Too long

[Wolfe]

I was sexually assaulted by my older sister from the age of about four until I was nearly nine. She would induce me to do different sexual things to her and then when she was finished she would be really mean and abusive toward me. Fast forward to my early twenties when I met and married my soul mate. We enjoyed a loving and passionate first couple of years of marriage until one morning my wife very lovingly asked me if I could stay awake after we made love so that we could maintain our connection which she felt was slipping. At this stage in my life I had blocked out my abuse and had relegated it to "the things that all kids do" Well I freaked out and started shouting and yelling and blaming her and got really angry. This behavior was repeated for the next eighteen years until after many years of her trying different coping techniques and strategies my wife said she had had enough and was leaving with our two young girls. I broke down finally and told her and in a sense myself what had happened to me as a child. She was amazing and responded with nothing but love and support but now five years later and several therapists later I still am neglecting and abusing her. I have been able to see myself as a survivor but I just haven't come to terms with the fact that I am an abuser also. It just triggers the shit out of me and whenever my wife and I sit down to talk I just keep giving stump speeches and reasons and excuses and promises. I want to repay my wife for all the love, patience and support she has given me. I have to break out of this cycle but I just feel so mute and trapped and guilty. I don't know what to do!

 

[Mishka95673]

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[Esposa]

Hi Wolfe. I have been the recipient of the type of abuse you describe your wife enduring. I know intimately how covert and painful it can be, when your partner turns on you - and not as an act of consciousness but as a repetition of painful patterns from his childhood. It is hard for everyone involved.

I would suggest a structured separation. One that you present to her as a gift. A break, where she gets some peace without losing you - and you get some time to work on yourself without access to the target of your anger. When the target is removed, in my experience, you will be forced to come face to face with the patterns you are recreating in your life. It is not about her and it is not personal - that said, no one deserves to be abused regardless of the contributing factors.

 

[Mishka95673]

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[Wolfe]

Thank you for your comments but this was my first really open post here and I completely misrepresented what I have done to my wife for 22 years. We only had one happy year until I started to abuse her. I stopped physically threatening and chasing her only after our first child was born. (I manipulated her into having kids with me by saying many disgusting things I regret and even though she said she didn't want to have kids with someone who abused her, she did it because she believed the lies I told her about getting better. This was long before she knew about my CSA.)

I still corner her from time to time. I still verbally abuse her, but that's also decreased because of the kids. My emotional abuse is a way of life. It's the only way our marriage knows how to work. She's tried to leave many times, but I beg her to stay and promise I'll stop, but the truth is, I didn't ever admit to myself that I was abusing her. I have, in short, dehumanized her the way my sister dehumanized me. I don't see her at all and I never ask her how she really is because I'm afraid and I don't really want to hear her answer. I don't show her love. We talk, but when we do, it's always about me and I control the conversation so I can talk about myself or what I think. It's massive control on my part.

She is strong and has helped me through my situation since I told her. She helped me through the first 18 years before I told her, too. I have no idea how she is still here after all of this. If I was her, I'd have left me in year 3. The night she was about to leave (when I told her) was after another huge fight because I was angry for no reason. She's done nothing but try to help me and all I can do is abuse her and distrust her and she's really the only trustworthy person in my life. She just put me through college. She allowed me to do college full time and brought in all the money through three jobs to get me here and I'm about to graduate and all I do is still ignore and abuse her.

I need to know how to stop dehumanizing her. I don't know why or how I do this but I need to learn how to stop.

We've talked a lot about separation. I see what you're both saying about that and our problem is, with only one income, this is impossible and I am 100% isolated. I don't have any friends or family. I depend solely on her. I've made her stay for this long. And she's stayed because i keep saying I'll change or get help but even the therapy I've done sometimes feels as ham-fisted as my original post on this thread.

She keeps trying to help me but I go back to square one every time and she knows I'm abusing her and she knows that abuse is a conscious choice, and that's what hit me and made me write that original ham-fisted post. I know abusing her is a choice. It's my choice. It's not because something happened to me. That's never the case. I understand that I linked the two, but it's because I'm trying to say too much in one post.

What I really need to know is: How do I stop abusing my wife? How do I show her the love I have for her? I need to see her for who she is and not the stand in for my sister that I have made her. She is the most caring, loving, considerate person I have ever met and this needs to stop now.

 

[Mishka95673]

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[Esposa]

Wolfe... let's look at the steps of any sort of recovery. 1...acknowledge the problem (exhibit A, your post above). 2...that you can't solve this alone and 3...the will to make change.

To me, you sound like you are tracking the right way.

Here are my thoughts...

Your wife needs to get some help for codependency, whether through a support group, an abuse group or simply going to al-anon will do the trick. (She can message me, I am solidly in codependency recovery!) This way she can learn to establish and defend her boundaries.

I still go back to a little separation, even if you just go stay with a family member or friend - limit all contact and kind of get your head out of the pattern. Talk only of the children and of nothing else. Remove the target.

Then, you have to work and work hard. Fast and furious.

I had a therapist tell me once that we are all either Victims or Victimizers. This stuck with me because my husband was a victim who grew into a man who thought that they only way to avoid ever being a victim again was to be the victimizer. I became the victim. You need someone who can help you build your idea of self, your self worth, your self esteem because frankly, baring real personality disorder, we attack others when we feel vulnerable or weak ourselves. So build that person back up, take back control of your story and you may see that you feel more worthy, less vulnerable and ultimately less aggressive.

 

[HD001]

This post really struck a chord with me and in a surprising way. Your behavior reminds me of who I used to be and the way I used to treat people who were close to me. controlling others and keeping them down was the only way I felt like had any control in my life. Having a truly close caring relationship was was something I couldn't even begin to know how to participate in. And like so many others I believe that my behavior was drive by fear of getting abused again or even rejected or abandoned. My sense of self was so shattered that even the smallest slight from another felt like an attack on my being. Although before recovery I didn't see what drove my behavior.
Spending the last decade on recovery has been the hardest thing I have ever done. If has broken and rebuilt me over and over again. It has exposed old wounds and ugliness that I could barley stand to look at and it has been the most wonderful thing I could ever do.
Whether you believe you can or believe you can't you a probably right. This has become my mantra.