I had a revelation

[SoftLanding]

The other day I had a revelation that was so unexpected.  I found myself in the presence of my uBPDbf, his adult children and his ex-wife.  He has strained relationships with all of them.  In fact, it is rare that we see his children or his grandchildren.  It started out calm and civilized, but then he started bringing up his rather "out there" political and religious views out of the blue.  He proceeded to bully his views upon his children and try to humiliate his ex-wife.  I was standing next to him and there has never been a time in my life where I more wanted to disappear or find a hole to crawl into.  Since then I've been thinking about how unacceptable his treatment of them was.  Then I realized that I'm not only accepting, but tolerant of that same treatment towards myself.  What is up with that?  In my past life, I would have never tolerated it.  He treats me as if I were his child and I'm not able to bring up my opinions without being punished for them.  I just shed the resentment as soon as I'm able to and try to prepare myself for the next onslaught.  Is it right to do that or am I warping myself?

[RELATIONSHIP PROBLEM SOLVING]

RELATIONSHIP PROBLEM SOLVING This is a high level discussion board for solving ongoing, day-to-day relationship conflicts. Members are welcomed to express frustration but must seek constructive solutions to problems. This is not a place for relationship "stay" or "leave" discussions. Please read the specific guidelines for this group.

[elemental]

This has become normalized as being directed at you.

The contrast sounds really eye opening. he has grandkids? What about your side? Do you have children and grandkids? What do they think of that sort of thing being directed at you.

I can say with absolute certainty that if someone was hurting my mom like that, I would be trying to get her away from the person. I am angry at the very thought of it.

[SoftLanding]

I moved to another state to be with him 3 years ago after we reconnected on facebook.  I have kids and grandkids, but they haven't met him yet.  We know each other from going to high school together in the 70's.  He doesn't like me going home for visits. He says he'll never go back to that state. I've been twice, but he's convinced something bad will happen.  My family has no idea what I'm dealing with.

[elemental]

One of the things that is really helping me is stepping back in order to gain detachment so I don't feel so anxious, hurt, angry. If you step back in order to detach and focus on your life instead of engaging with him, probably you will feel more yourself.

Boundries. Your boundries follow your values. Is it your value to let this person disrespect and control you? If it isn't, then what is your boundry. For example, if he is speaking disrespectfully to you, is there a value you have about that being directed at you where you can place a boundry?

For example, when he does this, your boundry could be that you don't stay present to get further disrespect. That means you enforce it by removing yourself from his presence. You could state the boundry and leave, or you could simply politely excuse yourself and go do something else. The next time he does it, you enforce your boundry again. After a while he will catch on and if he wants you there, he will avoid being disrespectful and you can possibly enjoy each other's companionship instead of these painful for you episodes.

Hiding that someone is abusing you from your family, after a certain point, isolates you in it. I hope the tools here will be helpful to you. They are really helping me step back and do what I want and need to do. 

[SoftLanding]

Well... . I'm embarrassed to say that I've painted myself into a pretty tight little corner.  I'm hundreds of miles from friends and family.  I have no car and I live in a location that requires a car to get anywhere.  I am most definitely isolated.  I've been hiding what's going on from my family and friends purely because of pride.  I do love my man, and we mostly get along.  But when it breaks, it really breaks.  I love my family and miss them desperately.  I've rationalized leaving them all behind and not seeing them very often by telling myself that we all have our own lives to live and we gotta do what we gotta do to be happy.  But when he dis-regulates and I'm here to deal with it by myself, unable to even leave for a couple of hours, I miss those days of being a half hour drive from people who love me.  Sometimes I feel like I've messed up my life beyond repair. 

[SoftLanding]

Oh you mentioned boundaries.  I have some work to do there.  I did manage to stop making things worse for the most part.  We've gone from daily all out battles and breakups to rare escalations, maybe 3 or 4 times a year and the last time we broke up was April of last year.  I tend to build up resentments in between though.  I'm afraid when I add boundaries in, I'm going to take a huge step backwards at least at first.  That thought has made me procrastinate implementing them.