BELIEVE

Believe in yourself! Have faith in your abilities! Without a humble but reasonable confidence in your own powers you cannot be successful or happy.
Norman Vincent Peale

About Me

I am a 28 year old single mom of a 9 month old boy. He is my world and my life. Before I was pregnant I was in a very physically and emotionally abusive relationship. My son gave me the strenght to leave that man to create a good life for my child. My life has now become a matter of protecting my child to make sure the pattern of abuse does not get imposed on him so he is a "benefit to society" not a "menace to society". I am in the midst of a court battle for visitation and child support and it is taking all that I have to stay strong for my son. His father harasses me every chance he gets and is trying to take control back of my life and I won't let that happen. Please note I am not a counselor or psychologist; I am simply sharing what I have learned through my personal experience and time through counseling and groups to recover from abuse.

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NO CREDIT!! YOU CAN STILL HAVE A PREPAID VISA!!!

Wednesday, January 27, 2010
So I want to focus back again on the power and control wheel. The next area I want to touch on is:
USING EMOTIONAL ABUSE TO CONTROL YOU:

*So obviously abusive men will put you down to gain control of you. Whether they tell you you're crazy, they are too good for you, you are not attractive enough to be with them, you are fat or ugly etc...what ever the insult...it is emotional abuse and is meant to hurt you.

*Abusive men will make you feel bad about yourself. and make you self-conscience so you don't have the confidence to see that you are too good for them. Also, to make themselves feel like they are too good for you!

*Abusive men will call you names to gain control and power. For Example; stupid, dumb, crazy, psycho...anything that again puts you down.

*Abusive men will use tactics to make you feel crazy. When you are mad at something or upset, or try to stand up to them: They will tell you, that you are crazy and out of wack!! Don't believe them, you are not crazy and chances are, you have every reason to be upset or mad at them. (my abuser was a pro at this...still tries to convince the world that I am crazy and have psychological problems....)

*Abusive men will also play mind games with you. They will try and make you jealous, or stay out late to test you and play with your emotions and your mind.

*Abusive men will also humiliate you. Have you ever been in a store when he started yelling at you and embarassed you? or out with friends and he snipes on every comment you make? yep...this is his technique to control you no matter where you are.

*I love LOVE LOVE this last one: he will make you feel guilty!!! He will do everything and anything to make you feel guilty...The only example I can think of is my personal example. He harasses, verbally attacks me, waives his arms at me and starts arguments screaming, yelling and calling me names at every chance he gets, so I hired a third party to do the exchanges between him and myself for his visits with my son(the courts ordered this as well) and now he tries to make me feel bad because he doesn't work and can't afford the third party: We pay half, it's not expensive...but again he is trying to make me feel guilty...it ain't my problem that he chooses (CHOOOSES CHOOOSES CHOOOOOSES) not to work...that's his choice..not mine!!! So anytime he tries to flip the situation and make you feel guilty, think twice and don't MISPLACE YOUR COMPASSION...(the story I posted a few days ago really demonstrates this)

If you find that your partner is doing any of the above, you are in an abusive relationsip and he/she is trying to control you....

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Interesting reading this and remembering back the version of these things I got to live through. I think there are so many different ways they isolate, and play with emotions. Mine were slightly different. Keeping me isolated from my family. Saying he wanted me to have friends, of course the only type approved of were women who were part of the same male-dominated religion that he and his family came from. My abuser convinced me that my family wasn't good for me since they were not members of my new religion since I adopted the religion of my abuser. I was convinced for a long time that his family was better and better for me than my own family. Once I realized he was wrong I was many years into the relationship and felt completely trapped and powerless to change anything. But inside I knew that my family was actually much healthier than my abuser's family. There were lots of things I knew were different than what my abuser was telling me to believe, yet when I tried to voice my differences I was shut down by my abuser.

For me many of these things were much more insidious, not blatant. The one thing that was blatant was the emotional blackmail. If I upset him by disagreeing with him, or arguing with him he would threaten to commit suicide. He used the same tactic to get sex whenever he wanted it. My feelings or desires were never an issue because he felt that his needs were so powerful and consuming that he wanted to kill himself if I didn't meet his needs sexually. That alone is a really painful situation to live through.

My abuser would constantly come up with lists of things that I needed to being doing to be a better wife. Literally for 20 years I endured this until I just told him I was sick of his lists and goals of how things could be better. I tried for years to do everything he advised would make things better, and I learned that no matter what you do you can't "make" someone happy if they aren't happy now. He was a severely depressed, bipolar mess of a human being. Unfortunately, medication will not help change behavior and his behavior is ingrained in him. Bipolar or no, he has the signs of a sociopath, nothing I can do at this point but follow the court orders of letting him spend time with his kids and for myself just staying away from him as much as possible.

He still tries the guilt thing through email concerning visitation changes he constantly wants. And when the sob story doesn't work he changes to threats of taking me back to court. I have chosen to just ignore both things and make the contact as business like as possible. it's the only way to disengage the abuser that I know of. Just don't get involved in the sad story or the threats or the arguing. My hope is that if I don't respond then he'll just get bored and drop it. No reward for him if I don't engage.

well, enough rambling for now.

Anonymous said...

Forgot to finish my part about how I was allowed to have friends... he would constantly be jealous if I wanted to do anything with said friends. it was a constant issue that I was spending any time with friends because it impinged on his right to my time.

Also, the mind games concerning jealousy. After I married my abuser he would bring up things like how he had lunch with this woman after we were engaged and he kept it a secret from me. What bothered me was that he kept it a secret and then decided to 'confess' later. It felt like he was just playing with my emotions. How he went to a very important former girlfriend/fiance and had a long talk with her because he needed to have closure with her. He was a policeman and would tell me about women flashing him, calling him to ask him out on a date, about a assistant prosecuting attorney that wanted to have an affair with him and how he had no choice but to take her out with him on one of his shifts, later how he had to travel with women for work related things. All these things he seemed to get enjoyment out of telling me because he liked to upset me and toy with my emotions.

abusemom81 said...

sugarplumb: 20 years is a long time, I didn't realize you two were married for that long...that is a lot of abuse you endured...your stories are similar to that of mine...and a lot of men will use their religion to control and mainpulate...and use jealousy to get you under their control...it's sooo frustrating..their whole way of thinking is one big double standard. You are right, he can never change his behavior..the only way would be to recognize it and seek professional help - and that wil most likely never happen...because - TO HIM YOU WERE THE PROBLEM...you would fit in perfectly at my womens group: your story is similar to that of the 5 women in my group...have you found one yet? or a counsellor?

Anonymous said...

I found out about a group that meets once a week. Got there too late the first time, the second time, this week, I had way too much school work to break away and go. I went to a counselor for a month or so at the start of the divorce, but I've moved since then. I almost went to the counselor at my college just to see if they had some recommendations, but decided to do something else that day and canceled that appointment. Still working on it I guess.

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