Editor’s note: The following story was submitted by the Lovefraud reader who comments as “Free.”
I was in an emotionally abusive relationship for 13 years. Two years after we started living together, I slowly developed Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. It first started off with a safety issue, where I was going around the house checking to see if everything was locked and turned off, until it escalated that I couldn’t have knives anywhere near me because I was too afraid that I might lash out and hurt someone. I lived in absolute terror because of this. Some instinct told me to hide all of this as much as I could from my husband. But he did find out and he didn’t offer any help, or seek help or to take me to the doctor. There were no hugs or reassurance. Nothing. I very nearly had a nervous breakdown about a year after I started having my symptoms. He used it against me by deliberately “forgetting” to turn things off or lock the door when he went out.
He once told me that I was so lucky because now that I had him, I could fall apart. Weird thing to tell a person, that they are lucky that they can fall apart. He told me this when I had found a counselor who wanted to analyse my relationship with him. My husband convinced me that he was the perfect husband and that I didn’t need this counselor to pick apart our relationship. I look back now and wish I had continued to see that lady. She was onto something and I stupidly believed in him.
Alone with the illness
I was on my own with this and it was very lonely. I didn’t trust myself to do the simplest tasks such as turning off a tap, turning off the stove, the iron, locking the door without having to check them a million times. It got to the point I was afraid of being me. I was afraid to drive, talk to people, everything and I just wanted to die. It was sheer hell. So many people get put on meds because of OCD, but I refused. I had OCD for about 11 years and everything I read indicated that you can never truly get rid of it.
During my marriage, I didn’t have any emotional support from anyone. I was isolated from my friends and my family lived a long way away. The friends I did make, he would overtake and they would become his friends. I really only saw my mother-in-law and sister-in-law during that time and on the odd occasion, I would see my best friend until he moved us to another country where I had no one, but slowly I started to make friendships at work that he couldn’t sabotage and they have helped me through this devastation.
Husband wants a new family
He told me our marriage was over the night our house sale settled and the funds had been deposited into our account, which was a Friday night and I had just gotten home from work. Because he had lost his job in May of that year, I put our house on the market (in our home country). After convincing me that I was an alcoholic amongst other things during our time together, he handed me a glass of wine that night and told me that he needed to stand on his own two feet but he was too afraid to leave and needed to stay until he was ready. I truly believed that he was going through a midlife crisis, because he was laughing and crying hysterically. I was pretty shocked at his apparent devastation. His actions during the following week didn’t seem to match his theatrics and I found out he was seeing other women during that week including receiving kiss emails from the woman he is with now living with in Canada. I told him he had to leave during the following week and he found a place to stay in (just up the road). That was in early December 2006.
He wouldn’t leave me alone to grieve for our relationship. He continued to manipulate me and we spent Christmas Day together. We talked, talked and talked about our marriage, so I thought maybe we could fix it. In February 2007, I learnt from his mother that he had told her that he missed being in a family unit and that it was okay for him to replace his family with a new one. She seemed a bit confused by this and I believe that he deliberately told her this as he knew we were very close. That conversation made me start to question everything and to start piecing together our whole history. He told me after the conversation I had with my mother-in-law, that he was going overseas to visit friends and I confronted him straight away and told him to stop lying to me. You are replacing us with that woman. He defiantly said that he wouldn’t do that, that he loved the family he had. He said that it was a friendship only on his side and that the other woman had been presumptuous to think that there could be a relationship by sending him that kiss email and he had told her it was friendship only.
Seeing the lies
I eventually Googled the woman’s name who had sent him the kiss email when he was overseas with her, not believing that it was friendship only. That was late April last year. I had to wrack my brain to remember her name and later on, when he returned, I was able to view her Myspace profile because she had supposedly made it public because she is a psychic and I was calling to her in a dream. Absolutely unreal, but this is what she told me in an email to me when I started to warn her. She doesn’t realise that that day, I had told him I tried looking her up but her profile was blocked. Her profile told me everything that he was lying about and I confronted him and he was violent and I was very afraid of him.
I had started listening to my gut instinct after we separated and even though he was lying to me, I couldn’t truly believe him no matter how convincing he was and no matter how hard I tried to. I am so glad that I listened to me. Last year I was so devastated by all of this. But typing this now, I am so glad I am no longer spending my life with someone who could treat me like I was some disposable trash. A man of integrity does not set out to replace his family before he leaves the one he has.
Symptom free
My OCD symptoms didn’t fully disappear until I was strong enough to cope with the whole truth about his abuse, which was June 2007. No matter how bad it is for me to know the truth of all of his deception and abuse, I now have my life back. I still have flashbacks of his abuse, but I know that I won’t have them forever; it is just part of the healing process and that time will heal all my wounds.
Oprah says that in order to stop overeating, you need to find out what the root cause of it is. Same with OCD. The OCD was the symptom. The ambient abuse was the cause.
I am now OCD free. Absolutely FREE. I stopped feeling the need to check everything when I realised I was safe. Safe from him. Safe from someone who was playing with my mind, distorting my reality with ambient abuse. I have been OCD free for almost a year and it is wonderful! I look back to the girl I was in that marriage and I can’t believe that I am that same woman. She looks better, walks straighter, laughs again and believes in herself and she doesn’t have to check a damn thing! Because she knows that she can trust herself. It amazes me that throughout all of those years where I despaired about this disorder, that the answer to beating it was to just get out of that relationship. That relationship was poison to my mind, body and soul.
Rperk,
The suicidal “ideation” (and in some cases actual suicide) is WHY it is imperative that you be under the care of a therapist as well as a physician with antidepressant medications.
Sometimes people who are WAY depressed, and literally don’t have the energy to commit suicide, get better enough on the meds that they have enough energy to do it, and like a friend of mine did (a former foster child of mine) he DID it. Quite frankly, I as an advanced practice nurse when I was in family practice did NOT Rx medications to any depressed person UNLESS THEY ALSO GOT THERAPY and I was in contact with the therapist for quite some time, sometimes even weekly.
Medications are a help, and in some cases, a LIFESAVER for people with very bad depression, I only suggest that you be EVALUATED, the decision to take or not to take (or if you need them) is with your health care provider and YOU.
No medication for anything is a panecea but while the “old” medication for many mental illnesses were very ‘crude”the recent advances in medicine and science have made them much more effective and safer.
I had a very sick patient once in family practice who refused a flu shot each year (and he was at high risk for getting it and being severely effected if he did) because he was SURE that the one time he got the flu, he had “gotten” it from the shot. This is IMPOSSIBLE scientificly.
He got the flu and died 3 days later. I did my best to get the man to take precautions, but his mind was made up, and his prejudice against “flu shots” cost him his life. The other side of the coin is that sometimes meds are approved before they are fully tested and problems are later discovered, or some weird side effect becomes evident, but on the whole, medicaitons and especially antidepressant medications are so well and widely tested that there are very few problems with them and from both personal and clinical experience I would suggest that anyone who is showing the signs of depression or PTSD at least be evaluated by a professional rather than suffer in silence and try to “just get over it”—your cry for wanting to know “HOW” makes me think that a professional evaluation might be in order. Off my soap box now. LOL
Did Rperk say she was suicidal?
I think we need to be careful projecting our opinions.
Of course, we need to offer our help, concern and how we would handle the same issues, but I am wary of diagnosing people.
I apologize if I missed a suicide reference.
i went to see a psychiatrist a month before i entered a relationship with xS. if only i had continued seeing her … i could of avoided so many problems. during that time i was also going to emotions anonymous meetings but he battered the whole concept and read the book in order to undermine all my attempts at self-control and empowerment.
i only wanted to ask one thing. i didn’t quite understand why she told you that she was psychic. i get that he told her to make her profile public (or possibly inferred it to her and she thought she was having a psychic moment?). then you saw the lies he told her about himself? a little confused about that bit.
i am very glad for you that your OCD symptoms are gone and now you are happy and confident. i was like you- i didn’t break up; he left me. but it was the best thing he ever did for me. my nightmares faded away after i dealt with some issues that he had instilled in me. it is so good to wash him and all of those issues away.
Holywatersalt,
On another thread she mentioned that she had taken ADs before and had suicidal ideation—I am in no way intending to project my opinons on anyone or “assume” suicidal ideation or any other feeling that anyone has not expressed unless it is a misinterpretation of their words, and I don’t think I missed on “I thought about suicide”—
I DID NOT DIAGNOSE Rperk, repeat DID NOT DIAGNOSE her, and I don’t think anyone is qualified to make a “diagnosis” that is clinically sound by e mail or by blog.
I took what she said her symptoms were and advised her to SEEK PROFESSIONAL COUNSEL and to consider medication for what sounded like (but is not diagnosed as) major depression. Keep in mind, please, that I am licensed to diagnose and to Rx medication, but in this case I am doing neither diagnosing or Rx’ing medication but giving my opinon that she should seek professional medical assessment AND therapy.
I am glad that you have been able to overcome your devestation by being just a very strong person and “taking it one hour at a time” but some of us need some professional help and something a bit stronger than chocolate. (though chocolate is wonderful LOL!)
As far as “diagnosing” the Ps–if it quacks like a duck, it’s probably a duck–and since I am not signing a chart or making a legal document out of this blog, and am not going to give them any medication, or treat them, I’ll cross the “line” and say “he’s a P as far as I can see” or “he’s acting like a P” quite frankly, I don’t care if the diagnosis is clinicaly “right” or not—they just need to be OUT of our lives—preferably on a desert island that isn’t on a map! Even if their PCL-R is only 29, that’s “close enough for government work” in my book.
holywatersalt,
No, I am absolutely not suicidal. I was only stating that years ago, the meds they had me on, did do strange things to me.
The whole point was, I was asking How to heal thinking that I was taking a very long time to do so. Earlier today I read something that helped to see that I am normal, that healing is different for everyone and we all heal in our own time. Thank you for your concern tho. I do appreciate it. I would like to make it very clear that I am NOT suicidal and don’t have ANY thoughts of that.
OxD-
If I were a strong person–well, I wouldn’t have screwed up as I did.
And no I am not anti-self diagnosis, I agree OFTEN it is obvious, esp. Psychos.
I have gone to therapists and found varying degrees of help.
What worked for me is realizing suffering is part of life, and to try and hang on . That got me through labor and delivery : )
In NO WAY am I trying to tell people to tough it out, that it just takes endurance or to “suck it up” ….. I hate that advice.
For me it was a lot reading, much acceptance and constant reminders that I am YES dealing with a sociopath.
I am not fond of drugs- not to a scientologist degree, but while there are sucesses with them, through my work I have read much about disasters with drugs.Not to mention my husband’s anti-depressants- taken for migraine– make him grouchy as he admits.
Free-
Thank you for mentioning OCD and ambient abuse…..it’s a light bulb moment. I can’t tell you— it makes so much sense.
I lived with, among other things, a patholigical hoarder. You know the kind where you open the door and see piles and goat paths to chairs.
Thanks so much–this is a lot to think about.
Free:
I lost my keys and pin numbers all the time. Went through three money cards in that year; kept misplacing them (haven’t done it since going NC last year!). All I can remember is feeling frantic all the time…sometimes crying, sometimes just walking around in a daze…and yet, deep down, feeling cold and numb, unlike myself. It was a state of perpetual panic with no clear-cut outward reasons.
Having been away from him for so long, and besides that having only had a casual relationship with him before (never the intensity or such frequent contac) I totally didn’t get it. Thought it was all my family issues pushing me over the edge – and maybe they were partly to blame.
But not totally. Not by half. Because the family issues are still here, but I feel back to normal. No panic. A little paranoia, according to my co-workers — a little overly worried that I’m doing stuff wrong and am to blame for a bazillion things.
All of these responses are part of the symptoms victims of emotional abuse exhibit during and after the fact, OCD and PTSD, too.
We’re blessedly NORMAL! And we’re blessedly still walking around to tell the tale, getting stronger every day.
Hugs to you for the fearlessness it takes to tell your story!
Holywatersalt:
IT is just it. Hahahaha. Here I was thinking IT was short for some sort of illness or issue, like OC or PTSD. LOL. Too much time reading mental health sites!! 🙂
First I would like to apologize to R perk–I didn’t mean to insinuate that she was currently suicidal–and rereading my post it did sound like that.
Suicide after starting antidepressants is rare, but it does happen, because the person gets starts to do better and actually gets enough energy to actually kill themselves. I lost a friend and former foster child to that very “side effect” when he was profoundly depressed and his family doctor gave him the medication without having therapy or other follow up along with the medication.
WE are fortunate to have one “secret weapon” in our healing and that is each other. The similarities and yet, the DIVERSITIES of our experiences and our willingness to share insights, questions, pain, and joy with each other. To celebrate the good days and support the bad days, or the slide backs.
Free and HWS–to me finding MEANING in the suffering was the key to letting go of the anger about it.
Orphan, in a sad sick way, it is almost funny that your therapist was suggesting as a “cure” the very thing that was making the problem with your fear of driving. LOL But you know, I think that “lots of folks” who give us advice about how to “live with” or “get along with” the Ps almost do the same thing. They make excuses for the Ps behavior and tell us how to live with it, or make “it all better” FOR HIM.(her)
“Democracy” only works in some cases, not all…two wolves and a sheep democratically deciding what to have for supper may not turn out well for the sheep. LOL Dealing with the Ps in a “fair and equitable manner” is about that ridiculous, and we try it and fail (DUH!) and then our friends and family try to give us more ideas on how WE can “improve” life for the P and therefore he/she should be nicer to us. LOL
Free: YOU GO GIRL, throw them suckers as far away as you can hurl them! It doesn’t matter if the stone is the size of a pigeon egg and worth a mint, if throwing them away makes you feel better and symbolizes your release, I think it is wonderful. You are right, it isn’t about the “money” or the “value” of the gold or the stone, it is about the symbol for YOU.
OCD, and the symptoms that go with it, can be totally life ruining just in themselves, and it sort of “makes sense” to me that when we “lose total control” over our own lives and start to DOUBT ourselves, and our own sanity that we could start to display some of those OCD symptoms in an effort to “check on” ourselves (who we now doubt) and to keep ourselves SAFE.
One day in a therapy session I was very upset and crying and my therapist asked me “WHAT do you want?” and I thought a micro-second and I screamed out I WANT TO FEEL SAFE!
I realized afterwards that I had ALWAYS felt “safe” here on this piece of property where I had “felt safe” as a child, it was my HOME, though I had “lived” all over the US and the world, “Home” was here—safety was here—until the P attacks. I had suffered “SANCTUARY TRAUMA” (I took that phrase from another blog, can’t remember which one) and there now was NO PLACE ON EARTH that I felt truly SAFE. No hole to hide in when the world got to dangerous.
Of course, LIFE IS NOT “SAFE,” but my perception of absolute safety had been violated. When the Ps were here I told my son one day when we came back to get something that I “felt a great black cloud of evil hanging over the place” It was almost visible and almost touchable. No matter that I had a place to GO, the money to buy another house, I was EMOTIONALLY HOMELESS. I bought the RV and it became my emotional “cave” to hide in while I waited out the turn of events.
It’s “odd” too, that though I am now living back at the farm, I am still living too in the RV, I think, because I still feel safer there than in my nice 4-bedroom home 100 feet away from where the RV is parked. So I guess that is some form of OCD or avoidance, but I’ve decided that it is OK, if I never move back into the house totally. I’m more willing to “go with the flow” and to listen to my gut, and if living in a 38 ft. RV makes me feel safer, that’s OK. Just like FREE wanting to throw away the gold and diamond rings to make HER feel better, is okay, so is me sleeping in the RV rather than the “nicer” and “bigger” house that SOMEONE ELSE might prefer. LOL
The experiences change us all, in biological ways, in emotional ways, and we COPE, we heal and we grow into our OWN UNIQUE BEAUTY, and we don’t have to become square pegs in square holes, and if we want to be round pegs in square holes we CAN LET OURSELVES do that. ((((hugs))))) Peace, healing and love to you all.
okay. i get it.
Free, i don’t think it would of made a difference had you been in the right state of mind. it seems like she really wanted him and plus she seems too weird to think or listen. timing her profile to public so you could see it is very manipulative and hurtful and then saying that she is psychic as if that explains it … she sounds as if she is in socio terroritory herself.
a guy i knew had stolen 300,000 from his insurance company’s account and put it in his own. his office was closed down but he was never convicted. he was fancy free really. but he became involved with a guy he met on a cruise. he put this guy in charge of his finances, let him move in, paid for anything he wanted (a truck and an RV). In a matter of time that guy stole 150,000 from him apart from the gifts which he kept. They are both rotten and i am sure the boyfriend was a socio but the point is what goes around comes around. there is a saying ‘you can’t con an honest man’ as in a con can con a con. i think he may be getting some of his own brand of punishment now.