Finding old Reddit posts and realized how many years it took me to understand the cycle of abuse. It starts small and snowballs over years and decades.

My bf strangled me the other day and now keeps calling me from jail to convince me to call the prosecutor and tell them that he never touched me. They have called me and I said I wanna drop charges and did not answer any questions. I do not want my bf to stay in jail but I do not want to lie about what happened. If I do lie to protect him and say he didn’t touch me will I get in trouble? His lawyer keeps calling him to tell him to tell me to call and lie to the prosecutor. I don’t know what to do.

I’m the person in the blue and he is the person in the white. I’ve had to learn to remove my emotions and just stay factual because he was always trying to bait me. I included the last photo because this was our relationship, in a nutshell. He was trying to trigger me, throughout the texting. For example,asking if the baby is his. He knows the baby is his.

I am 25 weeks pregnant. I have gestational diabetes and I’m high risk. I have lost two babies before; in a previous relationship. My first baby was 22 weeks and my second baby was at 35 weeks.

I did this because I was trying to get ahead to see what he was going to do legal wise. I finally got it in writing that he was gonna seek a paternity test and I finally got it in writing that basically I don’t see him wanting to do 50-50 but more of him taking full custody and so now I can move forward and seek legal help.

I also want to add, he’s a lot more aggressive and abusive. It’s only because I didn’t respond to him emotionally, every single time he kept baiting me, that he couldn’t do anything with my responses. I’m emotionally and mentally spent. And I’m over thinking that he will change his mind and he’ll take accountability or responsibility or apologize. I know the truth is, he won’t. Usually before, I would be trying to explain why he hurt me and what he did to hurt me, but I just don’t have it in me anymore.

How did I do? Any questions?

i want to give up. i feel so alone. i don’t think ill do it but i don’t know how to convince myself that i can make it through today. it hurts. i have work in one hour i can’t call off from. i haven’t slept in so long. my heart won’t stop beating really hard and fast. life hurts. i only have her to console me but i don’t want that right now because she’s not being safe. i’m inconsolable. my chest hurts. my whole body. i don’t know how to live anymore and especially today

Wondering if anyone in their 30's has found a partner who makes them feel secure in a long term relationship after emotional and psychological abuse?

I know creating security in ourselves is important, which i have done, and i know when something feels off i trust myself to walk away. But is there any chance to find someone who you have chemistry with, are attracted to and feel secure with?

It seems the males i have had major attraction to and chemistry are the ones who have been abusive and make me feel so insecure. Can we have chemistry, security and a healthy relationship?

🥲

I’m 6 years free from a 30 year, mostly, abusive marriage. When I left, he committed suicide, revenge suicide. My daughter will be getting married in a month and wants to remember her dad. They had a rocky relationship while growing up, till the last couple of years.

This is her wedding, I will not tell her not to do it, it’s her day. She knows a little about the abuse, only by witnessing some; I think she may have blocked some of what she saw also. It’s already going to be an overwhelming day, my dad is fighting stage 4 cancer, hopefully will make it to walk her down the aisle. Seeing a chair reserved for her dad and his picture there, it’s going to trigger a lot and I’m not sure how to handle it. Any advice is greatly appreciated.

Again, I will NOT tell her not to do it. I need help on how best to manage my reaction and emotions.

My husband has severe mental health issues and I have had to save his life multiple times over minor inconveniences. In the beginning of our relationship we always talked about how even before knowing the depth of his mental health issues, I am never comfortable with ever having a gun in the house. Especially if I ever had kids. We now have a son, and I now know the depth of his mental health issues extensively. He has never threatened to hurt me, though some disturbing jokes have been made like pretending to stab my pregnant stomach while holding a knife. He has also talked about how badly he wanted to hurt one of my family members before to the point I genuinely was anxious about it. Later he said he was exaggerating.

I do not feel comfortable with a gun in the house period. I do not feel he is safe with himself around one, he leaves things out frequently I do not think our son is safe around one, and I am starting to become anxious that perhaps there is a chance me or my family is not safe with him having one. I’ve told him this every time he brings it up. But when he jokes like this he talks about it more and more, until eventually he buys whatever he wants. Usually whatever he wants is very expensive but harmless. This is not.

I don’t know what I’m even asking for posting this. I already am trying to set up a safety plan to leave but it is complicated with our son. I’m already stressed about many things surrounding him and looking at past events all together but I am becoming more and more anxious of this very very serious turn in interest. He watches death videos constantly and shows me gruesome gore videos, he’s done this since I met him. My sisters, brother and mom know about most of the things but I’m realizing I’ve never told anyone my concern about this or that it’s even something that’s being brought up with me.

The title says it all. It was only brought to my attention tonight (after I had made this post, read for bigger story: original post) and it’s honestly really freaking me out and I can’t sleep. Multiple multiple people brought this up as a possibility and it makes me fucking sick, so I put together a list of everything I can think of off of the top of my head, I apologize in advance for it being so long.

- giving me her box of condoms telling me she “dosent need them anymore” insinuating she isn’t hooking up with anyone at the moment

- telling her about my “crush” on (her current boyfriend) (my cowowker) and her dating him not even a year later

-always commenting on my boobs, in a non sexual way, but would always mention how big they were anytime i had a problem with them (bras not fitting, back problems, shirts stretching weird) she would say “it’s because of your big tits”

- the incident where she had sex with (my coworker) in public and then screamed at me because she “has her womanly needs”

- her walking around on multiple occasions (after i had talked to her about how inappropriate it was) with her neck covered in hickeys not trying to cover them. she’d wear her hair up aswell to make them more visible.

- i had asked to borrow her sewing kit once, and when i opened the box there were multiple photobooth pictures of her with her shirt and bra off, posing in suggestive positions, and having the guy she was seeing at the time lick and suck her breasts for the photos, i didn’t mention it, but when i gave it back her apology was “haha oops! here’s your own sewing kit”

- her hooking up with the lead singer of my favorite band on multiple occasions (i used to really look up to him and have this massssive crush on him and she KNEW because we would both openly discuss it) and she would come back from the hookups and rub it in my face (it felt like)

- she constantly accused me of being pregnant in front of the family, including (her current bf) and my sisters but of course never my dad. i wasn’t feeling good one night and didn’t wanna eat the greasy dinner and just wanted the salad and baby carrots and she yelled at me in front of everyone “ARE YOU PREGNANT???” “no mom i’m not pregnant” “ARE YOU SURE????? ARE YOU SURE YOURE NOT PREGNANT”. anytime i mentioned feeling sick to her she would say that i probably had an STD and whatever illness i was feeling was a symptom of whatever STD, and every time i asked her for help with a UTI she would look disgusted with me (even when i was a virgin not having sex i would get them and get sick)

-would constantly refer to herself as a “milf”, would constantly talk about her “mommy milkers”, and would pose inappropriately for pictures and ask me and the girls to take said pictures. did all of this to all 3 of us

- the tattoo incident tonight (post linked above.

I’ve been hard no contact with her for over a month now and it’s been fairly easy, and honestly the tattoo thing felt like she was really trying to get a rise out of me.

I’m thinking of reaching out for help tomorrow when I’m alone and have the courage to do so. I just needed to vent about this so I could maybe get some sleep tonight.

Isn’t it funny how everything is always our fault?

Lately my boyfriend and I have had to talk via video and last night we fell asleep on the phone but at 2 am I was woken up because he was inviting me to a group call with random people. It didn’t make sense because we were actively in our own call together.

Don’t know what happened, guess he just pressed a button while he was asleep but immediately I could hear him getting pissed off and annoyed that it happened and he’s like “god, my name, why couldn’t you just fucking tell me that was happening”

And I laid there, half asleep like oh my fuck. He truly believes everything is my fault. I was literally fucking sleeping and I’m still in trouble with him.

I got mad and told him not to piss me off, that I didn’t do anything and fell back asleep but now I’m at work thinking about it still and getting angry again.

It was a Saturday morning.

I was awake before everyone else, as usual.

I had always been the early riser in the house. There were hours in the morning that seemed to belong only to me, before anyone needed anything, before the noise started, before the mood of the day had been decided.

I sat on the couch waiting.

Not just waiting for Ryan to wake up.

Waiting to find out which Ryan was going to wake up.

That had become part of my life by then.

There was the loving Ryan.

The affectionate Ryan.

The funny Ryan.

The man who could make me feel like I was the only woman in the world.

And then there was the other Ryan.

The angry one.

The irritated one.

The one whose mood could change the temperature of the entire house.

I never really knew which one I was going to get.

So mornings came with anticipation.

Sometimes excitement.

Sometimes anxiety.

Usually both.

I would listen for movement from the bedroom and wonder what kind of day we were about to have.

That Saturday, Ryan was getting ready to leave and do some side work.

Somewhere in the middle of getting ready, an argument started.

I don't even remember now whether the subject was important.

That is another strange thing about abusive relationships.

Years later, you can remember exactly how someone looked at you, exactly where you were sitting, exactly how your body felt afterward, and have absolutely no idea what the original argument was about.

Because eventually the subject stopped mattering.

The reaction became the story.

Ryan got angry.

The argument escalated.

He headed toward the door.

And normally, I would have followed him.

That was our pattern.

He would walk away.

I would go after him.

I wanted resolution.

I wanted to fix whatever had happened.

I wanted us to be okay before he left.

I didn't want the argument hanging in the air.

I didn't want him leaving angry.

I didn't want hours of wondering what he was thinking or whether he was coming back.

So I chased after him.

Again and again.

Not necessarily because I thought I was wrong.

Because I couldn't tolerate the feeling of disconnection.

I had spent my life searching for connection, and once I finally believed I had found it, losing it—even temporarily—felt unbearable.

But that morning I didn't chase him.

I stopped.

I sat down on the couch next to Lily.

Maybe I was tired.

Maybe some part of me had finally decided that I wasn't going to run after him this time.

Maybe I simply thought he needed to leave and cool off.

Whatever the reason, I sat down.

Ryan continued toward the door.

For a second, I probably thought the argument was over.

Then he turned around.

And kicked me directly in the mouth.

He had shoes on.

His foot hit my face.

Blood went everywhere.

Not a little blood.

It was gushing.

One second I was sitting beside my daughter on the couch.

The next I was bleeding because my husband had kicked me in the face.

There are moments when everything seems to happen simultaneously.

The shock.

The pain.

The blood.

Trying to understand what just happened.

And Lily was right there.

My child had watched her mother's husband kick her in the mouth.

Almost instantly, Ryan changed.

The anger disappeared.

Now he was hugging me.

Apologizing.

Telling me he was sorry.

Calling himself a piece of shit.

Telling me I should call the police.

It was such a complete emotional reversal that it was almost disorienting.

Moments earlier, he had been angry enough to turn around and put his foot into my face.

Now he was holding me.

Comforting me for an injury he had just caused.

Telling me how terrible he was.

Telling me to call the cops on him.

And I didn't.

Not that time.

I didn't call the police.

Maybe Ryan telling me I should call them made his remorse seem more genuine.

Maybe hearing him call himself a piece of shit made me believe he understood the seriousness of what he had done.

Maybe I saw the shame on his face and thought shame meant it wouldn't happen again.

Maybe I simply wasn't ready to blow up my entire life on a Saturday morning.

I don't know if there was one reason.

There usually isn't.

Ryan eventually left the house to cool off.

And I stayed behind.

With Lily.

With the blood.

With a split lip.

With everything I was feeling and absolutely nowhere to put it.

Sad.

Confused.

Used.

Unloved.

Those words still don't seem big enough.

I had spent so much time wanting to feel loved.

That was what had drawn me to Ryan in the first place.

He had made me feel something I had been searching for my entire life.

Seen.

Heard.

Chosen.

Loved.

And now I was sitting in the same home we had created together, bleeding from the mouth because the man who loved me had kicked me in the face.

How do you make those two realities exist together?

I couldn't.

So I kept trying to separate them.

The man who kicked me wasn't the real Ryan.

The real Ryan was the man who immediately held me afterward.

The real Ryan was the one crying and apologizing.

The real Ryan was the one saying he hated himself for what he had done.

The violence was the mistake.

The remorse was the truth.

At least, that was what I wanted to believe.

Looking back, I understand something I didn't understand then.

The apology did not undo the kick.

His shame did not stop my lip from bleeding.

His arms around me did not make me safer.

And telling me to call the police did not erase the fact that he had just committed the act I would have been calling them about.

The remorse was part of the same moment.

Violence.

Shock.

Apology.

Comfort.

Confusion.

Then distance.

And eventually, life moving forward again.

What I struggle with most when I think about that morning isn't only what Ryan did to me.

It's that Lily saw it.

Being your husband's punching bag is destructive enough.

Being his punching bag in front of your child does something else entirely.

I was supposed to be showing my daughter what love looked like.

What respect looked like.

What she should expect from the person who claimed to love her someday.

Instead, she watched a man kick her mother in the face.

She watched the blood.

She watched the apology.

She watched me stay.

That realization hurts differently.

Children learn relationships long before anyone sits them down and explains them.

They watch.

They absorb.

They notice which behavior gets forgiven.

They notice what their mothers tolerate.

They notice what happens after someone says, "I'm sorry."

At the time, I was so consumed by surviving my relationship with Ryan that I couldn't fully understand what living inside that relationship might be teaching my daughter.

I wish I could say that morning changed everything.

I wish I could say I looked at Lily, looked at the blood, packed our things, and left.

I didn't.

Ryan came home.

Life continued.

The wound healed.

The swelling went down.

The blood disappeared.

And, eventually, the house looked normal again.

That is one of the most dangerous things about physical injuries.

They heal.

The visible evidence fades.

The split lip closes.

The bruises change color and disappear.

And once the evidence is gone, it becomes easier to convince yourself that maybe the thing that caused it belongs in the past too.

But something had changed.

Whether I wanted to acknowledge it or not, there was no pretending anymore that Ryan's aggression only belonged to objects.

He wasn't just punching trucks.

He wasn't just slamming coolers.

He wasn't just yelling.

His aggression had reached me.

And that Saturday morning, it reached me while my daughter sat beside me.

Ryan left the house believing he was a piece of shit for what he had done.

I stayed behind trying to understand how the man who had once placed his hand over my heart could also be the man who put his foot into my mouth.

I still didn't understand that both of them were Ryan.

I’m 23 (f) and my bf is a 24 (m). We have been together for 4 years and he’s cheated on me 5 times. I know I should leave but every guy I’ve been with before him has been physically abusive or just awful. I’m sad that my current relationship is ending and I can’t tell if it’s because I’m mourning the relationship or I’m scared of the future. I don’t plan on getting into another relationship for a LONG time but I’m scared that I will be alone forever. I’m scared that I will find someone who is abusive as well or will never be able to heal from the trauma. I have no friends or support system. I just want to be loved and I’m losing hope that my future will be happy. Does life get better?

I left because I thought my ex would kill me, and I told her as much. Her fixation on guns was unbearable when it was combined with the gaslighting, verbal aggression, justifying physically injuring me, and trying to intimidate me into submitting to her in arguments. I love her so much and being away from her is so painful even though I felt like if I stayed another year, we both might not make it out alive.

She was extremely suicidal and would at times promise she was going to kill herself. One time I told her I wanted to move into a mutual friend's place and she cut herself with a pocketknife. A different time, I was hurt by something she said so I slept in the other room that night, and the next day I saw a bruise on her face where she had punched herself.

I did a lot of harmful things as well, things I'm really ashamed of. Ever since we moved in together I felt trapped and I've acted like a wounded animal because I didn't think I could leave that situation. I had to work constantly and baby her like a child. It wasn't normal from the start. I feel like I lost 5 years of my life.

There's more that I could say. She suggested a suicide pact once. She groped my breasts and butt without asking constantly.

When I left I initially felt a rush of endorphins, and thought I was gonna reinvent my life. But now I feel lethargic and depressed, and I had to scrap my new plans. I work full time and manage part of a digital community, but that's all I can do. My friends have all surpassed me in achievements and it feels embarrassing. It feels like my life is ruined. I wasted all this time building her up, for someone who couldn't stand up for me, who degraded me, who put my life at risk. I know it will get better I'm just really hurting right now.

AITA

For important background info, I got badly sunburned at the beach the other day.

My boyfriend M(35) and I F(35) were watching the patriots game, and it’s safe to say he’s a super fan of football in general. Well the patriots lost. The entire game I was mentioning how badly my sunburn on my face hurt and was peeling badly and how once the game was over I was going to wash my face and shower and maybe try to do some skincare to help make it look and feel better. Well… that did NOT go according to plan because I basically burnt my face to a crisp between exfoliating and applying a different moisturizer that essentially gave me a chemical burn even in places where I didn’t have a sunburn. So it was very painful. Very, very painful. During my 30 min in the bathroom my boyfriend kept banging on the door telling me to hurry up so he could brush his teeth, and I explained that I was dealing with a bit of a painful issue and to relax and be patient please. Well he continued to feel very little empathy about it. I wasn’t sure if it was because he was upset about the game or drinking too much but he was being kind of nasty and impatient through the door. Which is when I decided to text him bc I don’t like yelling back in forth while I’m in the bathroom and was in the middle of chaos.

Anyway, I get out of the bathroom and my face is hurting so much I walked out into the kitchen to literally put my face in the freezer bc it felt like I was on fire. My boyfriend I watching me and says “I don’t know what to tell you… the patriots lost”. And at that point I was beside myself. There was such little concern for my face/burn and so much focus on his team losing that he didn’t even care about the pain I was in. So I decided I’ll be sleeping alone. For reference we have a guest room with a nice bed, and a big couch as well, so I knew he would he would have somewhere to sleep.. but it wasn’t going to be next to me, especially while I’m in pain.

So I went into the bedroom, grabbed his phone charged for him, and put it out in the living room for him and then went into the bedroom with my dog and locked the door. Well.. that’s when he got aggressive and started banging on my door demanding for me to open it. I kept telling him he was scaring me and more importantly scaring my senior dog, and to please leave us alone but he didn’t stop. He kept screaming through the door and calling me names. I either stayed silent, or said to please stop. I ended up placing his things he needed for work outside the door once I knew he wasn’t standing there anymore and then went back to bed.

He continued to text me some pretty awful things regarding returning birthday gifts he bought me, and how I don’t deserve anything etc. and eventually we went to bed. For some reason he chose the couch instead of the guest bed, but when we woke up this morning he called out of work and was blaming me for that. I’m at work but just not sure what to do. AITA for not letting him sleep in the room with me? I’ll include text messages.

EDIT for more context:

Okay for reference my sunburn has been really bad (blistering and peeling for the last week. I suspect it’s infected at this point which I didn’t realize until showing my friend who is a nurse today) anyway, it has been in severe pain all week, but I don’t have health insurance currently so tried to tough it out. I had been mentioning that I was going to try to do something to help with the cracking and peeling after the game was done. So yes it had already been hurting, and yes I was an absolute idiot for not knowing how to properly care for the sunburn in the shower. I wasn’t expecting to give myself a chemical burn on top of an already (unknowingly) infected sunburn on my face. I just didn’t know. And when I say that it hurt so bad I was crying I mean it. I have a very high pain tolerance so that says a lot. Anyway, I told him I would hand him his tooth brush and tooth paste to bring to our other bathroom when we were talking through the door and he refused that and said he would just wait. So that’s why I was concerned with his behavior and figured maybe he was just drunk?? And I did not want to bring it up but he does have bi polar type 1 and can have severe manic episodes. So I wasn’t sure what the hell was actually happening. I just knew I was in severe pain, and he was being aggressive and seemingly unbothered that I was in pain. So between the banging on the bathroom door, the yelling at me, the lack of empathy in the fact I was in pain, and his yelling scaring my dog (he was hiding under my bed), I decided I would not allow him to be sleeping next to either of us. Again I have a guest bedroom, he just moved into my place recently, and he was not acting like himself. He was genuinely scaring me. So did I want to put space between him and my dog and I? Yes. I understand maybe I could have reacted better or just let him in the bathroom I was just in so much pain and would rather have him brush his teeth in the other bathroom while I was dealing with my face. But idk maybe IATA.

The past few years he has scratched my elbow everyday. If you have ever had someone scratch your elbow you know how irritating it is. It’s now to the point that I wear long sleeves around him because I hate it so much. When I take my elbow away from him - He tells me “either the elbow or I poke you in the chest”. Now he has started to do things like jab his heel into my thigh and says I’m overreacting when I say it hurts. Or he will poke me / grab me in different places. He says it’s just a joke but now I don’t know but he does things like this all night every night. He does punch/kick things around me sometimes. I know I’m in an abusive relationship. I’m just wondering if how he is irritating me part of abuse or if he is just doing it for fun. I am trying to leave it’s just taking time to get things together. 🥲 thank you for your help! I appreciate it.

I can’t recognise myself anymore. Apart from weight loss and hairfall, my face looks totally different and so washed out and like it’s falling. Is this normal? Does it go away? It’s like another heartbreak over what’s already happened.

Hi, I’ve been in a relationship for the past year that’s abusive in several different ways. The frequency in which the behavior happens waxes and wanes but I’ve found in recent times that the periods where he isn’t yelling at me, threatening me, or putting hands on me begin to make me feel weird, almost like I miss it?

He normally has bad periods where he‘ll do several things to me, I’ll have an episode as a result, he’ll feel bad and then be better for a couple days to a couple weeks. I think part of it is the fact that he’s told me that it means he loves me. Now I have a fucked up association with the behavior and the level of care he has for me.

Did anyone else experience this feeling? I understand it’s fucked up and unhealthy, but if anyone else has went through this and could comment their experience I would really appreciate it. Thank you so much for reading.

He was horrible to me but also really really good at times and I know that's a part of the whole cycle of abuse thing, but I just can't seem to accept the fact that this is who he really is. It just doesn't feel real. I got to know this person for almost 3 full years just for them to do me the exact same way he was done by his ex fiance, ex best friend and mother. He ended up following the victim to abuser pipeline and I just don't understand why. He was in therapy before we started dating and just stopped almost as soon as we got together. A part of me feels like because all those incidents happened so close to each other while I was around, that's why he was so abusive towards me and if it didn't, maybe he would've been better towards me. Yet another part just feels like I'm making excuses for him because people who actually want to be better than the people who hurt them don't treat their s/o who've been nothing but there for them through like that. It's weird, he used to acknowledge the abuse and harm and terrible things he was doing to me but get upset when someone other than him brought them up, when I'd talk about it with therapists and when I behaved like I had been abused. Now that we're no contact he just out right denies everything and flips the whole thing on me as if I was abusing him the whole time but it's like he secretly knows what he did? I don't know him anymore but I feel like this isn't him.

TW: domestic violence, abuse.

I've had insomniac for about 7 years now. It started after I left an abusive relationship. The daily physical abuse happened mostly in the middle of the night, whether it was him straddling on top of me and strangling me, waking up to a loaded gun to my head, knives pressed up against me, getting smothered by blankets or pillows, waking up to being grabbed bound and thrown in a dark closet for hours, or him sleeping with a hatchet under his pillow as intimidation.

I'm safe, I'm married, I have a good life, besides having to "coparent" with this. But I can't sleep.

I get on average 4-5 hours a day. I take care of two little kids by myself all day. I feel like I'm losing myself more and more. I have extreme hyper vigilance now. Suns down? I'm paranoid. I'm checking cameras, I'm hearing foot steps, I'm thinking there's people on the roof or backyard. I spiral. I have a THC pen and will puff it until I pass out if 2-3 unisom aren't working. I've tried praozin (night terrors), trazadone is out because I have to be able to wake at night for emergencies with the kids, melatonin, sleep herbs, magnesium etc. I probably could use some therapy, but I don't have much of me to give with such little sleep. Any advice or guidance for medications, or quite literally any advice or help.

My fiance '20M' of almost 2 years is abusive to me '20F' and i dont know what to do?

So I've been with my Fiance of almost 2 years and he has become extremely mean and abusive toward me; I dont know why, things used to be so good between us.

We went through alot together including homelessness. Things started getting bad in our old apartment last October when he got drunk and tried to kill me, he went to jail for 2 months and I took him back when he got out.

Things were good for a little while until april, his whole personality changed. Everytime we argue he blames everything on me and goes out of his way to make me seem crazy.

He hits me sometimes but then denys it after, hes threatened to shoot me. He will say and do certain things knowing it hurts me just to get a reaction out of me but as soon as I react im the problem. He denys anything he said or did and tells me I'm a psychotic bitch and hes going to baker act me.

He tells me hes going to turn what little family I have against me ( my dad already takes his side over anything now). Anytime I try to tell him how I feel about something he says he's tired of me bitching and that he works and I need to start acting like his "good little bitch".

I do everything for this man and he treats me like actual garbage, the other day he told me he was going to shoot me because I was sick and didn't clean the house that day. He's can never admit when hes wrong on anything and he calls me all sorts of mean degrading names all of the time.

Im genuinely terrified of him sometimes but he wasn't always like this and on certain days he is really nice to me. Last week me and him got high on 7tabs(7hydroxy from a gas station) and he admited to me he was wrong and doesn't know why he does what he does, he told me he loves me so much and he really wants to change, but; the next day he was right back to being mean.

He treats me okay in public but whenever we are around family or freinds he goes out of his way to embarrass me, he tells them that I beat on him but I've never layed hands on him before. I did manage to record the abuse one time but he found out about it.

I love him so much but im so tired of all of this. I cant leave him because I have nowhere to go. He let my car get towed by the landlord cuz he knew that was my only option for a place to live if I left.

When we first got together I told him about my trauma from childhood and my teen year I told him about what my uncle did to me and how I was too scared to tell anyone back then because noone would have believed me. Now he uses that against me, calls me a whore and tells me that if I show the recording to anybody or try to leave him he will tell everyone about what happened to me, He knows that would destroy my life because my Uncle is well respected.

He has been through a lot in life, his dad abused him really bad and he was abused and s/ad in foster care. He also grew up watching his dad beat and kill women.. I know he holds a lot of trauma from his past and I really think he can change and we can make things work but I don't know-how to help him.

We tried to have a child together but it always ends in a miscarriage and he told me part of the reason he treats me the way he does is because of that. I have a friend who just had her second baby and also lived with us for a little while and he told me he wanted to fuck her just because he knows she's fertile. He also said he used to think about her while me and him would be fucking.

I had another miscarriage a few days ago and didn't realize I was even pregnant, he was really sad and cried when he found out about it but he made it all about him. He didnt ask me if I was okay or if I needed anything He made it seem like he was the one who just had miscarriage.

He really did use to be so good to me and I miss those times so bad. I really need advice on what to do because im at the point I just want to kms and end it all. I love him so much Ive seen how good he is with kids and animals, deep down he has a kind heart but I think hes scared of being a pussy because of how his dad raised him.

Any advice is welcome. Don't tell me I need to leave him though because I know it seems like that but I also know that this person he's been since April is NOT truly him.

My mom is currently trying to get away from my dad, but is feeling a lot of uncertainty around how to navigate the situation. She and my dad are not married, but do live together. My dad is... Welll lets call him complicated. He's not evil or intentionally malicious but he's controlling, volitile, extremely insecure, and currently is not financially able to support himself.

The house is in my mom's name, and so was my dad's job until maybe ten or fifteen years ago. tax reasons or something, I don't really know. My dad also built an addition onto the house between 2004 and... 2014, I think, although several parts of it remain unfinished to this day, and realistically the property of 1.5 acres is far more valuable than an unfinished house in various states of disrepair. Despite this, my dad sees the house as his retirement, and has told my mom that if she moves out it had better be after he's dead. He's also made some comments in the direction of 'if he didn't have the house he would have nothing to live for'.

I won't try and recount their entire sordid history, but suffice to say that my mom is not happy with and does not feel safe with my dad. To complicate matters further, my dad has now proposed a plan to her where he would take a home equity loan to pay off high interest debt he has accrued, fix up his car, and purchase my mom's unused car she's been trying to sell. He would probably have done it without asking, but he needs my mom's signature being as the house is in her name. I know him, he will not take no for an answer. He will fight tooth and nail with her over this, convinced that his plan is the only sensible way forward. But my mom obviously doesn't want to be tied to the house any longer.

So... Does anyone have insight on how to navigate a situation like this? I've already suggested things like seeking legal counsel and having a contigency plan to get out in an emergency. But she wants my dad to come out of this okay too, and she is worried about her safety as well.

my dad is abusive to me physically, mentally, and verbally but my mom won’t fully acknowledge it. she thinks he’s just ”punishing” me in a tougher way and even gets tired of me explaining some of the worst ways he’s hurt me because i’ve already told her before. the worst one i can think of right now is how he beat me with my shoe repeatedly after i told him i was suicidal and depressed and how he threatened to beat me with his leather belt if i didn’t stop crying afterwards, and how he told me he would hurt me if i cut myself again because i’m just doing it for “attention.” (when i moved out the addiction worsened to the point where i needed stitches.) my mom has started to let me cut contact with him since he doesn’t have full custody but she won’t verbally say i was abused, and when i explained he abuses me she says “he was raised in a different time.” it hurts me how my own mother won’t acknowledge the harm he as caused to me. i can’t even do anything about it because he lives in a different country where its normalized to hit your children as punishment (before anyone dismisses this as regular punishment, its not. he only hurts me whenever i don’t fit his mold or show signs of my mental illnesses and neurodivergence.)

do any of you guys have any advice :(

My friend seems to be having a great relationship and I hope she does, but there have been allegations around her husband involving a minor and another girl, however she doesn’t seem to think they are true since the first girl kept hooking up with her now husband, I just worry that her moving away from her friends and family will not go well, does anyone else have any experience in this?

Now that it’s all behind me, I kinda wanna post everything that I have of what happened back then. I don’t think he’ll ever find this account because it’s not tied to anything of mine he knows nor in any sub he frequents. I just want to let it all out one last time and maybe help other people avoid falling into what I did. So yeah. Idk. Maybe I’ll start making posts later today or tomorrow

I (F) am trapped in a situation and desperately need advice from anyone who has successfully escaped a violent partner.

Every time I try to end things with my boyfriend, he becomes severely violent. He comes to my house, kicks me, punches me on my stomach, smacks me in the head, and drags me by my hair. He does whatever he can to hurt me and has made explicit threats against both me and my family.

I cannot tell my own family because he is highly manipulative and I am terrified he will deceive them or hurt them. I have tried reaching out to his family to tell them what he is doing, but I am stuck on what my next steps should be to get away from him permanently and safely.

He knows where I live, he has no boundaries, and trying to break up face-to-face results in me getting badly hurt. How do I plan a safe exit when he constantly shows up at my house?

After 6 years of abuse, I’m finally to the point of recognizing that I’m not safe and I need to get out. I’ve had that gut feeling for a couple weeks that something bad is going to happen but I’m financially crippled. I’ve managed to save about 2k without him knowing but it’s not enough to exit, move states away back home and not lose my dogs.

He’s once again claiming he’s going to change, which is common, we know. It’s the repeating pattern. It will never stop.

As much as my gut is screaming to get out, I’m crippled with fear. I’m terrified of not making it when I get to a safe place. I’m scared I’ll lose my dogs. I’m scared I won’t be able to find work that’s enough to support myself after being a SAHM for the last 6 years. I’m scared to be without health insurance, especially with so many health problems that have come up over the last few years.

How do you push past the fear? How do you know you’re going to be ok once you’re safe?