(It wasn't until I wrote him a letter taking ownership for my flaws and mistakes in the marriage that he began to craft his narrative of the controlling and manipulative wife. He turned my desperate insights and honest apologies into weapons, arming himself with reasons he had to leave me. Giving him that letter was probably my biggest mistake in this whole process.)
scout ~
This exact same thing with letter-writing happened to me. I'm so sorry you had to go through that, I know how painful it is to feel so vulnerable and pour out your feelings onto paper only to have them weaponized. Also my biggest mistake and regret..
Me too. I have hundreds of his e-mails spiraling into that narrative. It's like they have to build up the courage to believe it.
Don't have any regrets. The letters were part of your love. Your love will always be a victory, no matter what evil thoughts took over your H's mind....
I believe I will see the bounty of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait for the Lord with courage. Be stouthearted, and wait for the Lord.
I've been chatting with a tall, beefy, funny Irish lawyer and we are going out on Friday night. It's the first time I've felt excited and not sick about the idea. Now that I finally feel ready to date, I've also been feeling a bit deflated with thoughts of 'what man would want to get involved in this situation?' The fact that I have full-time care of a toddler would have to be challenging a) logistically and b) emotionally for someone considering a relationship with me. But I don't want to borrow trouble, so let's just see where this date takes us.
In divorce news, I'm seeing my L tomorrow to discuss the parenting plan vis-à-vis the escalating abuse from H. She hasn't contacted me to confirm H has signed the orders, so I'm assuming he hasn't yet.
H has not yet replied to my proffered compromise to his parenting plan modifications.
He did send an email to say he is going away with FIL this weekend and would not be available for his scheduled visitation, but said MIL would like to take S1 for that time instead. That's fine with me. At least I know she will change his nappy more than once!
I've been doing some reading on the topic of compassion in light of abusive behaviours like betrayal, deception and abandonment (not to mention more overtly abusive behaviours like threats, intimidation and physical hostility I've recently experienced). The following excerpt is from a review of a book written by an abuse counsellor.
Quote
To care about another, to have compassion for another, is beautiful and life-affirming. To care about and have compassion for another who is abusing you is a toxic mimic of real compassion, and is one of the obscenities spawned by a culture of abuse.
Bancroft states that one of the most common forms of support for abusers is the person who says to the abused woman: ‘You should show him some compassion even if he has done bad things. Don’t forget that he’s a human being, too.’
Bancroft continues, “I have almost never worked with an abused woman who overlooked her partner’s humanity. The problem is the reverse: He forgets HER humanity."
Acknowledging his abusiveness and speaking forcefully and honestly about how he has hurt her is indispensable to her recovery. It is the abuser’s perspective that she is being 'mean' to him by speaking bluntly about the damage he has done. To suggest to her that his need for compassion should come before her right to live free from abuse is consistent with the abuser’s outlook.
I have repeatedly seen the tendency among friends and acquaintances of an abused woman to feel that it is their responsibility to make sure that she realizes what a good person he really is inside—in other words, to stay focused on his needs rather than her own, which is a mistake.
This was the biggest cause of cognitive dissonance for me on my DB journey. I knew what STBXH was doing to me was not okay. I KNEW it, more than I could feel it. It just took a while for me to give myself permission to feel my feelings instead of worrying about how STBXH felt and whether my feelings would push him away. Once I did, the relief was immense.
His need for compassion should not come before her right to live free from abuse.
As a caveat, the above describes my lived experience. I realise it is not necessarily representative of other situations.
Thank you for sharing this scout. I’m trying to figure this out also, but another thing in my sitch is H’s depression- so I’m always thinking about my words and action now how it will affect him psychologically. Is he using that as a crutch so I am focused on his needs? Maybe......
Now I know a lot of the things he did in our M was not okay. But he was the broken one, so I always felt like I had to be compassionate and “understand” him in that way. And in doing so I put my sense of self away. My feelings were not valued as much.
His need for compassion should not come before her right to live free from abuse.
This is true. But it’s possible to have compassion and good boundaries at the same time. Compassion doesn’t mean you have to have any contact, or give anything up in negotiations. It definitely doesn’t mean tolerating abuse or being codependent.
I see compassion in a more Buddhist sense - trying to see the Buddha nature in every being.
I could easily get stuck in just thinking about how my ex is a narcissist who cheated on me more than once and who could never quite be satisfied with me. And all those things are true, and I have anger at the way he continues to interact with our adult children.
But I try to maintain a compassionate stance. He consciously tried to be better than his parents, although he ultimately failed. He’s had multiple concussions and maybe a shadow form of bipolar disorder that affects his actions. And his behaviors towards me in the marriage were just a reflection of his deep inner dissatisfaction, a hole that wlll never be filled. I’ve got by far the better end of the deal, as I’m happy with life, free of bitterness.
That doesn’t mean I want any communication with him. I just feel sorry for him, that he’s missing out on a rich relationship with our cool kids, and continues to be incapable of being satisfied with what he has.
Here's a parable from the abuse counsellor's book which stood out to me.
Quote
There once was a man whose neighbors had a large and beautiful maple tree growing behind their house. It gave shade in the hot summers, turned stunning colors of fire in the fall as it dropped its leaves, and stood against the winter snow as a magnificent wooden sculpture.
But the man hated his neighbors’ tree, because the shade that it cast into his yard made his grass grow poorly and stunted his vegetable garden, which was his passion. He pressured the neighbors repeatedly to either cut the tree down or prune it drastically, and their response was always the same: “You are free to cut any branches that stick out over your property, but beyond that we are going to leave the tree alone, because it is beautiful and we love it. We are sorry about the shade it casts on your side, but that is what trees do.”
One summer the neighbors went away on vacation for a week, and the man decided to rid himself of his aggravation. He took a chainsaw and cut their tree to the ground, making careful cuts so that the tree would not fall on the neighbor’s house and destroy it but also directing it away from his own yard, so he wouldn’t have to clean it up. Then he walked home, fully satisfied if perhaps a little afraid.
The next day he took his chainsaw, threw it in the dump, and prepared himself to deny having any idea who had brought the giant down, even though the truth would be obvious. There was only one hole in his plan: He didn’t realize how popular his neighbors were, and he didn’t know how unbearable it would be to have the entire local population turn against him, to the point where no one would even look at him or talk to him.
So the day finally came when the man realized his life would be wrecked for good unless he dealt with his destructive and selfish act. What steps did he have to take in order to set things right?
THE STEPS TO ACCEPTING RESPONSIBILITY
1. He had to admit, and admit fully, that he cut down the tree. He dreaded looking at people and saying, “Yeah, it was me”—even though they already knew—but he had to do it. He had to stop claiming that the neighbors had cut the tree down themselves so that they could blame him and turn everyone against him. And when he did admit his act, he also had to acknowledge what an old and impressive tree he had killed, rather than try to save face by insisting that it had been small and ugly.
2. He had to admit that he had cut it down on purpose, that his actions were a choice. He couldn’t claim that he had been so drunk or enraged that he didn’t know what he was doing. He couldn’t say, “Well, I just meant to put a little cut into the trunk as a warning to them, but I accidentally cut too far and the tree fell down.” In short, he had to stop making excuses. Furthermore, he had to admit that he had goals that he tried to further through his destructive behavior; he needed to be honest about his motives.
3. He had to acknowledge that what he did was wrong. This meant that he had to stop blaming the neighbors and playing up how victimized he had been by the shade. He had to make a sincere, heartfelt apology.
4. He had to accept the neighbors’ right to be angry about what he did, which meant that he had to be willing to truly acknowledge the effects of his actions. He had to take in the anguish he had caused. He had to stop asserting that they were “making too big a deal over one stupid tree” and that “it happened along time ago and they should be over it by now.” Although apologizing was important, he also had to accept that saying he was sorry was only the beginning and that it meant nothing unless he also looked seriously at the damage he had done.
5. He had to accept the consequences of his actions. First, he had to provide reasonable monetary damage for the value of the destroyed tree. He then needed to plead guilty to the criminal charges, so that the neighbors would not have to go through the ordeal of testifying against him. He had to stop seeking sympathy from people for the problems he himself had caused, along the lines of: “Poor me, I had to pay out all this money that I can’t afford because of their tree when the only reason I cut it down was because they were wrecking my yard with it.”
6. He had to devote long-term and serious effort toward setting right what he had done. No amount of money can replace a mature tree; there’s no way to erase the effects of such a destructive act. The man therefore had to make amends. He needed to buy as large and healthy a young tree as he could find in a nursery and to plant it carefully behind the neighbors’ house. What’s more, he had to water the tree, protect it from deer, watch it for diseases, and fertilize it as necessary for years. A young tree takes a long time to securely establish itself.
7. He had to lay aside demands for forgiveness. He had to recognize that even if he sincerely were to take all of the steps I have described, the neighbors might still be left with pain, hurt, and bitterness, and the man had no right to tell them how long their bad feelings should last, especially since he was the cause. People might be nicer to him now that he had stopped denying what he did, but they wouldn’t necessarily ever like him. The neighbors might never want to be his friends—and why should they be? If they did decide to be friendly with him at some point, he should see their forgiveness as an act of kindness and not as his due for replacing the tree.
8. He had to treat the neighbors consistently well from that point forward. He couldn’t decide to stick it to them five years later by cutting down a rosebush, for example, and then say,“Okay, I messed up, but shouldn’t I get credit for the five years that I’ve been good? You can’t expect me to be perfect.” Asking someone not to cutdown the neighbors’ flowers is not the same thing as expecting perfection.
9. He had to relinquish his negative view of his neighbors. He had to stop speaking badly about them to other people and accept that most—perhaps even all—of what he disliked about them actually had to do with their responses to the damage he had done and their refusal to be bullied by him. He had been the creator of their hostility toward him.
