bamboo10

So my RABF and i just had a fight. On 4th of July (yes this was my fault) I was at a friends pool and they were serving Maragaritas. The bf was not there. Well, I had been feeling him pull away from me in the relationship and had been feeling badly about it. Due to the fact that I have not been drinking at all recently (out of respect to my RABF) the two margaritas I had got me incredibly drunk. I ended up calling him and coming home and telling him i felt he didnt care about me or want to be around me anymore. Long story short we talked about it and he was fine and everything was all better. Now when we have a fight that has nothing to do with it, and he tells me he doesnt want to talk about it now, lets talk about it later why dont i go hang with a friend or something. When I tell him I am going to hang with my mom and her friend Wanda, it becomes "well try not to get super drunk and freak out" WTH? I got to drunk ONE time....how many times has he done that?? I NEVER throw that in his face, but its ok for him to throw this in mine? How about be thankful that I respect you enough to never drink around you and to barely ever drink at all. Ughhh just needed to vent.

akrasia

Hello, projection!

I used to get that all the time. Once when AH was on a binge I got home from a 12-hour day and after bringing in groceries left the car door open. He came (stumbled) in shortly after me, having been at the pub for five hours. He asked me why the car door was still open and I went out and closed it.

Then he went upstairs and wrote a pompous email (email!) stating that I was endangering our assets. Lulz.

Adventure

Oh yeah, have been there!! That one time, 5 years ago, when I got too drunk at a friend's party, and lost the plot with him, admittedly I was demented, is still brought up. Nowadays I just laugh. He can't remember what he did this afternoon or last week, but by God does he remember that ONE TIME 5 years ago :rotfxko

shawty80

ugh. i got crap thrown in my face all the time...that i didn't even do!

a personal favorite of my xabf's was to come home and tell me he had turned down an invitation with his friends because he knew i wouldn't like the event, only for me to tell him that i WOULD like it (or at least the dignity to make up my own damn mind), and that i thought we should go. regardless of whether we went, or not, said events always came back to haunt me as he, not so nicely, pointed that finger at me and said it was MY fault that we could never do anything with his friends.

cranapple

Wow are we with the same person?? Mine was invited to go on a paid trip to Alaska with his father, brother, and brother in law last year and he didn't go last minute because he had been binging for a week and didn't feel like it. I begged him to stop drinking and join in on this once in a lifetime trip but NOPE. A few weeks ago when we were arguing and he told me it was ALL my fault that he didn't go to Alaska because we were fighting. WTF???

RedCandle

Kate...I call this "Score Carding" in my relationship with one of my alcoholics.

I am guilty of it too, unfortunately.

I often feel like my alcoholic "fishes" for information...only to turn it on me later. Things that happened ages ago...thrown back in my face at random moments.

As he got sicker...so did I. I too am guilty of screaming craziness like, "OH! OK! So you're just going to leave and go sleep with someone else!!!!????"

Or, "No, sure...go have a bunch of beers...so I can find you passed out cold again on the floor." (Happened two years ago...)

My point is...I think this happens when there is A LOT of hurt...that we just can't deal with. It's an attempt to "even the score"...of emotional pain...

I can't tell you what your RABF is thinking...but I know that when I have caught MYSELF doing it...its when I'm feeling very sad and very hurt...and all my mental B.S. comes flying out.

Its not an excuse...
I just wanted to share a different perspective...because I know I've been guilty of this.

Carol Star

score carding- very interesting- yep we were guilty of it- both me and XH

ZiggyB

yeah this is exactly why I am coming to the conclusion that alcohol has no place in a healthy relationship.

Carol Star

My "part" is my reaction to it........I can walk away......not engage with the craziness, not say something more hurtful to make it bigger......There is an exercise I heard about in an Alanon meeting- Write on the left side of a piece of paper everything anybody had done to me, on the right side write my reactions. My "part" is the right side. I had a pattern- going back years and years even though situations and people changed- I 1. was too sensitive, 2. got too angry, 3. overreacted........NOW I am aware of it- see it- feel it in my body (your body will tell you)......this is why exercise is so good to displace bad emotions.......it moves them.......but they also move on their own.......Latin for emotion- is "to move".

lizatola

Carol, I love that idea because I know I kept a 'scorecard', as well. It's definitely one of my faults. And, yes, it's because I'd get sucked back in to his ranting and raving and trying to defend myself so I'd 'one up' him. That has got to stop.
Thank you for sharing this exercise, I think I will do this next week while still on vacation.

As to the original poster and the topic here. Yes, I have had things thrown in my face but it's usually more about blame. Something breaks in the house and it's my fault. One day the garage door wasn't working, the remotes weren't communicating with the door so it was obviously my fault and I must have pushed a button on the outside key pad to make it unresponsive, etc. He was steaming mad and I swear his eyeballs were RED. I started defending myself about something that I had no idea what was even happening. I made up stuff to just try to get him to stop yelling at me and accusing me of something I didn't do. It's craziness. And, this fight happened way back before he picked up the drink again! We had so many altercations like this: it's your fault I can't find my stylus for my handheld device, it's your fault I kept drinking, it's your fault that I had to hide the drinking, it's your fault that the internet isn't working because you must be downloading some stupid game, it's your fault that the lawnmower isn't working because you put the wrong oil in it, etc. And, he was wrong on every occasion but I believed every word he said. DUH.

Linkmeister

I had so many things thrown back in my face, I wanted to buy a goalie mask to protect myself. The things he would throw back in my face were confidences we had shared, it reminded me of a person surfing the 'Net, bookmarking web pages they found interesting, to be used for future reference. As Adventure said, they can't remember what happened yesterday, but can remember things that happened years ago. This was the case with the EX and I.

It got to the point that the EXABF, when drunk, would go through what I called the "laundry list" of complaints, ranging from the settlement I had to make to my ex husband as part of our divorce (he felt he was entitled to that money), to the fact that I took my ex-husband's name when we got married, I was too cheap, I spent too much money, I loved the dog more than him, I had too many books, I actually moved out to another province to be with him, that "my issues" caused him to drink, that I smoked, at one point, was a little too "chunky", that I was too loving, that I was not loving enough.....you get the idea.When he would cycle through these things, it would start all over again.

All of these things "caused him stress, and to drink". In the beginning, I would try to defend myself, blame myself and tried to justify things to him. When I tried to walk away, he would keep on worrying whatever the issue of the day was to death, like a dog with a bone.

Gradually, with the help of my Sponsor, a good counselor and reading SR posts, I learned what detachment was all about, and that I had a choice-to continue defending myself (falling on deaf ears) or, walk away, saying something like "I'm sorry you feel that way." The first time I tried that, the reaction was less than positive but, with each time doing this, understanding their behaviour, I began slowly to realize that all of his stuff was being projected on me, I was being used as a punching bag and that it was not my fault that this was happening.

It took a lot of time for me to get over this feeling of being at fault for all of "our" issues and realize that all of this related back to his drinking. All I kept referring to (and still do) is the 3 C's-I didn't cause it, I can't control it and I can't cure it.

HeySoulSista

My X-non-alcoholic but Narcissistic Husband does the same thing...
every argument of any kind can bring 15 years of wrongdoings up.. the list of offenses against me...

but I do not even mention most of his daily offenses. I am learning how to stand up to myself now.

My XABF from long ago, he projected frequently. Called me crazy when he was acting up, would bring up my weight loss not progressing fast enough while he was still not sober and jobless. It was pretty predictable, he would get tired, after a certain amount of hidden drinking... and watch out! Acid tongue.

How to respond or not respond is tricky. They both learned how to really go for the juggler. If I did not respond, they would get more personal. Interesting that they are so different, one has never drank, but yet the same.

The x husband even gets false witnesses to make false accusations based on hearsay (from him) in court. Oh the joy. It is very hard to get away from the Narcisstic X-Husband. He tries to control forever, through criticism or court accusations or trying to make me fearful to live my own life.. without custody repercussions and more false accusations. It's all about control and punishment for leaving him.