Reddit reviews The Verbally Abusive Relationship, Expanded Third Edition: How to recognize it and how to respond

It sounds like your husband is a verbal abuser/ controller. I know this because I personally had this problem when I got married.

http://www.amazon.com/Verbally-Abusive-Relationship-Expanded-Third/dp/1440504636/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1426849546&sr=8-1&keywords=patricia+evans

Check out that book, I have a feeling it will ring true to you

> All the articles I find online are about dealing with husbands who are angry AT the wife.

You should be looking for articles about dealing with abuse, not with anger. Your husband is abusing you.

He refuses to get help.

His anger causes you horrible anxiety. This is because your body is not stupid. Your body knows that angry men sometimes hurt women, even the women that they say that they love.

He breaks things in your presence.

He turns his anger toward you when you try to help.

Sometimes he chooses to drink too much.

You are depressed.

The only person trying to fix your marriage is you; he just gets angry when asked to make any changes.

You didn't only promise to stay with him until you die. A marriage is not about just living in a house with someone... that's a housing contract, which is different. A marriage is about promising to love someone when they are well and when they are sick, including mental illness. Loving them is not a warm-fuzzy-feeling; it means wanting what is best for them even when that is not the living arrangement that you had hoped for. When someone has Alzheimer's and their spouse cannot care for them properly anymore, then the two of them no longer live together because that is the best way to care for the one who is not well. When someone needs to be hospitalized for a little while in intensive care, that person and their spouse are not living together either, because that is the best way to care for the person who is not well.

What is best for a man who is abusing his wife?

Is it best for him for his wife to continue living with him until he crosses a line that (if he were well) he would not want to cross?

This is something that you have to think about for yourself. The US Catholic bishops website has some guidance that was helpful to me. I also read https://www.amazon.com/Verbally-Abusive-Relationship-Expanded-Third/dp/1440504636 (and cried a lot).

You have done everything you can for him that you can do while still in the same house with him.

Make sure that you are open and honest with your therapist about how your husband treats you. Do not make excuses for your husband when doing this or downplay it (I know there is a very strong impulse to); describe the behavior like it's happening to a girlfriend of yours and like you see it from the outside.

Google for "signs of an abusive relationship".

Read the resulting webpages several times.

If you are still unsure that you are better off, read "Controlling People" by Patricia Evans. Also get "The Verbally Abusive Relationship: How to Recognize it and How to Respond" by the same author.

If you read those books, have googled for "signs of an abusive relationship'' and are STILL unsure that you are better off, send me a round-trip plane ticket to your city so that I can personally thwap you upside da haid several times with a big, wet, sloppy, dead trout.

If you FINALLY understand after then, I'll happily filet, bread and fry the thing into a nice fish dinner and include some champagne to celebrate your positive new sense of wisdom. I'll be sure to name the fish after your former boyfriend first. :)

EDIT: I have to add that I remember how much I pined for my ex so many years ago... it took me a whole lotta months for it to become finally clear to me that he was an abusive jerk. Even his own family thought he was a jerk. Seriously. Still, I was in major denial all over the place. After that experience, I learned how to have REAL standards for a change! Now I have a guy who is awesome. :)

Try reading this and see if you see anything familiar.

You are in a verbally abusive relationship, or you were. My (female) fiance's ex of 10 years matches that description. He is using your guilt to control you. I think this is the book she read that made her realize this. Please take some time to research "verbally abusive relationships". PM me if needed and I can ask her opinion.

Give him a copy of this

Saying that you're "too sensitive" is a clear sign of a verbal abuser.

If he cared about you, he would defend you in front of his friends, not embarrass you.

You deserve better. Your SO should build you up and make you feel good about yourself.

I stayed married to my abusive husband for 21 years, always thinking that things would get better. They didn't, and the constant verbal abuse wore away at me, until I was a very broken person.

I highly recommend this book. It will validate your experiences, and hopefully, give you the courage to stand up for yourself, which probably means getting out of this relationship.

Good luck. PM me any time if you need support.

"Why does he do that" by Lundy Bancroft and "The Verbally Abusive Relationship" by Patricia Evans are both fantastic reads.

You should note there is a chance this will not be the end of their relationship. People in this situation often require several attempts at breaking up before its final although id they've only been together 4 month that might not be the case.

I've just read this book:

The Verbally Abusive Relationship

I highly recommend you pick up a copy for your sister. It details the scope of verbal abuse (ALWAYS a precursor to violent abuse) and will empower her with the ability to detect the slightest hints of these behaviours in future relationships and call it out immediately.

In fact all people would benefit reading it. Verbal abuse is rife in our society.

My abusive partner did escalate to hitting. But frankly, that was a relief. I know that doesn't sound like it makes sense, but hitting was something that other people would understand. Hitting made the situation clear and easy to define as abuse.

And... hitting is just physical. I find it really hard to explain to most people, but I would take a solid beating (especially with the actual apology and honeymoon period that would follow) any day of the week over someone trying to reach into my head and verbally convince me that I'm worthless again. The verbal and emotional aspects were absolutely the worst parts for me. Bruises heal in a week, but it's been three years and I still stammer when I speak, because I was trained so thoroughly to expect that I'd be interrupted and berated for choosing the wrong word (or speaking at all).

What helped me the most, especially at the beginning of being free from him, was thinking of myself as injured. If your leg was broken, your doctor would inform you that you'll experience pain and immobility, and itching under the cast, so you wouldn't blame yourself somehow for feeling those things or refusing to take the cast off. The emotional symptoms you're feeling now are no different. Read everything you can on the psychological damage that you may be dealing with, and try to get that information from your therapist as well, so you can be informed enough to say to yourself "that's a normal thing to feel while I'm healing." It does get better. You just gotta give yourself time.

I didn't have access to therapy, so these were the most helpful things for me:

The Verbally Abusive Relationship - Evans

The Emotionally Abused Woman - Engel

http://www.drirene.com/verbalabuse.php

Anonymously send her a copy of the book "The Verbally Abusive Relationship" by Patricia Evans It was sent to me and was a real eye opener. It made me realize that it wasn't all my fault and that his behavior was 'textbook' abuse.

Congratulations! This is a big step forward for you and it is what you deserve out of life. Well done!

As someone who has been through something similar, I have an idea of what you are looking at, and I am with you. To move forward, it is worthwhile to understand the effects of abuse in the brain. The simple fact is that being in an abusive relationship had an impact on your brain and brain development, especially as a young person. The effects of verbal abuse on the brain are the same as physical abuse.

At the end of my abuse I was literally like a punch drunk boxer, staggering around the ring not knowing what year it was. There was like a fog over my perceptions, emotions, and decision making that kept me from living my life. This was partly due the damage being done by the abuse, but also a mechanism that my brain used to protect me from more. The fog still manifests itself as an inability to take action, especially ones that I know will benefit me. One part of my brain knows what to do, and another seems to not allow me to do it. I consider this an 'echo' of the abuse, and it diminishes over time (but hasn't gone away). I do struggle to take care of myself in basic ways at times. Sometimes it is hard for me to get out of bed.

The big thing to understand is that you have been through a physical trauma, and it will take your brain time to recover. You need to give yourself the time and the emotional space to do that. It might seem like other people are moving forward with their life and you are standing still. However, you need time to have your brain return to normal. I left my relationship three years ago and I am just now starting to feel emotionally whole every day. It is easier today, but it till a while for it to get there.

Over time you will find it easier to take action and make decisions. It just takes time and patience, which is really hard right now. Just love yourself and trust yourself to get better. This is going to be a season of learning and introspection, take the time to learn about who you are, where you are, and what you need to thrive. Once you have a better handle on this, action is a little less scary.

Don't force things, especially by jumping into another relationship. You are uniquely vulnerable right now and could very easily fall into the hands of another abuser. They really do prey on vulnerable people, and it is all too easy to fall into the hands of someone who promises to make it all go away. You don't owe anything to anyone, except to yourself.

HINT: this won't go away until you are heathy and know yourself well enough to make good decisions. You will just start establishing a pattern.

I would most strongly recommend looking into anything by Patricia Evans. Her book The Verbally Abusive Relationship helped me to get a language around what had happened to me and Verbal Abuse Survivors Speak Out helped me understand I was not alone. If you can't afford these, check at your library or PM me and I will buy you a copy.

Counseling and therapy were invaluable for me as well.

Recommend:

The Verbally Abusive Relationship, Expanded Third Edition: How to recognize it and how to respond Paperback – January 18, 2010

by Patricia Evans

https://www.amazon.com/Verbally-Abusive-Relationship-Expanded-Third/dp/1440504636/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1551034416&sr=8-1&keywords=the+verbally+abusive+relationship+patricia+evans

http://www.amazon.com/The-Verbally-Abusive-Relationship-recognize/dp/1440504636/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1345345778&sr=8-1&keywords=verbally+abusive+relationship

Read the book, it will answer all your questions.

Short version, though: he enjoys having power over you. He is "nice" to you, sometimes, in order to stop you from leaving, but what he really wants is the feeling of dominance he gets from bullying and devaluing you. Get out while you can - you're still young and you can heal and find another relationship with a man who isn't a bully. Don't let this go on and on because it's only hurting you, and he will never change.

The thing that ultimately caused me to leave was his increasingly abusive, controlling behavior.

I liken it to the fable of the frog in the pot: If you put a frog in a pot of boiling water, he will, of course, leap out to safety. If you put him in cool water over low heat, he will stay in there unknowingly until he is cooked through.

Things escalated so slowly and so subtly, that before I knew it, I was in an emotionally and verbally abusive mess of a marriage. When my therapist recommended a book on verbal abuse, I thought she was nuts. Then I took the quiz on the first page. I answered yes to 8 of the 10 questions. It said if you said yes to 2 or more, you were being abused. I was shocked.

Here is a link to the book. It changed my life.

The Verbally Abusive Relationship, Expanded Third Edition: How to recognize it and how to respond https://www.amazon.com/dp/1440504636/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_bQiOAbEA9HABE

So you've traded in a physically abusive relationship for an emotionally abusive one.

First, call the National Domestic Violence hotline. They can give you advice and help on leaving your abusive husband even if you're not ready yet.

Second, pick up a copy of The Verbally Abusive Relationship: How to recognize it and how to respond. The advice in this book isn't about hand. It's about standing up for yourself and setting boundaries with an emotional abuser.

Great resources on verbal/emotional abuse (which almost always precede physical abuse): The Verbally Abusive Relationship, and Why Does He Do That?. Both books saved my life. Literally.

Sorry for delay, just saw your question.
I found the books by Patricia Evans to be particularly helpful. They focus mostly on interpersonal relationships, but also discuss how the same tactics get used by institutions, largely religious. (In fact, I came across them while dealing with the aftermath of a toxic marriage. Her books helped me understand not just what had gone wrong in my relationship, but also why it had seemed so normal and familiar to me at first - because I'd been raised in that kind of family atmosphere, thanks to TSCC.

Also, a Google search for "mental abuse recovery" or similar phrasing turns up a ton of good information.

The books my therapist recommended me are:

http://www.amazon.com/Verbally-Abusive-Relationship-recognize-respond/dp/1440504636

http://www.amazon.com/Stop-Walking-Eggshells-Borderline-Personality/dp/1572246901/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1348629805&sr=1-1&keywords=walking+on+eggshells

The second is geared toward children of parents with BPD (which my mom has), which might not suit your needs, but the first is just about verbally abusive situations in general, and it's helped me a lot.

To say things about your ability to father- especially if it is in front of your children- is not okay. My spouse was verbally abusive once, when I pointed it out, we read a book together and are trying to figure it out.
I have heard good things about this book: https://www.amazon.com/Verbally-Abusive-Relationship-Expanded-Third/dp/1440504636

Also, counseling is important. A 3 day tirade borders on torture. It is emotional abuse.

That's verbal abuse. It will only get worse.

http://www.amazon.ca/The-Verbally-Abusive-Relationship-recognize/dp/1440504636

Hey, I'm sorry to hear about your experiences. Male victims of abuse is a very real problem though it tends to go unreported.

Your experiences sound rather significant. If you're not talking to someone about them, I encourage you to do so.

Personally, I found that my childhood experiences ended up making me more likely to find abusive partners. One thing that has helped change my perspective and aid me in setting boundaries is this book:
The Verbally Abusive Relationship

Anyway, good luck to you. Please message me if there's anything I can do to help.

I though you should read this book because most of what you are saying you experience from your wife is textbook ervbal abuse.

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Think about the example she is setting for your children.


She is showing them that when someone makes genuine efforts to change and accommodate the other persons needs and support them, the appropriate reaction to that is to tear down and demean the other person.

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She is teaching your children that because of your gender, nothing you can ever do is right. She is teaching your children that SHE is always the victim, and you are always the aggressor.