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Today I had an online catch up with a friend who only ever knew me when I was with my ex. I mentioned that he he had been abusive, specifically controlling. She replied that she’d seen we’d had a volatile relationship.
Volatile? Really?
Volatile describes a clash between two strong personalities, both unwilling to back down until they’ve got their point across. Both parties have equal status. Google it.
Clashes with an abuser are different but maybe they look the same from the outside.
My friend didn’t see the relationship imbalance. She wasn’t aware of the hundred different ways I was controlled every day. She didn’t know that the way my ex behaved in public was fake.
If you are starting to question whether what you are experiencing is abuse, please don’t go to family and friends for their opinions. Unless they have experienced it themselves it’s impossible for them to have any understanding at all. It’s not their fault.
You may already have confided in others and they don’t seem to ‘get it’. This doesn’t mean you’re not right. Trust your own instincts above anyone else’s.
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I saw my oldest friend yesterday and I know she doesn’t agree that I’ve decided to go now contact’ with my ex (on the advice of a da charity) and so our children are no longer in touch with their father. It brings up all sorts of feelings, guilt and doubting myself mainly, and I have to work really hard to remind myself that no one knows what I’ve been through.
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I have the same issue and was recently told by a close family member that I have to put my big girl pants on stop telling people lies about him and move on with my life if that’s what I want. She said it couldn’t have been that bad else you wouldn’t have stayed all those years. They think I’m just trying to hurt him or am jealous of his new relationship (3rd one so far in a year!) it’s hurts so much more when it’s people you are close too. I try to ignore it and stop confiding in those that don’t understand leaving it got those who do. In a way it makes me pleased they don’t understand as it proves they’ve never lived through the hell.
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I think we spend so long trying to put on a perfect face and pretend they’re perfect that it’s hard for other people to then change the opinion that we’ve spent so long instilling into other people. It’s hard to then say actually none of thar was real…… I still get people who used to know us both saying how great he was and we were the perfect couple. They know what I wanted them to see at the time
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Not feeling validated by people we know can be crushing but that’s their ignorance not ours. Take a step back from these people and surround yourself with people who validate your feelings. In a while it won’t hurt so much because with your confidence returning you will understand that it’s a very complicated subject and all our emotions are heightened at first. Lundy Bancroft always said there was no middle of the road for family and friends of victims so if my family and friends don’t side with me then they’re sidelined. The support should always one hundred percent go to the victim.
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I couldn’t agree more. Many friends and family members would comment that I needed counselling ie I was the problem one in the relationship, with the implication that my partner was doing his utmost to be supportive and that I should be grateful having for such a great partner. I don’t think it ever crossed their minds that perhaps my behaviour was a product of what was going on behind closed doors in my marriage, and that what appears to be support to outsiders is actually subtle control.
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Yes, yes, yes to all of the above. I am being far more selective in what I say to who now, after hearing some really hurtful comments early on (unintentional, from friends and family, but still hurtful). Like many others, I did a good job (too good a job, I now see) of pretending all was well. Including to myself. So, it’s no wonder it is so difficult for friends and family who have known us both for many many years to even try to understand what was going on. I had no idea, myself, for such a long time. Just that weird feeling that all was not well and that I was really unhappy. I find meeting new people and having interesting conversations about all sorts of things much more helpful than trying to get folk I’ve known a long time to understand. These new people are interested in me and what I have to say, which is novel, refreshing and is really helping me get back on my feet. Just to say, I am also interested in them and what they have to say! Ha, normality is very lovely.
Wishing you all good Mondays and better times ahead.
Brave
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Totally agree. My ex mother inlaw had previously been in abusive relationship years before she had kids so she has full inderstanding of what I am goin through even givin me advice in regards to telling me keep all messages he has sent and telling me I have done the right thing and even telling others that can’t believe we are through that he has his own temper to blame he has caused this. However his sister who is very close to my ex mother inlaw is very much in defence of him (she has never been in a controlling relationship) previous to us splitting I remember her tellin me about this book she had read psychology book. About “people” like me who stay with partners who treat them mean she went on to say it’s a personality like ppl who like a bad boy. When she said all that to me in my head I felt like screaming. You read a book on the way to work and you think I like being treated like this. You think I choose to be treated like this. And the saddest thing is you are normalising being a victim as a choose. It is so easy for people to say just leave or why do you let him treat you this way. I didn’t let him treat me this way if I let him that means I had a choice on how I was treated. I did not have a choice and it’s not easy to leave. He recently told me I showed weakness by leaving my home with my child and moving back to my mums however I now feel like I have shown strength in leaving. It is hard enough to end a relationship in normal sircumstances but in an abusive or coercive relationship it almost feels impossible. I feel lucky that I had the support of my mum and someware to go if I didn’t I could honestly say I don’t think I would yet be free.
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It’s not just family and friends, although my nephew said to.me , ” no wonder no one believes you, 1 minute your saying about abuse, next minute your going bk to him saying you love him.. that’s when I just found out it was abuse..
The mental health team, suggested marriage counselling and maybe when he would say he’d break my nose that he was still in work mode with his mates and he was joking..
I’d come out feeling worse than when I went..
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My friends and family have supported me all the way.
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Hello ladies. I’m glad my post got some discussion going. I remember a few occasions when my very good friends didn’t seem to see what was right in front of their eyes. The time they came over to celebrate my birthday and the night disintegrated into a drunken showdown over my choice of music. The time I told them that I’d just found out he’d been cheating on me and they let me follow him overseas, no questions asked. I think they remembered how happy I’d seemed at the start, how charming and ‘into me’ he’d seemed then. I think they assumed that our relationship was normal, that arguments and disagreements are to be expected, that if I ‘forgave’ infidelity then that was good enough for them. I wish they’d asked me if I was happy when we were staying with them and I threw him out of their house in the small hours (when I found out he was still shagging the ex.) I wish they’d been nosy. I wish they’d taken my side, not the ‘balanced’ view. I wish they’d realised that their dear friend had disappeared. And cared enough to keep on at me until I came back. But I can’t blame them for being too nice to peer below the surface. When you can’t explain it yourself, can you expect understanding from outsiders? Although I never went into details with these friends I was fortunate that they never questioned my need to cut all contact and shielded me when he tried to get in touch. Maybe they’re just not emotionally equipped to deal with the s****y nitty gritty. Whatever, over the last ten years we never talked about it. Maybe they didn’t know what to say or didn’t want to upset me. Or maybe they had too much going on with actual family and no emotional energy spare for me. It is these friends that I left behind when I relocated recently. I’d already started to isolate myself from them. They are genuinely lovely people but I’d come to realise that I’m never truly myself in their company. I feel guilty these days that she may feel I’ve abandoned her, that I don’t put enough value on our friendship. Maybe she sees me as her best friend? I used to feel that way about her. But the truth is, when you’re lonely and broken, you must feel able to open up to those close to you. And if you’re not allowed to, those friendships will become more trying over time. When you spend years putting on a front, years trying not to be needy, years being the single friend and trying not to notice…For god’s sake, sometimes you simply need to b***h and cry and feel sorry for yourself and have someone feed you vodka while you do it!
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It’s funny that his brothers say to my husband when he was younger that he is a town saint and a house devil, cause they don’t know how true those words are yet, because blood is thicker than water, I’m afraid that they’ll think I pushed him to get so angry and someone that knew what she got mo g before she married him. People that only see his nice side say that he is a gentleman and to be fair he can be, and I know that they would find it very hard that he is capable of abuse and know they will all think I’m making it up.
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