OK, I get it, my husband’s a verbal abuser

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Cary’s classic column from WEDNESDAY, OCT 8, 2008

It’s taken me a long time to accept what my therapist has been pushing at — but I think I’m ready to act in my own interest.


Dear Cary,

I’m troubled.

At long last, my therapist did something I sensed she meant to do a long time ago — assign me to read a book on verbally abusive relationships. I suspect that, despite her dissimilation, she expects me to find myself there, in the role of the victim of verbal and psychological abuse.

And I do.

And yet on another level, I question the whole idea. The book contains no citations. It could well be cut from whole cloth, as they say — an angry woman’s fantasy of how men are, how men act. Even if that characterization is a straw man (womyn?), it is a tempting one, especially when the self-help verbiage gets a little much. But where do we draw the line? I seem to be standing on a line, on one side of which is mutually unproductive communication that can be resolved through talking and counseling and new approaches, and on the other is a crowd shouting “Why haven’t you DTMFA?”

Since I have been with him, I have gradually given up my passions — my theater, my academic field, my crafts, my gym membership. Only those things that he finds acceptable — the hobbies, the reading, the baking (but never on hot days) — remain. He wished to own a house. We own a house. I cook, clean, launder, mow the lawn, call the repairmen, run the errands, pay the mortgage. I have been working for seven years under the assumption that these are all choices I was involved in, decisions I made. And yet I daydream of a cozy studio apartment where I am alone and everything — the belongings, the music, the choices — is mine. Of going where the jobs in my field are, instead of staying where they aren’t. Of dallying with women, and perhaps men, with beautiful souls.

I take pills. I go to therapy. He goes back to school. I applaud this — it is a sensible decision that will lead to a stable job in his field — even as I resent his freedom to do so. I make a point of telling him that I wish to return to school (yet again) once he finds a job. He is wholly supportive of this, he says — once the loans are paid off, once we are no longer in debt. Despite my thrift, the loans pile up. When I fail to manage the money as he directs, I am chastised. Every cent I spend is one that cannot be used to pay off those loans and buy my freedom from menial jobs that siphon my self-confidence and passion, but which pay for the therapy to deal with the panic attacks and crying jags that primarily manifest themselves when he’s around.

And yet, and yet, and yet.

There is a long and storied history of psychological instability in my family, on both sides, which has led me to believe that my problems were internal and self-contained. There is also (as I learned recently, yet have known all along) a long and storied family history of controllers and controllees, criticizers and objects of criticism. I am not sure what his family has given him, aside from a Midwestern up-by-the-bootstraps aversion to psychoanalysis of any kind.

A dear friend says that she had these concerns before she knew him, from my tone, from my phone calls. She met him, and “[saw] how he looks at me,” the love in his eyes, and her fears were assuaged. I know that he loves me, from that same look, those same heartbreakingly beautiful smiles. I also know that he expects me to read his mind, then tells me that I am the one who needs to fix my reactions so that we can communicate — who drives me to tears with his inconsistencies, then allows me the solace of his embrace.

It is not that I fear to be alone or independent — aside from the annoyance of dividing things up, the prospect seems inviting. But the prospect of remaking myself in my own image, of reclaiming the me that was, is more complicated. And there are so many things that I would miss. Friends, games, holidays, my mother-in-law, even the house that taunts me with its constant breakings and dirtiness. Him, the man who has been so good for me in so many ways, who rescued me from an equally dead-end (though less malignant) relationship, whom I’ve shared so many adventures with. Who I’m not even convinced is aware of what he’s doing.
And yet things cannot remain as they are.

Angel in the Details

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Dear Angel,

I am going to try to be direct. You know that’s not my style. But still.

I suggest you leave this guy.

There is only one twist: You make your new life first.

I basically agree with the DTMFA approach — with one caveat.

The caveat is that you begin not by disrupting your current life but by building your new one. If you leave without trying to rebuild your life first, you may find yourself alone in a new place, isolated from friends and family, without a solid network, without a life plan, having just gone through a traumatic breakup, flooded with emotion, and you may, under that stress, be more prone to fall back into your old pattern of finding a rescuer, a controller, a caretaker. You may slip back into the same situation with someone else. So I advise taking a gradual approach to building a new life so that when you leave him, you have a new life to step into. Work to develop new behaviors and reinvigorate abandoned passions.

For instance, these things you mention that you have given up — your theater, your academic field, your crafts, your gym membership: Put these things back in your life one by one. When you begin doing this, he may object. Keep in mind that you are leaving him anyway.

It may help to set a date and write it in your calendar, say, six months. In six months you are leaving. During that time you tackle the many concrete tasks of rebuilding your life. This includes looking at new places to live and working out your budget. As you pursue this project, at a certain point — and this may happen sooner than you expect — it may become impossible to continue to live with him. Your positive action may force buried conflicts to the surface. He may decide that he is divorcing you. He may become unstable. He may threaten you. If he is a certain kind of man, when his control over you is threatened, he may become dangerous. So, while laying the groundwork for an orderly departure, you need to also be ready to leave quickly if things get to that.

The point is this: To the extent possible, don’t act precipitously to your own detriment. Instead, begin putting your life together and try to leave at a time that is best for you.

Now, regardless of his objections, you may find that you yourself just can’t build this new life while still living with him. You may feel paralyzed, blocked, unable to act. If so, OK. Leaving him might be a precondition to putting your life together. That’s OK. Discuss this with your therapist and make a plan. But please do what you can to prepare first. Give it a try. Take what steps you can to reconnect with your theater, your academic life, your crafts and your gym first. Do what you can.

Just so we’re clear: Yes, I think you should leave. DTMFA or whatever. Just, to the extent possible, prepare first.

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9 comments

  • Cary’s very good advice takes these objections into account. If the husband is, in fact, not abusive, then the wife can assert herself and move on with her life. The marriage might get better. However, I think Cary nails it when he suggests that the husband’s reactions won’t be positive once he realizes he is losing control of her and the situation. The subtle threat of some kind of punishment is what makes this type of control so insidious.

    • No, he does not take a possible other side into account – he tells her upfront to leave – we don’t have enough info to say whether this is best. She may be suffering from the grass is always greener scenario.

      “that the husband’s reactions won’t be positive once he realizes he is losing control of her and the situation.”

      So? Life is full of negative events. Since the key to the success of a relationship is compatibility, every relationship has attached to it the threat of things falling apart of you don’t meet your partner’s needs and/or wants, even if your partner is not controlling or abusive.
      If she has pretended to be his dream woman for the sake of keeping the relationship together and will shortly book because he’s not the one without trying to work out a solution to BOTH their needs, he is a much if not more a victim than her.

  • We don’t know how much he is willing to compromise. If she’s the wishy washy type who says “ok” every time he suggests something, then it’s on her, not him.
    She herself says ” I have been working for seven years under the assumption that these are all choices I was involved in, decisions I made.” If she’s saying now that she didn’t really want to do that then she needs to learn to say what she wants. Labelling herself a victim is going to worsen the problem.

    I’ve nearly always been the type who is not afraid to say “I don’t want to do that” or “I plan to do this and you haven’t convinced me otherwise.” I don’t understand those who can’t or won’t say it.

    Maybe he is a controlling tyrant but her ambiguous wording as to his “abuse” makes me say that I need to hear more before I condemn him.

    I am curious as to how this turned out. Perhaps she took Cary’s advice, redid her life then left and found happiness. Then again, maybe she left and found it difficult to survive on her own, emotionally financially, or both.

    • I realize you don’t understand that kind of person. That’s what I meant – you don’t understand.

      This kind of abuser – and I’m not definitetively saying he IS one, only that it looks that way – manipulates the other person into doing what he wants partly by getting her to believe that she isn’t capable of making decisions on her own.

      I am not that person, nor have I ever been, but I have seen this type of relationship. It usually looks just fine to outsiders, and often the person being controlled thinks that kind of behaviour is acceptable, mostly because he or she has been manipulated into that thinking.

  • I don’t agree with advising to leave with only 1 side of the story. The truth is that unless he holds a gun on her to prevent her from participating in her preferred activities, she did participate in these choices. We don’t know how much debt they have and for what expenses. We don’t know her spending versus his spending. We don’t know what choices she has in the town in which they are currently living.
    My advice would be to continue with therapy and look for the life she wants within her current bounds ( the hometown and the marriage) and see what happens. If he can’t handle it, let him tell her so. If he can, then go from there.

    • Vermin8, I don’t think you understand the nature of this kind of abuse. Sure, there has to be compromise in any relationship, but when the compromise is all on one side and one person is doing what he wants while the other is not, and dictating under what circumstances the other gets to fulfill her wishes, there’s some trouble there.

      Sure, we never know the other sides of these calls for help. Cary can only respond to the person who has reached out.

      • Wrong. I do understand. I dated a manipulator (I’ve probably dated more than a few) – I was 22 and just out of college. He was older and recently divorced and told me he wanted a career woman rather than a dependent wife. He told me what car to buy, how to dress, what to drink, who to pal around with.
        I would weigh each instruction on its own merits. The dress advice turned out to be very good. But more often than not I would tell him thanks, but I’ve got my own decision parameters. It was that simple and it was because I wanted to make my own decisions. This is why I don’t understand the LW – she voluntarily checked out of the decision making process and now she wants (or wanted since the letter is 6 years old) to blame him.

        • So you had the strength to see what he was doing and counteract it; you had the confidence to go your own way. Not everyone does. Else there would be nobody in abusive relationships, ever.

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