Gaslighting myself?

[RelearningMe]

I think I’ve been invalidating my concerns and feelings recently and I guess i could just use a little reassurance of what I’m living through.

 

I’ve found that recently I have been doubting that it was ever like abusively bad in my marriage. We’ve gotten to this sort of quiet place, it still feels like I can’t do anything right or he’s offended by anything I say but he’s not been super critical or mean in a short while. I think he expects me to snap back to super happy and romantic but I’m not even close to there yet. Sometimes I think he’s forgotten everything he said and he never actually realises how he makes me feel  its often overlooked as how I react is the problem, I guess.

 

I keep telling myself that I’m just holding onto it at this point. I need to let go of this hurt and anger that I have. I tell myself a whole host of excuses like “I’ve started my period so it was just p*s, it might be seasonal depression or my regular depression, maybe I’m overthinking, he’s been stressed or slept bad lately, I should be nicer and do more for him”

 

The fact as well that it was only really kinda abusive for like 2 or so months for example out of over 10 years is another reason why I just keep telling myself it’s not that bad. Its just times when hes snapped. Hes admitted he has anger problems in the past. I know that if you could show me recordings of older arguments and issues there’d be some like abusive tendencies throughout most of the relationship, but I write those off so easily due to being young or us both being unmedicated and showing clear mental health issues.

 

I think logically I know it was still bad, especially when I look back through diary entries.

 

Its just it’s so easy to tell myself that because it only happened once, was never physical and hasn’t happened in a long time that it doesn’t really count?

[Wavesripple]

I sort of relate to this, l suffered prolonged emotional abuse a kid. I’ve been in my current relationship decades. It’s never been easy and l think l should have walked away along time ago. But now we seemed to have reached some sort of equilibrium where it’s ok some of the time but l feel very neglected a lot of the time. I can’t work out whether those feelings come from the past or present….or am l minimising things? I don’t know. I don’t know what a person can expect from a relationship. I don’t have many friends l can talk to and I’m confused.

[Karisqq]

I got you, having emotionally abusive parents and studied in a dysfunctional secondary school make me not know how to set boundaries and what healthy relationship is, which makes me keep facing boundary crossing and abuse outside closed relationships as well. Luckily gradually I found that those are unhealthy, and they’re wrong, and gradually learning to deal and cope and heal. It’s tough, and it takes time, but with persistence, you’ll get there.

[I miss king sized mars bars]

Something I found helpful was recognising that I only need enough evidence to convince myself, I dont need a watertight case that would hold up in some court of law.

Only you know everything uou experienced and it’s so easy to minimise things that happened a long time ago or only happened once or twice.

Another question is to ask is why he was only violent few times. Is it because he got better control over ho self or us it because you adapted your behaviour to minimise his abuse?

For my relationship, I can see on one hand that his worst behaviours improved over time, but on the other hand that I adapted behaviour to make things the way he wanted, so it wasn’t really him improving it was me removing some of his triggers.

What you’ve described sounds like it was unhealthy and it’s good you are out of it

[Eyesopening]

My dad only ever was voilent physically to my mum once, that is all it took for him to gain control, after that point she knew she could never ever stand up to him, she could never question him anything. It only takes a few angry outbursts to make you feel like you can’t confide in that person. They teach/train us to how they wantg us to be. When we obey they don’t have to train so hard. And we are praised. Depends on the abuser ofcourse.

[EvenSerpentsShine]

Yes, it’s so interesting to read this thread because I felt like the initial act of violence was all that was needed. It was a kind of warning that he had ‘no limits’. I was so shocked and knocked sideways by this act that I wasn’t able to see clearly afterwards. I did everything I could to avoid ‘annoying him’ in future. Strangely enough though, towards the end when I started feeling really fed up with the relationship and stopped tiptoeing around and started acting just a bit more like a normal human being again, I noticed the threat and the aggressiveness started to return.
In a laboratory setting I would say to any of you wondering whether things have got better, “ok just start behaving in a natural and relaxed way, disagree with him when you feel like it, go on holiday with your women friends and so on, and see how much ‘better’ the relationship really is.” But I definitely wouldn’t advise doing this in the real world! As I suspect the violence would return.

[EvenSerpentsShine]

Ps . Completely with you on this,  ‘I love king sized mars bars’.

In normal relationships you don’t need a court case full of evidence to justify leaving. People ( both men and women, leave just because ‘the spark has gone’, they’ve fallen for someone else, they’re a bit bored. ‘They don’t have much in common any more’.  All kinds of reasons. Seems like only abused people feel like we need chapter and verse explanations all backed up with evidence before we can walk away from a miserable relationship.

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