I slapped him - very long post, sorry
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| Tue, 02-17-2004 - 3:55am |
Please bear with my long post, I want to be clear about why I did this.
My exbf often gets himself worked up about things and then blows up at me later... He's driven erratically when angry before and he knew it was a huge problem for me - I get very nervous when stuck in a moving car with a man who's angry - it scares me. I was very clear about this when it happened the first time.
Let me say first that I was not in the best frame of mind on valentine's day because I had a horrendously emotional day with my mom who is dying... he knew this... he knew I just wanted and needed a nice time out.
We had my dog in the car after exchanging valentine's day gifts and in heavy traffic driving 80+ mph I started getting nervous and kept asking him to slow down and be careful. He didn't. I asked again and again and told him I was nervous and getting scared and he didn't. One car flew past us, I saw a truck veer out of its lane, and my bf was driving with one hand and not always staying in his lane. At one point he accelerated to 90 mph to pass another vehicle and I could feel my adrenaline and panic. I sat there so worried that we'd crash and die... all I wanted was for him to slow down. I don't know why he didn't slow down and drive more carefully. Was I a nag? I don't know... I was getting very freaked out by the whole thing situation. I didn't understand why he couldn't just slow down.
I started asking more insistently that he slow down and he snapped at me for telling him how to drive and we spent the rest of the 80+ mph drive in silence until our exit.
Once we got off our exit and were on back industrial roads where we drove much slower, I asked him what was wrong and why he was being so quiet and he started in on me - criticizing our relationship, etc. All the while he's doing this he was still driving and getting more and more angry and bitter...
He went from telling me how much he loves me to telling me how awful he thinks our relationship is and how uncomfortable he is and confused and he started giving me ALL kinds of examples as to what's wrong with me and why he's so disappointed that I'm not what he wants afterall. It went on and on and on and there was nothing I could do to stop it. He essentially was working himself up into a jealous rage.
Now all this was fine with me... I have enough emotional stuff going on and if he wanted to stop seeing me - fine. My issue is that he kept driving and getting more angry and being erratic. He was hitting the wheel, spewing out more and more of his "honest" opinions of me... all negative. Some accusing questions about my past, some pleas of love for me, some just plain mean.
I literally had to keep asking him to please calm down and I finally just started bawling my eyes out from the stress of being trapped in the car with him after the terrifying drive there and the idea of driving back when he was even worse off emotionally was not an option for me. I didn't have my cell phone with me that night, either, so I felt stranded.
Then something was said (i don't even remember who said it) and he flipped out. Started gunning the engine and yelling at me that he was taking me home and that was the end of it.
Fine, I said, but you're not getting me back on the highway with you when you're this pissed off and worked up - it's not safe. Please stop the car.
The following happened in the span of a few seconds...
Even though we were only going 30mph and no other cars were around (it was in a dark, industrial area, he refused to calm down or stop the car. I finally lost it and started yelling at him to stop driving and when I tried to take the wheel and get us over to the side, he pushed me away and screamed at me to never touch the wheel and he kept driving - intent on getting back on the highway. My dog was shaking and I was damn near hysterical, no kidding. My stress levels went through the freakin' roof and there was no logic or reason I could use to get him to stop his tirade.
So while he was trying to push me off and continue driving, I slapped him and told him to "stop this car right now before you kill all of us - I refuse to allow you to get on the highway again."
By this point, his "issues" with his work stress and school stress and "inability of me to be the woman he wants stress" became secondary -- all I cared about was that we not get on a highway to drive 80 mph again when I knew he was emotionally out of control.
I hit him real hard and he called me a f-ing b*tch and to never hit him ever again. I told him I was sorry to have hit him and that I would again if I ever felt he was unnecessarily putting my life in danger - and the life of my pet... and his, etc.
He was still intent on driving but I wouldn't let go of the wheel.
Then we pulled over and we sat in the car and I listened to him ask me to prove to him that I wanted to be with him. He asked me why I wanted him. He told me I didn't act like I wanted to be with him on valentine's day and that I should prove to him that I wanted to. He continued with some of his personal insults... then he calmed down and after a while he drove me home.
We broke up after this...
Girls, I couldn't allow myself to get back on the highway again, I just couldn't. He had already scared the bejesus out of me.
He KNEW I was scared and he wouldn't listen - it was like he reveled in me being panicked.
He knows that I can't stand being in a car with an angry man who has lost self-control.
What would you have done? What could I have done besides slapping him?
I don't believe I regret hitting him. I can honestly say as a woman alone with an angry man that I was going to do anything to avoid that 80+mph insanity again.
I felt he would have put my safety in jeopardy had he driven and I have too many people who need me and love me for me to let that happen. It was like I was driven by pure survival instincts. The whole time with him was totally insane.
Thank you for reading.

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Charite, I know you're trying to help, but I feel I must disagree with you.
Both LovinHockey and myself have been in a car with someone dangerous. Both of us survived without grabbing the wheel. We did not aggravate and escalate the situation with hysterics. We did not make it far more dangerous by grabbing the wheel. The original poster appears to think steering is a way to stop a car. The brakes do that.
If the car she was in had a parking brake handle between the seats, that would have done it. Putting the car into neutral would have had a slower, but similar effect. Grabbing the keys and turning the car off works too; if you do that, make sure the car is pointed straight, otherwise the steering will lock in place. While I don't recommend any those, they would all be safer than grabbing a steering wheel or hitting the driver. If she was sitting there fuming for an hour, she had some time to think, and she took a course of action more likely to cause damage and injury.
She does not understand how dangerous 30 mph crashes can be. 73% of fatalities in cities happen in 30 mph zones. http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/pdf/nrd-30/NCSA/TSF2001/2001rural.pdf. We're not just talking about hitting a hedge here. Even a parked car could be pretty hazardous at that speed. I don't know what kind of car it was, but you can rollover a lot of SUVs at 30 MPH.
She also said she knew from prior experience she didn't like his driving. Despite that, she went with him. Apparently she went without a cellphone.
I repeat my recommendation that she go for therapy. Her description sounds like a panic attack; those can be disabling and dangerous. She also has a problem if she does things she thinks will be dangerous with no backup plans.
Like Erin, I am also concerned that if she demonstrates similar behavior with another guy, he might not just get angry. He might beat the hell out of her, or push her out of a moving car.
You can understand what someone did and why, while still knowing it is wrong or dangerous. AA is full of people who understand what it's like to be an alcoholic, messing up their own lives and the lives of others, while feeling they aren't doing anything wrong. Or they feel that they did something wrong but couldn't help it, it was their only option. When they sober up and take responsibility for their own actions, they admit how bad their prior behavior was. They understand that behavior in others who are still alcoholics, and they do their best to stop. They do NOT try to enable other alcoholics by making them feel better. That's precisely what I think will happen if you try to make the original poster feel better. She'll be back with more similar problems.
Edited 2/18/2004 12:49:23 PM ET by fluffymutt
In cases where I think someone clearly did something wrong and dangerous, I don't want any mistake about my opinion. I don't want it to sound like "oh, I understand you were stressed, but I think you made a teensy weensy mistake where you could have handled it a teeny tiny bit better". I want the message to come across the way I said it: "He did some things wrong, but she made it far worse and endangered both of them."
In some cases, the message might be "I've been there and done stupid inappropriate and dangerous things too. I've suffered the consequences. If you change your behavior, the results will also change." That's something you might hear at AA.
"By doing what I did, I probably saved HIS life, too. I'd say that I ultimately had more regard for our safety because I was willing to do anything to preserve it. He sure as hell didn't care now, did he? He was more than happy to take me on Horrifying Highway Drive - Part 2.
Debate my methods all you will - but they worked. I was far beyond being his therapist or playing nice-nice with him. After he stopped the car, calmed himself down and that's when we had the "State of the Relationship" therapy session to his satisfaction. When he was ok to drive me home, we drove home. I felt it was ok to do so and it was."
This is much worse than saying what you did was ok, now you want to claim to have saved his life too? This is worse than I thought.
And after doing alleged "self defense" by grabbing the wheel and hitting him to stop the car, you let him drive you home? You didn't take a cab or call a friend? All I can say is don't return his calls, don't date for a while, and when you calm down after a week or so get therapy.
My situation should not be folly for you and it is not your place to take it on as a crusade to prove your opinions. you are taking this too far. please respect my request.
No one here ever said i did the right thing, neither have i. no one has endorsed it and no one has said it was "ok" -- me included. what some people have said is "given the exact situation, i *may* have done the same thing", that's all.
I came here and posted because i thought it would be helpful to process my reaction to a situation that i believed was out-of-hand a the time and to learn from it. it's not black and white and of course there are details that i haven't disclosed - yet at the same time, this is not a battle to prove who was right or wrong.
My exboyfriend and i were both wrong to have allowed the situation to explode the way it did. we are incompatible, we are no longer dating.
I was there, you weren't. it is easy from a distance to say what you would have done or what i should have done and to speculate on every possible option or outcome.
The issue i put out there had more do to with the nature of human behavior when one feels pushed to the limits of emotional endurance.
Don't you think i tried other methods of diffusing the problem? of course i did.
Curiosly, do you see how you and i are batting this subject back and forth? you won't budge and i won't budge... so where does that leave us? *somebody* has to budge and if one of us refuses, where does it go from there? well, it continues and then eventually it gets worse and worse.
stay with me here, ok?
From here, you and I could go around and around about this and drive ourselves nuts or we can agree to disagree and be cool about it. There, we've both budged and reached a common ground. Things are good again and all is well.
But if both of us don't agree to this and follow through, one of us will start up again and the cycle will continue. If i started in on you again AFTER we agreed to drop it, you'd probably respond with frustration that i still won't let up. if i wasn't satisfied with your response based on what i thought you should say, then i would counter-respond. and so on. for me to say i won't push it and then start pushing it again escalates everything.
Now you're not only frustrated that you have to re-address multiple issues that you thought were somewhat resolved, but you're also frustrated with me personally because i started up again when i said i wouldn't!
Before we know it, we're fighting again but this time it's getting worse and we're making no progress in reaching a middle ground or to stopping it.
Understanding this to be true, if Person A refuses to budge the only resolution then is for Person B to give in entirely.
See? We both have to have some *give*. It's not all or nothing, black or white.
It's not about one of us being "righter" than the other and beating the other into submission. The goal is to reach common ground.
Try reaching this middle ground with a pissed off guy who won't budge and who won't stop driving the car.
Honestly, honey, it just wasn't that easy.
:)
Let's agree to disagree, ok?
Edited 2/18/2004 5:21:58 PM ET by bawitdaba
>>thing, neither have i. no one has
>>endorsed it and no one has said it
>>was "ok" -- me included.
I'm going to have to call you out on that one.
Your posts are of the tone "this is what I did, I'm glad I did it, and I'd do it again", are they not?
Is saying "Debate my methods all you will - but they worked" not an endorsement of that behavior? I haven't seen anything approaching a "Gee, what I did probably wasn't the best thing" from you. Let me ask you this: if you had another chance, how would you handle things? Obviously, you're giving off the impression that you'd do exactly the same thing, which quite honestly scares me.
In fact, if you were my GF, I would have stopped the car & let you out - not because I felt I was endangering my life by going 80mph, but because YOU would be endangering MINE - And I would *not* let you back in my car, ever. Driving angry is bad, but hitting a driver and trying to grab the steering wheel is DOWNRIGHT STUPID.
You've justified your behavior by saying "oh, he MIGHT have killed someone", but in all honesty YOU were the danger in the car! What if a little kid ran out when you were hitting him? What if a pregnant mother crossed the road, right as you grabbed the wheel? Your hypothetical games of "saving lives" works both ways - and unfortunately for you, some people here are smart enough to realize it.
As lovinhockey said, you came here looking to be coddled and reassured that you made the right decision.
You didn't.
Maybe rather than try to argue about it, you should accept that mistakes were made - both him AND you - rather than try to villify your Ex-BF & try to portray yourself as some kind of hero.
I wasn't pouting, merely saying that if you're going to disagree with me, disagree with my actual position, not what you THINK I said or meant.
Thanks.
Sheri
Fair enough.
OK, believe what you want, but you continue to misstate my position.
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