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Not once has he apologised for his rage. He obviously doesn’t feel the need. (removed by moderator) yrs of walking on eggshells for fear of triggering his temper. At his worst he would launch himself at me & our daughter & point his finger in our faces screaming & shouting. I’m reading why does he do that, and I’ve just realised not once has he apologised for behaving like this. He would throw things down the stairs, the was (detail of object removed by moderator) the worst. My daughter was so afraid that day. When I bring these episodes up he gets angry, saying I haven’t done that for ages, it was a long time ago why do you always bring that up. My daughter had been physically abused by my ex before this. I’ve always said you can’t do this she is traumatised by what my ex did. He always said I would never hit her. I point out that she probably though my ex would never have hit her, but he did. Yet when she stays with him on her own he is a different dad! She says of him ” honestly mam, when it’s just me & dad he’s completely different, we don’t work as a 3″. Is his rage towards her a way to get to me? Why does he only do this when I’m around? He says she needs to learn when to shut up, she never knows when to keep to back down. My daughter is like me. When he gets in her face, for all she is terrified inside, she screams back at him. I do the same, even though every part of me is trembling with terror. I worry that when I do break up with him he will take it out on her. How will I keep her safe if I’m not there? He thinks he is justified in his rage because she is strong willed & as a child she needs to learn when to shut up. How would I deal with it if he shouted & scared her when we split up? She loves her dad, but she also understands that he cannot treat her like that. I know she would ring me if he went off on one, but I don’t ever want it to happen to her again. Her camhs treatment is going to be a lengthy process. She’s being treated for a borderline personality disorder. Firstly she needs to learn different coping mechanisms. She cuts, but lately it’s been suicide attempts. The psychologist said she needs to overcome that before she can deal with what’s happened to her. Otherwise it could trigger her. He agrees that staying with dad is the best thing for her at the minute just until we can show her that death is not the answer. I feel so low today, he’s staying tonight & I feel sick at the though of having to pretend I still love him.
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My ex never once said sorry despite doing things that deeply hurt me or made me scared. He once said sorry but it was so insincere and flippant it was not worth saying it. Many times he wronged me and the resulting atmosphere was so horrible I said sorry just to make the situation better. I think this lack of owning up, admitting their wrong doing and taking responsibility for it is common with abusers. It made it difficult for me to move on happily. If he had sincerely apologized to me it would have unburdened me a lot.
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If he apologises then he is admitting he is wrong and what he is doing is wrong. Much easier to blame everyone else, dump the guilt on them so that he doesn’t have to deal with it. He will justify his behaviour in totally dysfunctional ways. Causing confusion and if you push him too far he will resort to rage. You need to get away and stay away to clear you head and tackle this brainwashing, programming. I used to pretend to love my abuser. It made my skin crawl, made me depressed. Outrageous, dysfunctional behaviour x
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My ex never apologised, ever.
It is typical that things might appear to work better between your daughter and your ex when you aren’t there, because abusers work better 1 to 1 ( divide and conquer; easy to brainwash when you are just 1 to 1- and he doesn’t have you there pointing out what he is doing is wrong, so he has free reign to act as he likes, so feels drunk on freedom).
However, as we know, they are covert and clandestine abusers. Everything is carefully calculated to suit them. Abusers don’t put others’ emotional and mental health first- even their own offspring’s.
You can’t help your daughter unless you help yourself first and are in a strong place. This will involve cutting him off. Being in any contact with a twisted man who doesn’t admit his own issues is soul-destroying, confusing, and stops you from moving on, as it recreates the abuse and damage continue using to be in contact, and ultimately weakens and immobilises you. We need to get off the wheel: to extricate ourselves from our abuser’s warped dimensional reality.
You need to be strong for yourself ( you deserve to be, and to be at peace daily), but you need to be strong for your daughter. If you are feeling happy and strong, your daughter will begin to feel this more too, as if by osmosis, but you will be more able to cope with her disorder and treatment, too.
I am worried that your ex says she needs to learn to shut up. This is what my ex told me towards the end, because I had stopped suffering in silence. Your daughter- for her own health- needs to stand up to him if needed about important things and not feel scared about doing so. Maybe look up the abuse victims’ Bill of Rights and work to make her aware of these rights as being healthy and important ones. Abusers can make you feel you have no rights.
Your ex and even your daughter might claim they get on better alone, but don’t forget what’s probably going on under the surface. Abusers rule by guilt, obligation and fear, and may be making her feel any or all of these. Help her by talking about your views about being controlled in unhealthy ways by others.
Also, PTSD can mimick BPD. That’s something to bear in mind.
As a victim of abuse with horrendous PTSD, I found ideas within Dialectical Behavioural Therapy very helpful. DBT is often used for those with BPD, but can also help victims abuse. You can look up ideas and daily practices on-line. They include things like Distress Tolerance techniques and they got me through many distressing times. Maybe if you looked this up and used some techniques, this would help your daughter, too, as she will see you putting these things into action. X
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I wonder if these men don’t apologize because saying sorry is an act that just doesn’t enter their conscience. Their actions when they do horrible, wrong things I wonder if in their minds they are doing nothing wrong. To say sorry is a decent, normal thing to do. I wonder if the actual nasty things together with lack of remorse is nothing out of the ordinary for them and is just their personality. Not sure i’m explaining it very well, but I would never deliberately hurt another person and If I had hut them I would apologize sincerely. I wonder if these abusers would not only enjoy hurting someone but an apology is just not something they feel a need to do.
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Thank you, this makes me feel less alone. I was beginning to question myself again coz he never shows remorse. Serenity my daughter is starting DBT in a couple of weeks to try & steer her away from cutting & suicide. Then we can start working on helping her deal with what she’s gone through with him. In her session with the camhs psychologist (removed by moderator) today she talked a lot about how her dad still controls me with txts & calls. She said its stalking & she’s going to say something to him, at this point I burst into tears begging her not to coz I know the rage would be directed at her if she said this to him. The psychologist latched onto my reaction. He talked about how he’s still controlling me, & asked if I am scared of him. I said I’m scared of the impact it will have on our daughter at the minute. She was very open about how she thinks I’ll be much better off without him & that she hates spending time with us together coz he’s always mean when I’m there. We talked about my options & how she would feel if I left him. She said she would be sad but she thinks it’s the right thing to do. Them she talked about how he will pump her for info on me everytime he sees her. Right on que he called while we were there, even though he knew I was at her appointment & couldn’t possibly answer the call. I’m so scared she will say something to him & he will lose it. Then I feel like I’m being dramatic coz he’s never hit us only emotionally abused us. I feel sick knowing she knows I’m going to leave him, then I’ve had to beg her not to tell him. I feel sick knowing he’s staying tonight & she might let slip. I’m a terrible mother putting this burden on her but I don’t think I could cope with the rage at the minute. I’m hanging by a thread.
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Hi Moogie,
I am so sorry to read what you and your daughter are going through as a result of her father’s awful abusive behaviour. This is such a difficult time for you, but it sounds like you are coping with it admirably. You are helping your daughter to get the right professional support and it is really positive that you have been able to talk about it openly and honestly; this will help you both so much. You sound like a fantastic mother.
You are not being dramatic about this Moogie, emotional abuse and control is extremely serious and damaging, and you deserve to live without feeling like you are hanging by a thread. It is possible to get through this, keep going one step at a time, and let us know how you are when you can.
Please bear in mind that you can call the 24 Hour National Domestic Violence Helpline on 0808 2000 247 to talk to a female support worker in confidence. You could talk through your options and about making a safety plan for leaving.
Kind Regards,
Lisa
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There was a programe on TV tonight, a person was withholding vital information about something, refusing to speak. Talking and revealing information would have been the right thing to do and given this persons daughter peace. For many years he has withheld crucial information. The presenter on the programe said that him doing this was his only means of remaining in control and to talk would relinquish this control and also give his daughter what she wants and needs. It gave me a bit more insight into withholding and how it is a control tactic. Not saying sorry is withholding isn’t it. X I remember the Moors murderer Ian Brady, he withheld information for many years as a form of control and to torture his victims family, he would not reveal where he had buried the children. Its power & control, my ex’s specialty.
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Yes, and Fred West did the same. Even now, they think there are more women and girls buried in places where they will never be found.
Towards the end of my marriage, I began to ramble and desperstely try to explain my feelings, after years of being too scared to say anything. I never used any abusive language- yet he told me that I was being ‘verbally abusive’- just by trying to point out to him how unkind he was to the kids and I!
It is so scary how these abusers use censorship as a power tool. My ex was brought up in a totalitarian regime with much censorship when he was very young. He tried to recreate this in his own home. Like he was the dictator and we the underdogs.
My ex’s grandfather had his money and business stolen from him by the corrupt government of the time in another country. And my ex tried to recreate that political scene in a domestic sphere- by streaking from me and trying to keep me down and penniless! My ex is guilty of crimes against humanity, just as the dictators of his home land were!
Well, do you know what happened to the dictator in my ex’s home country? The impoverished and the downtrodden people of the land rose up and created a rebellious militia which shot him and his family at close range. This man, who had even apparently been treated to dinner by our very own royal family in the past, when he was successfully manipulating global leaders.
Victims aren’t victims forever. They rise up.
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