Wedded Agony

I got married in 1999. This year would be my ten year anniversary. We should have never gotten married. I obviously had father and abuse issues to work out still. My ex is VERY much like my father. Doing some spring cleaning the other day, I found some notes I made obviously before a counseling session about what happens when we fought:

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I say something that he takes offensively. He gets angry & he becomes offensive in return.

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If I try to explain how I meant something I said, I either get the disbelieving "Mmmm-Hmmmm", or I get the lecture on "It's not what you said, it's how you said it," or I get the no-win "So, are you lying now, or were you lying then?" Trying to talk my way out of any of these goes nowhere. He is stuck in his stubborn mmindset.

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If I walk away, he stews and gets more angry.

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If I tell him that I need time, he will follow me or yell to me until I come back and finish the conversation. He hates to give me my time. On the occasions that he has allowed me some time, he is utterly furious by the time I'm ready to talk. Knowing he feels this way, it makes it impossible for me to relax & think. I spend it all worrying about how angry he's getting.

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If I stay calm and try to be gentle, he accuses me of pacifying him, talking down to him, or tells me to quit my "psycho-babble."

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If I cry, he says he must be the "no good SOB who made me cry so why would I want to be with him?", or he accuses me of making myself cry to manipulate him or he shuts down completely and can't deal with me.

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When we discuss parameters or boundaries for disagreements, he usually agrees but when we fight, it all goes out the window. When I try to remind him that made these agreements to improve communication, I either get "Oh great, I failed you again. What else can I do wrong?" of he will tell me that I can't expect him to control himself when he's mad. After all, as he says "Fighting is war." Someone has to win and he will do whatever he has to do to win.

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Other times if I make suggestions, he feels I'm telling him what to do. If I ask him to make suggestions, he won't. More often, he will say something like "Well, if you hadn't walked away from me, none of this would have happened in the first place."

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His other response when I ask him what he can do is to say "I will just always say 'yes dear' and then you can have everything you want, I'll be your little puppet, and then you'll be happy."

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He beats me down until I feel I have no choice but to cry and apologize a hundred times. It's not good enough for him. I can't just give in. If I want the agony to end, I have to tell him that I no longer have my own opinion on the subject but that I agree with him.

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Oh my gosh, I feel so horrible for my old self when I read back on this. I was so miserable, SO miserable. It actually knots up my stomach when I read it. I have notes all over this page reminding myself that I have the right to take care of myself and to expect to be treated respectfully. I'm happy that I've learned so much but the hard roads I had to travel to get here have sure been hell. The last part, about him forcing me to agree with him before he'd let it go....it reminds me of the night my father forced me to admit that I made up everything I said about my brother abusing me. Horrid.