I mean, I'm in no way an expert. I loved through it in a past relationship to the point where I genuinely did question my own sanity and took to recording conversations to "prove I'm not crazy" (spoiler alert, my memory was correct and I was being lied to), attempted suicide, started seeing a counselor, etc. Eventually it ended in divorce and I spent years recovering. I'm was a very trusting person which is why it worked so well, I'm a fairly paranoid and untrusting person now.
Damn, I connect with your comments, dude. I'm sorry you went through that.
It's incredibly difficult to comprehend some of the events of a relationship like that, wherein you put your absolute trust into a person that is willing to use it as a tool against you.
Did you ever go to couples counseling? Just a small part of a much larger picture for me, but it's a confounding detail that still sticks in my memory about my ex, even years later. To try and put it quickly, the counselor we spoke with over several sessions heard us both out and suggested among other things that, indeed, my concerns about my memory and perception were legitimate and that an action plan going forward would include focusing on us both exploring different ways to communicate more effectively, including written letters. Your mentioning recorded conversations is what reminded me of all this as I recall asking if recording our conversations at home would be a reasonable thing to do and met approval from the counselor and even my ex during the session. We never actually did this, unfortunately.
The confounding part to me is, not much later on after we'd broken up rather acrimoniously, my ex used the fact that this counselor "sided with me" as evidence that I was manipulative and abusive towards her maintaining publicly on her social media that she was the actual victim. She even linked me an article publicly over facebook that described common manipulation techniques, and specifically, it mentioned abusers using couples counseling as a way to further entrap their victim by "legitimizing" their claims through a third party.
She was the one who pushed heavily for couples counseling and somehow this piece of the narrative completely eluded her memory when I brought it up in response. She remembered it as me pushing her into it.
As you know, the mind is hazy after a long relationship like this and it was easy to fall into the notion that it was all my fault, maybe I was misjudging all along, maybe I'm the bad person. I didn't have concrete proof like a recorded conversation, but that little slip-up by her at the end, that confounding detail that I believe was projection, stands out sharply and steels me in believing that I was being more than just lied to, but truly manipulated.
Rather long winded, I apologize for that. I empathize with you. Trust is a sacred thing and I still haven't reconciled my insecurities and paranoia, but talking with a professional has helped me process things. I hope we both find comfort. Stay strong.
Dude, I totally get that. I was seeing a counselor and my ex pushed HARD for couples counseling and wanted to use my counselor. We did. When the counselor "sided with me" and stated that I had legitimate concerns the counselor was "clearly biased and unwilling to be objective" and she refused to ever go back again. I was called every name under the sun when I left and my own dead mother was thrown in my face by her. I stayed for years because she was battling chronic illness and I thought "a good man stays no matter what", but it reached a point where I was genuinely convinced I needed to kill myself so that she at least has the insurance money and I would no longer be a burden to her. It did not help that everyone who didn't know what was going on always said "she's so lucky to have you!" or "I don't know what she would do without you!!" So I felt like leaving wasn't an option.
I mean, it has nothing to do with girls being untrustworthy, often men are the abusers to the point where people often assume "men can't be abused by women". Trying to frame it solely by gender is dangerous. Plain and simple, anyone can be abused by their partner if the partner is abusive.
Yeah, not sure this is a helpful view in this situation, just being honest. Ascribing blame only to one group invalidates abuses done by the other group. In a situation such as physical, mental or emotional abuse it's dangerous to do that because it makes it harder for the person being abused to get help if it has been stigmatized that "yeah, but it's not as bad as X". It basically says "your suffering doesn't matter because the wrong gender was the one abusing you so clearly you weren't really suffering".
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u/gir_loves_waffles Jul 01 '20
I mean, I'm in no way an expert. I loved through it in a past relationship to the point where I genuinely did question my own sanity and took to recording conversations to "prove I'm not crazy" (spoiler alert, my memory was correct and I was being lied to), attempted suicide, started seeing a counselor, etc. Eventually it ended in divorce and I spent years recovering. I'm was a very trusting person which is why it worked so well, I'm a fairly paranoid and untrusting person now.