Incest Survivors Support Group
Incest refers to any sexual activity between closely related persons that is illegal or socially taboo. Consensual adult incest is very rare. Incest between adults and prepubescent or adolescent children is a form of child sexual abuse that has been shown to be one of the most extreme forms of childhood trauma. If you or a loved one is a survivor of incest, join the group...
Okay...my wife has been doing something that has chronically hurt me. She being aspie and I being dissociated...neither of us realized her negative comments (which she somehow construed as helpful!?!?!) were basically trashing my confidence. For years.
Now hat I have finally snapped-to and realized what a number she was (probably unwittingly) doing to my head...trust is broken.
You see, I tend to give trust until it's broken.
Then I take it back and never give it to that person again.
As a kid I kept relaxing around my dad, and then I'd put a foot wrong and get knocked silly-slapped or punched. It took a millisecond for him to go from happy to hitting, and then back to happy, and wanting me to pretend like my face didn't have a red, throbbibg handprint on it.
Until one day I had made him late for work three times in a row...I believe I was 12...
He basically kept slapping and screaming and driving the whole 20 minutes it took to get me to school...
I remember counting how many times he smacked me, I think I lost count at 14...I dissociated, so I could not hear what he was screaming...but I really wanted to jump out on the freeway and to this day I wish I had...if I had lived I would feel less of a doormat.
So I used that to shut off my love and trust for him, kept replaying it when I found myself relaxing around him, or feeling warm towards him.
Now that I know how to shut love off, it's more like flipping a switch. So my trust for her is...just gone.
My love is evaporating too.
The only thing...I can't live without trusting.
I can't trust without getting betrayed.
I can't live without love, but I can't have love without being destroyed by the people I love the most.
The only choice I have is who gets to smash me to bits this time.
I think about this and I feel terrified and helpless.
She's been keeping my gun locked. It's a revolver, it can't be used if you padlock the frame. Without bothering to tell her, while she was sleeping last night I took the padlock off it.
Now hat I have finally snapped-to and realized what a number she was (probably unwittingly) doing to my head...trust is broken.
You see, I tend to give trust until it's broken.
Then I take it back and never give it to that person again.
As a kid I kept relaxing around my dad, and then I'd put a foot wrong and get knocked silly-slapped or punched. It took a millisecond for him to go from happy to hitting, and then back to happy, and wanting me to pretend like my face didn't have a red, throbbibg handprint on it.
Until one day I had made him late for work three times in a row...I believe I was 12...
He basically kept slapping and screaming and driving the whole 20 minutes it took to get me to school...
I remember counting how many times he smacked me, I think I lost count at 14...I dissociated, so I could not hear what he was screaming...but I really wanted to jump out on the freeway and to this day I wish I had...if I had lived I would feel less of a doormat.
So I used that to shut off my love and trust for him, kept replaying it when I found myself relaxing around him, or feeling warm towards him.
Now that I know how to shut love off, it's more like flipping a switch. So my trust for her is...just gone.
My love is evaporating too.
The only thing...I can't live without trusting.
I can't trust without getting betrayed.
I can't live without love, but I can't have love without being destroyed by the people I love the most.
The only choice I have is who gets to smash me to bits this time.
I think about this and I feel terrified and helpless.
She's been keeping my gun locked. It's a revolver, it can't be used if you padlock the frame. Without bothering to tell her, while she was sleeping last night I took the padlock off it.
Trust is so hard.... yet once it's formed, it's solid until something breaks it.
And once it's broken, it's like a rubberband, it can stretch and stretch - beyond normal limits - until it snaps and then it can't be repaired. I know this feeling oh so well.
I can't say it applies in your situation. I hope your wife is supportive of you and perhaps this is a mental distortion based upon your years of abuse....
But if it's not, if it's justified and honest, I feel for you deeply.
I know what broken trust -as an adult- feels like and, for me at least, it was irreparable.
We have 3 children in young adolescence and I am financially dependant on him so leaving is not an option. Yet another thing I have to work my way through. And I will. I have to learn to stand up to him and just not accept his crap, to stop having expectations of him that he can't fulfil.
I suspect your wife is like him - not bad, but an insensitive arsehole who has a shed load of problems she would rather dump on you than deal with. You don't have to take the crap, just because she want to dump on you doesn't mean you have to take it. And if you can no longer trust her with your emotional well being - then that's fine, don't trust her with it.
Please put that padlock back on the gun - take away the possibility of acting rashly. Killing or wounding her would not make the situation any better - far from it. I would add to your problems.
I'm sorry this is so long - it's just that it hits exactly what I'm going through now and I've been wondering how to write about it.
I ended up leaving him and finding my way, miraculously. That was over 10 years ago and I am now in a healthy, supportive relationship. I'm glad I suffered and struggled through leaving him. I had to leave the kids, too, momentarily until I was able to provide for them which wasn't easy but it happened.
I wish you peace and luck.
But I will no longer allow him to use me as his punch bag or let him off the hook when he (emotionally - he has never physically hurt me) hurts me. Lets see what happens...
You could use support from those who understand. Please try.
And put the lock back on the gun.