Welcome To A Road Less Traveled

1. She destroyed my possessions

Intimidation:

1. Scaring me with with looks


2. Yelling


3. Gestures


4. Body Language
   
5. Throwing Things
   
6. Destroying Property
   
7. Showing Up Uninvited or Unannounced
   
8. Not honoring my desires for her not to be here at certain times
   
9. Throwing tantrums when I tried to set boundaries
   
10. Constantly threatening to leave if I did not let her have her own way
    

Emotional Abuse:

1. Verbally Assaulting with insults


2. Criticisms
   
3. Name Calling
   
4. Punishing me for making mistakes
   
5. Professing that I was unlovable and sexually inadequate


6. Ignoring my feelings, thoughts, and concerns


7. Used intimate knowledge to create vulnerability
   
8. "Drastic mood changes or sudden emotional outbursts. Whenever someone in your life reacts very differently at different times to the same behavior from you, tells you one thing one day and the opposite the next, or likes something you do one day and hates it the next, you are being abused with unpredictable responses."

Denying (all of this category found on another emotional abuse site) Most of this fit.

1. Denying a person's emotional needs, especially when they feel that need the most, and done with the intent of hurting, punishing or humiliating
   
2. The other person may deny that certain events occurred or that certain things were said. confronts the abuser about an incident of name calling, the abuser may insist, "I never said that," "I don't know what you're talking about," etc. You know differently.


3. The other person may deny your perceptions, memory and very sanity.
   Withholding is another form of denying. Withholding includes refusing to listen, refusing to communicate, and emotionally withdrawing as punishment. This is sometimes called the "silent treatment."
   
4. When the abuser disallows and overrules any viewpoints, perceptions or feelings which differ from their own.
   
5. Denying can be particularly damaging. In addition to lowering self-esteem and creating conflict, the invalidation of reality, feelings, and experiences can eventually lead you to question and mistrust your own perceptions and emotional experience.


6. Denying and other forms of emotional abuse can cause you to lose confidence in your most valuable survival tool: your own mind.

Isolation:

1. Attempted to control who I saw, socialized with, and talked to


2. Created an exaggerated Dependency on her

Sexual Abuse:

1. Attempted to make me feel bad about my sexual history
   
2. Demeaning remarks about my sexual response levels

Economic Abuse:

1. Created a situation whereas she had control of finances
   
2. Used finances to control me, hurt me, and punish me
   
3. Damaged Property
   

Entitlement:

1. Treated me as inferior
   
2. Used differences to her advantage - lack of class privilege, disability, physical ability, history of trauma.
   
3. Almost Always came first
   
4. Interfered with sleep

Intellectual Abuse:

1. Would throw up in my face that I log and document everything

Spiritual Abuse

1. Attempted to interfere with my way of studying the bible and meditations
   
2. Attempted to control and regulate who I socialized with and sat with at church
   
3. Refused to let me have my alone time with God & Meditations
   
4. Attempted to dictate how I could meditate and sit with God.

There is a lot more, but this is a pretty good recap of the major things. It did not take me long to get my belly full and I got out from under it. The article I linked this title to is a great one on same sex abusive relationships.

I know I was afraid of her and felt like I was walking on eggshells. No matter how carefully I would word things not to set her off, she would ignite anyway.

This started early in when it should have been the honeymoon period.

Had I stuck to my guns and gone with the one year rule, I could have spared myself a lot of misery and pain. I was warned by my therapist and pastor not to allow this to move so quickly. I allowed myself to be manipulated and it moved more quickly than I had hoped it would. This is an area I definately have to work on.

This woman is a psych nurse and I believe she has the tools and skills to manipulate me and misused her expertise. Without question she had to be an authority figure; Power and Control is important to her.

One of the reasons I opted not to put blow by blow details here, is this is how I set myself up for getting into this mess in the first place. She had studied my writings and had plenty to work with in knowing what is important to me and the things that bothered me, as well as my likes and dislikes. Initially she came across as caring and attentative.

The positive is I saw this for what it was early in. Even then, it took time to go through the cycle of realization and exactly how I should handle it. I kept hoping it would get better, but it did not.

While not all areas of any of the emotional and verbal abuse articles applied here, many did. I was actually surprised to see how many.

I think one thing that same sex partners go through that hetero partners are not up against is there are less laws to protect them both physically and financially. I have not studied up on adding people with disabilities vs emotional and verbal abuse. I would imagine there are additional vulnerabilities in this area.

I hope this helps others who run across this in blog world and cyber-space to know they are not alone. What I have learned from this is not standing up for myself was about fear of what they could do next and how it would effect my life. The reality is once they do whatever it is they are going to do, they can never hurt you in these ways again. At some point it will exhaust itself.

Here's To Striving For Healthy Relationships & Friendships!