Dear all,

I am here following the advice of my therapist to speak with people who have had the same experience as me. Sorry for the long post to follow!

What I have been through is difficult to sum up, as the abuse was subtle, and in constant and daily details, rather than in a few big and explicit events. 

I had this very good friend at work, we were in the same group of friends and we would share everything, from lunch breaks to outside of work parties. One day, as we had been getting progressively closer in the past few months, we had sex. I had just been out of a difficult break up so when he told me he did not want the nature of our relationship to change, and he would prefer to just stay friends, I agreed, as I still had not completely moved on from the break up with the other person.

After that however, his behaviour towards me changed. We started having sex regularly, but he would act in a very ambivalent and entitled way. He would write to me constantly, need my constant help and attention, we would have passionate encounters outside of work, but he would ignore me in social situations. It is like he would take everything from me but not give anything back. He started saying mean and sexist things, criticizing me for the way I waxed for example, and he would never say anything positive or nice about me. He would flirt with my friends, and speak constantly about other girls and how pretty and attractive they were but then he would keep secrets about the girls he was really seeing behind my back. I felt like he always wanted to remind me that I was nothing to him, that I was not his gf, and that he was free. He would refuse to wear a condom and it made me really anxious as I thought he might not use it with the other girls either and then he might get me infections or get me pregnant etc. He would make me pay for the things we ate while together, and tell me as a joke that it was because I had to pay him back for having sex with me, etc. Whenever I would call him out for his behavior and how it made me feel, he would act very apologetic, so it made me think that he had a heart after all, but then again, his behaviour never changed. I was also feeling very guilty for the way I felt and the way I complained to him, because after all, we were not a couple. But still something inside me told me this was not right, it was not a reason to be dishonest like that and disrespect me, we were friends after all. When I tried to “break up”, he would come back to me and we would get back “together”. After six months however, I finally had the strength to put a real end to all of this, as I was losing my physical and mental health. All this time, the relationship was secret as he did not want anybody to know.

After the “break up”, we would still be “friends” and see each other every day at work, and also since we had the same group of friends, we would always see each other also in social situations. I really wanted to move on but this was making it difficult. And remaining friends just felt wrong because it made me feel a lot of emotions I could not identify. I started seeing a therapist and after a few months of me explaining how I felt, what had happened with him, and how the negative emotions about him would not go away, my therapist diagnosed that I had been through emotional, economic and sexual abuse. It helped me understand why I was feeling so bad and why it was so hard to move on and get better. When I tried to distance myself from him however, he would show me his ‘vulnerable’ side and make it hard for me to cut contact with him.

After that, one day I noticed his behavior towards another colleague of mine, and I understood he had started seeing her and was in a relationship with her. However, he would always tell me that he was single, and he would lie about everything and hide even the stupidest thing that did not need to be a secret. When I wanted to tell him I knew he was with her, he kept lying, making me feel like I was crazy. Finally one day when he could not lie anymore because of what I had noticed, he finally admitted, and it made me furious. A/ I did not understand why he would lie and make me feel crazy; B/because this other colleague did not know what he did to me and he did not want to tell her, so he would not ruin his chances with her; C/ because it was already hard to see him every day, and seeing him with her acting so kind to her was making me feel horrible, because it made me feel like if he had this potential to treat women well and he decided not to treat ME well, it was because there was a problem with me as a person; D/ because no other colleague knew about what he did not me and what happened with me so I could not get support in the work place; E/because he left me a horrible scar and it is tough to see he can just get away with it and find love and happiness when I still struggle to get better.

Finally, I decided to quit my job to find mental peace and never see him again as it was becoming horrible. That was two months ago.

My question is: how do you move on and forget about what happened? How do you stop thinking about this every day constantly, and how long did it take you to live normally again?

Thank you so much for your help and support.