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    • #60758
      Alicenotichains
      Participant

      It’s been almost a year since I was last on here, I got back into the relationship with him again, but this time in secret. I have lied to everyone who knows me. They think I am single but really I have been seeing him. I am don’t know myself anymore. I was always such an open person but now I am a liar.
      The minimising, blaming, stalking, manipulation just broke me down, I broke no contact by changing my profile settings on Facebook and within a couple of days he was back in contact and it’s just carried on from there. I missed him in a strangely intense way, so those feelings of pain went. But then they were replaced quickly by the guilt of telling lies to the people who love me the most, to my children, to my family and best friends. I have just numbed it all out, when he is lovely it’s harder because I want to see him but it all has to be done in secret. When he is abusive its easier because i can see that I am right to keep him away from
      My family.
      I have kept Him away from my kids, I instinctively know he is not safe for them to be around. But I don’t have the same self protection. I am scared of him sometimes and I freeze in fear and I can’t speak, I try not to be in the same physical space if I can hear he is angry so that means he hasn’t had a chance to hit me. Sometimes he is so lovely and he says such amazing things to me, compliments me, tells me I am beautiful, gives me physical affection. Then he switches and will call me a c**t. This weekend I wouldn’t go and pick him up because I was exhausted (it’s (Detail removed by Moderator) drive and I work full time and he is unemployed) and he just lost it. I give him money, I pay for everything. He was screaming at me down the phone to go and pick him up and then he got me to tell him what I had done wrong, now he has blocked me.
      All this is happening to me, and nobody around me has any idea. I am pretending to be a normal, working single mother. The truth is I have got myself into a situation that I don’t know how to leave. I can’t tell anyone e becaus social services said they would
      Refer me to child protection if I resume a relationship ship with him. He knows this and I tried to explain that I couldn’t see him but he just ground me down. I love my kids so much, I feel like a rubbish mum, what kind of person ignores a threat like that from social services and risks the most precious thing I. Her life for a man who takes her mother ey and calls her a c**t. I feel like the lowest of the low.
      This is the first time I have opened up about this. I am glad I have told someone- I am so sorry I feel like such a fraud. Sometimes my friends tell me I am amazing but the person who I am pretending to be doesn’t exist. I am not a bad person, all I ever wanted was to be happy.

    • #60759
      Alicenotichains
      Participant

      *money not motherly 🙄

    • #60760
      Tiffany
      Participant

      The abuse is almost like a drug. We go chasing after that high of when they are nice to us. And it messes with our rational brain and we make stupid choices. I would try no contact again. It’s basically the only way to get the abuse out of your system. It is also like going cold turkey. It’s hard. The cravings get worse.

      You obviously know this relationship is bad for you and that it is making you unhappy. He is financially and emotionally abusive possibly other types of abuse are involved too. The secrecy of the relationship is isolating you from your support network. It’s classic abuse.

      Get help. Go no contact. Delete Facebook. You know it is a weak spot in your no contact defenses. Get help. Tell people what is going on. Call women’s aid. I know that things are bad now, but they are only going to get worse. You need people to support you to get out and stay out, but you can do it.

    • #60761
      KIP.
      Participant

      Grab this opportunity to regain control. He’s blocked you, so block back. Your post makes perfect sense how they hook us in and trap us with their lies and threats. It’s good that you can articulate what is happening to you. And it’s great you are engaging with this forum where we will not judge. Most of us have been hooked back in on more than one occasion. My local women’s aid were my saviour. Non judgemental and always there for help. Ring the helpline on here and re engage with them. Keep posting x

    • #60764
      Alicenotichains
      Participant

      Thank you for your responses. Yes he has isolated me from everyone, including isolating me from myself and my own values. He is like a drug, as the counsellor I once had said, it’s like he is inside you with lots of carefully placed hooks. She told me to imagine myself pulling a serpent out of my mouth.
      I will block him and I will go and arrange some help with the local domestic support services. I think I use the relationship to numb out pain. I think I will need to accept that I am going to have to feel the pain and not keep running from it. The two abusive relationships I have had have wasted too much of my time now. My current partner who has blocked me is a very violent man but I think if I just block him and stick to it I won’t have any problems because of the significant distance between where we live.
      I feel a bit clearer having discussed this with you, thank you x

    • #60776
      fridges
      Participant

      I agree with tiffany – by knowing that you kept this relationship in secret, you will not open up about abuse what he is doing to you. It gives even more power over you.
      No one should judge you that you have slipped from the right direction. You need get back to the right part for you and for you children. Specially when he started to blackmail you with social services.
      You really need to stop with him.
      Educate yourself about the patterns and about abuse, it will make senses what is happening around you. By realising it and confirming, you will be able to stop the attachment to him.
      No contact is the right way. And if he will try to contact you again – then you need to report it.
      Welcome back, and I’m glad that you are opening up!
      Keep updating how are you doing and how are you coping!
      Make a plan how to protect yourself.
      I did that in my head, I even wrote it in my diary.
      For example if he will try to contact me – I will do that.
      If he will approach me on the street – I will do that.
      It gives me the feeling of safety to have a plan.

    • #60781
      Alicenotichains
      Participant

      Thank you Fridges. I have blocked him today and I came off social media a while ago so it is a bit more difficult for him to contact me. I have the police marker on my address from before. I am in no doubt that he abuses me in several ways physical, emotional and financial…a few years ago he had pinned me up against a wall by my head and trapped me in my kitchen and I thought he was going to kill me. That is the only time in my adult life that I have ever let out a primal scream. I didn’t even decide to scream, it just came out. I was just screaming. My body remembers that incident and sometimes if he is angry I am paralysed by fear. It is like having your chest in a clamp. When he got angry in the car a few
      Weeks ago he kept clicking his fingers and saying randomly that he wasn’t a threat and he wouldn’t be violent and he got cross that I seemed so scared. One of the things I did wrong that day was to buy him the wrong flavour of drink. I waited for him to get out of car and I just drove off and left him as I felt in great danger. My body sends me clear messages when the risk is high. I am starting to listen to them.
      I am definitely in a bit more confident place than I was a year ago as not being able to see him much because of the social services banning me from having a relationship with him has allowed me to develop a life outside of the relationship and I feel happy , more connected to others and I have fun. I am hoping that because of this I will be more resistant to the inevitable love bombing, guilting, am I sure will happen.
      I do feel better about it than last year, I really believe that I am wasting precious time and that I can meet somebody with whom I can enjoy a healthy relationship.
      Listening to him ranting yesterday he is so ungrateful and rude. He doesn’t have any respect or care for he fact that I work full time and how tiring all this driving is. My kids Dad also does not pay child maintenance and so I have to work So hard to cover all costs. I asked him to meet half way between our towns but that enraged him as he said it wasn’t fair and that I should go and collect him. When i spoke he would talk over me. I didn’t understand what the conversation was about, it stemmed from asking him what sort of thing he wanted to do today as we had sometime together. That did not need to be a hard conversation. He really lost it and sounded like he started to smash things up. Had I been there he would have gone for me again. I have made some progress because I knew to stay clear, despite him demanding that o drive over to see him. So I think I am starting to take better care of myself. I just need to keep going forward. I have read most of the recommended books, I think it’s starting to sink in. It’s not me. It’s him

    • #60790
      Tiffany
      Participant

      Well done for blocking him. Consider changing your number – I found that incredibly reassuring – knowing he absolutely couldn’t contact me. And I didn’t copy his number over to my new phone, so I couldn’t contact him either. I also changed my email address.

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