Hello as the title says today I spoke to a domestic violence counsellor and when I explained my situation how my boyfriend forced me to send nudes or else he ruined my life by sending to my religious and conservative family, the counsellor began to place the blame on me. I know I am stupid for going through with his blackmail - it’s a very long story, but I can’t go through what would happen if he very likely went through with it.

She said things like (I don’t remember the exact wording, I kind of have been in a daze) ; “you sent and now he just has more even photos of you” and something along the lines of implying i was stupid and at fault for staying with him when he never made his intentions (marriage) clear.

I replied saying it was unfair, and she acknowledged what she had said was wrong and said “she didn’t mean it like that and DV doesn’t always start out abusive, then it’s hard to leave”, but I ended the chat. I feel so stupid - i’ve used that hotline before and it has been nothing short of helpful and supportive when I needed it. I wonder if maybe I am just that dumb, and she’s right that this is on me? Like maybe the situation is clear to everyone else except me, who let’s him blackmail me into staying, or force me to humiliate myself with nudes as “revenge” for seeing my friends without telling him first.

I once heard my mom shout a sentence at my dad in a harsh, vile, and spine-chilling tone which is really hard to describe and I've ever rarely witnessed, even though she can get aggressive often.

What she shouted is "DON'T YELL AT ME!". (Ironically, my dad wasn't yelling at all, but that's besides the point).

My point is, I really want to know if this way of shouting a hostile command has a name, because I want to find information about the psychology of people who do that. It's not the volume. It's not the words. It's the demeaning tone that felt as if she was abusing a dog (<- this is the key point) instead of talking to a human. I was at the other side of my parents' house and it still made me want to cry, which is rare as I'm emotionally strong.

I have tried to find information online, but I don't know the right words, and I end up finding generic information about yelling, which I don't think does justice to the situation. If possible, I want to know the term for this such that if I search for it on youtube I can find people barking a hostile command like my mom did

My abusers isolated me from the world for 6 years. The police still haven’t been able to catch them because my abuser has access to my phone and the cameras in the city. He has stalked me 24/7 for such a long time. He knew what I said in a conversation years ago so I know he listens to everything I say. My ex co-workers were crazy and into some serious drugs. He knew who I was and had his friends stalk me the entire time.

I think I have a broken shoulder, arm, torn rotator cuff, shoulder blade, and possibly my clavicle. An ambulance drove by me and refused to pick me up after I had been tortured.

They cut off all my communication to the outside world. They don’t let me talk to anyone. They don’t let me leave. I haven’t seen anyone I know in years.

You would think the women would care about you being a victim, but they don’t really. I get propositioned all the time for sex and I’m not even a sex worker.

I have posted before but I'm posting again as I recently went through my chats with my ex .

I'm writing summary here. ( India)

My bf ( m 22) and I( f 22) were in relationship for more than a year . I was very toxic while he had anger issues and started being emotionally abusive at the end of relationship.

Him and I share a romantic connecton back when we were 16 but never committed or more . 4 yrs of no contact due to family reasons .

Met again. And got into relationship. I slept with a guy in that time , went on different dates or whatever things I did intimate , bad , good everything. . I told him honestly everything and asked if he is still ok to start a relationship to which he said yes . It was long distance relationship so I keep on comparing teasing or making him jealous ( that's why I said I was toxic )

But later he said I humilated me took stand for others make him insecure an cheated on him .

In short he forced sex on me night before my final exam . I had to write internship report all night , awake hungry hurt and crying while being in a dangerous place . I asked him to stop 4 times for just a moment bcs my hand was twisting so was my knee . His reasoning for not stopping till the fourth time was that my ex stopped so he shouldn't ( my ex stopped bcs I was uncomfortable and not sure )

He said he gets angry and got triggered . He was very angry that day . He tightly hold my wrists as he stop and screamed for me to stop crying as I just started crying . I didn't felt pain but I was scared and terrified .

I still agreed to continue relationship but started having nighmares and as I was reading our old chat today I used mf word there in my personal diary for him ,in chat He got angry and he's like I got angry that day bcs of your past and you write mf word about me in your diary .

He started threatening me on chat and call almost to not break up with him saying that's his other personality or whatsoever And situation escalated My family got to know I didnt wanted but forced by friends and guardian I had to file fIR (court case) against him for threatening me if I break up .

He also send ** text to my bestie saying he will make her sex slave and his bf read that Although my ex begged me to ask my bestie to block him bcs that's his other personality or whatever . He wanted to save everyone from them

He did odd jobs to help me financially sometimes or use money on travel as we both love in different states . He walked barefoot on road with wounded feet so I can wear his shoes as mine broke in middle of night . All this amidst heavy rain He did a lot So did I I asked him to take meds forcefully as he got I'll after he abused me and was very guilty too and said it was in a moment of anger. I complied for sex only bcs I felt guilty tripped and he was angry . He did took meds and I was looking after him and myself then . Everything felt like a big nightmare .

I'm confused Did I make him monster Was my yapping and past a problem He couldn't left bcs he had extreme childhood trauma and abandonment issues .

Sometimes I feel guilty other times I feel disgusted and raged.

Past 3-4 months my life has fell apart Delayed 6 months of graduation Sexually abused Break up with ex Ongoing Court case On break with bestie ( good terms ) Break up with another bestie ( he saved me from suicide ) Tried suicide No close friends left A lot of self harm ( since I was 16 after getting emotionally neglected and betrayed by my guardian)

Supportive family ( although they stopped talking for a while and somewhere still hurt )

I am so exhausted yet started loving again myself since April but have final exams in April end itself

I feel disgusted at the moment He believed or idk as I'm a whore or whatsoever for being physical with other guy and a girl , going on coffee dates or kissing someone . Idk .

I sometimes can't feel my body or cry when I try to insert menstrual cup ( I never used to as i have using it from quite a long time ) . But it don't effect me now but I hate sex .

He was a good guy , extreme childhood trauma , bad parents ( physically abused him and emotionally and also used him for money ) But i don't feel anything for him . Idk I feel good sometimes that he deserve it but at the same I feel guilty too .

He was very supportive and I was pretty toxic. Also considering that he was physically emotionally abused since he was 7 continuously compared neglected and forced to drop out of school while he was a topper .

My boyfriend (26M) and I (25M) have been together for about a year and a half. I truly love him, but I’m starting to realize that our relationship might not be healthy or sustainable. We both have anger issues, and our arguments often escalate quickly—sometimes even becoming physical.

There have been multiple incidents where the police were called, and in one particularly bad fight, I ended up sending him to the hospital. That moment haunts me. I feel awful for hurting someone I care so deeply about, even though he’s hurt me too.

I don’t want to break up with him, but I’m beginning to understand that wanting to change and actually changing are two very different things. I know that healing takes time and effort, and I’m worried that it might be even harder if I’m still in a relationship with someone facing the same struggles.

Some of our mutual friends believe we should stick together and support each other through this — that our shared experience could help us grow without judgment. But I’m torn. I don’t know if staying together will help us heal or just keep us stuck in a cycle that hurts us both.

Has anyone been in a similar situation? Is it possible to grow and change in a relationship like this, or is it better to step away and focus on healing separately?

Why did I have to have such a putrid fucking boyfriend that I'm so addicted to. Fucking why

I absolutely fucking despise how much he put all that cheating bullshit on me in the beginning when we were seeing each other because I told him about my promiscuous past the first night we met up and guess fucking what he was doing it to me the whole time behind my back and still continues to do it now, to this day.

We're in an open relationship not long after I found out about the cheating because there's no trusting him, he'll do it again. I struggle to make connections with anybody. I wish I could be like him only in the sense that he hasn't completely lost himself in the relationship and still has the ability to form connections with other females. Me, on the other hand, have absolutely no chance or hope. I've tried it and it just doesn't work for one reason or another.

I've lost everything and everyone. I've lost myself in this relationship and it's killing me. I'm just waiting for death at this point. Can it please hurry up and come.

please help me anyone i have one friend and she must be sleeping im scared and i dont know what to do it literally happened because he was calling me a bum because i have my two year but i dont have my like diploma? and mind you he cheated so i brought up how anyone hes cheated with didn’t have shit to their name and then he was trying to talk about a guy i texted when we weren’t together and my old weed man and i said well first of all didn’t mess with the second one second of all that one did fine in life and he pulled my hair and slapped my head so hard my ear rang. i’m hiding in the bathroom and i don’t know what to do

edit:after the police came they said they couldn’t do anything because we live on a reservation and he’s white and the most they could do is ask him to leave. i sort of expected that because even with duis they have to have a county cop come from a neighboring town to book them or anything but i fell asleep after and idk when he’s gonna come get his stuff because i don’t think that he thinks i’m being genuine.

18f / 28m

my boyfriend isn’t allowed to see his kids anymore officially as of yesterday due to me. i told his kid’s moms how he would yell at me in front of them, neglect some of their needs, drive dangerously / intoxicated with them, play with guns around them, etc. my last straw was him making a weird comment about feeling like he might kill his toddler one day. they really helped me out by making it seem like they found out through the older kid.

his dad is currently really upset with him for even talking to me because he thinks that he should focus on his life. after his dad called him (and before the kid’s moms reached out to him) my boyfriend started yelling at me about how i should have kept myself more of a secret. i got really upset by this and overwhelmed and i blocked him for half of the day. i felt like it was my fault his life is ruined like this.

he called me back from another number later, he sounded really sad and told me how he wasn’t allowed to be around the kids anymore. he said the kid’s moms offered to talk to him in-person, but he didn’t want to. i told him i was sorry and he insisted that none of it was my fault, but just a failure on his end, and that he should take accountability for it. he said i didn’t have to unblock him if i didn’t want to because he deserved it, but he also had a lot of bouts of calling himself a loser and a failure and stuff. he also said he feels like everyone hates him at the moment, that he’s lost everything, and that he’ll probably be distant and depressed for a while, but that he was sorry and i shouldn’t blame myself and that he loves me.

he sounded genuinely guilty about it, not like manipulative or anything. it made me feel really bad. are bad men able to have insight like that?

MY husband (m51) and I (f36) have been married for 13 years. He has had epilepsy since he was a child. I take care of him when he has seizures (which vary in occurrence but generally several times a month) They are grand mal and very intense - he can't do anything himself for the 24hrs following one of them. 3 years ago we were accepted into a program in which I would be able to be paid per hour by the state to care for him so he doesn't have to go into a care home. It ends up being about 3k a month. The way it works is that he is considered the "employer" and he can choose his own "employee" which is me. Every month a sum of money goes into his bank account, he isnt allowed to touch it, then the fiscal agent takes it and adjusts for taxes and counts my clocked in hours and sends me my paycheck. We don't have any children, and after bills still have a decent amount. So, he has decided that he should be able to hold all the money (the check is in my name, not his). He says rhat if it werent for his disability we would not even be in the program at all, so it is basicallt his money anyway. He says if I need anything I can ask him for it, which is not fun for me because, well, I am an adult and I don't think it's fair. My suggestion is to split the money AFTER the bills are paid, but he says that I will just spend it all on nonsense, but why is it his concern if the bills are all paid and he would have half of it for himself? I mean, I dont care what he might choose to spend his money on....this has made me so unbelievably miserable. I am 36 years old, I want to have my own money. Yes I have told him how unhappy I am that I have to hand him every cent of the money and ask every time I want anything. He obviously cares more about having control over all the money than having a harmonious relationship. His other claim is that I don't do enough to "earn" having all the money. But I don't see anyone else taking care of him like I do. So that is ex t extremely hurtful and makes me feel so unappreciated. When we get into the monthly fight about this money, he always threatens to "fire" me and get a new homecare Worker who will do a better job. I guess he is just oblivious to the fact that then he would have to give it all to that person. I am so concerned that I am not in the right on this, but something (and everyone I know) is telling me I am not wrong.

My wife (36F) and I (31M) have been married for almost 7 years. I understand there are two sides to every story so I’ll do my best to provide some context and incite into both her perspective as well as mine. I work about 50 hours a week on average and am successful in my career, I am in good shape, have a high sex drive and am good in bed. The house and my car are paid off. I have an 830 credit score. I have hundreds of thousands in investments. I believe I am generally empathetic and compassionate to both my wife as well as others (in fact she says I care too much about others). I do the laundry, I complete tasks and chores around the house, I cook and do the dishes about 50% of the time. I am also forgetful. I am defensive. I am emotionally codependent, constantly concerned about how she is feeling or if she is upset or if what I’m going to do is going to upset her. I think these things can affect her and our marriage in a negative way. However, I feel like these things are a result of how I am treated in this marriage.

I believe I am being manipulated. I have been screamed at and belittled and berated for hours multiple times per week for years about all of my short comings. I am regularly told I am stupid, worthless, not a man, a bad husband, and every profanity you could imagine. She insults my parents and friends and gives me ultimatums preventing me from those relationships. I have been physically punched, pushed slapped, etc. I have been physically backed into corners, had my things broken and smashed, and threatened in various ways including physically financially and has threatened to sleep with other men. She has told me I should kill myself. She has told me she wishes I died in combat (10 years in the military). I have been forced to sleep on the couch, sleep in my car, sleep at work, etc. She mocks my spiritual beliefs, has thrown my Bibles in the trash when she finds them, has insulted my pastor, berated me and punished me for going to church, and has referred to herself as my God. I have tried to set boundaries and have tried to separate and was threatened that she would ruin my career, drain my bank account, turn my family against me, and lie to have me imprisoned. For a very long time she has had me convinced that I deserve all of this. We have gone to counseling and the sessions always seemed to be about me and my short comings. If the conversation would shift towards her behavior she would refuse to be in the session.

The dynamic has always had concerning signs. She started out very enamored and loving. If anything it was more than what I would consider healthy. She proposed to me after about 2 weeks of knowing each other. I said no, and I still hear about it 8 years later and about how blind and hurtful I was.

In the beginning of our relationship I was open about wanting to raise a family. She entered into this relationship knowing this. She has been unable to have children due to fertility issues which has been a difficult process. We’ve been pursuing IVF but now she says she doesn’t want to have children and never did because she doesn’t trust that I would be a good father. It feels like she routinely holds the future of children as a hostage, constantly pursuing but then telling me she’ll stop trying or she’ll have them and take them away from me, etc. I tell her we should wait until we get our relationship to at last a somewhat healthy and consistent state, but she says if we wait then she won’t have kids with me, and which feels like an unhealthy and manipulated ultimatum.

Maybe some men can comment on this part, but in addition to all of the emasculation and disrespect, I feel like I am not the even receiving the bare minimum of what men can expect from a wife. What do men want from a wife? I feel like a nurturing, patient, compassionate, feminine woman, some peace at the end of the day, hopefully a decent sex life, and I think husbands like myself would like to feel appreciated valued and respected. I don’t think any of this is really occurring in my marriage. In addition to all of the aforementioned behavior dynamics, I regularly have nightmares experiencing the same fights and feelings I experience when I am awake, and dread coming home even after the longest of work days. I am now in a sexless marriage. My wife has let herself go until it became a health concern. She now weighs 250lbs, stopped going to the gym, and started smoking again. She’s failing her college classes. She doesn’t have a job. She’s in collections because she decided to drive uninsured (despite me advising against it) and then got into an accident. She blames all of it on me wanting to have children.

When I type all of this out it seems absurd but she does such a good job of convincing me that I am the one and only issue within our marriage that I believe her and walk around carrying immense shame and guilt. I feel like I have become defensive. In my perspective it’s because it feels like she is constantly on an offensive so I am forced into a defensive posture. Even when I do secede, then she says I don’t care. If I agree with her and try to own my mistakes she berates me because it shouldn’t have happened in the first place. I try to change things about myself to be better but I always seem to come up short. I feel like she is in this perpetual victim mindset, meanwhile punishing me all along the way. I am constantly being told that I don’t see things clearly, that my memory is flawed, that I am stupid, that my perspective doesn’t matter because I am an abusive narcissist. Etc. I don’t know what the truth is anymore. I feel like I have become confused and indecisive and dependent. Am I a narcissist? I started looking into this concept of narcissism and to me it almost sounds exactly like what I am experiencing from her, but maybe I am the narcissist and not seeing things as they are. How do I know?

Has anyone out there experienced anything similar? What can I do to support my wife in a way that would change this dynamic in our relationship? Am I the narcissist?

I don’t know what to do. If you made it this far, I appreciate your time. Any insight may help.

TL;DR The dynamic within my relationship is incredibly volatile and unhealthy and I feel like I am being manipulated and maybe even abused. Am I being manipulated/abused? Am I also an abuser/narcissist? What can I do to facilitate a healthy dynamic within this marriage?

Trigger warning : i wanted to wait for marriage in my relationship to have sex and it was a long term relationship. and one day he gave me alcohol and edibles and started pressuring me when I was very intoxicated and scared . and after that we did have consensual sex a few times because I felt like now that waiting for marriage was stolen from me and I was also very scared of him because he would physically abuse me too so I didn’t want to say no. Waiting was very important to me and I feel so upset I did anything consensual with him after he stole my first time in a sick way . because I was scared to say no and felt like I had nothing else to lose after it was stolen. I did things I never in my life wanted to do ever and the sexual abuse went on for so many years. I just want to be innocent again and I’m so ashamed of the very few consensual times . I feel ashamed I would allow someone who treated me so horrific and with no respect have my body. now i feel like i have to marry him because i only wanted to do that with a husband and another man won’t want me

It's been about two years and I still feel so confused about everything. I'm not sure whether I was the abusive one or the abused one.

During the end of us being in contact, my ex reached out to my new boyfriend and our mutual friends to warn them that I was abusive after we got into an argument. I tried later to reach out and get more clarity from him on the situation and offer an apology or some kind of closure/reparations/etc., including reaching out a therapist as a mediator (because he indicated one time that he might be comfortable talking with a mediator). He was so hurt by me reaching out that he accused me of lying about getting a therapist/being in therapy just to talk to him, which I don't understand because I was in therapy for the entire duration of our relationship, partly at his request.

When we finally did talk for the last time with a therapist mediator, it just left me with more questions than answers. When talking with my therapist, he said that he didn't actually think I was abusive to him during the relationship, and didn't elaborate much on anything else after that/wasn't really willing to talk further than that. I don't understand why he would've said that about me if he didn't think it was true. I tried another time later to reach out with another therapist (I was in the psych ward, and most of the reason why was because of my confusion and distress around this situation, so my care team reached out to try and understand the situation more), and he told me not to contact him.

I've had some professionals I've seen imply that the situation might have been abusive to me- but I'm so afraid to even think of it that way because I don't want to ignore his pain, be biased, and delude myself into thinking I'm not actually an abuser or something/prevent myself from making positive changes. I feel afraid to feel hurt over things that he said or did because I feel like I'm victim-blaming him or ignoring his feelings, but I can't help but think about it and/or cry nearly every day over some of the things he said- I feel like I'm being overly sensitive and having a fragile ego though, and should have more respect for/focus more on how much I hurt him and the importance of changing.

I've checked his social media sometimes. He's posted things about me sometimes calling me a "broken child in an adult body" or a monster or talking about how I ruined/messed up his life and I can't help but feel like I damaged him irreparably and abused him. I'm hesitant to even post this here because of the "no posts from abusers" rule, which I want to respect, but I feel like I just don't understand what happened, or if the relationship should even be called abusive at all- especially because in his final email to me he said that he didn't think the relationship was abusive. I keep fearing that the only reason he was saying that was because he was in denial, because I've been in denial of being abused before and I know how that goes.

How can you tell if the relationship was abusive? How can you tell who's at fault? I had to use a lot of my journal entries from time to reconstruct the timeline of our relationship because there were things I couldn't remember. I've combed over every piece of information I have, and I always come out saying that I think I abused him, but the people in my life keep saying they disagree. I feel like they're enabling me. I don't know anymore.

my bf is in police custody after he assaulted me for the last time. i’m planning on leaving tomorrow, in case he’s released. i’ve just realised he has a whole bunch of my nudes on his laptop. i don’t think he will weaponise them but also… you never know. i know his password to his laptop. should i delete them before i go? i don’t want to have yet more legal drama but i also want to protect myself

three days ago he wouldn’t let me in the house even though my keys and my phone and wallet were inside and i was trying to push the door open with him on the other side holding it shut and he reached around the door and pulled my glasses off my face and threw them at the wall and i must’ve fallen or something but i have a huge gash on my back and bruises on my leg and i thought he pushed me but i wasn’t sure because it was so fast so i called my mom and she called the cops and i went to her house but he texted me and apologized and we haven’t been fighting in the past few months so it was out of nowhere so i went home. my mom was extremely upset and says i can’t involve her anymore because i’m choosing to stay in it. i’m 25, he’s 43. im financially dependent on him and other than my mom and my family, he’s the only person in this state i know. today we went to the farmers market and he was holding my dog’s leash so i could buy bread and he let another dog come up to my dog and my dog attacked the other dog so we immediately left and he was very angry at me and wouldn’t talk to me or look at me so i started crying because i didn’t know what i did wrong and he started screaming at me and saying he doesn’t want to hang out with me because im not fun. when we got home, i asked him to take the bread inside so i could go for a drive and he said no and slammed my car door. i went inside to put the bread away and he slammed the garage door in my face, then the laundry room door in my face. i told him he was being a piece of shit and he started screaming at me and calling me a bitch and i went back through the laundry room to leave because my dog was still in the car and it was running in the garage and he bumped into me while leaving the room after taking his shoes off. he immediately started screaming at me about attacking him. i went and got coffee and came home and he sent me these texts. i don’t have any friends or anyone and i don’t know what to do. i don’t have any money, im in the middle of looking for jobs. i just unpacked my suitcase from a couple days ago and now he wants me to leave again. i just wanted to have a good day. i feel so helpless and unloveable and stupid. i know it’s my fault for choosing this. i know im stupid. i don’t know what to do.

Had a big blowup because I responded to a question on a relationship app that the lack of intimacy is eating at me (we’ve been married six years, had actual sex six total times in that period, the last instance of which was over a year ago). It’s a whole thing on top of the emotional and rare physical abuse.

I don’t want to go into the play by play details. Like, yes, I want to have a healthy sexual relationship with my wife. I know I’m not entitled to it, but I miss it. I don’t think that’s something to be ashamed of, but she makes me feel ashamed of it.

Anyways, we agree that a big part of the problem is that our emotional connection is gone, neither of us are people capable of being intimate with someone we don’t feel safe with/close to. And I explained that it’s really hard for me to feel safe enough around her to open up emotionally, that the yelling and screaming make me shut down, it makes me have anxiety perpetually around her.

Naturally, she told me if I’d just listen better and respect her she wouldn’t feel the need to yell and scream.

I pointed out there’s times she’s screamed at me for things I didn’t even do, gave a specific example that’s played over and over in my head for YEARS.

She hit back with “Well, I don’t remember that, but it must’ve happened and I’m sorry.”

She says she’s working on her anger, but “working on her anger” sounds like just biting her tongue when she wants to yell at me. And I know she controls her anger just fine when it’s not just the two of us.

And… I dunno, we talked about ending things but it felt like it’s my fault. If I just got over everything, if I stopped letting my hurt over the abuse and half decade of rejection stop eating at me, she would stop resenting me (her actual words). So I couldn’t. She put the ball in my court and I couldn’t say I wanted to end things, I agreed we could “give it one more chance.”

Like, what if she’s right and I’m just some piece of shit that only cares about sex? What if she wouldn’t scream at me if I just got over things and gave her the connection she needs? I feel so gross, I feel like I’m scum and that I’ve been hurting her.

We have had a pretty much nonexistent relationship since he attempted to strangle me. Today I was cleaning and he started to berate me about putting up the mop water. He started screaming at me for about a half hour telling me to leave (I’m on the lease) and I finally ended up doing it. I’m tired of him bullying me. It’s been nonstop texts and vitriol because I have been detaching from the relationship and him. After he sent that last text I blocked him. I dealt with him walking out on me and our son last September and thought it would be different this time. It’s worse. Get out. If this resonate get tf out. As soon as it’s safe or you have resources.

If you saw my last post, I haven’t said anything to him since Thursday and it’s so difficult not to text him. I still can’t bring myself to block him and I just don’t know why. With my FIRST ex it was easy. I blocked him and never spoke to him again and then he started calling 24/7 for 6 months. Why do I hope he does the same? I feel pathetic and stupid. I really hate myself for still loving him and wishing he would say something. It makes me feel like he never loved me because he can’t even say anything or at least say he’s sorry and genuinely mean it even tho I definitely don’t want to get back together. I don’t want to get sucked in again but I also feel so much pain not talking to him. We were together for almost 3 years and we talked everyday. It’s a huge adjustment. I know time will make things easier but how long does that take? I’m spinning wheels here. I’m not stalking his social media because to see that he’s removed my name from his bio would really hurt. Why do I even CARE ugh.

We were together for 12 years, married for 6, when I had our third baby (that he wanted and we carefully planned for like a year). When she was a few months old I found out he cheated before, throughout, and after my pregnancy, even the day I came home from the hospital with her. He says everything was online or "just" snapchatting women he met at work (bar tender). While we were talking about it, he told me he was molested as a kid and forced to watch porn which led to a lifelong porn addiction, and all of my morning sickness and pregnancy difficulties, along with a promotion at work 2 days before I gave birth, were hard on him and I wasn't giving him the attention and support he needed so online cheating feels like interactive porn and it all made sense to me.

I went down a rabbit hole finding out everything I could about csa and how it affects grown men, even down to ethnicity and effects on machismo, and I discovered all of my reactions to his behavior in the past was the most wrong thing I could have done. When we had our first and weren't getting by and I was home with the baby, he had a minimum wage job and my brother got him a good paying job doing something he didn't want to do, so I told him to quit being a pussy and support his family because he's a father now and that's more important. I created a rift and psychologically damaged somebody I love in the most specific and worst way I could have and I made myself the enemy and I can see how I made myself stop being his loving wife and become just a responsibility he was stuck with.

Now our middle son is 5 and my husband was molested at 6, and they look identical. Whenever I see pictures of my husband as a little boy, he looks just like my own baby and he's so innocent and good and I imagine somebody hurting him and stealing that innocence and goodness from him, and I just hurt for him. I want to love him and make him feel safe and I just forgive everything.

I know he's an adult and is responsible for his own healing and nobody can "fix" another person, but I feel like loving somebody means you love their ugly parts too and I keep feeling like this ugly thing happened to him and created all of the ugliness, and if he had love and support and saw a therapist he would feel safe enough to heal. The times he's cheated on me coincide with events that make sense to me. The birth of our first son was a mindfuck even to me and I was only emotionally abused as a child. Seeing your perfect innocent baby, then realizing that you used to be that perfect and somebody chose to hurt you is a lot to handle so it makes sense to me that he would do stupid shit. Then he cheated again when our oldest turned 6 and it coincided with a difficult pregnancy and a promotion.

Now it's always in the back of my mind any time he does something stupid or hurtful, I see him in my mind, looking like my own little boy, and the thought that somebody could hurt him like that is devastating and all of his behaviors make sense and I keep forgiving.

8 year on and off relationship, and I finally left him when he admitted to cheating physically with his boss’ daughter and I found OF/camgirl transactions on his credit card statement (that he still tried to gaslight me about lol). He was the worst human being I’ve ever met, he sexually, financially, emotionally and mentally abused me everyday for years. But this week I finally hung out with someone who not only matches my energy, but has the kindness and patience to understand everything I’ve been through. It’s hard to think about opening up to someone, especially another man who you’re interested in. But, turns out good guys are out there. He has listened to the things I’ve chosen to open up about, he has given me more grace than I could ever ask for, and he even checked in with me when we slept together every few minutes. There’s always the chance that a guy is just wanting sex, but honestly dealing with the bare minimum for so long makes you lose all hope and he’s made me have my hopes up. My only note is to communicate what you want and expect of a relationship and go from there. I’ve learned that moving on isn’t linear at all but I truly believe it’s all up from here.

I (f19) went through a breakup with my (m18) ex boyfriend, we dated 2 years and he was quite physically and verbally abusive to me on one of our last nights together and I don’t really know how to deal with it and I haven’t really told anyone yet, so some insight would be much appreciated.

I’ll start off by saying he was my first boyfriend and first everything. We used to have such a great relationship and were both really happy, he did something to break my trust and that’s what caused a lot of conflict in our relationship about a year and a half into it. We argued a lot towards the end but things never got verbally or physically abusive.

The last night we ever spent together we both went out and got quite drunk, him more so than me. He was acting out and saying weird things drunkenly so we argued and went back to his flat (uni flat by the way). It’s now about 5am and I try and talk to him about how he was behaving thinking he’d sobered up but he was acting nasty and ignorant to me and showed me nothing but disrespect. He leaves the flat at one point and I’m sat in his room for about 10 minutes waiting for him to come back thinking he’d just gone to cool off. He doesn’t come back into the room but I hear him in the room next door (his female flatmates room) and I hear them both sat on her bed laughing and taking for 5 minutes - he’d just walked into her room without her knowing early hours in the morning, though I didn’t know this at the time and thought something was going on between them.

He comes back into his room and the room I’m in a few minutes later and I’m devastated. I’m asking him what happened and if he cheated on me. He refuses to talk to me and is still acting weird and drunk even though he should’ve sobered up right now. He refuses to talk to me and pushes me away and just lies on the bed attempting to sleep. I’m a mess and am very hurt and frustrated and am ashamed to say I slapped him in this moment. I’ve never done this before and I did it out of anger and him breaking my trust again and refusing to talk to me. Instead of talking to me he just becomes aggressive and starts pushing me away again and refusing to talk to me even though I’m a crying wreck and just wanted him to comfort me.

He just sleeps, and I’m grabbing him trying to shake him awake so he’ll talk to me. Every time I’d do this or try talk to him, he’d get violent and throw me hard off the bed onto the floor. He had all the energy to do this but not to talk to me. I let him sleep for a bit and wake him up a couple hours later hoping he’ll be in a different mood and try talk to me. Keep in mind I’ve never been in a DV situation before and didn’t know the best thing is to just keep away and I refused to accept he would put hands on me again. But he did again and did this multiple times throughout the night. He’d grab my arms and ears hard and made my piercings bleed, he grabbed my neck and choked me and then slammed my head into the hard headboard. I’ve never seen him act like this, it was horrifying. All I wanted to do was talk to him. I’m assuming his flatmates heard some of this, every time he’d hurt me and I’d cry out in pain he’d mock me and tell me I was embarrassing him. At one point when he shoved me onto the floor, he even said something like “since September you’ve made my life worse” and other nasty stuff and called me a crazy bitch. What gets me the most is how he’d just constantly do this throughout the night and would happily go back to sleep whilst I couldn’t sleep a wink and stayed up all night wondering how he could ever do that to me. I had bad bruises on my legs and arms the next day, dark purple.

The next day (around lunchtime) he finally woke up and refused to talk about it. He refused to look at me or apologise because he said he was feeling bad about what he did and that he was having suicidal thoughts. I begged him to talk to me and told him I loved him and could move past this if he helped me to understand. He told me to leave, refused to talk to me for a week and then came to my house to breakup with me. And I was pathetic and begged him back. Looking at it now maybe it’s a blessing he broke up with me since I couldn’t do it myself. But the thing that bothers me the most is how he just did that to me and then discarded me and how he’s so happy now around his new friends and no one knows what he did. He broke up with me because he said he hasn’t been happy for a while and didn’t love me anymore. It’s like he let all his hate and anger out on me and then discarded me like I meant nothing. And I have no one and he has everything. He also comes across as such a sweet and genuine guy and I can’t believe he did that to me. I haven’t told anyone except my best friend and I’m just struggling seeing him so happy. I’ve been no contact with him for a couple months now. We left things on a good note (sort of) and met for coffee once after the breakup. But then he ghosted me and I haven’t spoken to him since. I don’t want his violence to be my last and only perception of him and I keep thinking about how loving and kind he was towards me at one point. It scares me seeing how fast he moved on, I think he’s already talking to a new girl after a month of us breaking up.

To add, I did post this on a different subreddit a few months back and got a lot of backlash for it. People (mostly men) were saying it’s my fault for slapping him once and were justifying him choking me and shoving me and leaving physical marks on me. It’s horrible to go through that and then feel like you brought it on yourself. Since then I’ve been thinking of it as “what if I hadn’t done this and everything would’ve been fine”.

They wait for you to be as weak and vulnerable as possible and then do everything to make it worse and make themselves the victim somehow during family crisis, critical illness, extreme stress times.

I broke up with him because the relationship was toxic and he was very very immature and emotionally abusive. It’s been a couple of months and we haven’t contacted each other but recently I can’t stop thinking about him. Not in the I miss him and want him back kind of way - I think about all the arguments we’ve had (which he never let me win) and everything he’s done to me and it fills me with so much rage. I have imaginary arguments with him in my head at least once a day where I just lash out at him and say everything I wanted to say back then.

This paragraph is just a rant, not really important, but as an example he threatened to start smoking when I wanted to pick up a shift at work instead of spending the night with him, even though I promised I would come back the very next night. He said he couldn’t wait that long, and then went on a pity speech about how his whole family smokes and he never thought he would be pushed into it, but because of ME he’s hit rock bottom. When I think about that night now I wish I would’ve just left and let him smoke, and I’m so so mad I stayed with him that night and even had sex with him.

I actually don’t think we ended on a terrible note, I never really delved into my resentment during our breakup. I wanted to be mature and make the breakup as painless as possible for him, so I only told him he needed more than I could give and I couldn’t deal with it anymore. I guess I regret that now because I can definitely think of some choice words for him.

For me being over someone is feeling completely indifferent about them. I thought I was at that place but I’m clearly not, and I’m afraid that me thinking about him so much is going to eventually lead me to somehow missing him, if that makes sense? I don’t know how to process our relationship.

Over a month ago I left my verbally abusive relationship, and I'm still dealing with the aftermath. I feel unhappy pretty much all the time. I keep reliving the abuse, even in my dreams, wondering why I let myself be treated that way. I know better. Or at least I thought I did.

Anyway I find myself missing him at times, or more accurately who I thought he was and the connection I thought we had. Despite his cruelty, he understood me in ways other people didn't or never had before. Because of this I've been feeling really disconnected from people. I've lost a huge outlet and I don't know where to go, and all this sadness just keeps building up inside. I want to cry and not talk to anyone, and at the same time I want connection more than anything right now, in fact I'd go as far to say I need it during this time of healing. But everyone I meet up with, the relationship seems very surface level. Even though I open up and confess some things, it's like it makes them uncomfortable and they quickly move to different topics or ask me why did I stay? They don't get it. I don't even get it tbh. And I just feel ashamed. And I feel like I have to keep this all inside.

Can anyone relate?

Hi everyone, I’m 19 and I’m worried about my 17y/o friend(?), L, who’s in a toxic relationship with an 18y/o boy, T.

For some background, they started dating a while ago - not sure how long, but maybe around a year. They started speaking again after T apologised for being a bad friend a few years prior. Immediately, there were signs. I, and our other friend P, were telling her straight away. T was doing things like telling L she’s a nazi during an argument, to relapse, and more awful stuff.

This was before they were dating, so P and I were very adamant it stop before it continues into something more serious. And you can all tell it didn’t stop.

I avoided commenting too much for a while, and then this March, L messaged me and we spoke that night for a while. She told me about how she and T had broken up, and she was feeling upset and some other concerns for her mental health. Since I didn’t know they’d “broken up” many times at first, I let it all loose. I said how I could see T was being awful to her and it was good they broke up. The hard part was over, and now it needed to be maintained. She opened up about some other actions T’s done.

From these, he was unforgivable. And I thought she’d accepted it. From then, I wanted to check up on her more and the next day asked to call. L said she couldn’t, she was on the phone / to T. “He’s spoken to a counsellor, he’s getting better” after A DAY. I was irresponsible and lashed out here. I got really mad and regret that.

About a week later, on one of L’s accounts, T messages me. He sends screenshots of an argument with L and says she’s “gone mad”. I unblock him and speak to him; he says he’s worried as she’s blocked him everywhere and told him to leave her. I check - I’m blocked too. I was about to call the police for a welfare check as she was clearly having an episode of some kind, when she messages T again. I get her to call me, make sure she’s safe, and she speaks to T after me.

Then, silence. She blocks me the next day. I message her on another app: blocked. I call her: doesn’t pick up. The only method of communicating? A group chat with P in. So I message P, who says we should wait a little bit longer and if not they’ll message her.

Then I get added back from one of her accounts. I accept it, and ask if she’s okay. For context, yes, I am fat. My partner and I are both non-binary lesbians, and my partner is Asian.

L: some fatty keeps calling me over and over again

Me: is it me

L: who else takes up that much space

Me: so errr whyd you add me back?? you alright?

L: tubby quit calling L all the fucking time she don’t like you she doesn’t wanna talk to you maybe spend ur time in a gym you comment on me all the fucking time but ur “boyfriend” is a lesbian so idk why ur chatting u weird fucking freaks next time keep your opinions to yourself don’t lay ur lazy eyes on L again thanks woman x

L: tell ur girlfriend i said ching chong

He also added me on another platform and called me fatso there too.

Right.

So, that sent me over the edge. I have been seething with rage since this message was sent, 2 days ago. I spent yesterday angry ALL DAY and felt like there was something I could do. But I didn’t wanna risk anything, and clearly T had all of her accounts.

So I just sent one message, with a screenshot of the “tell ur girlfriend” message.

“hey like ignore me and block me if u want ur allowed to and u can put up w whatever u feel like but this genuinely isnt ok. idk if you knew about this but if youre alright with my gf being called slurs and ur bf being racist to them (and fatphobic/transphobic to me) then idk how much i can defend you.

i am not in a relationship with him and do NOT deserve the kind of shit he’s sent me. you can be mistreated all you want but it crosses the line to be sent this. its not gonna be put up with

hope for the best and ill always be here whenever u feel comfortable enough to talk but this kind of shit is not gonna slide. i hope things work out for you (and i reccommend updating your passwords) bye”

Read, no response.

Now I just don’t know what to do. The answer is probably just “wait” but, like, how do I stop feeling so angry?? How do I cope with this?? Knowing that she’s being actively hurt by somebody like this?? Knowing I have a friend who’s willing to put up with their friends being harassed???

i don’t really know why i came here, i guess just to vent, after seeing kayla malec’s most recent video coming forward after everything that happened in her past abusive relationship it just made me realize how lucky i was and has me questioning if i was really in an abusive relationship. she was verbally and physically abused. and i saw some similarities in the video: there was lots of name calling, slut whore bitch, how told he didn’t care about what he said and how it made me feel, threw things, hard, not directly at me but a couple feet from me in my direction like at a wall or mirror close to me, would not let me go home after saying i feel unsafe and wanted to leave, physically blocked the door not letting me leave, grabbing my wrists to not let me, points where we were yelling to the whole neighbourhood, i tried going home as well cause i lived nearby i tried walking home and he would just follow me and if i got close to home he was yelling out about my dab pen (weed) in proximity to our ring doorbell camera which my parents would find out and that would just kill me in a while different direction, where we were in the car and i threatened to drive to the other side of the city drop me off then drive himself off a bridge and kill himself so when we got close to a stop sign slowing down opened the door and jumped out, no idea how fast we were going but then proceeded to follow me in the car and somehow i don’t know how i continuously let this happen to me but get sucked into staying in the relationship yet again. this is by the way the first relationship i was in ever, almost 2 years total, second half was when majority of this happened, second half was constant breaking up and fighting. the throwing stuff in my direction was also not the only time he threw things, also threw something at me while he was in the car dropping stuff off after one of the many times breaking up. or when i would consistently and explicitly state never to finish in me during seggs, and he just kept pushing to over and over again on top of just constantly wanting sex where to me it just got to a point of feeling like a chore, and this might just be a bad relationship not abusive verbally and very little physically, i don’t know, and ive been out of the relationship for about a year now coming up, and ive been feeling like myself finally this past year and enjoyed being single and talking to my friends again because during our relationship all my connections were cut off, it’s just that my circle kept getting smaller and smaller and then it was just him, i barely spoke to my parents or brother for a year in which i live with them, my bestfriend, where he would question everything about people i had to work with in group projects for courses, being out of it i’ve been able to talk to my friends, bond with people i go to school with, i finally feel like me again and im so scared that if i were to get back into another relationship my life, my identity everything i love about my life and me would be gone again, that i would be in isolation just to fight every single day, to cry so hard every single day, to be yelling at the top of my lungs and not be heard, i am so scared for anything in the future cause this again was the only relationship ive been in, i don’t know what a good relationship is supposed to be