“The Mystery of Loving an Abuser” Comments, Page 14
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174 Responses (2 Discussion Threads) to “The Mystery of Loving an Abuser”
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michelle
131Dr. Carver,
I’m 23 years old and had been with my ex bf for just over seven years till earlier this month.
Om and off in those seven years Sean my ex who is now 26 has struggled with dope and porn addictions and I mean to extreme to the point that his only way to escape reality is to either smoke lots or lock himself in his room and jerk off even when i where home in the next room.
In the beginning I honestly though that he was just being a guy well at least with the porn side of things but I always hated his dope smoking right from the beginning and he did a good job of hiding it from me , well that was at least till he slapped me across the face one night three weeks into the relationship because i was asking for an answer to something and he was ignoring me on purpose and looking at the computer.
I let that slap slide you know as I didn’t think anything of it as when I was a kid my father hit me on a regular basis and I was just told to keep that in the family home and that no one needed to know.
Months passed and we decided to move to the city 2 hours from a families and decided to start our careers off. Within weeks of living with Sean and his friends I began to see that i was just an object to him and that it was ok for him to sit around with his friends/smoke buddies and poke fun at me as if he was one of them because i was the odd one out that didn’t take drugs and had much hatred for them.
As the years passed on we went from rental property to another , the voilence , the screaming and lack of funds caused leases to be broken.
I’m not going to lie to you and tell that there has not been a court case against his abuse and voilence towards me because there has been , two to be exact.
You can only imagine that state my mother has been in for years now with the toxic relationship that we have , and before the first court case has come around , mum use to work at the same office as him and she watched him be arrested for credit card fraud that he has committed weeks prior , and that his mum had had him arested earlier on because he had stolen money from her and no doubt hit her i don’t so much know about the voilence towards his family I guess its possible.
Anyway when the first case came around I was feeling pure guilt that I was the reason that he had to stand in front of a judge and face the punishment , that I was the one that pushed him too far i asked to have my nose broken twice in 48 hours and if anything happen to him I could not deal with it. In this state of mind I decided to defend him and make a statement to give the judge , he read it and decided to let him off with a 2 year suspended sentence and a big fine.And was warned to reduce his excessive drinking and smoking as it was obvious the chemical unbalance of the two mixed with his depression was a key factor for his domestic voilence.
We both appeared to be happy with that result and that he appreciated my help and was prepared to let me take the wrap for what had just happened. Once again we moved back in together. As I are with all my loved ones all I ever want to do is to make the ones close to me feel safe at home and provide them with my love and support. Him being in the chef trade and me being in the office field our hours were very much opposite so as I would be coming back from work he would of started for the night and in most cases would not return home till well after midnight.
Its always been the same patter with him for the first few months of him being there with me he is pure bliss and he is the person I fell in love with 7 years ago and it makes me think every time with out fail that he just goes through with drawl and he is only mean and nasty to me because I am the closest person to take it out on after all isn’t that your purpose of being there for someone? , to help them through what ever their troubles are? , this was different he was now getting to the point that he would try and hide bongs all over the house and buy eye drops so I could not tell he was off his face from pipes it was a dead give away with the insomnia and drunken stumbles into bed hours after I had gone to sleep. I knew that whenever he would stay up long after me it would be because he was either watching a lot of porn rather than having sex with me or he was getting drunk or smoking bongs because he knew that if he did it in front of me that I would be very upset as I had taken his word for it that he no longer wanted to do it and that he was going to change his life.
Ready for court case 2? , all the addictions continued in the house hold for close to six months and I found myself night after night with a sore head from where he had pulled my hair so tight or thrown me up against the stairs and left massive bruises on my hips from where i had landed on things. I got so low about all of this I really did start to think that its me and I’m causing him to get so mad at me that the only way to make me stop persisting with asking him why he is so nasty to me was to physically hit me so hard I would go off to the bedroom and lie in pain crying myself to sleep hating myself because I was dead set convinced I was to blame for everything totally blocking out the fact that he was abusive and has multiple addictions to substances and fantasy worlds.
I will never forget the afternoon that I asked him why he was being the way he was and he turned to me and said , because you are not up to my standards , your insecure , your getting fat , you have no brain I don’t love you anymore. As you can imagine I was so upset and got on the phone to my mum in tears and she asked me if he had been hurting me and I said yes but everything was ok and that we were going to work it out and not to worry.
At this point mum and her boyfriend lived in the same town and Peter mums boyfriend and my older brother David showed up less than 15 minutes later banging down the front door asking to let them in so they could take me away , I didn’t wanna go and I didn’t ask for them to come, Peter ended up seeing Sean grabbing me by the throat as I was trying to open to door to let them know I was ok and to just leave . There ended up being a fight between Sean and Peter and it got very heated , seeing Sean lying on the ground with a puffy eye and ripped shirt just wanted me to help him up and take him upstairs to clean him up and make everything better again.
But my family would not let me stay that made me clear all my furniture and belongings out and come to stay with them till i got a new lease in my name. The made me charge him again and told me that If I did not get him charged for this that would be the end of their support for me because they had seen enough and didn’t want to watch him get away with it for a second time. For a few days there I was convinced that his abuse towards me was not only wrong but he really could not get away with it this time.
Within a month of being in my new home I felt empty and wanted to see him and know he was ok , mind you at this stage there was a restrained order out on him but that did not stop us from seeing each other , what was wrong with me why did my mind change , why did I want him back?, by this time he has been living in a student hostel in a tiny room and it was very expensive and mum and peter had already left to go interstate so I didn’t see the worry of letting him come home to me again , after all it appeared he was healthy again and wanted to go down a positive path in his life and appreciate the help and love he had around him.
He moved back in shortly after and the patter started all over again of him happy to be home , the sex was great and we were back to enjoying cooking together , going to zoo , his bond with the cats just everything I was really glad we had made the choice to continue on this level even though we had the court case to attend too. We decided this time around we would put the hard work in and make sure he has good representation and that we had been seeking prof help not only for his addictions and depression but also as a couple so I knew what we could do together to make this work and make proof to the courts that he was changed and continue life positive and clean.
His love from what I could tell continued to go stronger in me and I felt very content because I hadn’t been hit yet , I would have the occasional harsh word thrown towards me but I didn’t think much of it because as most do I know when i get mad I say things I know I don’t mean.
A couple of months passed and I noticed his attitude had changed yet again and that something wasn’t right , and when approached he assured me he had been clean for months and that he was just going through withdrawl symptoms and it would pass in time. I got him to go to the doctor and they gave him a mild dosage of Valium and it was helping him sleep at night and to not be tempted to smoke anymore , well that was what I was led to believe. Its wasn’t long till I worked out why he was up late still at night , he had met the druggie middle aged woman that lived at the rear of my house in a bungalow and was there most nights whilst I was asleep getting high , I knew at least he was not there to sleep with her as she really was awful but he was getting off in his own way and being dishonest to our relationship and the trust between us.
He started at a new restaurant within weeks of this and once again found another crowd of bong smokers so he was not coming home till really early in the morning , im certain he was telling other female staff he was single , why do you think I think that? , because I was never aloud to meet them or his male friends infact pretty much through the entire relationship , why is that? , what does he have to hide? , I love him and will support him no matter what happens. He should be proud of that person for sticking around and being by his side , but instead leaves me at home and comes home drunk at 6 am shouting out abuse to my bedroom window with all the other bong heads he was out with for the night because I want let him in till he sobers up as he clearly has a past of hitting me under the influence.
After a few months in the new job and speaking to me a few times he decided to he really wanted to be serious this time , start going to the gym , eat healthy , make our relationship work and to get out of bad places that were tempting him to pick up bad habits so he quit the kitchen job and was unemployed for a few weeks so I of course continued to work and support us both , after all my money is his money , cannot say he was the same , in the sense that he would always by his luxuries before he would pay me off for things I would be always last on the list. Anyway within a few weeks I spoke to my HR manager in the company I was working for at the time and asked if there was any work avail. He was lucky enough to get an interview and was employed within a few weeks , we worked for the same company but he was in a different fund and floor so It wasn’t like we were always seeing each other at work and home.
He was progressing so well in his role and for a good 8 -10 months he seemed to be very much in tune with life in general, we were having fun , i felt secure but still wondered why he did not mention that his girlfriend works here also to his colleges and other females, and when questioned he said to me because thats my personal life people don’t need to know everything and the reason you cannot come out with us is because its my time to mingle with my friends let me do that so i just let it go and accepted that that was his way of being on his own and spaced out. I figured in the whole time I had been with him that he really did not have any proper close friends they were all just dope users and used him as a source to share drugs with, hence thats why they don’t like people that are against drugs.
Before we knew it , it was time for the case and we had been to several meeting with the phyciatrist and felt as though we had made some real head way and all those nights he was out at night with his friend Kenny he assured me that Kenny was a smoker but he only went around to see him as a mate and swap computer games and movies , I just figured his behaviour was a bit off leading up to it because he was scared that there was a high chance he could be facing jail time and i could understand that final week before when I found a bong in the laundry and he has to produce 4 clean urine screens the first two were fine but the last too of course showed the dope in it.
The night before the case he spent hours on the computer altering the testing so it would appear clear for the courts , I knew it was wrong but I didn’t want him to go to jail so I was happy to support him all the way. The morning of the case was terrifying and I was in the mind set that he was going for sure. The end result was that the judge could see the effort put into the work with the doctor , full time job and most important the support from the victim ( me ) , he thought I was very silly to continue but he granted a further two year suspended sentence and a fine and he was free to go. His mother was present and she has despised me from day one and is convinced I are to blame for everything and she even said that to me when no one was around , did she never register her son was the one with the charges being laid over and over again for his actions? , how can she justify that?.
3 months after the case we continue to argue and fight and he was getting very aggressive at least once a day and was always off at Kenny’s house , I started to grow a back bone and stick up for myself and ask what he was doing and why be so nasty to me , I love you Sean please calm down he kept up the threats of leaving me and that I was fat and ugly and that he could do so much better , It wasn’t till I came home from work one night and noticed his car , computer and his side of the wardrobe to be gone with a note on the kitchen bench telling me he was sick of the merry go round and that I’m not all to blame but he needed to go , he said if I contacted him it was a form of harassment and he would have me charged.
I was such a mess for a few months , I couldn’t eat , talk even work I thought that was the end for me and that I could never break out of the cycle. After a few months we started contact again and I could see living with Kenny was a very bad thing for him and It was only going to end in a disaster but he assured me everything was ok , well that was till i got a phone call late one Sunday afternoon telling me Kenny had just punched him in the face and he was going to press charges , so yes I went and got him and took an ice pack with me in the car took all his stuff back to my new place and let him come home.
He had been here with me since late October last year and he assured me he had made a massive mistake walking out on me and was sorry for all the pain and for the first few weeks he would be crying at night being so emotional and connected it was a side i was not sure i would ever see but it made me feel as though he understood why i cried when things were bad especially between me and him.
I asked this time that he would tell his colleges and family we are working through this and going to be happy , neither of them every knew he was here , he continued with the harsh words and putting me down every chance he got , i was getting weaker and weaker with my self esteem because it was obvious my man was ashamed to show me off to people because I was so insecure or ugly or something. I started questioning where he was going at night and why sometimes he would not come home at all , he told me he was with his sister and i know that did not feel right so tensions got more and more intense.
About three weeks ago I noticed a new number in his phone under the name of Rebecca i asked him who she was and he told me i was being paranoid and that she was just a college from work and that she knew he had a girlfriend so to stop accusing him of cheating on me.
A week after that he told me he was going out with the guys for the night and yet the guy he was meant to be going out with was on annual leave i know because when he said he was coming home and never did and was not answering his phone i was so worried something bad had happened so i rang all the hospitals and his work and no one had heard from him. All day I had the worst anxiety and made me so ill and when 5pm came around he just came home as though nothing was to be worried about and when I was crying so hard telling him how much he scared me he told me that will teach you for accusing me of cheating on you or not letting me live my life.
The same thing happened again the next week expect this time he ha taken some condoms with him yet when i rang and questioned him he told me he has been using them for personal use and not to accuse , is that was the case why did he not come home. Less than 4 days later he left me again and bought a gram of dope from my former house mates boyfriend on his way out.
The last three weeks for me doctor have been hell , i am not coping and have lost 10 kilos , i miss him so much and want him to come home. I did the most awful thing to him 2 weeks ago and If I could take it back I would , I rang his work and told them his police record is bad and they fired him , I was so sick of the pain and lying I had dealt with and at the time I thought it was a good idea but now realise the after effects of someone being fired.
He has been here several time to sleep with me and when in a good mood will talk normally but right now all he has for me is pure hatred and blames me for everything even the fact that this Rebecca woman who is 10 tears older than him was under the impression he was single after all that what he had told her months ago before he left me , why would he do that.
BESIDES GETTING HIM FIRED WHICH HAPPENED AFTER HE WALKED OUT , why does he hate me so much , disrespect me and not see me as a good person?
Why do I still love him? , why do I want him to come home? , will he?
He wont take my calls nothing, I’m so hurt and not sure how to deal with him but I want him back.
I need advice!
Shell
PLEASE HELP ME
I DONT WANT TO MOVE ON!
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marge
132I want to know if this is normal, or makes sense at all.
I was raped by a man who I found physically attractive, but since then I’ve hated him, for good reason I think.
But I recently had a dream where we were dating, and he was kind and adorable, and I was so happy with him.
When I woke up I was very disoriented, I find it hard to hate him now, and I’m fascinated by him. And I am so confused. I almost feel attracted to him.
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133
Dear Marge, The brain produces several dreams each night. The “mood” of the dream often depends upon our mood – depressed folks dreaming of death/dying while healthy folks have positive dreams. These same dreams combine our memories in odd ways. You may have had a positive dream of this abuser because your mood was good.
Here’s the problem: Our dreams are like our daytime daydream fantasies. If we think about winning the lottery – we smile and feel good. If we think about losing a loved one – we feel sad. In your case, a positive dream about this rapist produced a positive feeling. That positive feeling is, like a fantasy of winning the lottery, a fantasy that has nothing to do with reality.
Having a positive dream doesn’t make a person who raped you suddenly a good person. You still have significant reasons to dislike him and keep your distance. The dream has confused you because of the feelings it produced. Don’t be confused or tempted by this dream. His past hasn’t been erased and your positive dream didn’t fix him.
Don’t feel this dream is reason to change your position. If you dream you’ve won the lottery – don’t run out and buy a beach house. If I dream I can fly – that doesn’t change the fact that I can’t fly. I shouldn’t be jumping off skyscrapers. You should feel no need to change your original position on the rapist. We can be entertained by our dreams – but not controlled by them. If you contact the rapist, you will be victimized again. No matter what I dream – I still can’t fly. Dr. Carver
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Trying to Break Free
134Dr Carver,
I have written to you once regarding divorcing somone who was diagnosed as bipolar but has also been physically abusive. We are now officially divorced. It took a little over two years, but we are legally done. Starting in July of last year, I became seriously inovlved with a very caring, wonderful man and we are expecting our first child together in September. As much as I think one can tell in 8 months, we have a very good relationship. We have wonderful, open and honest communication.
My divorce though was just recently finalized. I got a new cell phone number becuase during the separation and divorce my my ex-husband was practicing some of the much cited phone techniques of calling up to 10 or 15 times a day, or inventing little “dramas” for reasons to call and/or text me. I kept my old cell phone though because of his tendency to become enraged when I try to limit contact.
Here is the dilemna: I still have that old cell phone, and he is still coming up with reasons to call, and I can’t seem to break free. I am not heartless and I would like to maintain an amicable relationship with my ex-huband. But if I am honest with myself, that is more because I am afraid that he will spread rumors that the divorce was my fault and somehow if I am nice enough to him, he will be kinder to me. And there is a part of my that does miss parts of our old relationship.
I have not told many people (friends, his family) of the real reason for the divorce. I agreed to file a no contest divorce despite the presence of domestic violence in our marriage. I have continued to make compromises to protect him.
But since I don’t want to continue hurting the new man in my life, how can I cut the tie to my ex-husband? How do you cut someone completely out of your life after 13 years with them? There are friends that say just delete any emails/text messages without reading them and get rid of the cell phone. I am having a really hard time doing that and am not sure why. It is not because I am still in love with him and can every imagine back together. The thought of ever living with him again sends shivers down my spine. My life is 1000% percent better without his controlling, stressful presence in it.
I thought it would be easier to break free once the divorce was legally over, but I can still envision ways that he can make my life miserable if chooses. He has a pattern of, if someone hurts or him or irritates him in some way, he feels justified to, in effect, punish them. How do I break completely free?
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135
Dear Trying: You are still being victimized by your ex-husband. Your reasons for maintaining contact are based in fear – fear that he’ll spread rumors, retaliate, punish, etc. HE KNOWS you are still afraid of him at some level – that’s why he still calls. He remains dangerous to you as all of his contacts are for HIS purpose and not related to any loving concern for you. You are totally correct…he does feel entitled to punish you and these contacts are part of the punishment strategy. His goal is to ruin the life you currently have with a new partner and new child. After multiple emails or phone contacts, he will have evidence he can use to blackmail you. Imagine how your new partner will feel when the Loser produces phone logs of your secret calls to and from his phone, not to mention emails. Keep in mind, the Loser has absolutely NOTHING to lose…and you have a new life to lose.
You are making a severe mistake if you feel being kind to the Loser will protect you from his behavior. This is exactly how you felt in the marriage – that “walking on eggshells” feeling that if you do everything perfectly, maybe he won’t be abusive. As you know from 13 years experience – that doesn’t work. We can love sharks but if we’re wounded and swimming around them, they will eat us. Being kind and loving doesn’t protect us from who and what people are.
As I mention in my Loser article, you must be an unplugged slot machine that stops giving anything – no calls, no emails, no acknowledgements. He’ll always be inventing drama – that’s how he lives his life and manipulates and abuses others. What we see as “drama” is an invented story to be used to contact and continue to victimize you. You’ve already lived this game.
You are not being heartless – although he will accuse you of that because guilt has always worked in the past. You are being self-protective…and protective of your new relationship and child. As for the rumors, if the start, you can drop the idea of protecting him (which he is counting on) and let folks know what really happened. Keep in mind, because you have accidently encouraged his behavior by allowing him to contact you frequently, he will increase his behavior when you try to completely detach. Don’t give in and continue on your current path.
You’ve won the relationship lottery – a good partner, child on the way, and new life. He’s trying to steal it from you and will if you allow it. This is no time to be kind – rather, save kindness for your new relationship and motherhood. He sees your kindness as a weakness and opportunity to victimize you, not as a positive trait. You need to defend yourself and not miss this opportunity to be happy.
Dr. Carver -
michelle
136I HAD A FRIEND GIVE ME YOUR ARTICLE ABOUT THIS STOCKHOLM SYNDROME THIS IS EVERYTHING MY DAUGHTER IS LIVING IN WITH HER HUSBAND HE LIES TO HER AND HE STAYS IN TROUBLE WITH THE LAW BUT ITS ALWAYS SOMEELSE PROBLEMS HE NEVER DOES ANYTHING THAT THE POLICE HAVE GOT HIM FOR LIKE LAST WEEK HE WAS IN JAIL FOR DRUG BUT HE TELL MY DAUGHTER THAT SOMEONE PUT THEM IN HIS CAR THAT HE HAS STOPPED SHE ISNT ALLOWED TO TALK TO US OR HE GETS MAD SHE HAS NO FRIENDS SHE NEVER GET TO GO ANYWHERE OR SEE ANY OF HER FAMILY WHAT DO I DO TO GET HER TO SEE THAT HE IS THE PROBLEM HE IS TRING TO MAKE HER HATE HER FAMILY IF WE SAY ANYTHING ABOUT HIM SHE JUST THINKS THAT EVERYONE LIES ABOUT HIM PLEASE HELP ME
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Josh
137Dear Dr. Carver,
My relationship with a victim of this syndrome has been educational in the extreme. I have been humbled by the power of an abuser to, in effect, remove the sanity from his victim–and the powerlessness of my love to help her. This is one of the strangest things I’ve ever witnessed, and the most painful, and if I had not lived through it, I would never believe such a syndrome could be true. It appears now my girlfriend will never be “free” of her aabusive ex-husband. Furthermore, she cannot admit, for more than a very short time, that she has stockholm syndrome, that she is sick, and that she is suffering the consequences of his control over her. (She is also, it seems, without a conscience in regard to who else is harmed by her syndrome…though there is not a mean bone in her body.)
I also now know that I will never be able to confront this man. I did, with her permission, then he compelled her to keep me at bay. And she complied. She is absolutely a wonderful human being, and it is a tragedy what has happened to her. She claims to be healing. She claims to be doing what’s best for her children. She claims that she’s a peaceful person. And she has always claimed she is not sick. But sick she is, soul-sick.
Lately, I have thought that the reason she cannot get to the truth, stay in the truth, and respond to the truth is because the damage done is irrepairable. I also think that she cannot face the truth without going crazy…because the truth is so bad. She cannot even remember the facts of her own history–and what they actually mean. Acts of violence, for example. And so much else.
I realize now that I have actually been unkind to her by trying to make her see the truth. I am with a woman who is missing part of her mind, and when I have insisted she be sane, it’s like insisting a woman with only one arm grow the one she is missing. It is not possible for her to see and admit reality. And each time I have demanded it, begged for it, made it as clear as it really is, she has turned against me…and harmed me in some way. I have wanted her to be free, and she can’t be. I have made her unhappy by trying to prevent bad things from happening to her, and I preveneted none of them. They all happened anyway. And yet I kept fighting her to face reality. That’s me who’s the fool. I have refused to believe she is a damged as she is.
I love her still and will not leave her yet. (When he is not harming her or she is not defending him, we have a wonderful time together.) But the hopes I had of having a mate who would one day truly be “free,” are all, at the very least, dreams–delusions of mine. I have two questions:
First, are their stories of women who finally admitted their syndrome and got better? And Secondly, what do I need to do to continue to enjoy the realtionship we have and to truly step back and accept her as a sick companion (without always trying to wake her up?) In other words, how I can I be the best boyfriend I can be, enjoy what good there is, and simultaneously keep myself detached from the insanity of both abuser and victim?
I want to hope that some day she’ll be free somehow, but I also want to give up and just accept that my girlfriend is insane and unable to admit she is insane. I want to live with the woman I really have to the best of my ability and to work with what I really have to work with. Thank you. And thank you for writing these articles and responses. You have truly done a great deal of good for a great many people. -
diana
138i cant believe other people go through these things to…….im not in love with my abuser but i get scared when i dont hear from him…kinda like i wnt to know what hes doing at all times?
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Kira
139I’ve read your artical and other like it on a few seperate occasions. the reaction I have to them is always kind of the same, but I’ve never tried to post any questions to the authors before. See, I don’t want to give a faulty portrayl because I’m emotionally worked up, but I think I need help. I know I need some kind of answer. I think I am in a mutually abusive relationship. I don’t know when or where things started, or how, or if it was all just accidental. I met my husband when I was 15, he was 19, we dated for awhile, secretly, until my grandparents who I was living with at the time found out and told us we were never to see one another again. I never dated again until my husband and I met again several months after I moved out of my grandparents home at 18. I had a decent job for a kid ust starting out with no college and no parental support, and a nice little nest egg of eight hundred dollars. Enough to have moved into my own place, I was living with a friend who’s mother was charging me 200 dollars a month to live there, a very nice deal, even for a tiny room in a full and busy house. Then my husband came for a visit to see the older sister of my friend with whom he’d been friends for a long time. Three months later we decided to move in together to save money since we had lived in seperate towns and were seeing eachother constantly and couldn’t aford the gas money. A year later we got married and I was 5 months pregnant. I was pretty much isolated from my family due to gas concerns and because I was not particularly close to my family as it was. I was also no longer working because I had been laid off and my husband told me it was fine and he liked me being home. I had actually gone back to work for a while but the pregnancy forced me to quit because I could not stand up for more than a few minutes without nearly fainting. We lost that child and six months later got pregnant again hoping for a successful pregnancy this time. I don’t know what I was thinking, I’d never liked children, but the romanticism and adorable little girls I saw every day at my job seemed to have sabatoged my good sense. The second pregnancy was sucessful and I hated being a mother. My husband worked all the time and would never watch our son for more than an hour so I could nap, even on weekends. He’d almost never change a diaper, and house chores? I’d never done them before really, but now I was exclusively responsible for them. I think both of us were far too young to consider having kids. I considered giving our son up for adoption, not wanting to give him to my own family members and hoping to find a home for him that would take him in and adore him and never pass him around like I was a kid, and hoping to avoid letting my hormones and building frustration allow me to cause him harm emotionally or physically. My husband talked me into letting his mother, who is agressive, loud, very mean verbally and who I hate and who hates me, take him for a few weeks and said that after a few weeks I’d want him back. I didn’t. My husband never explained anything to his mother, never. He didn’t tell her what was going on, why she was watching him or for how long. She had no idea that my only experiance with babies was one or two bottles and diaper changes. She wouldn’t really even talk to me, or rather, she wouldn’t listen. She’d talk a lot, about how horrid I was, what I was doing wrong, what to do, and not about just my son, but the entire time I’ve known her about -everything-. The way I sweep, the way I wash dishes, the fact that I’m a bad housekeeper and that I need to be doing that and on and on and on.
My husband was raised in a house hold with a very dominant woman who, though she works, is also very particular about upkeep on her house. His family bassically felt that a woman should be “Barefoot, pregnant and in the kitchen”. While my husband says that he doesn’t feel that way, he also refuses to do any housework himself. For three years I was stuck in a house isolated from eveyone outside of his family because we had no money for gas. We couldn’t afford for me to go get a job because we were too far away from the jobs for me to look, much less actually get there for the first week or two before I would get my first check. For three years I begged him to get us moved. I didn’t want to leave him, I love him, Leaving him hadn’t even occoured to me. Then one day we realized we had access to free wireless internet in our appartment. I began making online friends who told me that I was in a bad situation. I realized I really was. I began to reassess things an finally I realized that I could not spend the rest of my life living like that. So finally I told my husband, “look, we have to get moved to somewhere where I’m not trapped like a rat, to where I can go back to school and get an education and a better job so that we don’t have to live in poverty anymore, or I am going to find a way to do it myself, by myself.” Nothing changed until he lost his job a few months later, partly because our fights and whatnot were making him late to work. My husband has never hit me, he has pressured me into doing things I didn’t want to, but I retaliate when he makes me upset by biting, poking, pinching and scratching, not hard, just enough to make him notice because he doesn’t notice my “No”s or get my “That really upsets me”s, or my “Let go”s. But maybe I’m the abusive one blaming him for my own messed up self. He never defended me to his mother till we moved, and I’ve never actually witnessed him doing so. He reacts badly to the idea of me leaving him. He’ll scream wordlessly like a wounded beast, then he’ll put his head in his hands and start crying soundlessly, he’ll make me feel like a monster for considering it. I’m convinced by things he’s said and how he’s reacted that he’ll break down, go into a massive depression and his life will be bassically over. He’s told me that I’m the only woman he’s ever loved or ever will love. He’s lied to me and others about the strangest things for the oddest reasons. He’s convinced me that I will never find someone to replace him because I’m too selective. His brother’s are both violent destructive criminals, and while my husband has no record some of the things he’s told me he’s thought up to do to someone who really pissed him off make me worry abuot what he might do if I left, not perhaps to me, but to others I encounter in the future. I wonder here if I am simply paranoid.
We have moved to a town with a community college where he got a job after he was fired. I’m going to school now, but I still feel like this might not be the reliationship for me. He says he’s changed, and that he is changing, but he hasn’t much. But maybe I’m too demanding. He has nerve damage, sleep apnea and works a very physical job. So maybe I’m expecting too much to want his affection, to want to have time where we talk and reconnect, to have a little help with the house chores, like, I dunno, him to take out the trash once in a blue moon, or wash a few dishes? Maybe I’m the one being abusive, maybe we both are. I’m so confused and lost and I don’t know what to do. I love him. I don’t want to leave him and hurt him, or be alone, but I want to follow my dreams freely, I want to have room to grow, to maybe find someone who has more in common with me, someone who can understand my passions, not just say they want to help me reach them. Someone who was raised in a way that made them turn out as honest and inquisitive as I am. But maybe I’m wrong. Maybe we’re both just growing up and I need to give things more time. Please, I desperately need some direction. -
Andrew
140Dear Dr Carver
I have been a victim of female abuser for a long while. Just lately I have recognized this and I hope, no I am certain I have ended the matter permanently. Well I hope I have ended it though I feel that by trying to find explanation to the things that have happened I might still get under her influence, but this feeling is confronted by my reason which tells me i should get behind this phenomenon. I have just read few of comments and the strange thing is that i have known about Stockholm syndrome did even a bit of superficial research about it on the internet. What would interest me is the person of the abuser. Why has she become well… those people who try to find cure and healing will know how to name them… (this is a public forum after all… sometimes it is hard to say that monster is a good word to describe them.
Would it be possible to be in a multiple abusive situation, meaning that one person controlls and abuses another who in her turn also abuses another (who happened to be me in this case). I am wondering if this is the result of me trying to shift the blame from my abuser to the one on top of the … so to say “food chain”. The thing that scared me almost silly that by trying to somehow cope with the situation i have tried to copy my “abused abuser”, my girlfriend. I started having fantasies about her being abused by the top man, and i feel that by doing this i have very much deepened my I have dependence of her. Finally I managed to escape and tear myself away from her influence (at least i am now quite sure i have escaped)by confronting the man on the food chain… who is an older man about (my exgirlfriend and me are both very much younger). The impulse that drove me to the confrontation with him was mostly the combination of jelousy fear of what i might find out about my ex and finally i wanted somehow protect her from her “tormentor”. Finally the whole confrontation ended in civilised conversation with him, frankly in the end i almost felt compassion for the man who described himself as a person who can not make my girlfriend understand that it is over between them, and he is also so to say a victim of the situation. He also showed concern for her just as I did though in a more reserved way, and he was and still is I think controlled and blackmailed by my ex. He is married by the way and does not want to upset the peace of his home. He said or rather hinted that when my ex-girlfriend so to say admitted her love and affection towards him, he was tempted and agreed to start a liason, thinking my ex would sort of grow out of this passion. I was somehow concerned that something was wrong with my ex, because she sort of left hints that have led me to this. I interpreted this as a sort of cry for help, by which I know now that she only wanted to strengthen the bond between us or more exactly to be able to influence me a lot more. I have to admit that i think her a very intelligent person… or at least a very cleverly manipulative one.
Dr Carver please after reading this short description of the case, which is not a full account since I have left out a lot, tell me if there is a slight possibility that my ex could have been a victim of some assault or some kind of trauma or if she is also a victim who tries to cope with the situation just as tried to do.
I now see thru her quite well and know her also very well and i see how confused she is that i am not reacting to my usual behavioural pattern that she knows and knows how to use to her own intentions.
I have come to the conclusion that by resisting I either make her reaize how twisted and well let me admit in some way evil she has become or she would block me out of her life as she does in situations when she is not in control. I am relieved that I have freed myself of her, I somehow pitty her and would like to try to help her, but I know it is not really possible for me.
To finish in a way I regard my entry not only as a question but – as the result of self analysis – as an answer that I hope I have found.
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