Introduction

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-02-2004
Introduction
3
Wed, 06-15-2005 - 4:42pm

I posted on "new beginings" as well so this might be repetative for some :)

Hello

I visited this board about a year ago and now I'm back and ready to talk to others who have insight and offer help or insight to those that need.
My story, like all of yours in long and complicated. With time I hope to get your insight and opinions.
In the mean time...I am now away from my ex and have been for a little over a year. I had hoped that I would be healed a little more by now than I am so I'm hoping this helps. I was emotionally abused, not physical. I was also sexually abused you might say...with the mental guilt thing...again nothing violent. That being said...how did all of you begin to heal and why is it that you think you let it happen. I have gone through it with a councelor and I do take half the blame because I let it happen until I was a former shadow of myself. Why?? Because I thought if I was a good person that I could stand by him while he worked on it together and that it was the "right" thing to do. All the while, I just compromised myself.
I had always looked at my ability to have much compassion for others as such a strentgh and the ability to help others. I have always been able to see straight through people and honestly understand why it is that they are the way they are. I have never...I know this now...been able to strike a balance between the pain they have and my understanding of it and my boundaries as it pertained to me. I wouldn't say I let people walk on me but they can hurt me, easily if I actually care about them. I think that is why I fell into the relationship that I did. I care about people...too much...so much that I want them to help themselves because I see their pain and want them to better themselves.
Anyway...I just wanted to introduce myself and ask you all, to start out, how you thought it was able to happen to you?
katlc

iVillage Member
Registered: 11-12-2003
In reply to: katlc
Wed, 06-15-2005 - 6:02pm

Hey there!

CL-Blueliner4

iVillage Member
Registered: 12-30-2004
In reply to: katlc
Thu, 06-16-2005 - 12:04pm

Hi Katlc: I would like to answer you with why I think I have stayed so long. I have been married to my husband for just about 27 years – exactly half of my life. I always considered myself a strong person but something happened to me – around him. I guess, after educating myself here and with other reading, that I have to conclude that it was the conditioning that they are so adept at that got me to respond the way he wanted me to.

These guys, IMO, start to size us up the moment they meet us. They just have this need and are looking for someone who fits the bill, I guess. I think I attracted my husband because of my easy going nature, low self esteem and last but not least the fact that I am easily made to feel guilty. Being able to make their partner feel guilty to get the response they need out of them is a very crucial thing with these guys.

The first time my husband hit me I was so hurt (my feelings). This was my best friend and I felt he had just betrayed me by crossing a line. I have always been a strong believer that a man does not hit, or hit back, a woman. He hit me. I too thought it was the right thing to do to excuse or allow this. Somehow, he made me feel guilty for being mad about it too. So for probably the first half of my marriage I accepted his unacceptable behavior because I thought it was the right thing to do, and by the second half of our marriage I was so full of resentment and disgust that I no longer had any good feelings left for him but continued because I thought that my kids should have an intact home.

Little did I realize that even though I thought I was doing what was right for my kids -
that my kids were actually hearing and seeing and being upset by this behavior. I thought I was being careful in not letting them hear or maybe even that his abusive behavior had become so ingrained in me that I just didn’t notice how bad it had become.

It took their growing up and as young adults coming to me asking why I let him treat me the way I did and why didn’t I leave him and find someone else! I was so surprised that they would say these things about their father. That is what woke me up and set me on this road to learning what was really going on in my marriage. I also know that by accepting his bad behavior towards me that I was enabling him to do even worse things to me over the years and believe me he has! And over the years when the guilt didn’t work he would use scare tactics/threats to get me to respond his way. That’s more conditioning.

Now all I want to do is get away from him but the guilt about leaving is still there!!

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-02-2004
In reply to: katlc
Fri, 06-17-2005 - 7:54pm

Stuckmom,

You have already accomplished so much!!! It took me awhile but I finally decided that if I didn't just open the door and "free fall" so to speak that I would never be able to get on my own two feet and have any chance of healing. I "just did it". I enlisted the help of some friends and family...the family of which were shocked because I kept so much secret for so long. I had somewhere to stay because it got a little scary to me...even though to this day he states that he can't believe that I was actually scared of him. He never acknowledged his behavior and tried to blame my friends and family for putting it in my head in the first place. I guess these guys can't face themselves and blame others for "corrupting" us.

Just do it....get away!! I also had the help of local athorities and they had my name and their data base on file that there "could be trouble" if I were to call them. I had gone and reported some behavior without getting him arrested...to save the children from more damage. So I felt very safe as I had people around me, protecting me and a person who would never want anyone to believe that he could be capable. I was lucky in that way. There is a lot of help and support out there....a lot of these ladies, I am sure will attest to that.

Good luck hon!! Keep us posted :o)

Kat