She hit me, mild case

[JoeBPD81]

Hi,

I feel I can't tell anyone. And at the same time I have to.

I'm not in danger. I'm not injured. I just feel humilliated, and unloved.

The facts: She was exercising with a video on the TV, loud. Her son, 13, was seated behind her, playing a videogame on his phone, also loud. The other son was playing music in his room, to a friend on a video conference, and yelling at him, and laughing. There was a cacofony of sounds. The song on the TV made her cry, always, and she plays it on purpose to end her exercise routine, and then cries for a while. It helps let her go of her daily anxiety.

I wanted to pick up something from other room and I had to go through the room she and S13 were in. As I was passing though, she "danced" backwards, and bumped on me. She hadn't heard me coming in the room, and she we startled. That coused her panic, she took a couple of steps back, I said sorry. And then she took the two steps forward and started slapping me in the back and shoulder several times. She's not very strong, so 1st I though it was a joke, but then she kicked me as hard as she could. All the way I was leaving for other room. I took what I needed and left, not knowing what to make of that.

S13 without lifting his head from the phone told me "poor mum". And I said something on the line of "what? she hit me!".

24h later, she tells me that she is ashamed about losing control, but she's not sorry about me. That she has no excuse and her behavior was wrong, period. But at the same time, she still wants to hit me. That I should know better than to stand in her back, because she has warned me hundreds of times since we met. She claimed I touched her behind, and called me all the names in the book. She told me she's a danger to me, and she should go... But no compasion towards me whatsoever.

I told her I understand panic, and a panic reaction from PTSD. And still, I can't validate a violent response, I can't say "You can do anything you want to me" . And I can't help but feeling like garbage. I can't shut up a voice that says "Who would I hit like that? How little would I have to care about someone to hit him like that?" The answer is no one. Not a stranger, not someone I don't like, much less someone that I suposedly love.

Thinking back, I would hit like that, and more, the people who abused her and created her PTSD in the 1st place. And I understand that if she felt panic, she couldn't tell me appart from her attackers. But what about 24h later? What about all the other signs of complete scorn and disrespect in our daily life? I feel like a total looser. I feel like, if people around me knew, they'd know I'm worth  nothing.

It makes it worse that it was in front of the kid. A kid that we tell everyday that there's no excuse for violence, because he bullies his younger brother.

I don't know how to deal with this.

[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.

[Melissinde]

Hi JoeBPD81,

This situation seems very tough for you.. it's hard to have the impression to live with 2 very different people.
I don't know if it can help because all situations are different but here is how it goes with me: when my pwBPD cools down after a crisis, he is not fully back to himself rightaway. He can reach out to me again a few hours after a crisis but is not yet back at the point where he can take an honest look at his actions and take responsibilities for them. Sometimes it takes a few days. It can be quite frustrating and infuriating because when he hurts me I need my pain to be aknowledged and recognised by him, and for him to take responsibility for his behaviour asap.

I don't know if your partner does the same, but have you considered maybe trying to talk to her about that a few days after the event, when she seems to be back in an emotionally open place?

[JoeBPD81]

Thanks Melissinde

She will. It's been 6 years together. But then she will be so ashamed, she'll say she has to leave me. And she would spend 2-4 days crying non stop.

Then she will find out that she has nowhere to go, no one willing to take them in. People will tell her "talk to Joe, he will forgive you, he's a good man", and she will feel disgusted about being "the bad guy", and trapped. She will promise herself and me that she will find another place to live for her and the kids ASAP.  I will brace myself for a breakup. And then... If the circle keeps going around, nothing will happen. She won't go, but she won't make any promises or commitments to stay and try to make things work. She won't tell me she wants to be with me, she'll just stay because she has nowhere to go. If I bring up the subject, she would remind me that, that they are leaving, wasn't I listening?

If I don't say anything, things would be back to normal, and she can become kind again, even sweet. But in the next problem, she'll say we don't talk.

I lost hope that things can be different.

[Melissinde]

She will promise herself and me that she will find another place to live for her and the kids ASAP.  I will brace myself for a breakup

Is that what you want?

[JoeBPD81]

That's a loaded question, isn't it?

Some moments I think I want them to go, and start making sense of my life. I don't know what I want after they leave. Many times I day dream about she coming back and realizing how valuable were those years they lived with me. I can't look very far into the future.

Things are so different and full of challenges day to day, that It's hard to have a clear position about anything.

She is a different person. I've forgotten things she did. Many times I have forgotten why we were angry 2-3 days ago. Maybe I'm a fool but it seems real when she's this shy, innocent girl, sweet with the kids and animals, shy with me... When she can be scary because how cold, vengeful, angry, cinic...she is sometimes. I love her when she's shy, and sweet, I also love her when she's an intelligent woman, witty, wise, funny (which is also a contrast with days she's like a child). I love her when she's vulnerable and her pain fills me with compassion... I don't want to leave this person.

But other days she's this bitter woman who's complaining about everything I do, she can insult me just for waking up to go to work, when she said she loved me last thing  the night before. She can be very angry and tell me very hurtful things and tell me straight up she doens't care about my feelings at all. That she wishes she never met me, that we are toxic, a mistake... One day she thanks me for being the best person she knows, and the next all about me is fake and I'm an A*#%*le.

One thing is for sure, when she's OK with me, we are not a couple. It's been a year since the last time we had sex, and this week she told me how she remembers it, and it's very distorted from what happened. Also she doesn't remember the last time, but the one before that. A year ago we were intimate maybe 2-3 times in 2-3 days. A good stage. The one before that was maybe 6-8 months prior to that. So all in all, we had sex in 2 good weeks in the last 2 years. She's a rape victim, I knew it pretty soon. Also, she was phisically abused by the father of the kids. That I knew before we were a couple. So I knew she could have issues and I respect it. I could live with little or no sex. But I can't live without affection. For me it's much worse that most of the time she doesn't seem to have good feelings towards me. There is rarelly kisses, hand holding, private jokes... We sleep in separate rooms... I have the feeling that my presence, or my existence even, would bother her most of the time. Neither of us do those things with someone else. So the little couple behavior we have is with each other. That's why we could be marginally called a couple.

To the outside, it looks just like a homeless family who's taking advantage of a fool.

We both act as parents to the kids. The younger is 9, and we've been 6 years together. So I'm the  only father he knows. But depending on her mood, I'm valued as a father or dismissed as an outsider. Both kids are a haldful and they are the source of most or the stress and drama at home. It's really hard to keep any plan, because we have conflicts everyday. They are both a 100% selfish, and they can't accept the existence of a brother, or the other people at home. So they go from happy to complete rage the minute things are not going their way. Or they start a fight just because they are bored. This happens 10-40 times a day, and always about the same things.

My selfish point is that I don't get any sense of accomplisment from the kids. They love me and touch me and hug me a lot. But it feels very invasive when they don't respect me at all or care about what hurts me, or what I might need. And when their mom, who is the one I want to have a physical relationship with, refuses contact.

So, it all points out that I should want them gone. Right? I hope some people here understand that I don't just kicks them out. I'm raised this way. Even the days  I absolutelly see that there's nothing for me, it's a situation about 4 people, 1 will be better if they leave, me , and 3 will be out homeless, jobless and unloved. So, it's a bad thing.

And not all days I see that it's the best thing for me either. I love them. I can't see a life where I won't be worried about them.

Does anything make sense?

[spinninghead]

Hey Joe BPD81,
I have no good advice for you, but I just want to say "I get it." I hear you, I validate you, and I understand. My family situation is not exactly the same, but what you've described as the contrast between the sweet, loving girl that fills you with compassion and the angry, lashing out woman that abuses you (it is abuse, PTSD or not) are what I live with also. I understand the pull of wanting all the bad to stop and I understand how difficult it is to make that happen. I get it totally. In my case, I've read a bunch of books on PTSD and BPD. I am trying to enact some of the changes I need to enact, going to therapy, etc etc... the end result is honestly maybe 1/2 of one percent better. Two weeks ago I felt physically afraid of her and used skills I learned in MOAB training at work to diffuse the situation without being physically attacked (the verbal attacks were intense). Once she slammed my finger in a door when she was angry and shutting me out of a room. She didn't mean to, and cried and apologized for being out of control, just like your significant other, but she also never said "I am sorry for crushing your finger" which seems like such a basically decent thing to do for a human.
I'm really sorry for the pain. I understand what it's like to love someone so much and be in this predicament. Wishing you the best. Keep reaching out here.

[JoeBPD81]

Thanks for writing back.

She's told me a list of books she has read about "letting go the anger", and it seems it does the opposite to her. She can't forgive me, even things she knows weren't bad at all, but made her feel bad in a moment. Or even things later were proved wrong. As in she was mad about something that actually didn't happen.

I'm alert and walking on eggshells, and feeling sneaky and wondering if I should mention this or that... Exactly as a shady person would do. But I have nothing going on in my life that's shady. I'm not Mother Theresa, but I'm a simple dude. I work, I try to rest, I have some hobbies... I don't drink, or smoke, I don't go out, I don't even socialice with other women (not even other men). And I provide for them. I don't deserve to feel shady.

If I were to put together a portrait of the thing she says about me, it would be aportrait of a disgusting person, someone I wouldn't want to spend any time with. And she's with me, thinking I'm that person. She's not with me knowing who I am.

Prior to this experience. any friend would say about me that I'm a good person, trustworthy, loyal, patient, honest. And now I question myself. And I don't know if my life was so easy that I hadn't been put to the test.

[Rev]

Hello my friend,

Wow... good for you for articulating this so well.
 
I just finished an MA thesis on male victims of domestic abuse and what you describe here fits the bill.  100%.

Great that you are here.

Sit with this for while. And if you would like, we can talk about this more.

I am not sure what part of the world you are in, but there are online groups that can be of help.

Rev

[JoeBPD81]

Hi,

I hope you're not sarcastic about how articulate I am. English is not my 1st language and I'm not always sure I convey the message I want.

It makes me very sad to consider the "label": victim. When being a victim is what made her so jumpy, and angry and ready to fight back all the time. Even when no one is trying to hurt her anymore. She won't find peace, and now I don't have peace either. She didn't deserve it, and I don't deserve it. For what I know, some of her agressors are peachy, living an easy and comfortable life. Her ex-husband spent one night in jail, and that's it. She's lived in hell most of her life. How's that fair?

The world seems a place where predators thrive and good people are destined to become preys. I think subconciously she has interiorized that view and decided it's best to become a predator herself. Only then it fills her with guilt and shame.

She's been up and down since. Mostly very sad. I don't know what to expect. I'm sad too, and very tired and unmotivated. I worry about what's gonna happen next. What's gonna happen if they leave, and what's gonna happen if they don't. She says she's been trying to change since she was a child and she doesn't believe she can at this point. What I see is the opposite, she tries to reason her way into reinforcing her irrational behaviour. I can't go into detail right now. In short, I thing she would win by stopping the fighting.

Now I see her so erratic, I don't know where is up and where is down. She talks to me as if it was easy to have in mind all the things she's told me, when most of them contradict each other, and I've been in trouble for following each one of them. I have the feeling that it's impossible to get it right. So some days I'm paralized, and some days I stop trying.

In this incident. She can move freely around the house, but I'm supposed to be always aware where she is facing, in order to never be at her back. I care, and I won't stand there on purpose. But It's not a way to live to be always that alert about another person and at the same time lead your own life (with two troubled kids). Also there are days when she is completelly OK with me at her back, even hugging her from behind. When she met me she said I was the only human being that could do that and she was thrilled and cried a lot in relief. I'm also the only one that can touch her legs.

She gets very mad when I try to explain that if I (or someone) happen to be at her back by chance, while walking towards other room, like this case. Is not that I don't care about her, or that I want her to suffer, or that I don't listen. It's simply that a thing like that can't be avoided 24/7 living in the same house. When I say it's an accident, she calls me all the names in the book.

This can't be fixed by the rest of the world avoiding her back area, because it's a lot of work, and it's a fear atmosphere.

[Rev]

Hi,

I hope you're not sarcastic about how articulate I am. English is not my 1st language and I'm not always sure I convey the message I want.

It makes me very sad to consider the "label": victim.

This can't be fixed by the rest of the world avoiding her back area, because it's a lot of work, and it's a fear atmosphere.

Hello again,

No sarcasm ... and I hear you about the label. As a matter of fact the research I read was pretty universal that men react negatively to the label. Pick another word if you would like - just so long as we understand each other. It's hard not to get caught in language when emotions are running high.

I think that one of the major blind spots than men encounter is that we can be encouraged to accept the behavior that could be called abusive - I prefer the word "coercive" and "coerced" - when we can understand why it's happening.  

This is unhealthy thinking in my estimation. To be well and properly boundaried is to at once - A) understand why the behavior is happening B) Not accept that coercive behavior be directed at me C) Seek a better path that involves both parties doing the necessary work... on themselves.  This is the root of compassion.

So I was just wanting to put that out there. Nothing more.  Not wanting to label you by any means.

Stay safe. Be well.

Rev

Just a note - abuse directed at men is characterized (at least in the western world) by a few things - A) Female abusers generally suffer from a personality disorder and there abusive behavior is generally unprovoked. Rarely to women cite self-defense as a reason for acting out. B) Most of the abusive a behavior that men suffer is psychological in nature, but the effects of depression and shame are the same as physical abuse. C) The most common symptoms that men suffer are deep rooted shame, PTSD and substance abuse (usually as a reaction to the shame and PTSD). D) Coercive behavior is characterized by something called micro-aggressions - a series of small, yet escalating acts that serve to marginalize another person (put them in "their place" so to speak)  Hope this helps you make sense of your own situation in some way.

[JoeBPD81]

Hi there,

I know her behaviour is abusive. There's no way around that.

Living with a pwBPD, and 2 troubling kids I've been reflecting a lot in how this works. In the line of what you say. The law judges you based on the facts and the consecuences of your actions. If you dig deep enough, doesn't everyone have a reason to commit hurtful actions agaist others? When are those reasons justifiable?

If you are mentally Ill, you still don't have the right to hurt others and do certain things. And at the same time, if you are mentally ill, maybe you don't have the necesary self control to stop yourself from doing something you know you are not allowed to do.

After hitting me, the next day, she said she would understand If I kick her out, not speak to her again, and report her. Any or all of the above.

I take it as a very bad sign, but there have been many things that hurt way more than that.

I feel I've been "put in my place" and it's a place that it's very unfair to me. I wouldn't put her in any place because I pay the bills, and I put a roof over her kids' heads. I encourage her to find a job that would maker her happier, but I don't demand she does it. But our reallity is like that, and she's the one who marginalizes me, I feel lika a visit that has overstayed his welcome. An intruder, a pest, a pain in her... Not all the time, of course. She insist on doing all the cleaning, and cooking and shopping (even as she doesn't drive), and she does nice things for me. But at this point it feels like she's trying to compensate out of guilt. Not out of love and tenderness.

[Domino]

Sorry to hear what you're going through. Instinct of course says 'dont put up with that crap'. But of course we're all here dealing with similar treatment. You're not alone feeling like you have to stifle your feelings constantly and put up with being treated badly.

I guess my advice would be to explain calmly how it makes you feel. It's not acceptable for her to hit you and it's definitely a boundary that needs to be set. If it upsets her to hear it, then so be it. You can't accept being hit just because you're scared of hurting her feelings if you say don't. You are 50% of this relationship too.