Ugly stuff here, Arfie, and definitely triggering.

Emotion was to be denied until it exploded in my childhood home, and it did so via rage only. Violence.

I swore not to do that.

I was placed on an epilepsy medication that affected parts of my brain involved in *not* doing stupid sh*t.

I round-housed my hubby. No lies, no excuses, no explanations. We'd been around his family, they'd run me down as white trash, he grabbed my shoulder saying I was hysterical (I was crying) and my chlidhood said, "F*** it". I clobbered him. He held that over me for *years* despite counseling and more, it was just horrible, and I still carry the remorse and guilt and shame. I was my horrible abuser. It devastated me. Hubby has long since forgiven and forgotten. I can't. It haunts me.

Beyond traumatized sibling skirmishes (5 brothers, 5 sisters) physical violence was not a big part of my personal birth family circus. 100% of my exposure to the phenom has been from a safe distance. Kiddie whorehouses keep good bouncers on hand.

Just figuring out that my pumps-and-pearls, upper-middle-class MIL was beating her husband was a shock to my system. It remains a closely-guarded family secret. Details still mostly unavailable.

Finding myself tempted to use my combat-training on my husband? Yea, he is more than twice my size, but so were some of my sparring partners. . . His big-guy athletic training is no match for my under-sized combat training.

Still sorting. . . Don't accuse me of expertise, but I believe this is bubbling up out of the recent domestic Tit-for-Tat skirmishes hubs and I have been fielding.

"You see it your way
"I see it my way
"And we both see it slipping away." ~ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EaO-kgG7eCQ

Stress is stress.

This is just my opinion. It's not the "particular" kind of abuse or situation that triggers it...it's the stress, and the stress response itself.

Further, I don't think that this is rocket science. I think that this is down to the basics about as fundamental as you get biology.

Have you ever seen an animal tormented? By flies? By a child? By pain? They'll turn around and snap...at whoever or whatever is there. It's not "personal", it's instinctive.

My personal views are, that if we cared kids, we'd reduce stress for parents and kids.

You asked for no advice. Well throw cream pies at me, because I'm going to suggest that you reduce your stress, AND give yourself credit.

Because it IS a big deal that you haven't ever hurt him. Just about everyone feels that feeling from one time to another. The fact is...you found another way to cope.

And that's not just something...that's Everything.

I'm with Patti (as long as I"m not the one being absolved).... I haven't harmed since... But even on those meds, I shouldv'e been a better person.

I could say a lot about how getting shoulder-grabbed was my sister's MO and being told my emotions are "wrong" is a huge trigger, and I did clock my sis a few times as a kid (gibven our age and size difference, the worst I accomplished was one face-slap and I broke her glasses by accident once).... But it stil lcomes down to....

You didn't fail that test, Arfie. I'm very admiring of you for that.

I am on the flip side of this story. My first wife was very abusive. She would punch and kick me everyday. I would laugh it off as she was about 5'5" tall and never weighed more than 105 lbs. So she wasn't able to hurt me physically. What I didn't realize was the non physical part of domestic violence was there as well. I allowed her to control my life. She drove away all my friends and made it impossible for me to do things I loved to do. It took me years to process that. Actually it was during my fmla leave a year ago that I started recalling how bad I let things get. A friend reminded me that I once asked my ex if it was ok to put mustard on my hotdog.

It is good to recognize that you have the ability to physically harm your husband. It took her trying to kill me twice before I recognized how dangerous my ex was.

Yes, Atec, it does sound like you were on the opposite side of this coin. Maybe. Sorta. My fight training included the how-and-win-not-to training. I can't even imagine intentionally using physical blows on untrained civilians, no matter how much bigger they are, or how much they goad, but. . . A split second loss of control is all it takes.

I do see parallels.

The tendency to laugh off how much a little girl can hurt a big, strong man. . . Hubs is twice my size, but so were some of my sparring partners. The trick is using the momentum of their size to your advantage. Pure physics.

Ignoring the surrounding symptoms. . .

Methinks there are more parallels. . . I am not at all sure it is a pure gender stereotype phenom. Or is that just the skewed perspective of a lady engineer/Army vet?

Still sorting. . .

Thank you for the advice, Patti. Think I'd rather eat my cream pies than throw them. Love cream pies. Chocolate cream and lemon cream are my faves. Does Key Lime pie qualify as a cream pie? Don't matter. I'm keeping my Key Lime pie, too.

Less stress is always better in my book.

Oh forgot to mention I've had a bit of martial arts training also. The thing that scares me is I've trained to the point of reacting without thinking and those reflexes are built into me on a level that can't be controlled sometimes. When I become hyper vigilant I will swing at someone before I even know that I'm doing it. Thankfully I manage to hit something other than a person most times but I'm still scared it might happen.

Well here's a flip on it. I do get mad and can turn if I am protecting some one else, but not for me. So I never hit back at my first husband, his control was little or none in that department. Also well trained thanks to the military.
I did turn on John once when we were just getting together , I was extremely triggered by my exes stalking me with a gun. Also loud noises get me fast, I usually turn to protect me from too much damage. (I told about it before), John just slamming down his beer bottle to cheer a football game. Not really that loud but in my state it may as well been an M-80 going off. Even then I pulled and didn't connect.

It brought about a talk as to what happened to me. And that I wouldn't fight back ,I would always let what happened from him happen.
John was also a well trained boxer, Golden Gloves and the traing and boxing for the Marines.
So he set about teaching me to fight, box, guard with connections. He didn't want me to cower anymore. I'm good at it now if I need to, but he took many a blows in the lessons. He would show me how to put the force in, squaring my stance to 3/4 (smaller target) and direct the punches with my shoulder muscles ( 3 miles a day for years of swimming made my trapezoids the strongest base for a punch), using momentum, and balance so I could hit harder. Just so I could do it if I needed to, and block what might be thrown at me.
He would laugh if it caused a bruise or two, saying good stuff, now do it again until you can do it with out pulling, because I know you can.

It did help my confidence, but he took a lot of bruises in my lessons. It is still not my first choice, but if it happens?

Arfie, hugs.
J.

I was that way, I couldn't protect myself from my own abuser within a relationship, just did not have it. but don't hurt anybody else, and don't anybody else scare me either - it is hard to talk about this.

right now, thinking about it? I am jello, but if I were confronted by someone intent on harm - it just happens. it is frightening when it does. I have prayed to see it first - like a geometry or something like that, almost out of body, my body just does its thing and I calmly walk away. done. nothing like this has happened in a very long time - I don't put myself places where it is possible to happen. I feel like I am dangerous and stay in. I had no formal training, just picked things up by accident and oh yeah, that torture and stuff.

***kicks can***

I love lime pie.



Oh and back in my younger days, my ex's friend was dating this 95 pound girl. Quadruple black belt (or whatever it's called). They were walking down an alley and got attacked. Scott said that he looked on in amazement as 30 seconds later 3 men were laying on the ground groaning. Her makeup didn't even get smeared.

They got up and scrambled off. Scott hadn't even dropped the six pack he was carrying. They called the police when they got to his room, but the guys were never found. (Days before cell phones.)

He married her.

I hate me for being that way, ever, for even a minute. I hate it. It's such a failure to me.

that said, if you want to hurt a small child or animal in my presence, think twice. I won't strike, but I get this look that Hubby calls my "feral" look. This guy who was trained to kill very well by the US military saw me like that for a couple minutes when I was informing a fellow contractor about reality in my employ. I didn't use profanity, didn't raise my voice, but that *thing* was in my eyes, apparently.... The chided contractor still avoids me to this day, and I never got within six feet of him.

I hate that, because it's how my dad was.

On the other hand, I've learned in my 20s and since how to "summon" it, and while the PTSD can mess me up? I own it, not the other way around.

Also, I will never ever touch that class of pharmaceutical for epilepsy ever ever again. OMG. Might as well have been walking around wtih a fifth of whiskey in my brain. And we all know how well *that* ends when combined with hypervigilance and reflexes like ours....

Like Lilly, I learned by experience. The rule of any fight I went into was "survive". No half-measures. That's how my dad and sis were to me, so taht's all I knew. Then I took self-defense for girls in college. (Essentially, use your available resources kind of stuff.)

That little detail about the training reaching the point of being reflexive is critical, both in effective use, when appropriate, and disastrous results when not appropriate. By this stage of training, it takes less time to deliver a lethal blow than it does to deliver a faux pas at a PTA meeting. The when-and-how-not-to training needs to be every bit as reflexive.

Is there anything like a lover's quarrel to skew the reflexes?

Patti, I ain't a-throwing a perfectly good pie, but I'll be happy to share a slice with you. Key Lime, it is. I'd love to hear what your ex's friend thought of his 95 pound surprise around their 10th anniversary. I don't know, but I suspect my own husband was thinking he should have been more careful what he wished for by then. What do you do when a dream comes true and it's not quite what you planned?

Maybe all of life is a course of baby steps, and that's all we can do and all we can take it in?