Physical & Emotional Abuse Support Group

Hi Katt ---

I hope you can find an alternative to panic mode.

You wrote:

If he recognizes that he has a problem and needs professional mental help and is willing to get it, is there the possibility that he can turn his life around.


Well ---- sure.

Just let me ask you this:

Is there an ingrained pattern in your life your life that you recognized needed changing, that you got help for and then was able to do what it took to change the pattern and was successful changing it? Do you remember how hard it was? Were you successful?

Now ----- can you picture an abusive partner owning a problem, seeking out and utilizing help, doing the work required and staying focused and dedicated long enough to extinguish his/her abusive behavior?

That's your answer.

My best to you.

Ilene

Hi Katt I am new to this group, I felt the need to answer you. The only person you have control over getting better is you, the abuser may or may not seek help, they usually dont see they need help. I wanted to recommend a wonderful book to you it did help strengthen me. I was so incredibly anxiety ridden it was awful..my life had just stopped. I have been married to my verbal abuser (he was physical in the beggining) for over 24 years and I had no clue I was an abused woman until Dec of 2007. Thats where the manipulation was finally seen. Anyway the book is "The verbally abusive relationship" by Patricia Evans... anyway it may help you and if not she does have many more on abuse. The book pointed out so many things to me like the fact it was not my fault. My abuser to this day thinks everything is my fault, but I now handle things differantly. He can blame me all he wants, but in the end I now know better. I know that if he did not have me to blame that would mean he had to take responsibility, and that he wavers on. He is in AA he is an Alcholic/ drug addict. Even with almost a year under his belt, he can still be so cruel, the lies and so on. I know the ball is now in my court, all of these findings have taken so much anxiety away from me, and I feel a freedom I have not felt since I was 21. Good luck Katt, I truly do wish you the best and for the anxiety to be lifted off of you.

Thank you ladies. I needed to be talked off the ledge. I know him, I know he's not going to change, not for me, not for himself. I want that so much in my heart though. At what point do I just stop caring and give up hope on him?

I pray everyday for him to see that he is an alcoholic and than he's an emotional and physical abuser and to know what all it has cost him. His lost his freedom, his home, his job, his wife, and if he doesn't stop, it will cost him his life in the end.

I know there isn't ONE single thing I can do to change that. I know that I have to take care of myself first and foremost and keep myself safe.

This would be so much easier if I HATED him, but I don't. I should! I should for all the hell I've been through with him, but it's not my nature. I'm a very forgiving person...to a fault.

When his sister told me that he hoped we could work things out a little later, it scared me. I'm afraid of being weak when it comes to him. I've heard all the promises to change and never hurt me again....all lies.

It's driving me crazy! I know I sound weak and pathetic right now, but the thought of having him back in my life stirred up all these emotions and anxiety that I don't know what to do with.

Dear Katt you asked at what point do you stop caring and give up hope. That may never happen, no one knows the future for ourselves. For me and only me working on me has helped me to understand he is a very sick man. I know the 3 C's, I didnt cause it, I cant change it and I cant cure it. Be strong for yourself, and I hear you saying just the thoughht of him has placed you in panic mode. I know this sounds crazy....Take the time to listen to your mind and body. We ultimately know the right answer when we can clear other things away and just listen to ourselves. That was a hard thing for me to do, I know it is not easy when the anxiety has taken over, so what I did was picture myself somewhere I felt safe and just closed my eyes and went there, and afyer practice I ended up helping me.
I finally heard my voice, not everyone elses.
Oh my gosh I could hear my voice helping guide me. I still faulter and I still am not in the best place but I am getting there. It took me 23+ years to get so down, I was told it took you 23 years to get here, it will not happen overnight, but it will come.
Take care of yourself Katt, I do not know you, But I have faith in you. If the feeling of insanity was with me for so long and I am slowly making it...I know you can do this also.

Take care of you Katt, you are worthy and special. As I now know I am also, I did not know that for so long, but we are special and worthy and deserving of peace, love and kindness and worthy of our voices being heard, even if its only by us listening.

Hi again, Katt ----

There's a middle-ground between "not caring" about him and "hating" him. There is, really.

You can continue to love him ----- and simultaneously accept that he's emotionally injured and not capable of being an intimate partner. He is what he is. He may simply not be capable of being a healthy partner.

It's a hard thing to accept, when we love someone and have a vision of the future as being together with that person.

Focus on building yourself up inside and taking the best care of yourself possible.

Ilene

My daughter has been married for 8 years and is abused. At first I was in denial I guess, but now about once a year she will call me and he has abused her. I pray that she will finally leave him and I worry for the safety of my grandchildren. Each time she says she is not going back but she always does. I wish she could have a happy, normal life.

i read the part where you wrote i can empathise totally

THe man you need him to be

indicates something...

was he ever this man? Or was that your hope and perception that this man was always a project that needed to be someone else?

There are men out there who are the finished article you need, who dont need to be fixed or changed into someone else, they can not or will not become.....books by don miquel ruiz the mastery of love etc.

There is no way to be happy and live a normal life when that there is an abuser in the picture. A normal life is what I've been praying for for the last year and a half. The men in our lives do not want anything normal. I think it scares them because they are so messed up inside.

It's been one month today since my husband last abused me. I've since filed for divorce and he is sitting in jail thinking that "maybe later we can work things out". If only that were true.

Hearing that he is thinking about possibly getting back together has sent me into an emotional overload. I pray with all my heart that he will change. That this time he will have "SEEN THE LIGHT", but I can't pin my hopes and future on that.

I cannot keep putting myself in harms way. It's too dangerous.

I'm beginning to think he wasn't ever the man I thought he was or needed him to be. A project to be fix is probably the best term to use. I was always trying to fix him. I don't know why I would think he would change now. He didn't change after the first time, or the second time, or the third time...etc.

I'm mentally exhausted by him and haven't seen in a month. I just want to move forward, but for every step forward I take, it seems that I take two steps back. It's very frustrating.