Piecing things together

[HealingMama]

Don't risk infection is my own advice, especially if you're supposed to be teleworking anyway!

Thank you. I am probably going to submit the letter. I just hate to stir the pot or be asking for special treatment in the middle of a crisis.

 

[HealingMama]

My x husband did the same thing....kicked me when I was down...said nasty unsupportive things that put the blame back on me........his hurt was a little here....a little there........and grew into more obvious gaslighting when the time suited him.....I'd rather be alone and not get kicked by anyone but me than to never know when it would happen....but always know it would happen at some point to really upend my day. Sorry you are not trusting your husband....a hard place to be.

Thanks. Unfortunately I think my husband has a fundamental belief that I'm illogical and hence inferior, that my effort at empathy is an effort to manipulate (he basically said that last night), that I'm just a fight picker rather than a confronter vs avoider. I've had the presence of mind to link my difficult behaviors to trauma triggers and he's said he thinks that I am trying to manipulate him when I do that. No, but if you can see why I'm doing it then maybe you'll choose compassion instead of judgment and not see me so negatively.

I try to get him to move out of his head into his heart, and he doesn't want to, especially if it means facing his imperfections.

 

[TruthSeeker]

Thanks. Unfortunately I think my husband has a fundamental belief that I'm illogical and hence inferior, that my effort at empathy is an effort to manipulate (he basically said that last night), that I'm just a fight picker rather than a confronter vs avoider. I've had the presence of mind to link my difficult behaviors to trauma triggers and he's said he thinks that I am trying to manipulate him when I do that. No, but if you can see why I'm doing it then maybe you'll choose compassion instead of judgment and not see me so negatively.

I try to get him to move out of his head into his heart, and he doesn't want to, especially if it means facing his imperfections.

So sorry to hear about your dilemma. My x was/is a control freak....and any "heart to heart" was started by me.....and those talks were never a satisfactory resolution.

You can't change him....but you can change you.....and if talking to him isn't working.....and if counseling between you two isn't an option,

consider going the silent route.....and say nothing but positive things when you open your mouth (like "you might be right, I'll consider what you have to say, it's possible.....all answers which aren't yes and aren't no) and ignore his negative behaviors-don't bring up his shit....just work on your own.....don't answer when he's negative.......and say nothing if you have nothing positive to say.

One of two things will happen, he will either back down......and just exist more quietly in your relationship....or he will get worse for attention.....hopefully, not the latter. Then you just work on you.....and get your praise from here and other positive places till you are stronger and better able to deal with your relationship issues. Just a thought....

 

[HealingMama]

One day of feeling calm and normal. Woke up today with sensory issues, consciousness issues, I just want to feel normal across time.

Husband basically getting laid off due to coronavirus shut down. Probably will pull kid from daycare. I am working from home and dread doing so with both of them here. It was nice to have one day where I could just enjoy it.

I am sure others are sacrificing much more than me and I truly am richly blessed.

 

[TruthSeeker]

One day of feeling calm and normal. Woke up today with sensory issues, consciousness issues, I just want to feel normal across time.

Husband basically getting laid off due to coronavirus shut down. Probably will pull kid from daycare. I am working from home and dread doing so with both of them here. It was nice to have one day where I could just enjoy it.

I am sure others are sacrificing much more than me and I truly am richly blessed.

I'm sorry you are seeing a decline in income....that really sucks.

 

[HealingMama]

I'm sorry you are seeing a decline in income....that really sucks.

Thank you for the kind words.

 

[HealingMama]

Therapy again. Discussed trauma history and found myself thinking I've not been through enough to struggle with the symptoms I have. We discussed the theory that there might be some sexual trauma in my history that I'm not aware of.

He asked if when new parts Clic forward, if I click backward and I don't. So it would be OSDD if anything.

Apparently my husband experiences me as much more disorganized than I experience myself. He said I am "very different from day to day" including things that I say I want. I'm aware if he takes a while to do something I've asked for it is possible that the thing I asked for will no longer be important or on fact I may want something different.

So much inner conflict. It's really exhausting.

The session ended with a part sharing the front with me that doesn't usually, so I didn't feel like myself and it lasted for hours. Did a yoga healing session thing that helped but then it switched out again later in the evening and was uncomfortable plus I have thoughts like "I wish you'd just go away" or "I don't want to feel like this" which I know isn't helpful.

I tried to journal to increase communication among my inner parts but nobody said anything. My therapist said I am probably putting too much pressure on the situation. Apparently it's more likely to be in the moment collaboration and cooperation but that is stressful for me as a planner and control freak to just allow.

I also struggle to allow ANY childlike experiences, any play, any fun. My childlike experiences are usually parts with huge shock and grief.

Yesterday was our anniversary. We didn't really celebrate. I'm not sure we even should. All the restaurants are closed and the person we would use as a sitter is immunocompromised so it would be irresponsible to have a date night anyway. And why should we when we keep fighting and are separated in the same home. He keeps saying he loves me. He lost his job due to the pandemic and let's just say we have been a little stressed.

 

[TruthSeeker]

So sorry to hear you are struggling. Yeah-I got the OSDD label...and it can be a struggle sometimes....especially if the external world starts crumbling. Every once in a while I have like a personal part's party. It happens when school is cancelled...and pandemics....LOL.
Free time doing specific planned fun things.....is better mentally than doing all the have-to's and having lots of irritation in my head....so right now I photograph wild animals (right now deer, water birds, and song birds are out), cook on the grill favorite foods, go to the park......you can have a celebration.....just do it as a family and then play games! Maybe having some fun can help to lighten the moment.

 

[HealingMama]

So sorry to hear you are struggling. Yeah-I got the OSDD label...and it can be a struggle sometimes....especially if the external world starts crumbling. Every once in a while I have like a personal part's party. It happens when school is cancelled...and pandemics....LOL.
Free time doing specific planned fun things.....is better mentally than doing all the have-to's and having lots of irritation in my head....so right now I photograph wild animals (right now deer, water birds, and song birds are out), cook on the grill favorite foods, go to the park......you can have a celebration.....just do it as a family and then play games! Maybe having some fun can help to lighten the moment.

Yes specific planned fun things. I love that you photograph wild animals. We are trying to go out for hikes more. Parks here are closed but there's other places we can go. I have been watching a lot of dumb tv also, stuff that's easy and makes me laugh. Keeping expectations low. Everyone is on edge.

Nice to hear from someone else with OSDD. I feel like such an outcast LOL here in the forums there's a lot of single incident or straightforward PTSD. But elsewhere if they engage dissociative symptoms it's all about DID and seems to be a lot of younger Tumblr people that write bios for all their parts and it's really overwhelming! Like ok I'm a system and there's people here with me but I don't want to name my system and change colors and fonts and maybe that's just because I'm hardheaded but that just all seems complicated and being this many pieces is complicated enough. No offense meant if you do any of that. More power to you! I've just felt very out of place without a community.

I specifically asked my T to not diagnose me with anything because I am using insurance and it is supposed to be private but realistically isn't always, and there's a lot of weird stigma so I'm just listed as chronic PTSD on my records.

I have started recording yoga chant videos, possibly to share online somewhere. Keeps my vibes up.

I'd love to see a nature photo if you ever want to share one with me!

 

[HealingMama]

I contacted a domestic abuse hotline today, regarding myself as the instigator. It was helpful, and embarrassing. I definitely have coped poorly with my partner's difficulties in communication and self-regulation. I have made some bad decisions. I have had an unruly protector part and behaved badly and that sucks. I have crossed some lines. Shame on me. No matter what he is or isn't doing, there is no excuse for some of the things that I have done to try to force him to make space for me. I should have just ended the relationship rather than try to make him change.

In the past I sought support anonymously about some abusive behaviors, and the people who responded somehow found out who I was, and based on other questions I had posed, they basically told me I was being gaslit and driven to abusive behaviors based on my husband's stuckness, neglect, etc. It was nice to be validated I guess but in that moment I was actually trying to get help to not be a control freak and everyone just said "honey anyone in your shoes would be a control freak, you need to get out, he has manipulated you into feeling like you're the abusive one but it's him" and, well, okay, but that isn't what I was asking for.

One thing bothers me about my hotline call today. The hotline people seem to only validate active forms of abuse, and did not address the validity of covert abuse. Is refusing to get a job financial abuse? Is refusing to ever communicate abusive? Is the absence of healthy behaviors abusive or is it only the presence of unhealthy behaviors that counts? I asked about the Water Torturer abuser style a la Lundy Bancroft and they kind of brushed me off. That is disappointing.

(Bancroft is aware of a full-text version of his book online and is okay with it.)

"THE WATER TORTURER [Lundy Bancroft, Why Does He Do That?]

The Water Torturer's style proves that anger doesn't cause abuse. He can assault his partner psychologically without even raising his voice. He tends to stay calm in arguments, using his own evenness as a weapon to push her over the edge. He often has a superior or contemptuous grin on his face, smug and self-assured. He uses a repertoire of aggressive conversational tactics at low volume, including sarcasm, derision—such as openly laughing at her—mimicking her voice, and cruel, cutting remarks. Like Mr. Right, he tends to take things she has said and twist them beyond recognition to make her appear absurd, perhaps especially in front of other people. He gets to his partner through a slow but steady stream of low-level emotional assaults, and perhaps occasional shoves or other minor acts of violence that don't generally cause visible injury but may do great psychological harm. He is relentless in his quiet derision and meanness....This style of man rarely lasts long in an abuser program unless he has a court order. He is so accustomed to having complete success with his tactics that he can't tolerate an environment where the counselors recognize and name his maneuvers and don't let him get away with them. He tends to rapidly decide that his group leaders are as crazy as his partner and heads for the door.

The central attitudes driving the Water Torturer are:

• You are crazy. You fly off the handle over nothing.

• I can easily convince other people that you're the one who is messed up.

• As long as I'm calm, you can't call anything I do abusive, no matter how cruel.

• I know exactly how to get under your skin."

Bottom line, the relationship is very unhealthy but I am bringing this up to dissect for myself because my partner called me abusive and says he is very anxious around me and I am trying to understand what is truth and what is manipulation (intentional or otherwise). My husband sees himself as a victim in most areas of his life. His first wife left him for another man, not because he had untreated mental illness and didn't proactively manage it. He got laid off and feels sorry for himself rather than seeing how he was not treating his ADHD properly. He feels victimized by God for having ADHD and having all these bad things happen in his life. So, when he sees himself as a victim to my actions, I had to call a hotline to get a third party's opinion because he so easily paints himself that way.

He laid into me yesterday. I am still not sure what triggered it. I think because I mentioned that we are currently separated and he was assuming because I am acting civil and nice that the things I've said when I was upset are not real for me. I have told him for weeks now I cannot tolerate the stonewalling and since he refuses to communicate I have no choice but to end the relationship. He seems to not believe me when I say that, which I guess I understand why but it is exhausting having to prove that my decisions exist across time when I already struggle with a lot of inner conflict that makes it hard to make a decision and stick with it. It's very hard to do that, and he questions it and makes me work all the more harder at it.

I am tired. I should never have chosen an avoidant person. He talks about me like I'm a monster. He sees himself as a victim. He does this awful thing where he makes a comment and before I can respond he bails on the conversation. I always see his back and he never promises to return. He just disappears. So last night and today I have done the same thing. He doesn't understand how it feels to have someone nope out of a conversation before you are ready to end it, so I'll show him.

He also does this thing where he will come back to a text based conversation and ignore everything I said before to say something on his mind. He doesn't respond to what I said previously. Today he was writing to me and I responded saying "I am just coming back to say my own thing without reading what you wrote because you have done that to me a hundred thousand times and I would like you to understand how it feels."

Toxic but it's one thing I've not tried yet. Maybe if I give him his own behavior back, without any malice, he will eventually understand why I am acting the way I am. If he truly has an avoidant attachment style then there's someone in there that does want connection and support, and that part of him will feel what I have felt every time he's bailed on the relationship leaving me with the pressure of all the issues.

I am so over this relationship. Before someone comes in to say we should not be texting, he is so avoidant that this is the only way I can communicate with him. He does not tolerate a conversation in person. He will stare at his phone the whole time, or yell at me, or storm off. He cuts it off no matter how I'm trying to communicate, but it hurts less if I'm not trying to be heard in person.

I am tired. I am tired of a relationship that only functions if I do not dare share any authentic communication about unmet needs. Does not matter how softly I share my discontent or disapproval. He breaks everything if that is what I am trying to communicate.

I guess I will go back to a Stepford wife approach. He's not working. I'm working two jobs. Apparently wanting him to clean the kitchen once after dinner each day is asking too much. He agreed to it, and continues to break his agreement, and will not be held accountable. I resent his lack of financial contribution so much. You would think that he would at least be willing to do this one domestic thing so I can appreciate a clean space between jobs. But apparently he can't handle this one thing. Always an excuse, never just "yeah, sorry, I broke my agreement to do this for you after you worked so hard to negotiate for your needs and compromise in a respectful manner. I cannot be bothered to hold myself accountable to these agreements."

I really want to take the dish that has been soaking in the sink since dinner last night (which is when he promised to clean the kitchen including emptying the sink) and put it in his bed. But apparently that's childish and dysfunctional. Well, so is breaking an agreement. We had a huge fight about it, and he still cannot be bothered to do this ONE thing he agreed to.

 

[HealingMama]

I am reading about covert abuse tactics. It is not good. I am recognizing a LOT of my husband's behavior especially the grooming and the denial/minimizing/twisting reality stuff.

I am tired. I feel like I do not know which end is up here. I do not trust my own instincts anymore. That is also not good.

It is hard to do some of my self-care right now. Husband watches kid during the day so I'm tagging in as soon as I finish work, and basically solo parenting til job 2. I am getting very little self-care time. I am sure a lot of people are in the same boat. It is a hard time to have trauma, when everyone around me is very anxious and unsure. I had a sudden death anxiety attack the other day and went to my therapist with it (not the trauma one, the other one), and she was terribly unsupportive. I was getting ready to terminate anyway for financial reasons. I have a lot of skills that I need to practice, and beyond that I just need somewhere to vent and I do not necessarily need to pay for that. I will start journaling more.

I will give myself credit as I have done a really good job remaining regulated in front of our child. I have not escalated anything. I have backed off if he looks like he is getting dysregulated. I have worked hard to maintain a safe environment for our child. I am exhausted. I have had basically nobody to share my emotions with and feel safe in doing so. I have had to keep it together all day at work, around my child, my husband cannot tolerate my emotions, I have to table them for my clients. I have nowhere to put all this energy.

 

[HealingMama]

I am tired of being in a relationship that robs me of my ability to be present in other areas of my life. When there is a conflict I cannot concentrate on anything else. I'm so jealous of those that can. I did so many things to help me transition today so that I could just show up going through the motions of normal and it isn't working. I am so overwhelmed.