for a while he was low on money, the whole time I had been weekly paying for his shopping bill, it was one of the things we would do together when I got there.
I can remember bringing it up for the first time that I didn’t understand how he could afford those things when he can’t even pay for his rent or his food most of the time. The whole time if I was away I had to message him all the time, keep him up to date all of the time. He had passwords to everything, all my social media, my paypal, even my bank account and my phone.

There he would emotionally blackmail me, telling me I was just like his (detail removed by Moderator), that I just wanted to take away all the nice things that he had. How I didn’t love him, which then would get turned on me, that my love wasn’t enough, that I wasn’t doing enough for him.
At this point we’d been together for just over (detail removed by Moderator) years and the sexual abuse got worse, his behaviour got worse.
Sex most of the time was forced, I was forced to multiple times a day, it was my job to give him b******s and taking it as rough as he wanted. He liked inflicting pain to me, making me cry. After it was over he’d say “(detail removed by Moderator)”.
He controlled what I wore, who I spoke to, he didn’t like any friends I made at uni so I wasn’t allowed to have them.
He never hit me, he would leave bruises from sex, or bite marks where I bled or marks all over my body as I was his, he wanted to make it known he could do whatever he wanted as I belonged to him. The sad thing is that I’d just take it as I thought it was what I deserved and that he loved me and would never hurt me, even though he was.

(detail removed by Moderator) he worked (detail removed by Moderator), I had to eat my lunch and dinner with him. I would have to wait till his shift ended and leave from work with him.
The whole time, I thought it was normal, He treat me the way he did because he loved me, he wanted to keep me safe, I was safe as long as I was with him. The money he had made from that which was a good wage, he again would blow.
I had to pay for everything and it got to the point I could barely afford to keep on going. I was taking more overtime and shifts as I needed to money.

I can remember one day getting upset, I was breaking down telling him I can’t afford this anymore and he would blackmail me, tell me of how terrified to be homeless and that I couldn’t do that to him. I can remember I was on the bed and I was crying into the pillow, I threw the pillow down back onto the bed, he started arguing with me. He would throw his (detail removed by Moderator) at me, or the things I bought him like aftershave, plates, cups. I can remember being terrified, it smashed right next to my head and I remember being told clean it up, so I did as per usual it was all my fault he got angry, it was always my fault.

(detail removed by Moderator) years in (detail removed by Moderator), we me and him house sat for (detail removed by Moderator) whilst her and her partner went on (detail removed by Moderator) away. It was quiet whilst we were there.

(detail removed by Moderator) later when I was at home my mum and older sister sat me down. They told me that my partner one day when he got in from work whilst we were house sitting that he broke down.
He made out to them that I was abusing him and that he was terrified of me. They said he was crying and screaming, that he was shaking and was almost sick.
They confronted me, he had almost convinced them that I’d been abusing him. Then I came clean, they thought I was in a happy relationship that had its ups and downs. But I wasn’t.

(detail removed by Moderator) my mum called him to our house and (detail removed by Moderator)they confronted him. He denied it.
(detail removed by Moderator) we broke up. Later (detail removed by Moderator) I was getting messages about how he was going to kill himself im a certain way, that he couldn’t live without me.
He said that to mess with my head knowing how I had lost my best friend that way.

I didn’t really know his family I’d only met them once before as he wanted to keep them away from me. We rushed to his dads and begged for him to go over there.
I got contacted, he didn’t do anything and wasn’t going to do anything, he was sat playing games in his room when his dad turned up at his door.

I never got the money back he owed me over £(detail removed by Moderator), even now I pretty much live out of my overdraft.
I remember the moment I came to the realisation that I was abused. Me and my mum were shopping, I don’t remember what I was thinking, but I said to my mum “I was abused wasn’t I?”.
We cried, I sobbed and was inconsolable.

I couldn’t accept that I was this pathetic victim, I ended up seriously attempting to take my own life. I’m lucky to be here today.

We split in (detail removed by Moderator), so he got his presents before we split. The (detail removed by Moderator) in (detail removed by Moderator) I was reading through the #MeToo campaign and I finally accepted that what happened to me when I was (detail removed by Moderator), it wasn’t my fault, I accepted that I had been abused for years by someone I loved.

I still struggle to this day, I don’t like the term survivor or victim as forgiving myself for what happened to me is still on-going.

I recently accepted that I have a problem with picking at my skin. When we were together he would inspect my body, my boobs. To this day, I pick at them, now they’re scarred up, bruised and I don’t know how to stop myself.
On the positive side, I believe I’ve found the one. I learned meeting him what a man means and what love is.

[KIP.]

Hi and welcome, firstly I want you to know that you have absolutely nothing to forgive yourself about. None of this was your fault. It’s beyond devastating to be abused by someone you trust and love and who you think loves you in return. I wonder if you feel a little better now you’ve written things down and shared your story And now know you’re not alone? Keeping a journal or writing things down can feel very positive. I wonder if you have ever had counselling? Have you spoken to your GP. It sounds like you’re self harming as a way to cope with the trauma you have suffered. Good counselling can help you come to terms with the abuse you’ve suffered. There are also good books out there too. I liked Healing From Hidden Abuse. It takes you through the stages of how to heal and explains the feelings you may be having. Your ex sounds sadly like a typical abuser. Have you read Living With The Dominator by Oat Craven. I’d also recommend you talk to rape crisis. They have a helpline and are wonderful. I know it was several years ago but you can still report this to the police. These sexual predators will have assaulted more than one victims and you may find someone at that party remembers him and it might give you some sort of closure to at least make a statement and report what happened. If you can read the other posts on here it may help you to Know you’re not alone and many of us have been abused my men just like your ex. Same pathetic tactics, threatening suicide, sexual assaults, emotional blackmail, financial abuse, controlling behaviour. At least you now recognise it for what it was. There’s also the domestic abuse helpline that you might feel you want to talk to someone or you could find your local women’s aid. Keep posting and working through these feelings but I’d highly recommend starting with GP and counselling. There’s trauma you need to work through with a professional. The Body Keeps the Score. Another good book about trauma x

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