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    • #33194
      phantasmagorical
      Participant

      I’m bewildered at his moods. We’d have periods of being comfortable, even happy with each other, during which he’d be quite affectionate and fantasise about our future. He had a name picked out for his future daughter and would tell me how he imagined us all together. Looking at times like these, it’s like there wasn’t a problem at all.

      Then he’d change and become cold and rather callous, very unresponsive to me, completely lacking expression both in his tone and his facial expression, ignoring me / silent treatment. I feel these changes were usually caused by my insecurities that I kept trying to explain countless times had worsened because of the ways he’d damaged my trust. But he either didn’t see or didn’t want to see how the lying, withholding of information, flirting with others and inconsistency was having a terrible impact on my mind and health. Even writing this, I know he’d most likely deny that’s what he was doing.

      It would go in a cycle like this without the core issues being addressed. He’d confuse me by going round in a circle, and then seem to play on my sympathy by saying he was a huge failure and couldn’t do right by me, etc. So then I’d try propping him up and eventually we were back to “normal” if I succeeded in doing this.

      The weird thing is he’d apologise in words (sometimes he’d sound pitying, but other times he was monotonous) but not demonstrate in his actions that he was sorry, and never altered his behaviour (when he did make a change in his life it was very drastic that made me feel guilty, and usually an external change rather than something to do with him personally). He said he was happy with me (apparently) but that it didn’t seem I could be happy with him…what this sounds like to me is not happy to accept his hot and cold behaviour, withdrawing from me and silent treatment.

      I’m not sure if he really just couldn’t help himself. He’d say as much, like he seemed to have an awareness of what he was doing but was somehow helpless in preventing it, and didn’t know what was wrong other than stating he was emotionally deficient.

      This is partly why I feel he has a personality disorder because of the way he seems at the mercy of his mind, and doesn’t seem able to fully relate to people on an emotional level. He seems a very self-absorbed person with how he’d make everything about him whether directly or indirectly.

      I also feel that perhaps he confused love / affection with sexual attraction. I’ve noticed he often said that of course I was beautiful and he wants me because I made him very aroused. I feel weird about that because it sounds like a compliment but at the same time it seems a bit off.

    • #33197

      Most of the time they are nice to you because they want something. Are they nice to everybody else? kind and respectful to everybody else? Its normally because you have something they want and they have to be nice to hook you. Once you are hooked and invested emotionally that is when the devaluation starts. The niceness is a facard that they put on.

    • #33198
      Peaceful Pig
      Participant

      Hi Phantasmagorical, he sounds exactly like my ex. I spent years convinced that he was depressed, autistic, anxious, lacking in social skills or something. I propped him up, tried harder and harder to make him happy, boost his confidence. Our lives became very restricted and isolated. I stayed so long because he said he’d become a recluse, alcoholic, I’d ruin his and the children’s lives etc. Not a bit of it was true. He was in fact internet dating, stealing my money, paying for porn/sex and having a great time at my expense. I have since met colleagues and friends of his who tell me about a very different person from the one I thought I was with. I feel like I spent (detail removed by moderator) decades with a stranger. Posts like yours still help me by reminding me of how it was. After so many years of gaslighting the doubts can still creep in at times. My ex was similar with ‘compliments’. They were indirect such as ‘of course I love you’ delivered in a weird formal tone, but never just ‘I love you’. He did the opposite of some abusers, he was big on compliments about me to others, they thought I was so lucky but at home he told me how stupid I was and how those people thought so too. I’m sorry to say that he can control his behaviour and the nice times are merely crumbs of affection designed to keep you hooked in and hoping. It’s a bitter pill to swallow but a relief to get free of the fog xx

      • #33236
        phantasmagorical
        Participant

        p.s. I also feel like I’ve spent all this time with a stranger; I can’t pick apart what’s real and what isn’t. It also seems like he’s mixed the truth with lies, and it’s even more confusing that way.

    • #33235
      phantasmagorical
      Participant

      Hello Healthyarchive and Peaceful Pig – he’s always seemed confident and friendly around other people. I remember a time in particular when I was having a bad anxiety attack, and I kept trying to reach him but couldn’t. I found out he’d been busy attending to a girl he’d known for a few weeks, as she was struggling with anxiety as well. He wouldn’t address how I was feeling, and said it was easier to help her because he wasn’t involved with her. It was very confusing and upsetting.

      I also feel that our lives became quite isolated; I tried encouraging him, but he was lying to me anyway; he was away doing things I had no clue about until quite recently. I have a weird feeling he’s going to blame it on me for being needy or something.

    • #33266
      Nova
      Participant

      hi
      thats so the same expereince, its like reading back what happened to me!
      I know its happening to others, but when I see it and read it right in front of me, I want to shout out YES!!! OMG I wasnt going crazy THATS the reality, we all believe you…though my frenemies woudnt believe me, as he totally set me up!
      I cant beleive how much effort he put into the whole situation, he totally got off on it, switching from Nice Nasty Nice in seconds, about nothing, left me confused.
      Now I have read up more I know a bit more, of what was happening, though Im still unravelling it all, (probably for years)
      he manipulated me when I was getting out, by turning on the Nice switch, the ‘I’m just a good guy, your the strange one!! he would super nice around my friends, then when theyd gone, call them all sorts, and tell me things, like he was speaking for me, ‘You always…’ ‘ Dont WE…@ I used to think NO WE dont do xyz or think xyz..
      he was stealing all the best bits of my life and my identity!
      WHEN do they get busted for ALL this c**p??? why do we have to suffer in silence? I cant face court …but isnt there any other way of naming & shaming??

      hugs C x

    • #33324
      Peaceful Pig
      Participant

      Yes Cuppa, ‘stealing the best bits of my life and identity’, that’s exactly it. Parasites.

    • #33327
      Nova
      Participant

      PP…Yep that’s it isn’t it…they need to get a life…my ones taken 😀
      (Oops..for all my spelling errors!! Btw)
      Hugs C x

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