| profile entries archives refresh |
 �what is Man? a miserable little pile of secrets.� - andr� malraux "i desire to live in peace and to continue the life i have begun under the motto, to live well you must live unseen." - rene descartes note random entry image credit design by : ilazarn ikmal powered by : diaryland |
valid.
2020-05-07 @ 11:25 p.m.
i started writing this on tuesday but didn't finish as usual. i am watching a video by dr. ramani (who is just amazing, by the way) about coercive control in relationships, and it is fucking chilling how abusive boy was. i am sure that sometimes, to someone reading this, it probably seems so random and just sour grapes and spiteful of me when i get started on him. like, i seemed pretty happy. all of this just came out of nowhere after we broke up because i'm bitter. even sitting here, writing this now, a little part of me is telling myself that that's true, and that i was a piece of shit and sucked as a partner and that's why this all happened. but i'm getting pretty good at squashing that voice down. because as time has gone on, and i've remembered a lot of things that happened, and i've learned more and more ... and right now i'm watching this video ... i realize just how much i didn't know then. i mean, nearly every single thing she describes in this video is something that he did, except for the physical violence. that was the one thing he never did to me. i remember my therapist asking me if he had been violent with me, and if i knew about his previous relationships. he had been physical with all of them. she told me i was really lucky. dr. ramani is doing this whole series on narcissistic relationships so the videos have been coming one after the other but i was like, fuck. this one in particular really got me. i felt like she was talking directly to me. she describes the hopelessness and frustration and lack of support that people in these relationships experience when they try to reach out for help. it's so hard to explain it to an outside party. the constant psychological torture, the gaslighting that makes you doubt your own perception so you are never sure what even really happened. we would be arguing, he would say something fucking horrible to me, then i would repeat it and he would say, "i never said that." i mean, he would literally have just said it, moments before. incredulous, i would exclaim, "yes you did! you JUST said it!" and he would deny it completely. he did this often in arguments, so often that i started to doubt my own ears. did i really just imagine him saying that? is this just a thing i do, making up shit that he says? maybe i am crazy. one time i told him i was going to start recording our arguments* and he flipped the fuck out and stormed out of the room. *he would do that tactic, and his other similar favorite was both of us agreeing to do something for the other, then he would only remember the thing i agreed to do for him. he would sit there and blankly look at me like he had absolutely no idea what i was talking about when i would point at the very spot we sat and quote the agreement verbatim. then he'd just shrug and be like, "well i don't remember that at all." straight from the textbook. my mother has studied it well. it's hard to explain to someone all of these little things, because the abuser does them on a smaller scale, so often. you're trying to explain to someone why a seemingly benign statement by this person is actually more sinister, but you're trying to sum up years of interactions like that, and nonverbal behaviors, and so much backstory that you just kind of ... fizzle out. you know how crazy you sound. and dr. ramani describes perfectly how you're the one who's a mess, your life is in disarray, you're not looking so great these days, and your confidant might be sitting there thinking, you know, you're lucky he's still with you after the way you've let yourself go. the video was a punch to the gut, for real. the talk about how the abuser slowly makes you dependent on them, isolates you from friends and family physically and mentally. keeps you from working, keeps you from the money, keeps you trapped. keeps your world really small. and as a result, you start becoming more fearful and more anxious. she mentioned this in this video, but i think it might have been one i watched earlier in the day where she really expanded on this in a lot more detail. my entire life with boy followed this pattern and this trajectory. when i lost my job i knew i didn't want to go back into that field, so he's like it's cool, you just be my housewife and look good and i'll go to work since i make twice what you made anyway. i thought, cool, i'll take this time to learn a new skill. suddenly he's like "that's no good, we're broke, you need to go back to work right now. any job will do. i'm too stressed, i've decided i want to change careers." but no job i applied for was acceptable to him. the hours were no good. we'd never see each other. the pay was no good. after taxes, it wouldn't be worth the aggravation and who will watch little A? nevermind. but he didn't feel that he needed to give me any money toward the household bills because i wasn't working. so he lived in MY house, rent free, essentially free of all expenses except for stuff he felt like paying for, but i was the piece of shit because i wasn't working and my savings weren't enough to support my expenses and his lifestyle. he hated when i started working for mr. able and hated it even more when i started working for boss. he refused to help find anyone to watch little A before and after school (yes, HIS CHILD), and babysitters were too expensive, so behind his back i worked out the arrangement with mr. able. it was perfect. i left after little A got on the bus and headed back an hour before he got home so i had time to stop at the store or whatever. just a couple months later is when i got the fateful email from mandy. looking back now, i'm not surprised at all. i'm even less surprised when i realize that near the end of the relationship, i was a lot stronger and had started standing up to him and calling him out when he was being shitty and trying fucked up tactics on me. by then i had learned how to control my emotions a little better, and he could no longer get a rise out of me. i think that's why he started saying crazy shit (like that time he said adolescent girls could be "asking for it." fucking ugh) and was acting insane that time he was laughing at me while i was crying. it was harder to rile me up, to get me to take the bait. i know i've been over all of this a thousand times but the abuse was so private and insidious and when someone comes along and validates and gives shape and form to what you never could ... feels good man. this video brought back so much. dr. ramani mentions the abuser/narcissist's rage. that was boy. he was angry guy. i forgot that near the middle of the relationship, when he was done being mr. sweet and perfect, i asked him to start going to anger management or something because he was just this constant ticking timebomb, and i was tired of little A and i walking on eggshells and taking the blasts all the time. he went two or three times? i can't remember. then he decided it was stupid and he was fine even though the psych he was seeing told him he should probably be on some kind of medication. he refused that because he wouldn't tolerate even the possibility of any sexual side effects. oh well, you guys just have to suffer. wow. the video is 23 minutes and change, but my wish is that you'll watch it. for you, or for someone you know who might be in an abusive relationship. or just to better understand what i wrote about here. there's so much more, but for some reason i really felt this one. -- now it's thursday the 7th. i didn't finish the other night because i didn't know how to say what i wanted to say ... but i guess what i was trying to say was that i felt really "heard" for the first time. so many of the videos i've consumed between then and now have been by other survivors, but watching this actual doctor who specializes in this area describe to me and validate the exact experiences i went through ... it was really something. therapy was cool too, but it was only 45 minutes a week, then every 2 weeks, then once a month. i never felt like i had enough time to explain my whole backstory. i never felt like she really understood the depth and the extent of it. i felt like she got me off to a good start, but i wasn't quite running. every day i wake up a little bit more, a little bit more. i hate myself less and less. i didn't make him do this to me, nor did i deserve it. he did it because he is a bad person. the end. and i am stronger than i thought it was. a lot of women never make it out, they never recover. but here i am! i am still alive and life is beautiful. i have almost everything i want. i am a good human being. i wasn't exaggerating. it wasn't all my fault. i went through something. i really did. |