“Have you told him how you feel?”

[Lottieblue]

So. Once you’re out, and have done it all by the book. No contact. And he’s devastated. Doesn’t understand why you’ve gone. Doesn’t understand why you haven’t given an explanation.

And people. Especially his people. Ask you if you don’t think you should talk to him. Ask you if he shouldn’t at least know why you’ve done it.

Ask you if you ever told him how you were feeling. My response so far is “you think I should tell my husband that he shouldn’t be mean to his wife?”

I am crushed. Sucked dry. No. I haven’t said to him “you are crushing me. You are sucking me dry” because that’s when you get into a cycle of meanness and blame and I am too crushed to ask him to crush me more.

It’s difficult for people to hear “There’s no point. He won’t change. This is who he is.” People who have been our champions and are still his.

“Does he know how you feel?”

What’s the right answer?

[Anonymous]

I dont know if this helps, I am still with the git, but I have told mine. I have told mine almost exactly those words.

And as you can probably guess it did naff all good. Abusers aren’t stupid, they aren’t children who need to be told “if you do that it hurts my feelings” or “please don’t do that, it’s not very nice”. Plus opening up about your feelings to someone who seemingly enjoys trampling them puts you in an extremely vulnerable position: at best they know they’re doing damage, at worst they see opportunities for new ammunition.

So my response would probably be along those lines: he’s an adult and he knows if he’s awful it is hurtful.

Huge congratulations on getting out, x

[KIP.]

Yes he knows how I feel. You know when you hurt somebody. He knows he’s crushed me emotionally and yet he chooses to continue to do so and has done for years. I simply can’t take it anymore. Also, You don’t have to justify your decision to anyone.

[Imagesha]

Mine knows how I feel. I told him. Several times. Not the full extent of how he is destroying me and our relationship, but I did tell him that I can’t cope with being controlled and directed all the time. That I’ve been feeling “disabled” all my life and being independent is the most important thing in life for me. And all the other stuff about name calling and not letting me talk, and other things too. That I will not be able to sustain it in the long term. That it will damage my mental health (it already has but he would freak out if I told him).
Result: sometimes he becomes even worse. but even when he sort-of admits he went too far, the typical answers are (detail removed by moderator), “I did this and that for you”, (detail removed by moderator), “I will do counselling”, “I’m good most of the time”.
Nothing has changed. Telling him changes nothing. He keeps on doing the same things.
I think your husband knows how he made you feel.
“you think I should tell my husband that he shouldn’t be mean to his wife?” that is a good answer. And no, you don’t have to. It’s up to you. Nobody should pressure you.

[Cecile]

The thing I struggle with and can’t come terms with is knowing that he knew exactly how I felt then increased and refined the abuse to make it worse. Acted like some one who doesn’t understand feelings but underneath is actually incredibly insightful about his fellow humans. Some days this hurts so bad I can’t breathe, thinking of all the things he did to hurt me and knowing how I suffered. If I told him he would blank me but feed of the energy it gave him, feeding his need for control of me, his need to hurt others. So don’t tell him, it will give him pleasure and increase the risk to you.

[Catjam]

I told mine. Initially told him (detail removed by Moderator) or so ago but more about his anger. But a (detail removed by Moderator) ago I told him I wasn’t happy about the way he treated me. He keeps telling me how much he has changed. He claims he doesn’t understand when I explain that it’s stuff he did years ago that have conditioned me to react.
He now complains that I have all the power, that I always have made the decisions and now I am making things hard. Literally the only thing I have done is refuse to be intimate with him.
He promised to get help, but he hasn’t and when I bring it up he gets defensive and dismissed my feelings.
He claims he doesn’t understand what he has done and because it’s been over (detail removed by Moderator) decades I kind of understand that. I allowed it to happen for so long and now I am saying enough.

[KIP.]

He absolutely knows what he’s done. You know how you behave impacts others and so does he. He saves this abusive behaviour for you so he knows how to behave everywhere else. You didNt allow it. You were bullied, manipulated, scared, threatened, And are still being all those plus gaslighting. Abusers are liars. He absolutely understands his behaviour and he chooses this behaviour because he gets what he wants.

[Flowersinthetrees]

I completely know where you are coming from. It’s other people asking you the question, “have you told him how you feel?”. I never know what to say. I feel crushed by them even asking, making out like he is the poor victim And his wife hasn’t given him a chance.. My reply To that question from other people has been varying bumbling versions of ,”yes we tried to talk about how I felt but it just didn’t work unfortunately”. Stay strong! You have done the right thing and don’t let other people’s questions make you doubt yourself. You are the only one who knows your relationship inside out and what happened in it and how it made you feel. You owe no-one an explanation.

[Bettertimesahead]

I just say unfortunately he made some very poor choices in the way he treated me. I have been fortunate in some ways because he is a drinker and people can see that now, I had covered for him for years. He has alienated many of his friends and I have only had 1 person who feels I’m treating him badly. My feeling is I don’t really care what anyone else thinks, they haven’t walked in my shoes…

[Author]

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