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Dealing with abusive behavior from someone who as quickly will say they love you…
02 Apr 2007 by Rod Smith in Anxiety, Betrayal, Differentiation, Divorce, Domination, Manipulation, Reactivity, Recovery, Therapeutic Process, Victims, Violence, Voice / 19 Comments
A few thoughts on dealing with inappropriate or threatening behavior like shouting, swearing, pushing, restricting movement, drunkenness, withholding keys, wallet, or personal items from someone, who will also then will claim, usually within a very short time, to love you:
1. If your most intimate relationship has degenerated to any one of the mentioned behaviors, ask yourself if this is the kind of relationship you really want. Is this how you want to spend your most intimate emotional energy?
2. Remind yourself that relationship pathology (unwanted and unhealthy patterns) will not subside or decline without some radical shift within the dynamic of one of the participants. On the contrary, without some change, unwanted behaviors will only grow. It takes ONE person to shift (usually the victim) before some change occurs.
3. Remember that the perpetrator usually of does not want to be exposed for the behavior, and somehow will achieve the remarkable position where the victim (or victims) somehow agrees to maintaining the secret. Victims, if any change can occur, must find the courage to let someone from the “outside” in on the secret of what is really occurring, in order to get the help required to get out of such a position. Remember victims distort reality as much as perpetrators. This is the reason “outsiders” can see what you might fail to see.
4. Try to resist using reason with the perpetrator of such behavior – you will not, using reason, convince a perpetrator to stop abusive behavior. The only way to stop it is to radically shift your response to it. While you cooperate with what you do not want the behavior will not cease.About the Author: Rod Smith
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Verbal log-jam
When I was a boy I’d endlessly practice the fluent delivery of my name but it seldom flowed easily from my lips. As if it was new news to me, adults pointed out my stutter. Perhaps they thought I was beginning, at that precise moment, for the first time in my life to spit from the mouth, twist at the neck, jig my head back and forth trying to expel some inane statement log-jammed between my gut and my throat.
Idiots – always adults, children were surprisingly patient, – would make me repeat sentences as if a repeat performance of the humiliating uncoordinated gesticulations, my arms and legs flying in all directions, would make for an easier delivery the second time. That I’d just spent every ounce of energy trying to cough it up was lost on them. That I was already thoroughly humiliated was something to which they were blind.“Practice, practice,” they’d say as if stutterers simply didn’t speak enough. “Think before you speak. Now – try that again,” they would declare slowly and loudly as if I was stupid and deaf. These thoughtless people were ignorant of just how much stutterers do think. Too much – which is central to the issue!
If I’d known at twelve or thirteen that the day would come when I’d make a career of public speaking I might have strolled off a high-rise building.
Now it is quite easy to hide. I am very comfortable with crowds.
It’s asking driving directions or ordering food at a drive through where it gets tricky. Sitting in a cozy circle waiting for my turn to introduce myself sends my blood-pressure through the roof. The ticket attendant on the London underground can render me dumb after I’ve just spent days addressing a room full of graduate level adults about Family Systems Theory. I know. It sounds ridiculous.
I was almost immobilized the first time I saw Thulani put himself “on duty” in the event he needed to be my mouthpiece. He did it. No one asked him or appointed him. He just did it.
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Life in our beloved 122
If the inside of a house (outside, too, I suppose) is a metaphor of the lives of the people who live in it – which is something I once read somewhere – gosh, are we in trouble. Our house is a mess.
I consistently clean it room by room, thinking often of the legend that the Golden Gate Bridge that says there’s some guy constantly painting it. I feel for him. While I am sure the view is wonderful I must believe that the poor guy whose doing it daily from one end to the other must find the wind and the weather quite a challenge.
Our house is the same, but instead of painting from end to end and back again, I am the guy constantly cleaning, – and, it’s hard to tell.
Where I cleaned and swept and dusted and vacuumed and sponged and sterilized yesterday there are scooters and bicycles (boys), mail in piles (me), books (boys and me), newspapers (me), magazines (me), and socks (boys and Max, the Chihuahua).
Turn my back and the boys and Max are at it again – enjoying life as boys (and a dog) while I find being a cleaning lady quite an exhausting challenge.
There is a point of no return, I’ve noticed, or at least a point of the chaos where I feel compelled to let it all go for a while and I throw up my hands and join in the fun of trashing the place.
But when I clean I like to think I’m just like the guy painting the Bridge, which I can only imagine must be a slow and methodical task.
I do it room by room, starting at one end, the front, in the event that I soon lose interest – then, at least, the front room is somewhat in order. I push it (trash, magazines, books, socks, clothes) all back from the living room, through the piano room, then into the TV room until everything lands up in the kitchen.
Once it hits the kitchen I separate out what’s Max’s – he’s has his own set of toys with which he ruins the house – what’s Nate’s, what’s Thulani’s, and what can be recycled, dumped, restacked on bookshelves, placed in drawers, hung on a hanger, or filed in the “important documents” file I keep losing.
We moved into “122” (creatively named for its street number and which has had very few updates since it was built in 1886) when Thulani was about two – and I have been getting it in order ever since. Nate joined us in 2002. Max, in 2009. The house- attachment, at least for the boys and Max, is strong. When I talk of selling Thulani reminds me that Rhino, the husky that was on the run for nine months and returned to die within a few weeks after we reconnected, is buried in an Air France first class cabin blanket just outside of the kitchen door. Nate reminds me of where the fat goldfish is buried and Thulani ends the litany with his inability to think of living in a house without the large tree in the front yard where he has his brother (and Max) have “peed like boys” (and a dog) for the past several years.
So. I’ll go on painting and, before you send me letters about giving the boys chores and responsibilities and assigning daily tasks and getting on top of it before it gets on top of me let me advise that you are barking up the wrong tree (sorry, Max for the dog metaphor) because we do have all that in place and it does work here and there and off and on.
I know, I know. Consistency is the name of the game for parenting and let me tell you, the ONLY thing that is consistent here is the need to keep going room by room with or without the boys (and Max) to get this little bridge painted one stretch at a time so the world can see just how organized and decent our lives are here at our beloved “122.”
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Being a white South African can come with complications
Being a white South African reared under Apartheid is no simple matter. It permeated everything for me. While I do not pretend to have been a political activist, I was always cognizant that my privileges, simply a result of being born white, were unmerited, and most unfair especially when enjoyed at the expense of others who were not. I think this unsettling truth (for I took advantage of my station in life) was somewhat of a companion to me from the age of about six or seven.
I am regularly aware that:- I was discouraged from playing soccer in the “front” yard (in view of the neighbors) with the servant’s children. While this may seem insignificant in the light of other much more severe problems rising from racism, it was huge for me as a child on several fronts. I loved the children and I loved soccer even more. They were excellent soccer players.
- I did attend a segregated school as did almost all white South Africans while there did exist some church schools that were integrated even under Apartheid. I vividly recall my school principal scolding the entire student body (over a thousand white boys) because a domestic worker (a black adult man) was seen walking in the neighborhood wearing a school blazer.
- Although, by no means wealthy, I was waited on hand and foot by a full-time servant.
- In the late 80s I was warned not to pray publicly for Prisoner “Nelson” Mandela from my church pulpit.
- A member of my family did balk at my request that I bring black children to his home-swimming pool to swim.
- Even as late as 1987 I was embarrassed that a young black boy whom I’d “helped” in his squatter camp had shown up at my door unannounced. I recall wondering what the neighbors would think seeing a child arriving at the home for a social visit and not to work in the yard.While I am aware that these are piddly problems in the light of what millions faced under the Apartheid regime, I am also aware that these factors in my immediate environment “shaped” me into believing perverse things (like in my own superiority and in “their” inferiority) about persons of other race groups. More significantly, I am frequently reminded that my children and I could not have shared life as we now do if we were still living in the era of Apartheid.
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Location, location – remembering winter in August
We live very close to our school and church, so close we can hear the school bell from our kitchen and the church bells in my bedroom.
Sometimes we walk to both and we don’t see the car for days.
I like it. I like not having to get in and out of the car. I like not having to negotiate traffic, something as synonymous with life in the USA as Disney, Fast Food, and the Fourth of July.
That’s the upside.
We are a 10-hour-drive to the nearest coast – and, most of the east coast beaches are not worth the drive. The west coast, which has many wonderful beaches comparable to where I was reared, takes three full days of driving to reach.
Being landlocked is one thing but another is the weather. Indiana weather is erratic, neurotic, and downright psychotic.
Days ago I could’ve (but I didn’t) ice-skated across the street. Now, as I write, there’s a small lake in the street next to the sidewalk from last night’s rain. The weather is so brutal and extreme (it is as hot as blazes in the summers) that when we do drive anywhere (there are no grocery stores in walking distance) the streets are often full of potholes making some of America’s finest suburban streets resemble stretches of road you’d find in a rural stretch of South Africa’s Wild Coast. So, I am exaggerating but really not too much. Washington Boulevard is a challenge to drive right now, you have got to dodge potholes and loose pavement or, unless you drive a tank, you stand to severely damage your suspension.
But I do love living here. My neighbors are some of my best friends. My children are free and safe in the neighborhood and everyone knows everyone’s children. Even as I write Joseph (born a week or so before Thulani) from down the street has wondered into the house and it is quite likely he will eat with us, stay the night, and then wander down back down the street to his home sometime in the morning. His mom and I will talk sometime between now and nightfall unless he of course chooses to wonder off home and be gone just as quickly as he showed up.
Potholes and crazy weather won’t send us running, although we will drive to church in the morning – even though it is really close. I’m not sure I want to brave the elements which could be a snow-storm, an ice storm, the threat of a tornado – or a little or a lot of each. What else could you expect during March in Indiana?
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Ready to adopt?
If you wait until you are ready to adopt a child you never will because you will never be ready. The baby, and only the baby, will make you ready. Reading the right books will be helpful, but “ready” magically comes upon you when a real baby is sleeping in your arms or crying in the middle of the night. If you are not ready to change diapers – and I always am amused at the big deal about this non-issue – being unprepared will last only as long as a clean diaper. Of course you can go baby-stuff-shopping, get a room painted, stencil yellow ducks on the wall – if you know long enough in advance your child is coming. But painting a bedroom with ducks and rainbows and a pot of gold, and getting a truck load of stuff from your local one-stop baby emporium will only fill your home with a lot of weird and wonderful, and mostly unnecessary, equipment.
Children interrupt everything. It is the child who is really ready to teach you, whether you are or not. Once he arrives he will become the hub of all your scheduling. You will be fine with this because the child is not an interruption to your life but rather, from this point on, central to it.
The baby will make you ready and you can’t really prepare for the baby until he is breathing in the crib right next to your bed.
Life inside the Smith household
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19 Comments
Jim
I think this is really true. Also, you can get used to accommodating someone and not even perceive that they are being very abusive to you. They will deny their intent, but in reality they know what they are doing. I would add that “victims” should not blame themselves too easily. If you are a good person, it is hard to understand the mentality of the person who actually wants and even needs to harm you. You have to confront such evil, because you do not deserve being the victim of it. And, simply giving more love to the person will not cure them. You must stand strong.
04 Apr 2007 02:04 pm
tobeme
Rod,
Very good points of advice! We do get what we allow and we often support others actions by our reactions. You are a great servant to all of us.
04 Apr 2007 02:04 pm
tmulcahy
The odd thing is, my spouse exhibits some of this behavior and I’m responding in kind, so that now I’m the one with bad behavior. This relationship is deteriorating rapidly, and I no longer care. Now I wish it was over and I could move on. Living alone would be preferable to this.
10 Apr 2007 12:04 am
Catherine
This has struck a cord with me. My husband often shouts and swears at me for quite trivial offences. I suggest it is inappropriate for him to do this, to which is replies that I should not make him angry! As though it is my fault. I do love him but I can not support this weight on my shoulders any more, which I realise is the burden of this relationship. The thought of leaving makes me feel sad, but I think I will have to as I don’t think that he will change. Sometimes I imagine him dying, and I feel happy – can you believe it! We have 2 small children. Where do I find the courage to leave?
06 Jun 2007 03:06 pm
tmulcahy
Ah, Catherine, so true. I have noticed myself feeling the same way. Sometimes I like imagining her dying, and sometimes the thought of separating makes me very sad. It’s over now, but I hate it when she coldly pushes to speed things up. She said one day that she thought we shouldn’t throw away a 15-year investment in the relationship, (I agreed) but two days later said she’d changed her mind and I should just get out.
13 Jun 2007 05:06 pm
Amelia
yer thats true.. but its not as easy as you say.. or as easy as ne1 says..
im only 16.. and i put up wit so much!..
i used to get abused by my brother but he moved.. now i get abused by my dad and my other brother…
and my mum says its my fault.. but its not..
these tips i get from everyone.. but its sooo much harder to deal with..
trust me..
06 Jul 2007 07:07 am
Marissa
I lived with an abusive man for 9 years hoping he would change. Things only got worst as time went by so for all of you in this situation walk away while you still can. No amount of love can change someone who is abusive you are only wasting precious time which you can spend with your children or find someone whom truly does love you. I found a great man whom is sweet, understanding and loving….
27 Sep 2007 11:09 am
swann
i’ve read some comments. i’ve been ?? a victim thru 3 husb. currently numb. 3 n i’ve been beaten to a pulp by the first had the verbal n emotional by all 3. the 3rd in the first few years of marriage was sweet kind sensitive n generous. then i became ill but was still funtional able to go on trips n do things with him. i would go into emotional outbursts as one of the symptoms of the blood illness (porhpyria) n he complained that’s when the marr. began to go down hill. a few years later i became ill again with RSD try rsdhope.org n read what this illness causes how bad it is. so as time went on he became closer to my daugh. who’s now 29 2kids n marr. now 19 years later he shows her more compassion n love does more for her then his own wife. m i jealous in a way because as her mom i should be able to have the money to help her when needed i guess i should feel blessed that he wants to help her but i believe it keeps her in a stagnant position from growing up n standing on her own 2 feet depending on her husb. i don’t mind him helping her once in a while but the way he neglects me screams n yells at me almost daily causes me to wonder what the prob is. he goes to church i don’t go to his church but his friends there who use to be my friends can’t n refuse to believe he’s this kind of person because he knows how to turn on the charm to outsiders. i’m stuck i’ve nowhere to go i have to stay here. the gov. isn’t any longer taking apps for section 8 even for disabled. i have no friends because i’ve been told that most folks don’t like me because of my mouth i talk too much. he gone most the time staying away doing wk for his church or favors for others. i think this is just a way to keep his distance from me. as he was walking out the door the other day i finally got up the courage to speak my mind n said i realize u don’t love me anymore but i do believe u care. well you’d have thought i started world war 3 u know what hit the fan right then n i got accused of allowing satan to use me to speak such thing. sorry 4 using bible ref. but the bible does say we’ll know them by their fruits. a girl just the other day told me i was a very sweet good hearted person. so tell me who’s expressing the truth. n how should i handle myself since i have no other choice but to stay here i need to protect my health by not allowing all these things to get to me n cause depression. i have a good attitude. i’m out going to all n i’m a christian also. i keep forgiving my husband over n over daily believe me it’s no easy task n i do love him i’m just no longer in love with him. but i understand even as bad as my marriage is i’m not sure who’s at fault, can somehow over time be fixed. i just don’t know what to do. unless i become silent n we live in a silent house toget. unless we need to speak on a business level. help i’m not sure how to cope anymore i’ve used up all my skills with no success n nothings betters if anything he seems to get worse instead of better. thanx swann (nick) to keep me anonymous.
02 Oct 2007 10:10 am
Betty B.
So how is one supposed to radically shift their response to an abuser? The abuser in my household is my youngest son, who’s 21-years old. He often treats both me and my husband very badly, yelling at us, snapping at us, or not speaking to us. I don’t know how to deal with it. I’m going through menopause right now and often I’m very emotional. Sometimes getting yelled at like this can put me in tears. And it’s all starting to weight very heavily on me.
30 Dec 2007 09:12 pm
Rod
You might want to consider that he is now an adult — perhaps it is time for him to move out and be unpleasant to his roommates. I wonder how long others will put up with his behavior. You, having done your share of parenting him, do not need to have someone who treats you poorly live with you. Many 21-year-olds are living outside of their parent’s home and do so very well. This would be a “radical shift” on your part.
Please keep writing. I look forward to your reply.
Rod Smith
30 Dec 2007 10:12 pm
PictureChick
Betty B – your son needs to leave. It’s your house. Put him out.
15 Jan 2008 11:01 pm
Carla
I just left my boyfriend because he had anger issues and violent and abusive behavior. It started with name calling, then pushing, then damaged my car, and the final straw was being punched in the face like a man. I am petite female, 138 pounds and 5 foot 3. I was kicked in the face several times and a higher power did not help me escape from him and his rage. I may not be alive today. After being arrested for another incident prior to this, he had the nerve to call me to have me drop the charges. He told me he loved me, brought roses and flowers, candy and thousands of cards to show me he loved me and signed the cards with a ass kicking. Ladies that is not love love doesn’t hurt. All of this happened within a ten month period. And my soul kept telling me to leave him alone but I felt he needed me. He played helpless seduced me. He witness abuse when he grew up. To make a long story short. You can’t change an abusive person. His been in jail for a few days and my fear is how he will act when he get out. Will I have to look over my shoulder. Will he be upset because I called the police. Then I had to realize. He put himself in this situation because of the bad choices he made. They have to deal with their issues and get some help on their own. You will end up hurt, dead, or emotionallly dead. LEAVE. Somehow someway. I pray for all those who is experienced abuse. And hope God remove that evil spirited person from your life.
08 Aug 2008 02:08 am
fekans
Dont focus inside the circle be like an eagle look at your prey from a far you might see that there are dangers that
you dont need to approach, instead find a better prey which
you enjoy eating. politely spend time with yourself grt
out of thet captive situation the nature of attraction will attract you with the best. Ignore and be yourself.
09 Aug 2008 04:08 am
Emily
I am similarly dealing with a very abusive brother. He was alIways abusive when I was a teen but I moved away. Now that I got laid off I ended up moving in with my mom wherehe STILL lives. (he never left home).
Anyway, to make a long story short I’ve realized 20 years later that he has not changed. If anything, he takes complete advantage of my mom but then she is dependent on him as her caregiver. Unfortunately, adult protective services were not very supportive. They basically said I didn’t have enough evidence and everything I said they made excuses for it for him…I felt really betrayed by the way the system is set up. Unless someone stabs you, you can’t do much to find help from government agencies. Therefore it’s up to YOU and YOU ONLY to protect yourself.
This is someone that says “I really care about you” but then denies medical care when you need it. This is a person that says they act in your best interest but then wants you to hand out to him all of your life savings for “investments” that will benefit the family while leaving you dry…
While I did give him the benefit of the doubt that perhaps he HAD changed, I just realized I re-opened the door for another round of stepping over healthy boundaries. I had to end my relationship with my brother because I had to close the door on the abuse.
18 Feb 2009 02:02 pm
eileen
I am dealing with an abusive teen. She has anxiety issues with which we have had professional help. She can be very caring and the “outside world” sees her as this lovely helpful sweet thing. At home, however…she uses insults and threats to get her own way. When confronted, she becomes angry and even more abusive! She absolutely knows how to hurt the most with private things and blame. We don’t spoil her, and she has had a job of her own for a year and she is an honour student, so there are no problems there. But we are a “one car family” and I do a lot of driving and running her around to school for activities and rehearsals and to her lessons. You would think that she would be appreciative of this time we give up. Things go well for about a month and then she BLOWS!! Refusal to pick something up she has spilled or not wanting to be told that we are too tired to stay up until 3 in the a.m. to go pick her up and ask that she stay home or come home earlier. She hits her older sister and the insults begin. My husband is stressed and working 3 jobs. I work in a school and I KNOW that this would NEVER be acceptable behaviour there! I tell my husband this, but he would rather keep the peace and give in…no support there and he has a temper as well.
10 Apr 2009 08:04 pm
Rod E. Smith, MSMFT
Dear Eileen:
This is most certainly not an easy situation. It seems you have to do all you can to take care of your own well being that you might be better positioned to be strong and steady and immovable with your daughter. Let's hope readers chime in with their support and suggestions for you. Perhaps some of the conflict is coming from the issue of feeling you have little or no support from your husband. I do know that if you give in the virus of your daughter's behavior will only try to take greater and further hold.
Let's see what readers come up with. I am a real live person. You have not gotten this response from a machine.
I will be thinking of you ad hope you will write again and let me know how things are going. Please browse around the website and read many related articles. Also, please print off the one called Differentiation of Self or Self Differentiation. This is a crucial principle behind good mental health.
I'd suggest you try to take your daughter and your family by surprise by being outlandishly healthy and by being very strong and willing to stand up to her and all she offers. It will upset the apple cart but it is a cart she is used to controlling with her behavior.
Peace to you. Thanks for being the kind of loving mother you are.
Rod Smith
Let me know if you want to talk. I will make time for you and I will send you the number.
10 Apr 2009 09:04 pm
anaida
hi! i have been married for 8 months to a guy who seemed well-educated and liberated. Alas, barely a few months into the marriage he had a violent outburst and bullied me for 4 hrs for a very trivial thing. In denial and disbelief, I gave him another chance only to see him go off again. He used bad words, made me feel wretched, blamed me for his outbursts and said i ‘provoked him’. We started therapy and now, i see him not getting violent. But he is as touchy as ever, argues for 4 hrs and sometimes days even though i beg him to leave me alone. I now feel like he does not regret his behavior even though he says otherwise – he makes demands of me and expects me to fulfill them like nothing really happened instead of showing appreciation that i gave him a chance yet again… in addition, he makes me feel like i am a lowly creature with crude, unrefined thoughts. We started going to a therapist but he lies abt his thoughts… To the outside world, he is the most charming husband. Can he be expected to change?
11 Jul 2009 10:07 am
Rod E. Smith, MSMFT
You will see I have posted your question. Watch the space for replies. Mine will be up in a day or two.
11 Jul 2009 11:07 am
Cathy
My daughter is very manuplitive and as some of the responses stated most abusive people have no remorse for there actions,
she is 21 and her father and I have been divorced for over 14 years but we both parent together,
I remarried ( a second time)only to find out that he had a Narcisstic personality I divorced him and it is as if my daughters
use this as punishment towards me, I have been away from this person for more then 3 years,
yet I find my 21 year old is just as abusive, I have supported her in going to college she has one year left,
and she has become extremly lazy she says she is depressed only when you ask her to help or contribute,
she did not work the entire summer and expects me to constantly give her money, but she is abusive sometimes violent and will never offer to lend a hand, I really do not feel I should help her when she has no idea how hurful she is, she feels entitelment
03 Aug 2010 03:08 pm
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