Hi, I need advice. My bf(29) and I(24) started talking in Sept. 2020 (which involved some VERY rough patches) , dating in May 2021, broke up for a month earlier this year and now I just don’t know. I feel trapped. After a couple of weeks of us being broken up, I was no longer sad and was happy to be living my life and enjoying my freedom again. After about a month of being broken up, I went home with him after a night of heavily drinking and the next day he reached out to me to tell me to keep it quiet and it was a mistake. About a week later he was begging for me back. I currently live with him again and can’t help but dread coming home. I feel as though he try’s to control everything I do (ex: if I go out without him with my friends, If I’m not home when he wants me to be home, if I want to take a girls weekend get away). I feel like everything is a double standard since I don’t care what he does or how late he is with his friends. I have always been there for him and have done everything he asks with nothing in return, he has never once came to pick me up if I needed a ride, never taken me out on a proper date and a lot of other small things. Im at the point where I just want that freedom back.
I feel our relationship is more bad than good. I feel that he does have some sort of mental illness and is unwilling to seek help. He is very insecure and always worried if I am going to leave him, but I can’t help but think that is a narcissistic trap.
I guess I’m just looking for advice on what I should do and how I should leave, I’m so mad at myself because I have never been treated this portly in a relationship and I have allowed it for so long. Talking to him doesn’t help because nothing ever changes and he just insults me. I know that his ex left one day while he was at work and I feel I may have to do the same thing but we live in a small town and I don’t want my reputation ruined.
TL/DR; my bf is trying to constantly control me and idk how to leave
6 comments
If you don’t feel safe breaking up with him, then first get your valuable and sentimental items to a secure place. Move out as much as you can. Then meet him in a public location and break up in person at that location. If he isn’t willing to meet you in a public location and you cannot arrange this, then you may need to move out while he is at work, and you can just explain if anyone asks that it was the only safe way to do so that you could think of, since he refused to meet you in a public location.
Reputations heal, and small towns can be left. Don’t let that threat be the reason you stay in an abusive relationship. If you can take the route his last ex took, if that’s safe, fine. But you should also look into domestic violence support in your area. You deserve the help such organizations can offer.
Sometimes you just gotta set things up as best you can, then pull the cord and let the chips descend. Your extrication from the situation will never be fully clean, because… well, if it could be, he wouldn’t be the type of guy you’re trying to remove yourself from, would it? A couple tips:
-Fuck his feelings. Boo hoo, his ex left him at work? Abusive/controlling people always tell sob stories about their exes to try and play on the sympathy of normal people and control their behaviour/deflect blame. If he treated his ex like he treats you, of course she probably fled while he wasn’t around. You should as well.
-Speaking of feelings, time to start mentally and emotionally disconnecting. You need to leave someone in your mind before you leave them in actuality. Connect with your friends, who gives a fuck what he thinks, play it glib and easy if he gives you grief. Find your support network and people who see you for who you are.
-Get ahead on damage control. If he’s a profound piece of shit, he’ll go around slandering you, gossiping, etc. Tell the people who need to know or might get caught in the crossfire that shit is going to go down, tell them why, keep it minimal and functional. You don’t want to be punitive or slander back, you want to be classy and let his own behaviour speak for itself. Nonetheless, if he’s retaliatory and tries to take down your character afterwards, it’s best for people to be forewarned why you split/it’s coming down the pipes.
-Steel your nerves, and prepare to weather some bullshit. Once you leave, toxic people rarely let you unhook/detach easily. Mind games, trying to bait/provoke you, hoovering, etc. Remember that the decision to leave isn’t a one and done; it’s a process and a continuous action, one you renew each and every day. No backsliding shit like you did last time. Print out a list of all the shit he’s done that drove you away and put it on your wall where you’ll see it first thing in the morning. Stay firm, and wait it out till he gets bored and, regrettably, moves on to the next mark.
It ain’t gonna be easy, these things never are, but every day you sacrifice to someone who doesn’t have your best interests at heart is a day lost where you could be bettering yourself and becoming the best you you can be. Time to start taking those days back.
Sounds like he’s the one who’s going to get a well-deserved reputation of being so awful that multiple exes had to leave him while he was at work.
Nobody who knows what he’s really like is going to think badly of you for leaving.
>ex: if I go out without him with my friends, If I’m not home when he wants me to be home, if I want to take a girls weekend get away).
Most girls I know who are truly In love with their partners, do not want to go out without their man. But to your point, if your friends are single and/or consist of other men, and y’all staying out late, I think his uncomfortableness is warranted.
Also you wanting to take a weekend getaway trip.. lol if my girl told me that, I’d tell her, to go on your trip, but when you come back, I won’t be here. Sounds like your bf isn’t naive and understands what can happen on these women weekend getaways.
He isn’t insecure, he’s vigilant. I don’t think you two are right for each other.
>He is very insecure and always worried if I am going to leave him, but I can’t help but think that is a narcissistic trap.
His behaviour is suggestive of Borderline Personality Disorder (at worse) and just serious abandonment anxiety (at best).
If you fear for your safety, I would make sure to tell some friends and family when you plan on breaking up with him and absolutely do it in a public place. And make sure to hold your ground. He will likely beg and beg and insist that he will change. He will try to give you a very convincing apology. These people are often masters of manipulation. But remember, they always slide back into their controlling ways. Google “Cycle of Abuse” and see if this pattern looks familiar to you. If it does, you have your answer.