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Hi everyone – I have just joined the forum. I was dating someone on and off for (timeframe removed by Moderator) years, it ended finally in (month removed by Moderator) and I am really struggling to feel ok despite how he treated me. He dumped me about (number removed by Moderator) times yet kept coming back, he was married with kids – they all lived in (location removed by Moderator) and he was supporting them and living with his parents in the UK. I was (timeframe removed by Moderator) years divorced when I met him from a (timeframe removed by Moderator) year marriage with someone very controlling and disempowering, and I told him I was not ready for a relationship and was building my confidence. I had an issue that this man was married – when we met he said he’d been separated for (timeframe removed by Moderator) years and had no contact with other women, this turned out to be untrue and his true character was insecure, jealous, possessive and childish. He was very moody, gave me the silent treatment, said his wife didn’t want a divorce. He stole (number removed by Moderator) items from me, all my favourites but low value items. He constantly ogled women, and I saw he looked at them online on Facebook and Instagram too, which I confronted him about. We went on one small trip and he behaved really badly, and weirdly – after the trip I texted him to say I didn’t have the best time, he could not move in as he wished and it wasn’t great for me mentally to continue to date someone who is married. He kept telling me his family lived in poverty in (location removed by Moderator), but his son had a new (item removed by Moderator), his wife worked, and they lived in a beautiful town. He tried to pressure money out of me, but I never lent him any. He had a drinking binge one night and I called the police as I wanted to dump him. He would be very upset if I went away on a trip, going mad, shaking me up before long drives, ruining my weekends away. He disliked several of my friends, I wasn’t allowed male friends at all if they were single. I became really isolated. When I met him, I found him odd and I felt sorry for him. Each time he dumped me I felt physically shaky and traumatised as it was always sudden and aggressive. He smoked neat weed, and I think took other drugs. He told me his wife was a drug addict with unmedicated bi-polar but I think he was referring to himself. After I told him he could not move in, he never really contacted me again – he just drifted off for the last time and I blocked him, but I felt I was addicted to him by that point. I felt I needed him, even though I’d found him utterly suffocating and threatening. He even once held a (item removed by Moderator) to my body and turned it on, leaving me with scars that I still have and I was in agony for over a week as they became infected (he said it was a joke). Anyway, I saw he is in a new relationship – now I feel the ups and downs and madness were my fault. My ex-husband has gone on to marry again. This guy has also moved on – I cannot shake the feeling I am the issue. Like I am crazy, he and my ex always said I was highly anxious and difficult and this guy said I was very troubled and traumatised from my upbringing and marriage. But I have a ft job, I don’t have substance abuse issues, I have friends, family and hobbies. I don’t know – I feel however nice and good and kind and ‘normal’ I try to be these men are awful. I do not know why I miss him. I feel so weirded out he is in a relationship, maybe I was just too unkind to him. He told me his marriage had been toxic and he just wanted to be in a happy long-term relationship. But he never even bought me a birthday or Xmas present, never showed kindness and completely eroded my self-esteem. He never wanted me to meet his friends alone, and he criticised my looks – I don’t know why he bothered, why did he pursue me in the first place if I am this awful. I can’t heal as I can’t make sense of any of it. At the end he’d gone from saying how beautiful, he was punching above his weight, to saying I looked like an (detail removed by Moderator), and was too skinny (I’d had covid and lost weight) as he always had an issue with me being slim. I have a stressful job and building my life after my divorce has been really lonely – he cut me off further. I feel he and my job have triggered all my issues around low self esteem and I cannot see any good in me. Sorry – I’ve been spiralling on and off for a while.
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Believing that I was the problem and my husband would change kept me stuck in the relationship for way longer than I should have stayed.
The thought that after all these years of insults and unsolvable problems, he would go on to have a lovely relationship with someone else was unbearable.
When I found out that he won’t ever change and the next person will just go through it all over again, that moment was a massive breakthrough for me.
He won’t change. All the research including evidence from practitioners who work with abusers suggests that these personalities are highly rigid.
Change is highly unlikely.
Their new women are going through exactly what we went through, or will be, very shortly.
Well done on being the one that he couldn’t abuse.
Im in awe of you.
You trusted your feelings and stopped him at every major power grab. Ie moving in, lending money etc.
It’s possible that you were ‘the problem’ in some sense. But what I see is that you were only the problem because you were making it hard work for him to abuse you, and he thought he could find someone where that would be easier.
You’re amazing.
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Thank you so much for your reply and the massive dose of sanity. It’s these moments when I spiral, and somehow manage to rose tint the very few good moments we had, that make me feel uncertain and unsure. I felt so muddled with him – he has a victim complex, and I sometimes questioned if I was being too boundaried – when friends and colleagues were saying how kind I am easy to talk to. I had a (number removed by Moderator) year relationship prior to this one, with a lot of manipulation and gaslighting, and lying – but this latest guy was so overt and there were so many red flags. It has been huge learning curve – have boundaries and be alert!. I can’t thank you enough and right back at you – you’re amazing! Even his mum tried to warn me away from him, and recently I found out his lies are so much more than I initially realised – so my anxiety was not misplaced or innacurate, which is a relief. To come through what you have, and see the light and understand with such clear-headedness that these men never change, is incredible. Well done, and thank you.
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It is easy to spiral into anxiety and self doubt isn’t it. I feel like I fall down a big rabbit hole every now and then, like in Alice in Wonderland. I lose all perspective and reality!
It’s amazing isn’t it, the strength of the effects of this abuse.
Luckily I’m learning to climb out of that rabbit hole real quick these days.
Just learning to trust myself, whether I’m right or wrong doesn’t matter at this point. I’m allowed to just have my own opinion and feelings about things and trust that opinion or those feelings ( something I certainly wasn’t allowed to have in the relationship!). -
I am so glad and proud of you that you are able to pull back from the rabbit-holes, that is amazing progress and it’s all that self belief you’re getting back. It’s that sense of hearing your own voice again – and that is the voice that matters, and that self trust is so vital.
This latest guy was so corrosive to my self esteem erosion, it was so toxic, but I am aware of that and trying to find a foothold to get my balance. It’s funny – the years after my marriage ended, when i was single, I felt that my anxiety reduced and I started to trust myself and feel my preferences and my identity return and emerge. It told me all I needed to know. I am so p****d off with myself I got drawn into such an awful relationship, but I can start to rebuild again.
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