Prisoner in a relationship?

[Poodlepower]

I watched the film “3096 Days” yesterday-about a young Austrian girl who was kept prisoner for 8 years by a man who snatched her off the street-and was startled by how it resonated with me. Of course, the abuse I suffered was nowhere near as extreme as this poor young woman went through, but the kidnapper’s control over her eating and sleeping habits and his need to be “obeyed” and never questioned had similarities to my situation. My abuser would find ways to punish me if I questioned him, disagreed or expressed an opinion that was different to his own. At the end of the film-a true story-the girl got away and the kidnapper killed himself under a train, which is what my abuser did after my escape from him.
Do some men need to control another human being for some reason? Is it a common thing? I often felt like my ex felt he “owned” me. He would try to dress this up as romantic, telling me that he “belonged” to me. Apart from to go to work-and even then he occasionally forced me to stay at home with him-he rarely let me out of his sight. If I did go anywhere without him, I would have ” guilt trip” texts until I hurried home to be with him. He would say that I used to cry when he went away so now I had forced him to never leave me, therefore I had to do the same. It was a lie, I never cried when he went away, in fact I enjoyed the chance for a bit of “me” time!
As time goes on, I can see more clearly how abusive he was. I remember once slipping away from him on a shopping trip to find something to eat. He caught me eating and I can still remember the look of fury on his face and how scared it made me. Why did he need that level of control? Why couldn’t he see how wrong and abusive it was?

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