In the wake of Weinergate, CNN posted an article entitled, Stop calling Huma Abedin a victim. Abedin, of course, is Anthony Weiner’s wife, who I’m sure was, at the very least, embarrassed by the scandal, and perhaps angry enough to consider divorce.
The article quotes a couple of authors telling women to choose not to be victims. Instead, women should choose to define their own happiness. Oh, there are a couple of caveats—the advice doesn’t apply to women who fear for their safety or are facing financial ruin. But there is no discussion of what to do when your relationship is so emotinally abusive that you are psychologically traumatized.
In short, this story offers advice for women coping with infidelity whose partners are not sociopaths. Which is fine—these women need advice as much as anyone. But the article also reinforces society’s “just get over it” attitude, which makes life difficult for women dealing with true exploitation.
Read Stop calling Huma Abedin a victim on CNN.com.
Star-mine didn’t help me out financially for college either. My dad helped me some now and some in 2009 when I was unemployed for a short time. The thing is with him, he thinks that the assistance he gave entitles him to take over my life and have a say so in all my decisions and that is wrong. He tries to exert influence all over the place. I am through with there being strings attached to everything with him and this time it ends here. He send me $275 a few days ago-not cuz I asked but because I was upset about it and he sent more money than I needed and made me feel horribly guilty for it, and then proceeded to trash me about everything-including my weight, when he is huge himself and my stepmom enables him so he doesn’t lose it.
I emailed him back and told him how wrong he was for what he was saying. I told him that unlike him, my weight gain has to do with stress and female problems. His only excuse is eating like a pig all the time. Eating is his favorite thing to do. There was also underlying things about my gayness in there. He got my stepmom to show him my FB and he saw where one night I went out with my girl for dinner and he accused me of spending money to try and impress her. The stupid thing is that she paid for dinner that night and we had a great time together.
I won’t anymore-ever. He gave me the guilt about he was going to use the money to fix something on his house and that he expected it back as soon as I get my unemployment money back. I will give it back and then I will work to pay him back some other money he gave me and then quietly go NC and never speak to him again.
He does this Jekyll Hyde thing all the time and typical, my stepmom’s daughter was in town this weekend. That’s when he always sends the hateful emails. Apparently she is perfect and is the yardstick in which all the rest of us are measured. The day after he sent it he started sending me his obnoxious political emails and racist bigoted stuff that he likes-just like nothing ever happened. He never says sorry or acknowledges my feelings. He usually waits til I communicate with his wife and then he starts up communication again. I bumped up my FB privacy settings again so she and my brother can’t see any of my posts, so they can’t show them to him. I also will decline to start communication with her again.
Star-I actually really did need it to defer my car payment for May and June and it also provided enough for an extra tank of gas for my truck. It will help if I get to work this weekend cuz the drive is far.
I did thank him for the money and he definitely won’t hear about my life anymore. I don’t need his approval. It does disgust me though that he would have rather me be with exspath than with a good woman. He’s sick.
Star-thanks and you’re not making light of it. I busted my ass to get his approval all my whole entire life and it’s obviously never worked. There were several times in my life before all this unemployment crap started where he turned into My Hyde on me. It didn’t get bad until I lost my job this spring. I do see now that I will never get his approval.
I think that you are right about getting involved with my spath. I know remember when I told my dad about him how relieved he was and how he was glad I found someone really good who loves me and would treat me well. I sure wasn’t treated well. All along I always felt that my spath was a lot like my dad-they had the same eyes and part of their personalities were the same. I didn’t realize it til I came here that both of them are Narcissists-no wonder they seemed so much alike. I’m going to be relieved when I can give him his money back and be done with it.
Star:
Thanks so much for your posts. They were very helpful to me.
I did two things that I thought would help me heal and get over these feelings, but both only helped temporarily. I wrote the X spath a very long letter in January and last November I sent all the gifts back to the OW. She had given me lots of stuff and I just didn’t want it anymore. I felt like sending it all back to her would set me free and it did, but only for a little while. Same with the letter to X spath. I felt better for a minute, but as usual the feelings came back.
Time will be the only thing that will heal.
Louise-time is the only thing that will heal. I was still sleeping in my exspaths clothes a year after we broke up. Then I found this place and got the courage to get rid of them. I even got new bedding for the bed and through out everything that reminded me of him. It was a long process for me. Hopefully it won’t be as long for you. You seemed to have found this place much sooner than I did, which is good. I wish I wouldn’t have had to go through it as long as I did.
I know it will get better for you. ((((hugs))))
Lizzy:
Thanks so much. I just wish it didn’t take so long, but I am getting there. I am much better than I was a year ago…God, this time last year I was REALLY a mess. NC really does help the healing, it really does.
Louise-it will continue to get better. I also kept my spaths emails and texts for a year. The thing that really freaks me out though was last month I found a copy of his CV saved on my computer. I got a new computer in the fall and I don’t remember pulling it up since I had the old computer. So I couldn’t figure out how it got on the new one. Maybe I pulled it up in my sleep or something, cuz for the life of me I don’t remember-or maybe after I had my concussion.
Star-I talked with a friend from high school on FB and she now lives in Michigan and is married to a great guy. I found out that like me, she had been with women before she met him and also was with a married man too. She did say that she was with a man who roughed her up for awhile too. It’s amazing how you can go 20 years w/o talking to someone and then find out that you have had a lot of the same things in your life. She said that it’s probably best that I’m into women because all of my experiences with men were really bad. I knew deep down though that I was gay since the 6th grade and tried to run away from it because I was afraid of what my family thought. Once I got into my 20s though, it didn’t matter so much anymore and now it definitely doesn’t. Nobody can change me no matter how hard they want it to be so.
Lizzy and Star:
Thanks.
I just discovered something on Facebook that kind of threw me off. I just noticed that a male friend of the OW who I was in triangulation with just blocked me from seeing his wall. Normally if you are friends with someone (which I am with him on Facebook), you can see a friend’s wall unless they don’t want you to. Now, I do have to admit that I blocked him from seeing my wall a long, long time ago because I didn’t want him potentially telling her anything I was doing. Not that I do anything at all that I need to hide, but just the principal. Not that I even thought that he would tell her, but just to be safe. So for some reason I just happened to check his “wall” (which I was able to see just about a week ago) and I can’t see it. Now, I know that he must have blocked me individually because that is a normal setting for friends to be able to see and post on each other’s walls. Why didn’t he just “unfriend” me?? I’m just a little upset now. I never talk to this guy…haven’t seen him or talked to him since I left work. I wouldn’t since he is friends with the OW who I never want to speak to again. And she has him fooled just like she does all the men…they all think she is great. Typical narcissistic attitude…she has everyone duped. This is bugging me now. It will take me a few days to get past it. Ugghh. I guess I shouldn’t feel that bad because I had blocked him a long time ago, but he must have never noticed it. I have a feeling he noticed it so he blocked me to be spiteful. Oh, well.