Woman stands up to her SC Husband

[ShortTemperHatesStupidity]

As a survivor of abuse, I can tell you that you are absolutely right with this comment. No matter how much therapy you go through, a little bit of you will still feel helpless, weak, and unimportant. My bf is wonderful with letting me know that I'm loved and cared about, and that goes a long way. There are still days when I think about what happened, and those flashbacks plant seeds of doubt. The secret is to have support. A person who attempts to go that rocky road alone often gets lost because they have no one to help (and yes, you DO need help to navigate this path). As long as the survivor has a strong network of people that care about them, they will be ok.

[Hobgoblin]

But it is important for us to remember that just because a person escapes an abusive relationship, they may still be shackled by the abuse. And if we are friends or significant others of said people, it is our job to help them see the light and the truth of themselves, and not what they

Damn straight. Like you, I don't mind having to do this. If I did mind, I wouldn't be spending as much time with someone that type of situation.

All I really wanted to say though (and probably didn't say quite so well) is pretty much summed up in your post. But then, some mod would snip it all from the quote and I'd see "edit quotes" in the middle of my post. so to avoid that, I started rambling. Oops.

[ladylabyrinth]

To my fellow survivors: I'm right there with you, 100%

To those who have an inkling: Thank you for trying to see through our eyes, I know it's not easy; hell, I didn't understand abused parties myself, till I'd (unfortunately) experienced it for myself.

To those few (and I've met some people like this in person) who still think it's all on the abused party: Please, I'm begging you, read these stories, pay attention to what we're saying.

If you're interested in all the horrific, mind-numbing, unbelievable shit that can happen in an abusive relationship, in all its gory detail, PM me for my story. I'm in the process of writing it all out now on LiveJournal anyway, so it's not like this hasn't been dredged up recently.

Can the abused get out whenever he/she wants? Yes... and no. Especially when there's a sociopath as the abuser, it can feel emotionally and mentally impossible to leave, even if there are no children, no other ties than the noose about your own neck.

Abusers are magnificent at blinding you, so while the way is open the whole time, you only see barred windows and locked doors.

Just my $0.02 without getting all into my own history.

[Eireann]

It's like that saying: "The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step." Only, as with all journeys, the first step, and many more, must be taken in your head before you can even head in the direction of the front door.

I was once involved with a guy who had taken manipulation to a fine art. He was truly EXCELLENT at finding my weak points and using them to his advantage. Some of his favorite quotes:

"You really don't want to succeed, do you?"
"If you'd just be the way I want you to be..."
"I hear that!"

Yes, I know the last one isn't an abusive remark. It was his way of turning the key in the emotional shackles - giving me the impression that he was listening to what I had to say, and that he identified with it. I was also too young (and he was much older), very impressionable, and with a subterranean self-esteem.

Any two-year-old can manipulate, and I think everyone on this site has seen this happen at least once. This guy was (chronologically) older than two, but with the same mindset; he wanted what he wanted, and you HAD to give it to him. No argument.

When I finally ended it, and I knew full well I had never loved him, he was such a habit that I literally sat on my hands to keep from calling him. I'm serious. If I picked up the phone, I called a friend to talk me out of contacting him. And it worked.

I'd love to be able to say that I broke the pattern with him, but I didn't. It's only recently that I've come to realize that ANY relationship can be dysfunctional - an intimate relationship, a friendship, a working relationship. It took me too long to realize that, and to realize that nobody had the right to treat me the way I was allowing them to treat me. I worked in an incredibly dysfunctional business relationship with a certain business owner (a war story if ever there was one), and I didn't stand up for myself. I would now, but I didn't then.

Getting away is only half the battle, or less. You need to get away from the mindset that caused you to go for an abuser in the first place.

[Seshat]

Someone once told me that most men end up marrying someone similiar to their mother, a woman with the same personality traits as their mother. I also think the same goes for females also, they end up being with someone with a personality that's similiar to their fathers.

It can go further back than that. Both my parents had bad parents (thankfully, my maternal grandmother was a wonderful, wonderful woman. The other three grandparents? Bah.)

Courtesy of their own strength of will, my parents and my maternal grandmother raised my brother and I as well as they could. Unfortunately, as well as the good stuff they meant to teach, my brother and I learned some of the bad stuff they meant not to teach.

Like a person who was themselves abused, I have self-esteem problems that lead me to want to be 'looked after', and that have me thinking I 'deserve' shitty treatment. I have a bunch of other traits that are common to abused people as well - in fact, one doctor was certain I had been abused as a child. (Others may have been as well, and just didn't tell me.)

And just to put some icing on this nasty little cake: my grandmother was born in 190-something. She was raised in an era where a woman was pretty much the property of her father until she was married, then she was pretty much the property of her husband. When Granddad divorced her, she didn't even know how to pay her bills!

Some of the attitudes from only two, three or four generations ago also have to have leaked down, in both men and women.



Editted to add: It's great to 'hear' so many people making such important points.

[Arachne]

You guys are so cool. I was very worried when I posted my first post on this thread that it was going to provoke a nasty reaction. It's such a delicate, sensitive issue. But you all are too cool for that. I should have known.

Nothing else to say, really. Just grateful.

[ShortTemperHatesStupidity]

You guys are so cool. I was very worried when I posted my first post on this thread that it was going to provoke a nasty reaction.
<snippity snip snip>
But you all are too cool for that.

I think most of us on here are smart enough to know that there's two sides (technically three-but we won't get into that) to every story. You see things like, for example, Judge Judy yelling at abuse victims on her show, asserting that these people have the ability to do something-to leave-so why didn't they, and it's ridiculous because in truth she probably has never been exposed to anything close to that. There are some that have no understanding of the power and influence a manipulative and destructive person can wield on another-it's incredible really.

Part of being on this site is knowing that abuse comes in all forms, and it's not always possible to escape (think broad picture here-you're stuck at your "till", on the phone, behind the desk, etc). Plus, the majority of posters on here are sympathetic to anyone's plight as long as it's legit.