Abused No More

Abusive Men – Why They Don’t Want You To Be Happy

I was talking with a client who is taking that long, long walk away from her abusive husband and into freedom. 

And, yes, it feels like a frustrating journey that never reaches its destination because every step feels like a ‘baby step’ - and baby steps seem so small, and insignificant, when there is such a mountain to scale…  

But they are not.  

Never underestimate the power in those baby steps. 

My client is at the stage of asking hard questions and looking for answers.  One of the questions she asked is: “Why doesn’t he care about my feelings?” 

It’s a reasonable question – from the point of view of the abused woman. 

She does everything she can to love and support her man, and you might think he would appreciate this… 

But abusive men don’t appreciate what you do. 

They expect it, sure, but they don’t appreciate it. 

Of course, that is a violation of everything you are led to expect: generally speaking, one good turn deserves another. 

That’s not what happens in the Abusive Kingdom. 

My client was still struggling to understand – at heart level – why that is. 

I said to her: “Abusive men really do not like women.  In fact, they hate them.  They hate women in general, and your partner hates you in particular.” 

Now, quite a lot of abusive men run after every woman that has a pulse.  But that still doesn’t mean they like women.  It simply means that they hunt women.  They collect ‘scalps’, as it were.  They treat women as objects. 

They may appear to like the odd one or two unattainable ones (my was-band was particularly warmly disposed towards a beautiful lesbian friend of mine).  

They may profess to like the ones who are misguided enough to like them.  But still, by and large, they hate women. 

And the closer a woman gets to an abusive man, the more he gives expression to that hatred. 

My client was, understandably, shocked to hear that she had spent years with a man who hates women, and hates her. 

Still, she couldn’t quite internalize the enormity of it.  She asked: 

“But why does he do things that make me unhappy?” 

I tried explaining that happy people feel more empowered, and less isolated and dependent than unhappy people.  

And then I explained it to her this way: 

“When you meet an abusive man, clearly, you don’t know he is abusive, or you wouldn’t be there.  You’re looking for a partner, and you assess his potential to be a good partner – to the best of your knowledge.  He, on the other hand, is looking for… not so much a servant as a slave. 

The abusive man is looking for someone who will serve him 24-7 in various departments of his life: the bedroom, the kitchen, the finance department, parenting – both of his children, and himself – and so on, and so forth. 

But more than that, the abusive man is someone who will carry a heavy load of loathing - his loathing both for himself and for other people.  

He is looking for someone he can dump that load on, forever after. 

Enter the loving, supportive, biddable, naïve woman… 

You know what happens next. 

What he needs is for you to carry that heavy load on your back, forever after. Provided your back looks nearly strong enough, and your shoulders nearly broad enough, he attaches himself to you.  

He needs you... 

He needs you to be bent double, carrying that weight for him, so that he can stand up straight, and feel free of it.  

Now, of course, it is the case with healthy partners that both partners want to remove all heavy loads from the relationship. 

Abusers are different.  Abusers start from the premise that there is, always has been, and always will be, a heavy load to carry.  Therefore they need someone to carry it for them.  

That person is you.

(That’s why it’s always felt like such hard work.) 

That’s why they can’t bear it when you feel happy, when you enjoy good times with friends, family or children, when you have plans for your own life. 

You’ve put their load down! 

They can’t tolerate that.  

You’re not allowed to do that.

It's not part of your job description; as far as they are concerned. 

You are their emotional slave, after all. 

Spoiling the moment, and treating you badly is their way of putting the load straight back on your shoulders. 

That’s all that matters to them.  

When you are bent double under their load of negative feelings that is – quite literally – a huge weight off their shoulders. 

That’s why they don’t want you to be happy; or, more precisely, can’t bear it when you are happy for more than about a nanosecond.  

It’s not nice.  It’s not reassuring.  And it’s not about you.  

That is simply the dynamic of abusive relationships.  And that’s why there is no point hanging around trying to change them.  

Falling in love stinks when...

My client wept down the phone as she asked herself – not for the first time: “How could he treat me like that?” 

She’d met a man who led her to believe he was The One, and she’d fallen head-over-heels (or should that be head-over-Heel?) in love. 

You know as well as I do what happened next.  He was an abuser.  He lied, deceived, hurt and humiliated her. 

Months later - like all abused women - she was still asking: “How could he?” 

The short answer is: he did because he could. 

The long answer hinges on his inadequacies, and needing to hurt her to feel like a Big Man.  But the short answer is more useful here. 

Falling-In-Love stinks because… 

Imagine it is the end of an unbearably hot day.  You’re worn out, drained, crying out for a pool of cool water, so you can wash off the hassles of the day. And you’re a long, long way from home, travelling without a clear direction.  As night falls, you come across someone who is walking in the same direction as you. 

He strikes up a conversation.  You talk about the day and you tell him you’re looking for a pool of cool water to bathe in.  You just want to relax, let go, and feel the sense of peace and well-being that being immersed in cool, clear water gives you. 

He not only seems to understand, he tells you that he knows just such a place.  In fact, he’s heading there, himself.  

He invites you to travel along the journey with him. 

You agree.  

He’s nice enough, after all.   

He wants the same thing you want.

He’s sympathetic to your feelings.  

You prefer having pleasant company to travelling the road, at night, all alone. 

By the time you finally reach the place he told you about, you’ve discovered you have a lot in common.  He thinks as you think about a lot of things.  He’s made you laugh, and lifted your mood. 

You’re tired of being hot, sticky, and tired out.  There’s something magical about the stillness of the place, the dying heat of the day, the darkness.  It’s so dark by now, that you’ve let him take your hand to guide you. 

He leads you to the place – a swimming pool, he now tells you, not a natural pond, but, hey, that’s all right, it’s still cool, fresh water – and he says to you: “Dive in.  I’ll join you in just a moment.” 

You can’t wait to shed the troubles of the day.  So you do what he says.  

You dive in. 

And you hit your head on the bottom.

Hard. 

Why? 

Because there was no water in that pool.  

You hadn’t stopped to check, because you couldn’t see clearly, and you’d built up what felt like a relationship with him.  

And you would never have imagined he could deliberately do something like that to you, because you would never, ever do something that nasty to another person… 

And Falling-In-Love is exactly like diving into a swimming pool without taking the time to notice whether or not it is filled with water. 

I have a lot of time for love.  As far as I’m concerned, loving someone worthy and being well loved by that person is as good as it gets. 

But that’s all about a mutually loving relationship. 

It’s a far cry from Falling-In-Love.

Falling-In-Love, as far as I can see, is about leaping without looking. 

Falling-In-Love lays you open to the whole unsavory pack of jerks, abusers, and narcissists.

I asked my client whether she would take a job without first finding out about the pay and terms of employment.  She sounded surprised.  She answered, briskly: “Of course not.”  

Then she saw the connection. 

You don’t have to fall in love on Day 1, Day 2, or Day 20. 

Falling-In-Love is optional, not obligatory – although it is a neat way of silencing the little voice in your head that says: “Er… I don’t think so.  This one is NOT for me!” 

Falling-In-Love throws a thick blanket of fantasy over an unpromising reality… for a little while.  It allows you not to look at your niggling doubts about the person.

Then the blanket dissolves leaving you with a very, very sore heart. 

Even if you do feel yourself Falling-In-Love – it happens - there is no sense in diving into the relationship blind.  First, you want to be very sure that you will not hit your head, very hard, on a concrete floor.  

Abusive men often tell us they’re no good.  And we don’t believe them!  

Which means we fail to trust the evidence of our eyes, our ears – and our intuition. 

Falling-In-Love is a wonderful, chemical ‘high’.  

And it stinks.  

You pay way too high a price for that high. 

Because Falling-In-Love means you don’t take the time to really check out whether the man is an abusive jerk, or Mr Perfect-for-You.  

So, am I saying “give up, or get a marriage broker”? 

Not at all.  

What I am saying is that giving your love, and trust, to another person is probably the most important investment you will ever make in your personal life.  

Do it carefully. 

Learn to love another person by inches – or centimetres, if you prefer.  

And start to love yourself – IN SPADES – first.

 

“What’s wrong with me?”

There comes a point in every abusive relationship when you know you should get out. 

Your abusive partner is making you miserable, you know the relationship is all wrong and, as far as you can see, your life has stopped dead… 

But still you stay. 

We’ve all done it.  

The little voice of intuition told me my marriage was over about 6 weeks in, but that didn’t stop me staying for some 20 years. 

We know we should leave, but we don’t. 

Instead, we ask ourselves: 

“What’s wrong with me?” 

And we come up with a load of answers – all of them wrong… 

But we stay, and we keep on asking the same old question: “What’s wrong with me?” 

So, what is wrong with you?  

What was wrong with me? 

Try this one on for size: 

You were brought up to be “nice”.  You were brought up to be nice: your role was to please other people and delay gratification.  The idea of being rewarded by pleasure now was programmed out of you.  

You were taught what you had to do for others.  You weren’t taught that other people had a duty to reciprocate. 

Still less were you taught to select your friends, and partner, only from those people who did meet your kindness with kindness, your thoughtfulness with thoughtfulness, your selflessness with selflessness.  

I’ve noticed that whenever I talk with abused women about selflessness in a partner, it raises a wry smile of disbelief. 

“Could selflessness possibly be a two-way street?” 

So, let’s do a quick reality check: 

Because you haven’t experienced it, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. 

Because you have experienced a load of selfish, hurtful, destructive behaviour, that doesn’t make selfish, hurtful, destructive behaviour the norm.  And it certainly doesn’t make it acceptable. 

It’s been normal for your abusive husband.  

It may have been normal in your family of origin. 

Being on the receiving end of abusive treatment has become normal for you.  

It’s been programmed into you for so long that you have developed an abused persona. 

That persona is not who you truly are. 

It puts me in mind of the story of the lion who thought he was a sheep.  If you don’t know already know that story, you can read it here:  

You’re not a sheep.  

You are actually a lioness. 

Maybe it’s not time for you to leave the grassy valley, yet.  Maybe, you don’t feel you have the strength to climb the mountain, yet.  

Although, if you realized who you truly are, that mountain would draw you to it. 

But one thing you can do right now: 

You can find better answers to that question: “What’s wrong with me?” 

Your programming is wrong – and once you make the decision to change it, you’ll be amazed to see yourself grow into your true stature. 

That’s all that’s ‘wrong’ with you. 

Oh, and the question is a poor one.  

So, you don’t feel like heading off the mountain just now.  That’s okay, Leonie <g>. 

But please, please, change the question.  

Ask yourself not what’s wrong with you - you already know the answer to that: your programming is out, at the moment.  Normally, when that happens, you get the programming – or the software - sorted out, you don’t just give up on the hardware.  Do you? 

Here are a couple of questions to help you start reprogramming the software: 

• What is wrong with him, that he always finds fault?
• What is wrong with the situation that needs to change?