Well this triggered me a bit - great read for anyone thinking "this isn't right."
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Well this triggered me a bit - great read for anyone thinking "this isn't right."
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I read that recently, too, and it was startlingly accurate. Like when she describes their first confrontation and says "No one had ever done that to me before." That was completely me. I had never been emotionally abused by a partner. Ever. There was a part of me that, despite my education and "intelligence," seriously only thought that kind of thing happened in "trailer parks" and Lifetime movies. I was such a snob about it.
STBXAH also started our relationship claiming to love and appreciate my intelligence, but in retrospect, his BEHAVIOR never really bore that out. He openly insulted my intelligence on many, many occasions. He told me repeatedly that I thought I was better than him, because I was so sure I was smarter than him. He criticized every single thing I did and every decision I ever made. Even now, on the rare occasions when the subject of the demise of our marriage has come up, the first thing he asks me is "why didn't you listen to me? why didn't you take my advice? why (essentially) didn't you do everything I told you to do, the moment I told you to do it?" The implication being, of course, that if I had done those things we would still be happily married, and that I am an idiot for NOT doing those things.
I remember the first time I acknowledged to someone else that I was being abused. It was a literal shock to my system to type the words out in an email. And I stayed for FIVE MORE YEARS after that realization.
STBXAH also started our relationship claiming to love and appreciate my intelligence, but in retrospect, his BEHAVIOR never really bore that out. He openly insulted my intelligence on many, many occasions. He told me repeatedly that I thought I was better than him, because I was so sure I was smarter than him. He criticized every single thing I did and every decision I ever made. Even now, on the rare occasions when the subject of the demise of our marriage has come up, the first thing he asks me is "why didn't you listen to me? why didn't you take my advice? why (essentially) didn't you do everything I told you to do, the moment I told you to do it?" The implication being, of course, that if I had done those things we would still be happily married, and that I am an idiot for NOT doing those things.
I remember the first time I acknowledged to someone else that I was being abused. It was a literal shock to my system to type the words out in an email. And I stayed for FIVE MORE YEARS after that realization.
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Yeah, I never realized how much blameshifting and smashing my validity was abuse. When I would bring THAT up, the response was "well how would you feel if you lost every argument for 5 years." Then I'd wonder if he was right, and if I should be a lawyer....
Then in recovery, my mindset became, hmm...all those arguments he "lost" and yet, never one apology ;D
Funny - his definition f losing an argument was me bringing up something he did that hurt me. My version of losing was him blamshifting, and then refusing to discuss further after he let me know how much I suck and that I deserved it.
Abuse. So hard to spot.
Then in recovery, my mindset became, hmm...all those arguments he "lost" and yet, never one apology ;D
Funny - his definition f losing an argument was me bringing up something he did that hurt me. My version of losing was him blamshifting, and then refusing to discuss further after he let me know how much I suck and that I deserved it.
Abuse. So hard to spot.
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fb, can you post the article here? Firewall settings at work won't allow it. Have read other articles like this that have helped a lot and would like to read this one also. I can read always read it sometime at the library. 
So many ways that emotional abuse crept into my relationship with my husband. Also so many ways it's not there. It's good for me to continually read and remind myself. I can step away from being a target by changing my actions, responses, and when need be, my location.
DS9 and I have been staying with friends. It's been great being in peaceful places, yet I miss being home. No rush. One day at a time and letting HP guide this. Yesterday was day 1 again for my husband, and I'm spiritually deplete.
So many ways that emotional abuse crept into my relationship with my husband. Also so many ways it's not there. It's good for me to continually read and remind myself. I can step away from being a target by changing my actions, responses, and when need be, my location.
DS9 and I have been staying with friends. It's been great being in peaceful places, yet I miss being home. No rush. One day at a time and letting HP guide this. Yesterday was day 1 again for my husband, and I'm spiritually deplete.
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(((KTF)))
Emotional abuse is so horrific. Upon further thought, XABF accused me of being abusive by giving him the silent treatment - often. This comment hit me like a ton of bricks, and he was somewhat right.
Theres a fine and blurry line between "punishing" and just not wanting to talk to someone that is either drunk, or was a jerk the night before. Guilty of both here.
Toxic, toxic, toxic....SMDH
Here is the article:
I'm a college-educated professional with relatively high self-esteem (some might say too high) and a history of a long, calm relationship with my ex-husband. Even when we broke up, the whole thing was pretty low-key.
It's a shame I have to offer these disclaimers, but I feel like in a situation like this, I'll be judged. I was in an abusive relationship and didn't even know it. I know that sounds ridiculous, like that reality show where women don't realize they're pregnant until a baby pops out. You can't help but think, Come on. How could you not know? Turns out denial is more powerful than I thought. Turns out love is more powerful than I thought.
I was hooked immediately. He was funny, well-read (a professor once said he read the kinds of books writers read) and self-deprecating. He had a great job and was the kind of guy who, when he had downtime on business trips, went to museums.
In other words, he was my ideal guy. And he'd never been married even though he was in his mid-40s, which was also my ideal. No exes to contend with! No kids! Oh happy day.
During the getting-to-know-you stuff, we talked about how we had bad tempers.
"Oh, yours is bad, too? That's good. Maybe we'll understand each other," he said. He was so sweet and gentlemanly. I figured he was like me, where if my password won't work on a website, I throw a hairbrush across the room.
I remember the first time he lost it, about a year in. We were having a discussion about sex. As in, I wanted it right then and he didn't. This was something of a recurring theme with us in the beginning, and it bothered me. I felt rejected. When I told him so, he threw the covers back, leaned inches from my face and screamed at me.
He screamed into my face. No one had ever done that to me. It hurt my ears. He'd even spit on me a little. He jumped off the bed and stalked out, punching the door for punctuation. The doorknob dented the wall.
I wish now that I'd gotten up, put on my clothes and left his apartment, never looking back. Who treats me that way? No one! But God, I loved him, and I'd never seen anything remotely like that behavior. This was the guy who, when I sighed in the night, woke up to ask me what was wrong. I decided he must feel really embarrassed about the sex thing, so I went to the living room to try and calm him down.
I can't remember the next fight, and that's the thing. The frequency was so sporadic that I now liken it to a frog in a pot of water who doesn't notice it getting hotter until it kills him. There'd be a blowup, he'd say sorry right after, followed by 60 absolutely perfect dates.
Then I'd say something that made him feel like he was being attacked, and he'd scream at me, his eyes wide, his face red. It was so different from his regular behavior that in my head, I called this raging guy Sasha Fierce. You know how Beyoncé says her stage persona is so different from the real her that she calls that stage person Sasha Fierce? That's how it was. This wasn't the guy who loves his cat and gives money to the homeless. This was a whole different person.
I knew his father had a history of these kinds of explosions, and that this was learned behavior. I knew it could be unlearned, and since he was in therapy, I figured it'd get better.
Instead, it escalated. Sasha Fierce emerged every few months, and then even more frequently. He started calling me things like a "stupid bitch" or a "******* moron," even though it was my intelligence he always brought up when he was listing why he loved me, during the good times.
"I've never met anyone I've clicked with like this, intellectually," he'd tell me. But during fights I was an idiot. Or "crazy." A few times I was "smothering" or "not sexy."
At this point, I knew this was not just a man who had a "bad temper." I knew no one should be talking to me like this. I wondered if this counted as abuse, but when I Googled "abusive relationships," I always read about the controlling man, the man who hits you. He wasn't remotely controlling, and he'd never laid a hand on me. There was also no honeymoon period where he was contrite after. He'd say he was sorry he blew up, then it was always, very subtly, my fault.
"I'm so sorry I threw the remote and screamed," he'd say, "but you always …" Or, "but if you'd just ..."
It was me. If I'd just change, I wouldn't get screamed at. None of his other girlfriends drove him to this behavior, he'd point out. Not once did he ever act this way with anyone else.
The fights worsened by year three. He'd block my way so I couldn't leave the room. Eventually, he started pushing me and shoved me hard into a wall after charging across the room. The next day I realized I had bruises on my arm. "Are those … those can't be from Sasha Fierce," I told myself. "He didn't shove me that hard."
The final straw was when we were in the car, and he told me he'd seen an old girlfriend on a business trip. We'd been on the outs for awhile, so I asked him, "Did you sleep with her?" He got so angry that he began driving very fast on a residential street.
"Please stop," I said, horrified. He drove even faster, the car fishtailing, until we got to his house. We were approaching the fence at the end of his driveway, and I didn't think he was going to stop. He stopped. And so did I. He texted an apology, followed by, "If you just trusted me, and didn't act so crazy …"
You don't have to be hit to be abused. Your abuser doesn't have to be possessive, or some kind of drunk psychopath. He can be smart and funny and kind, most of the time. But if he calls you a stupid bitch, even once, when he's angry? That's abusive. If the fights are six months apart and he's wonderful in the meantime? You're still with an abuser. Blaming you for his behavior, even if he does it subtly? Classic abusive behavior. So is the escalation of the violence.
I wish this would come up on Google as often as the "If he checks your email and cuts you off from friends" stuff does. Because it's easy to tell yourself everything's fine if you can't find your exact situation. It's easy to say you're different.
The longer I've been gone, the more stunned I am that I didn't see how bad it was. I was gone two weeks before I said out loud to myself, "I was in an abusive relationship."
It angers me that I miss him. I miss the non-Sasha-Fierce side of him, the guy who asked how my day was, and who really listened to my answer. The guy who held my hand at the movies and cried during "Love, Actually." But I can't have that guy without the darker, more troubled one. I can't have "You're the smartest person I know" without the "You're a stupid bitch." So I choose neither.
I loved him, but I love me more.
Emotional abuse is so horrific. Upon further thought, XABF accused me of being abusive by giving him the silent treatment - often. This comment hit me like a ton of bricks, and he was somewhat right.
Theres a fine and blurry line between "punishing" and just not wanting to talk to someone that is either drunk, or was a jerk the night before. Guilty of both here.
Toxic, toxic, toxic....SMDH
Here is the article:
I'm a college-educated professional with relatively high self-esteem (some might say too high) and a history of a long, calm relationship with my ex-husband. Even when we broke up, the whole thing was pretty low-key.
It's a shame I have to offer these disclaimers, but I feel like in a situation like this, I'll be judged. I was in an abusive relationship and didn't even know it. I know that sounds ridiculous, like that reality show where women don't realize they're pregnant until a baby pops out. You can't help but think, Come on. How could you not know? Turns out denial is more powerful than I thought. Turns out love is more powerful than I thought.
I was hooked immediately. He was funny, well-read (a professor once said he read the kinds of books writers read) and self-deprecating. He had a great job and was the kind of guy who, when he had downtime on business trips, went to museums.
In other words, he was my ideal guy. And he'd never been married even though he was in his mid-40s, which was also my ideal. No exes to contend with! No kids! Oh happy day.
During the getting-to-know-you stuff, we talked about how we had bad tempers.
"Oh, yours is bad, too? That's good. Maybe we'll understand each other," he said. He was so sweet and gentlemanly. I figured he was like me, where if my password won't work on a website, I throw a hairbrush across the room.
I remember the first time he lost it, about a year in. We were having a discussion about sex. As in, I wanted it right then and he didn't. This was something of a recurring theme with us in the beginning, and it bothered me. I felt rejected. When I told him so, he threw the covers back, leaned inches from my face and screamed at me.
He screamed into my face. No one had ever done that to me. It hurt my ears. He'd even spit on me a little. He jumped off the bed and stalked out, punching the door for punctuation. The doorknob dented the wall.
I wish now that I'd gotten up, put on my clothes and left his apartment, never looking back. Who treats me that way? No one! But God, I loved him, and I'd never seen anything remotely like that behavior. This was the guy who, when I sighed in the night, woke up to ask me what was wrong. I decided he must feel really embarrassed about the sex thing, so I went to the living room to try and calm him down.
I can't remember the next fight, and that's the thing. The frequency was so sporadic that I now liken it to a frog in a pot of water who doesn't notice it getting hotter until it kills him. There'd be a blowup, he'd say sorry right after, followed by 60 absolutely perfect dates.
Then I'd say something that made him feel like he was being attacked, and he'd scream at me, his eyes wide, his face red. It was so different from his regular behavior that in my head, I called this raging guy Sasha Fierce. You know how Beyoncé says her stage persona is so different from the real her that she calls that stage person Sasha Fierce? That's how it was. This wasn't the guy who loves his cat and gives money to the homeless. This was a whole different person.
I knew his father had a history of these kinds of explosions, and that this was learned behavior. I knew it could be unlearned, and since he was in therapy, I figured it'd get better.
Instead, it escalated. Sasha Fierce emerged every few months, and then even more frequently. He started calling me things like a "stupid bitch" or a "******* moron," even though it was my intelligence he always brought up when he was listing why he loved me, during the good times.
"I've never met anyone I've clicked with like this, intellectually," he'd tell me. But during fights I was an idiot. Or "crazy." A few times I was "smothering" or "not sexy."
At this point, I knew this was not just a man who had a "bad temper." I knew no one should be talking to me like this. I wondered if this counted as abuse, but when I Googled "abusive relationships," I always read about the controlling man, the man who hits you. He wasn't remotely controlling, and he'd never laid a hand on me. There was also no honeymoon period where he was contrite after. He'd say he was sorry he blew up, then it was always, very subtly, my fault.
"I'm so sorry I threw the remote and screamed," he'd say, "but you always …" Or, "but if you'd just ..."
It was me. If I'd just change, I wouldn't get screamed at. None of his other girlfriends drove him to this behavior, he'd point out. Not once did he ever act this way with anyone else.
The fights worsened by year three. He'd block my way so I couldn't leave the room. Eventually, he started pushing me and shoved me hard into a wall after charging across the room. The next day I realized I had bruises on my arm. "Are those … those can't be from Sasha Fierce," I told myself. "He didn't shove me that hard."
The final straw was when we were in the car, and he told me he'd seen an old girlfriend on a business trip. We'd been on the outs for awhile, so I asked him, "Did you sleep with her?" He got so angry that he began driving very fast on a residential street.
"Please stop," I said, horrified. He drove even faster, the car fishtailing, until we got to his house. We were approaching the fence at the end of his driveway, and I didn't think he was going to stop. He stopped. And so did I. He texted an apology, followed by, "If you just trusted me, and didn't act so crazy …"
You don't have to be hit to be abused. Your abuser doesn't have to be possessive, or some kind of drunk psychopath. He can be smart and funny and kind, most of the time. But if he calls you a stupid bitch, even once, when he's angry? That's abusive. If the fights are six months apart and he's wonderful in the meantime? You're still with an abuser. Blaming you for his behavior, even if he does it subtly? Classic abusive behavior. So is the escalation of the violence.
I wish this would come up on Google as often as the "If he checks your email and cuts you off from friends" stuff does. Because it's easy to tell yourself everything's fine if you can't find your exact situation. It's easy to say you're different.
The longer I've been gone, the more stunned I am that I didn't see how bad it was. I was gone two weeks before I said out loud to myself, "I was in an abusive relationship."
It angers me that I miss him. I miss the non-Sasha-Fierce side of him, the guy who asked how my day was, and who really listened to my answer. The guy who held my hand at the movies and cried during "Love, Actually." But I can't have that guy without the darker, more troubled one. I can't have "You're the smartest person I know" without the "You're a stupid bitch." So I choose neither.
I loved him, but I love me more.
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Join Date: Dec 2004
Posts: 2,281
Warning signs of emotional abuse:
30 Signs Of Emotional Abuse In A Relationship
21 Warning Signs of an Emotionally Abusive Relationship | World of Psychology
Not many of these in my relationship with my husband, yet I identify with some and that is enough. Emotional abuse can take many forms, and can also be very subtle. It is still ABUSE.
Note on my above post: I am spiritually depleted. I have tools, knowledge and self-care to become spiritually fit. It occasionally takes some time, some resting, some space. My husband's day no longer directs how I'm feeling, although it's interesting how sometimes I attach those things together like above. Awareness, acceptance, action. In detaching with love and kindness, I more often now can see what my feelings really are and be aware of how to take care of myself. Ditto that, in becoming more aware of what DS9 needs also.
30 Signs Of Emotional Abuse In A Relationship
21 Warning Signs of an Emotionally Abusive Relationship | World of Psychology
Not many of these in my relationship with my husband, yet I identify with some and that is enough. Emotional abuse can take many forms, and can also be very subtle. It is still ABUSE.
Note on my above post: I am spiritually depleted. I have tools, knowledge and self-care to become spiritually fit. It occasionally takes some time, some resting, some space. My husband's day no longer directs how I'm feeling, although it's interesting how sometimes I attach those things together like above. Awareness, acceptance, action. In detaching with love and kindness, I more often now can see what my feelings really are and be aware of how to take care of myself. Ditto that, in becoming more aware of what DS9 needs also.
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Join Date: Jan 2015
Location: Texas
Posts: 2,872
FB-every stinkin word. This just made me cry-definitely triggered. That is my ex in a nutshell. Would tell me how I was smarter than him and compliment my intelligence in front of others abd then call me a stupid bitch (and other degrading curse words) in private. Blamed me: I've never treated anyone else like this so it has to be your fault, if you just didn't do x, y or z, I wouldn't have treated you that way, and the night I finally called the police on him after ge held a pillow at my face, he screamed that he should have listened to his family bc they told him I was crazy. Uh huh. And I was. To have not walked away a second after meeting him. My biggest regret in life.
Thank you for posting, truly helpful and needed to be read by many.
Thank you for posting, truly helpful and needed to be read by many.
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