Everyday Victim Blaming

challenging institutional disbelief around domestic & sexual violence and abuse

long story

Pretty soon after i hooked up with this guy, currently involved with, and havinga history of five years with, I chickened out and wanted to leave. I sensed in him things i could not tolerate living with, including his ability to claim righteousness in every situation, nomatter what he situation. After humiliating me over a course of hours, days and sometimes weeks, e would persuade me to stay rather than go, for out there I had no hope of ever finding someone who could love me like he did, AND given that I had attitudes and beliefs that caused me to want to leave him, i was therefore mentally deficient and would therefore never be able to conceive of a healthy relationship in my life. My problems are in the here and now, with him.
My self estemm obliterated, I started to override my instincts in order to be able to maintain a life with him, one where i live with him, have no access to my own space, and feel him as an obstacle between me and the front door, whether it is to visit a friend or leave altogether.

Yet still, now after five years, I cannot seem to rid myself of an almost instinctive repulsion of his affections. Perhaps this is because they were thrown on me as duties, as obligations, as an area in which i was to address my behaviour as inadequate, because what else could possibly be at play here other than my need for control?

He decides when we have sex, when i receive and when i give, and in spite of my never having asked ever, nor offered myself to him, in the long history of our relationship, he cannot understand why it is i am not lustful, nor why it is i cannot 'just leave' him.

I am drained of energy and afraid of life outside, because although his strength of character and sure attitude is the very thing I have allowed to stand in the way of my own personal development,m it has also sheltered me from the outside world, one where social anxiety and fractured relationships with my family keep me in a state of defense and fear.

Be honest with him...I have been advised, from various outsiders. Imagine this...I dont want to have sex with you! REsponse 'You do, but you subvert it, ofcourse you do, you did before, you will again'. I dont want to be with you 'Response 'you do, what else would you do, your life will amount to nothing.'

I am near reasy to leave now, I have been reading books about sex relationships and in particular sex addiction. I think he is a sex addict, and i know i have these problems myself. Not to the extent we need sex all the time, but the attitude towards sex is one that does noyt necessarily include trust and love.

He seems unaware of physical cues, when he is causing me discomfort for example. In the early stages of teh relationship i felt affection for him naturally, but if i expressed it it was seen as a come on. Like a child burned by the stove ive learned not to express such affection for fear of being in a sexual encounter im not readied for, or an argument about why such a sexual encounter has not occured.

And like many of the women on this forum, this man will masturbate in the bed next to me as opposed to the many available rooms in the house, late at night when im between twelve hour shifts, so that I can feel his anger and disappointment. he will ofcourse deny this.
he cannot control himself. If I make this claim to him he will bring up that ofcourse he can, because afterall how many times have i refused sex and yet he still has not raped me.

He never would rape me, but, when not giving sex produces a week long argument that interrupts sleep, has me in a locked room all night before a day at work, or has me with the threat of being oin the street wit nowhere to go...how different is that?

The worst part is, taht if he let go of his god complex he would be a very good person. As it is, I am his sex slave, and now, that ive finally had the intelligence (so are of me) to read about the subject, I may be ready to stand up to him finally, and go.

 

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2 thoughts on “long story

  • Roslyn Harris says:

    Get OUT! You can not save him. You MUST save yourself.

  • umlolidunno says:

    I’m so sorry for what you’re enduring from this man. He is an abuser. It takes a lot of strength to reach the point of writing something like this, and really feeling you may be ready to leave. It’s huge. Your feelings are not wrong, they are important information. Listening to them in the way you are here is brave. You are strong, right now, for doing that.

    If there’s a way you can reach out to any of your family (though this may not be an option), or anyone else who cares for you, it’s worth trying to get their support. Social anxiety and problems with relations can be a really difficult issue, but may also seem much worse from inside a relationship that has attacked your confidence and trust in yourself and others.

    Sending lots of love. xx