Herindoors

[Herindoors]

Hello. I am a few years out now of my abusive relationship. I have always been quite shy before I was with him but I was younger and friendships come easier when you are pre-kids and responsbilities. During the relationship he did his best to isolate me and I didn’t try and persue any budding friendships (through work or other mums and suchlike) becuase i knew he wouldn’t ‘give’ me the time I needed to devote to them. I am lucky enough to have one dear friend who stuck by the whole time and one other, who pushed for us to be friends and I managed to get out enough to maintain that friendship to this day.

After we split up one of the things I worried about was ‘I only have two friends’! It has taken me years to realise that this is not because, like he said, I am boring and no one likes me. It’s partly because I don’t actually operate well or want a large group of mates. I would only end up saying no to invites if I had people beating down my door! I like me time, just not all the time. I prefer to have a few close friends I know really well, than a large group. I am now OK with that.

However I often find myself alone at weekends or evenings and at those times more options would be good 🙂 So I set up a walking group because I love walking and it gets me outside at the weekend. I invited random people from my FB friends, local to me who I thought might enjoy it. And its working. A few weekends ago I brought together 6 people who didn’t know each other. There is something about walking while you are talking that makes it less stressful for someone shy like me.

The differance is that in past I would gravitate to a certain type of person – loud, charasmatic and overpowering – because they filled in the gaps in my quietness/shyness. Now I am actively trying to connect with people who are on my social plane, that don’t overwhelm me or hog all the conversation.

I think there are more lonely adults out there than we realise. FB does make it look like everyone else is having an amazing time with loads of mates but I think the reality is very differant. I am bad at just texting someone and saying ‘fancy a drink tonight’ but I have found that I can bear organising a group event – even if I am a bit nervous just before it in case no-one turns up! My theory is that if I keep doing the same events with the same people some lasting friendships might come of it.

[Herindoors]

I hear you pondlife. I too was elated and then felt weird. It all takes time to process and change. I remember early on after I got out, rushing around town shopping, worrying about getting home quickly, had a feeling something was missing…and then I realised…what was missing was his texts demanding to know where I was! I spent many days operating like a robot at work only to get home and just lie on my bed tearful and a bit confused. Wasn’t even sure what I was tearful about, after all I was free from him. It was just my brain processing processing and it does calm down eventually and when it does its blissfull x

[Herindoors]

Hi Oaktree – welcome and you do need to be here.

When you say ‘I am scared sometimes but not directly scared of him, I am scared of his reaction, I am scared of making him mad, not scared of him’- this is commonly described as walking on eggshells and it is a form of coersive control which is emotional abuse. Over time you start doing everything you can to avoid upsetting him because if you do upset him then there is a consequence to pay. Your consequence is him getting angry and that scares you and is a situation you don’t want to be in. With my ex I knew if I disagreed with him, pointed out he was being unreasonable or did anything that he didn’t like he would get angry and cause an argument, often keeping me up all night explaining to me in great detail why I was wrong. So eventually I believed I was wrong, I was the cause of the issues between us and I became a shell of the person I used to be.

‘but when he is in a good mood its great, we have a wonderful family, he is kind, he really looks after me’ – he is nice and its all lovely, then the tension builds and he explodes, afterwards he is sorry and you are grateful for the attention (because he has been mean to you) and its all good again, and then the tension builds, he explodes etc…. this is called the cycle of abuse. It doesn’t ever stop.

‘With the sex it is my problem, its not his fault what happened to me and its not fair of me to ‘punish’ him for that.’ Oaktree you are not punishing him by not always wanting sex with him. A man who is not emotionally abusive would simply not say this to you. They would understand your history, be compassionate about it and try and help you. They would not blame you. They would NOT blame you by saying you were punishing them.

How your husband treats you is how mine treated me. Over nearly two decdades it turned from what you describe in your first post and then escalated. First the arguments and emotional abuse got more frequent, then he started to use violence around me until eventually he was violent with me. This can often be the pattern with an emotional abuser. It stays emotional until you have had enough and he can tell you are checking out of the marriage and then it gets physical.

I feel like I may have overloaded you here with my post but your post sounded so much like my own experience I wanted you to know that you are not imagining things and you are not to blame.

Reading the posts on the forumn really helps – seeing how your situation compares to others and you will be shocked by the similarities between us all.

Calling womans aid and talking to someone who really understands would be the best thing you can do. They will listen, help you clarify. They won’t judge or tell you what to do. They will help x

[Herindoors]

Hi jsscollie. Call MIND and talk to them about this. My ex used to threaten suicide all the time and like you I had no idea what to do. When I spoke to MIND they reassured me that people who talk about it very very rarely do it. It is a form of coercive control. I also spoke to my counsellor about it – as I had convinced myself that if he did do something to hurt himself that it would be my fault. I could not get away from the fact that if I knew about it, and did not do what he said to stop it, then it would be my fault. Both MIND and my counsellor where adamant that I needed to accept that he was totally responsbile for his own actions and that I was not. It took some talking but finally I realised that they were right, I had no control over what he did or didn’t do and in fact he was controlling me with these threats. Take care xx

[Herindoors]

@Serenity – I downloaded your book recommendation ‘Boundaries After a Pathological Relationship’ last night. Great read and I am going to work on defining my boundaries tonight. I am a few years now out of my abusive relationship and feel ready to meet someone new. However I know that I need to learn to set boundaries or I will probably just end up with an abuser again and that has been holding me back.
You give great advice Serenty so just wanted to say thanks for all your posts and this book recommendation x

[Herindoors]

HI. I am not sure if this is possible in your current set up. You said your ex is not interested in seeing the children? However he leaves them with your mother instead? Your mother is clearly an abuser so can you go no contact with her and not allow her to see the children? So that’s one toxic influence out of your childrens lives. You are then left with the ex – but without being able to leave the kids at your mothers maybe his visits will drop off and then the second toxic influence is gone..?
I have one member of my family I simply no longer see because they are so toxic and I keep my remaining parent at a very long arms length. I feel no guilt about this because life is short and I am going to spend it around people who are good for me – no those who want to hurt me.
Good luck xx

[Herindoors]

backtome – you feel guilty because you are a nice compassionate person, you feel guilt because you are not an abuser. Make no mistake though, our abusers also know how to push our guilt buttons, they are experts in this. So push those guilt feelings down and prioritise you and your child.
Like the others I can’t say ‘No Contact’ enough. Its the only way and really helps with the guilt because you are not constantly seeing messages etc..from them. If you have to maintain contact due to your child can you do this through a third party?
Well done and good luck xxx

[Herindoors]

@shinebright2 – sleeping when i want to sleep……Oh yes! 🙂

@positiveandlookingahead – try and just go with the flow. I know its hard not to overthink it because we are used to our heads being filled with our abusers rubbish so we look to fill that gap – but what I keep trying to do is ‘slow down and smell the coffee’ as the saying goes.
Wishing you a wonderful holiday ! xxx

[Herindoors]

Hi Lilminx. My ex was similar. He would wear the same clothes for days on end, never cleaned his teeth or showered. Weirdly though he didn’t smell most of the time. I got to thinking that he was secretly cleaning up when I was at work but pretending he didn’t because he knew it grossed me out. Our child confirmed they could never ever remembering him shower. And he would want a spontanious love life! Not only did I not want to go near him because of his emotional abuse but physically I was never sure how clean he was. I didn’t fantatise about young, hot, good looking men – just a man who I knew showered every day and was nice to me! LOL

[Herindoors]

Sorry you are having a hard time Cuppa. As I was reading your post I was thinking well done you for spotting all of these traits in her – you can see what she is so clearly and this gives you the upper hand with her. I hope I will be able to spot an abuser next time one is near me! Hope your time away ends soon and you can get back to peace! xx

[Herindoors]

Hi White Rose – like most of us you are not used to thinking about yourself, putting yourself first. Impossible to do that when living with an abuser and a really hard habit to break.
Plan next Christmas exactly the way YOU want it and then stick to it. Between now and then practice saying No when you want to so its easier to say No at Christmas when people are making demands on you.
Don’t expect a 100% positive reaction but we all need to learn that that’s OK – we are important too, our needs and wants are as important as anyone elses!

[Herindoors]

Many many years down the line after being with him I was talking to my best mate who had also known him as long as me. I was describing how when we argued I could not get away even for a mintue, to lock myself in the bathroom for a breather, because the one time I did that he started kicking the door in. To me that was normal behaivour after years of a build up of increasing abuse. She looked me in the eye and said that the first time any man had behaved like that around her she would have ended it there and then – and that that was normal behaviour. That’s when the penny finally dropped and I stopped minimising, blaming myself etc…

On reflection – on one of our first dates together we were walking in a park and he ‘jokingly’ shoved me and I fell over. It wasn’t the shove so much that was the issue (bear with me!), it was the way he reacted to me falling over and being hurt and complaining about it. I had no sense of humour, he was only joking, I was too sensitive, I was no fun, he didn’t mean it blah blah….oh hindsight is such a wonderful thing!

[Herindoors]

Interesting thread and something I have thought long and hard about. I used to think he was not aware, not doing it conciously until after we split and our child explained to me how she would hear us argueing and then a lull, in which he would go off and silently strategise his next verbal assult on me – and then come back and do it. She knew what he was doing and she had to point it out to me.

Then I realised something, he is 100% aware of what he is doing but in his head he is also 100% ‘right’ – which is why they will never change. Abusers sees nothing wrong with treating someone that way, they don’t understand when we point it out because they don’t see anything wrong with it.

They will never change because of this..

[Herindoors]

@peacfulpig. Realising my posture was differant was a bit of a turning point for me in recovery. One day I noticed I was not walking along looking at my shoes anymore. I felt I could look people in the eye. Ironically he used to have a go at me about my bad posture….caused his treatment of me I now know!

[Herindoors]

No you are not stupid, you are a normal human being. I think we react like this for a number of reasons;

It does become our normal and we end up de-sensitised to it. I remember telling a friend about not being able to hide in the bathroom because I once I did this and he kicked the door in. For me that was normal and expected behaivour from him. She said she would have kicked him out at the point, no question. I was shocked by her response and it was one of the conversations that gave me perspective.

We minimise to save our brains from overloading. My head was so full of him and the situation that it litterally couldn’t take anymore. This is our brains way of protecting us, so that we can keep going and surviving. I HAD to brush off his behaviour because my brain couldn’t compute anymore.

We minimise because that helps us to not crack the eggshells we are walking around on. Again this is survival mode, which is not a concious action. Your unconcious brain takes over and does what it needs to to keep you safe. So we minimise to avoid a row to avoid danger.

We are compassionate and so we keep hoping that this behaviour is not really him, he will be nice again. It is really very difficult for someone who is not abusive to accept that someone can consiously be that way, that they are actually making a decision to abuse another person. So we keep giving them the benefit of the doubt, hoping they will change etc..

BJIS – you are not stupid, your brain is trying to protect you xx
Fight or Flight? My counsellor explained that there are 5 of these – Fight, Flight, Freeze, Friend and Flop. The one you default too when you are in danger is an unconcious decision. Your brain picks the one that worked best last time. For me that was either Freeze or Friend = minimizing, normalisation, denial.

[Herindoors]

Hi there. I am not sure this is the right counsellor for you! If they are not trained in DV then they simply don’t understand how an abusive person’s mind works. It doesn’t matter if your ex has depression, that is still no excuse for his behaviour. It unfairly puts anyone with a mental health issue into the same bracket as an abuser!

But….What your counsellor may be doing though is making you think through your reasons for believing he is abusive so that you come to the conclusion (that he is) yourself – and that’s really important. We can (and have!) had people around us throughout these relationships telling us his behaviour is abusive but we don’t believe it, we minimise it etc…and so its really important that we believe it was abuse and that we are not to blame for it. However is your counsellor is doing this it sounds like they are being a bit clumsy about it.

You might need to give them one more go and see how you feel but trust your gut – and change counsellors if you need to.

Good luck xx

[Herindoors]

Hi AuntyOof and welcome. If you do ever decide to make a call to Womans Aid be aware that they will not want, rush or expect you to do anything you don’t want to (such as report an incident). They will listen if that’s all you need or want, no pressure to do anything.
I admire your tenacity when you say you are aiming to sort out his drinking problem – but it would probably help to speak to an organisation that specialises in this area. There is going to be a limit to what you can do because he needs to want to stop and decide to do it himself, but of course you can support him.
We are all here for you x

[Herindoors]

Hi Phantasmagrical. I just wanted to share my similar experiences with you as it might help with perspective.

My ex used to threaten to hurt himself as well;

Texting me at work saying he was going to kill himself if I didn’t come home.
Texting me when i was travelling for work (sometimes thousands of miles away) saying he was going to kill himself – knowing I couldn’t just get home.
Telling me if I left for a trip he would kill himself
I learnt to check social media because inveriably during this same short period of time he would have posted something normal on FB that showed he was actually OK. Or I would check with people around him to see how he appeared to them. I checked with MIND and then later a counsellor ended up seeing and they both said people who talk about it (almost always) don’t do it. People who really want to do it, do it quietly so they can’t be saved. Also (this took some convincing) that even if he did I was not respsonsbile for his actions.
I cancelled one business trip because of these threats but never did that again. I cancelled that trip because he was so distressed but as soon as he knew I was staying he was 100% fine in a blink of an eye – that doesn’t happen when someone is truly distressed.

Took a tie and shut himself in a room with coat hooks to hang himself.
I was so emotionally shut down by this point that I managed to stay calm. I quickly realised that logistics meant he would never actually be able to hurst himself in this scenario and I listened silently outside the room until he realised I was not reacting and he came out and carried on as if nothing had happened.

Would bang his head against the wall during a rant at me.
This was distrubing as you can imagine. What I found out later is that this is considered domestic violence against me, because it is used to threaten and intimidate.

Visit to the doctors
After his repeated suicide threats I managed to get him to a GP. When i told them what he had been saying the doc hit a private button and another doc suddenly appeared. My ex went very sheepish and said he was never serious. I left the room to have a private sob.

You are right – there is a pattern. Its exactly as you describe above, when you have some emotion you want to express, or you call them out on something or they feel they are losing too much control they start acting this way – to try and get back control.

Its a very difficult situation to deal with because I am sure you are a compassionate person so its hard not to be sympathetic when someone is that distressed. By the end I was disengaged from it, partly because I had shut down emotionally due to his treatment of me but partly because the boy kept crying wolf….make no mistake – this is about controlling you and not about him actually wanting to hurt himself.

Take care xxx

[Herindoors]

Hi Dragonfly. Sorry you are having such a horrible time at the moment. Sometimes work can help when we are stressed by being a ‘normal’ part of the day but mostly its the last thing we need and it sounds like that is where you are at.

Sometimes we just need to forget about work and take time out for oursleves. Do you know what relaxes you? If so then do whatever those things are, push any feelings of guilt away and just be kind to yourself. You have been through a lot and recovery takes time. We are not used to being selfish and taking time for ourselves but is exactly what we must do.

Hope you are feeling better soon x

[Herindoors]

Hi Haggis. I hear myself in your post. I actually come from a large family but grew up shy and feeling isolated which I now know was because of the sort of childhood we were having. Then as an adult I presumed people didn’t like me because my abuser told me so. I managed to keep one friend during my time with him and make one more new friend (due to her persistance bless her 🙂 ) However since splitting with him I have wanted to to expand my social circle and do activities with like minded people. I am still getting to know myself and so I am not 100% there yet but these are things I have been doing;

Firstly – asking first if someone is interested in doing something. A big step for me and its suprising how often the answer is yes, because everyone else is waiting for someone else to ask first.
Spending more time with the family members I want to spend time with and saying no to those I don’t (a couple of toxics)
Volunteering – two differant places and chosen carefully they don’t take up too much time.
Finding a walking group. This is the most encouraging because it is populated with women my age who are also struggling to make new connections – because that’s how life is now.

I want to find more activity groups doing the things I really like doing – easy to find on the WWW. I am not a naturally social person and it takes me ages to get to know a person, so all this is not easy for me but the more I put myself out there the more I realise how many people are in the same boat and that encourages me.

The final thing I am doing is when I am alone I am training myself not to think about it as a sad event but as precious time to myself which I will miss when its gone!

Good luck xxx

[Herindoors]

My ex before we go for the night – don’t let me drink too much tonight
while out – stop being boring and telling me to not to drink too much
next day – why did you let me drink so much?

And I would blame myself for ‘letting’ him drink….

[Herindoors]

Hi Lilaclady. I was in your situation. I knew I had to end the marriage and in fact for me it was financially easier because I was the breadwinner, however I could not bring myself to actually do it due to fear. Eventually the tension between us got so great (I think he knew it was coming) that he snapped one day seriously physically assalted me (up to then it had not been seriously physical, mainly emotional). Don’t let it get to that.

Hindsight (without fear!) is a wonderful thing and if I could do it again.

I would have been more careful about hiding my plans, my thoughts, my feelings so that he was unaware I was leaving him. I would line everything up ready.
I would leave the house with my child while he was out – depsite the fact that I paid the rent, bills etc… I would just go regardless. I was waiting for him to go, and that was never going to happen. The only reason he left after attacking me was because I gave him that choice or the police being called.
I would immediately go no contact and only communicate with him through another person.
I would have reported his attack and abuse (I never reported him)

In my opinion, if you try and talk to him about it he will either get angry which is dangerous or he will try and persude you stay and try again, that he loves you, guilt, blame game etc…

Good luck, I hope you get your freedom soon xxx

[Herindoors]

@stillsmile – the same for me, strangled and then accused of being the violent one. Oh and apparently he’s also not violent because really violent men don’t smash up furniture ‘around’ their wife, they do it over their wives head. He knows this because he has met a ‘properly’ violent man who told him this. So there you have it!

[Herindoors]

Hi Lilaclady. Sorry to hear its been so horrible for you this week. I used to dread weekends as I would not be distracted by work! Classic cycle of abuse – tension – abuse – remorse – tension – abuse – remorse. It’s exhausting and confusing isn’t it? I would also think, once my ex was being nice again, did that happen? Did I cause it? Am I overreacting? Am I being unfair by not ‘being OK’ once he decides he is OK and sorry?
I hope he keeps his peace for you this weekend xx

[Herindoors]

So sorry to hear that inneedofsomepeace. You do not have the justice you deserve but as KIP says you have done the right thing in reporting it. He knows you are strong and will stand up to him and it could help other women in the future. I hope in the future you feel proud of yourself because you should xx

[Herindoors]

I was like this as well and it is a shame. Its taken a while but I am slowly getting back to putting myself first. It’s just little things like when I cook I would look for the nicest piece of meat for him because he would complain otherwise. Shopping for clothes just because I want to and not justifying every penny I spent. But most importantly, having emotions. Allowing myself to be happy, sad, angry, peed off, joyous – instead of being an emotionaless blank because I was not allowed to show emotion when i was with him.
take care xx

[Herindoors]

Thank you all 🙂 I do have a solictor but not formally until early next year. They did recommend a PI Firm but I got no response when I contacted them so I found my own as I was so keen to get the address. Should have waited! Will go back to the solicitors and use their PI firm. Just worried that there is a limit to their searches. He is so good at hiding – (detail removed by moderator) but how else do you find someone if they hide every other way?
Anyway thanks for the suppot xx

[Herindoors]

Interesting post Strube – I don’t know the answer to your question but wonder the same thing. My ex is a narcissist. Our child has not seem him or had any contact pretty much since we split up. He has completely disappared from our lives and this is typical narcisstict behaviour. Our child (and me) will no longer ‘feed’ him and so he disregards us. I am happy about this no contact from him but I worry about the day our child decides that they want to rebuild a relationship with him. I am concnerned about what Serenity articulates above – that there will be a honeymoon period to reel our child in (like our abusers did with us) and then he reverts back to his true behaviour and messes with our childs head. I will stay vigilant. Luckily our child is now adult age and a year before I even spoke the word ‘Narcissist’ out loud in relation to him our child had joined a forumn for Narcisstict parents because of him. Our child was one step ahead of me so maybe I don’t need to worry so much 🙂

[Herindoors]

Mine did this as well. Actually said that he had spoken to professionals and they told him he was the one who had been abused – lord only knows what he told them. He once told me that the fact that when I came in from work and nothing had been done in the house and I screamed at him was abuse….I didn’t remember screaming at him. I remember swallowing my words and getting on with the clearing up as I was too scared to say anything to him. But it played on my mind, did I do that? Am I remembering it wrong? So eventually I asked our child what they remembered. And what actually woudld happen is he would pick a fight while i was doing the housework, start shouting at me for ‘looking like I was peed off’ etc… Does he know that this is how it happened or does he really think that it was me? I guess I will never know.
Also twice I brusied him. Both times in self defence but he has quoted those incidents as time of my abuse of him. Sigh.
He says I am causing parental alientation because our child refuses to see him. Our child is scared of him and now adult age so can make that decision.
Luckily for me he has disappeard off social media so I don’t have to witness what he is saying to other people – but I can only imagine….

[Herindoors]

Thanks all. I have found someone who says she knows about DV but will see on (detail removed by Moderator) how much she really understands. I am looking forward to starting the process and dreading it at the same time. Will be having a divorce party when it finally comes through 🙂

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