First post, I have left again…

[Pinkflower]

Hi all, I have been reading this forum for the last few weeks after a friend of mine told me about it. I am finally feeling brave enough to write a post. Well I guess the first thing to mention is that I have left my partner again (detail removed by moderator)  and I am trying to stay strong but I feel that he is trying to guilt me into giving him another chance again.

A little back story – we have been together a number of years and have children together. I was very young when we got together and I guess I never realised all of the red flags he was showing. I am now in my (age removed by moderator) and over the last year or so noticed that his behaviour towards me wasn’t normal and that they way he was making me feel wasn’t normal. I don’t know if it is because I am older or because I simply god fed up of feeling so low that i started to notice things.
Reading the other posts on this forum and in some ways they all sound so familiar to my life. I guess the easiest way to put it is that I feel like my partner has ruined me, he has ruined the person I used to be.

He accuses me of being unfaithful, when I have never been and he has been the unfaithful one in the past. He doesn’t allow me to have male friends, yet he has female friends – who i recently found out that he tells them he loves as friends, yet i had to hide that i was friends from a male from work so that he wouldn’t shout at me and now that he has found out i had a male friend, he has been saying all sorts of horrible things and saying that why do i need male friends and that it is ok for him to have female friends because in his words they aren’t attractive. He has started moaning at what i wear. he makes sly comments when i wear make up. he recently went through my phone and social media again! he’s says i can’t be friends with one of my friends because he doesn’t like her and thinks she is a bad influence. he is saying he can’t trust me so i cannot go on my friends hen do because he doesn’t know what i might do if i am drunk… he has told me in the past i cannot go out with my friends clubbing because people only got for one reason and then a few months later he went clubbing for his birthday but it was ok apparently. he said that if i had said he could come with me then i could have gone? but i feel like i should be able to have fun with my friends without him needing to be there. he is awful when we argue and if i annoy him he says stuff like better shut up or I’m not coming here etc. one of my friends hasn’t spoken to me in the last 2 years because she thinks he is toxic and she doesn’t like the way he treats me. he makes everything my fault and everything i say he manages to turn it round onto me. he doesn’t financially support me or our children and when i have mentioned money he has left and he has made me feel bad saying he can’t afford to help me out etc.

A couple of months ago, I told him to leave because I had had enough and he left. but he harassed me for weeks, crying, threatening suicide, threatening to take the kids off of me. basically telling me that i am throwing our entire relationship away because i won’t work on things with him. i ended up letting him come back (detail removed by moderator) later i have left him again and this time i want it to be for good. he changed for a total of 10 days and then went back to being his usual self because apparently i wasn’t putting any effort in. He is once again saying that i am throwing away our entire relationship and that he can change if i let him. that he hopes i am happy with my decision and that do i realise this decision affects our children. saying that i am the love of his life, that he can’t go on without me.

the thing is i feel emptiness and resentfulness towards him. i love him and i always will but his behaviour has made me this way. he has turned me into a horrible person over the time we have been together and i don’t like what he has turned me into. i had a break down the other week and i banged my head repeatedly against the ironing board and then i had a panic attack because i cannot cope with the way he makes me feel. i feel suffocated and trapped by a man who is supposed to love me?! we don’t have sex anymore, or kiss or cuddle because i literally feel repulsed by him. he has literally said and done so many horrible things i can’t even write them all out, i am just mentally exhausted.
i guess i just need some reassurance that i have done the right thing? that he was being emotionally abusive towards me and that I’m not overreacting. I just feel so lost.

[marmaladechamp]

Hi Pinkflower,

You’re mind will be in such a muddle at the minute. Make a list of what he has said/done to you for your own sanity. I found it helps immensely when I am doubting myself as it makes me realise I’m not overreacting, these are genuinely things that have happened.

I also understand how difficult it is when they start trying to guilt trip you into staying and forgiving them. Is all I can say (as many ladies on here have said to me) is it’s okay to put yourself and your kids first.

You know what’s best for you and the fact that you e left means that you are so strong and brave! It will take time to adjust and feel that way but you have to do what makes you happy and it doesn’t sound like he did. I personally found making a list of things I have always wanted to do but couldn’t with him is a great little motivator for moving forward.

You can do this!!

[Tiffany]

Definitely the right decision. Definitely emotional abuse. Possibly coersive control. And probably various other types of abuse that you haven’t recognised yet because as abuse victims we tend to normalise abusive behaviour. I know when I left I recognised that the emotional stuff wasn’t right, and I knew that there had been a few physical incidents, but I didn’t even start to process the sexual abuse, or the financial abuse for some months.

It would definitely be helpful for you to talk to women’s aid – either by calling the national helpline, or by visiting your local branch. They can help you understand what has happened and help you access support to stay out.

You are definitely minimising what has happened to you, not over reacting to it. It might also help to go to the doctor and talk about the panic attacks and the self harming. I am hopeful that they will improve once you are no longer in contact with your abuser. It took a couple of months for me, but it happened. The doctor might be able to help speed that process.

It’s also really important to cut all contact with your abuser to the absolute minimum possible. Ideally you want no contact with him whatsoever. But if there has to be contact because of the kids then that should ideally be through a third party, to reduce his influence over you. I don’t have kids and went no contact whatsoever – blocked him on everything, changed my phone number and my email address. But women’s aid, or the lovely ladies on here will be able to give you advice on how to deal with the kids contact issue. In the interim if you have contact, make sure all of it is in writing (makes it so much easier to identify abusive tactics), and in a form that doesn’t bombard you continually – I would suggest email, if necessary mark him as spam, so you only see what he sends you when you are ready to deal with it, rather than on his demands.

Stay strong. You can do this. You didn’t deserve the hell your ex put you through, and you absolutely deserve the happiness that you can have from leaving and starting over.

[diymum@1]

Have you ever googled double standards this is what men with an entitlement problem do. It is the hall mark off abuse. You would be doing the best thing for you and the kids. There are ways around child contact but a court order is best then it’s set x*x that’s something to think about once you leave. Have women’s aid on side they’re amazing xx take care and don’t doubt yourself this is ALL him not you xx❤️

[Pinkflower]

I have cut contact with my ex partner. He will now see our children at his parents. Even though I know this is for the best I still feel unbelievably sad and broken. It sucks when you create a life with someone and picture a future and you know that it’s no longer the same. I know it’ll get easier one day. Xx

[Author]

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