TL:DR, my ex boyfriend was manipulative, controlling and emotionally abusive. He lied to me about a lot of things including not telling me that he had a 9 year old daughter. He used me for a year for a place to live. A year later and I can’t imagine ever trusting anyone ever again. Has anyone else ever gotten through something like this and managed to successfully find love again?
My (36F) ex (28m) and I were together for a year or so and had been friends for the same amount of time before that. He pursued me heavily for a few months before we eventually slept together. A month or so after that he told me he didn’t want a relationship and I agreed to be FWBs. That was fine for a while but I realised I started to develop feelings as we were spending whole weekends together and going on dates.
He then lost his job and was faced with the choice of staying with me for a while or moving home. He chose to stay with me and we settled into a quasi-relationship.
I have super low self esteem and I put up with a lot of shitty behaviour from him right from the start. He knew I was developing feelings for him but continually avoided defining the relationship, and was constantly very confusing in his behaviour. So many times I should have kicked him out but I didn’t because I have abandonment issues and I was so scared of losing him.
My last boyfriend before him had cheated on me in an awful manner and I really should have known I hadn’t dealt with my self esteem issue’s enough to date. He knew this and that I have pretty bad depression and anxiety and I fully believe he played on this.
If I tried to bring things up about our situation he’d say how I could make him homeless at any time so he didn’t want to rock the boat or he’d just get really angry at me for wanting to know what was going on. For the record I’d never have just kicked him out and I know he played on my kindness.
Our relationship was not good. I tried so hard to keep him happy but somehow it was never enough. He always had to be right but would accuse me of the same, and get angry if I ever disagreed with him. I remember he once got super mad at me because he had asked how to use the washing machine and I’d told him a specific setting to use. When I cooked sometimes my hip would knock against the dial and move it and he believed that I was telling him one setting and then using others because I thought he was too stupid to understand. When I tried to defend myself he got angry for saying “no that’s not what’s happened” and yelled at me to stop saying no.
If we left the house together he’d often point blank ignore me and just stare rigidly ahead, Jaw clenching if I tried to engage him in conversation. He’d treat me to the silent treatment for no reason whatsoever, and I walked on eggshells. He never ever complimented me except to say “you look nice” like two or three times. He’d made a big deal about his excessive porn habit and how he used to masturbate several times a day so was completely abstaining from masturbation only to then never initiate sex with me and we’d only have sex when I’d have to try really hard to initiate or just ask like once a week max. Never once called me beautiful or sexy. I would ask him if he really wanted to be there and be with me and say to tell me if he didn’t. He would insist he did and he wouldn’t be there if he didn’t want to be. But I knew deep down he didn’t. He would occasionally refer to me as his “roommate” and refused to tell his parents we were dating. I was so confused and convinced I was doing something wrong.
Then eventually one day (not long after he finally told his dad about us and I met his dad and step mum) he admitted that he had gotten his old job back and was planning to leave. I was devastated. He then dropped a huge bombshell on me. He had a 9 year old daughter. It’s a long story but he told me a story about her mum tricking him into getting her pregnant and then being abusive towards him. They split and the daughter was taken off them supposedly due to the mother being abusive. He ended up with supervised contact but somehow never explained why that was. He had stopped seeing her because he thought her mum’s family who she lived with had turned her against him He ended up staying and making my life hell in the same way as before. One time getting angry at me in the street when I’d looked at a map on my phone to check his directions as he thought I was being patronising (all I’d said was “hold on let me just check…”) and then when I’d had a panic attack he’d had a tantrum and stormed off leaving me alone crying in the street.
Two weeks later he told me he was leaving for good this time. By that point I was at an all time low. I said good. I think he was surprised by that. I told him that he’d made me feel that he’d never once considered my feelings in anything he did. I pointed out how when I’d asked if he wanted to sleep with anyone else he’d replied “no one in particular…” and how much that had hurt me. He in turn admitted that when I’d told him at times how I felt that he didn’t even like me it was because he didn’t. He basically admitted that it had been his plan to leave the whole time, as soon as he’d gotten his job back. He just hadn’t planned it taking a year.
On top of this he told me he was clean, and then gave me herpes. I know he knew he had it as the week before I contracted it he suddenly said he couldn’t t have sex as he had a swollen gland in his groin and wouldn’t let me see him without boxers on.
He single-handedly destroyed what little self esteem I had left. I immediately went into therapy as I realised that part of it was that I had been willing to put up with that behaviour for a whole year. A year on from him leaving and I’m definitely doing way way better. However I can’t trust men and I cannot even imagine being with anyone ever again. But more than that, I used to be able to imagine being with someone back when I was single before. Daydream about romance and sex. The usual stuff. But I can’t even do that now. It’s like he’s stolen my hope that anyone could love me. My self esteem his genuinely way higher than it was before but it’s like he conditioned me so well to believe that I was unlovable, that I feel completely convinced that it’s true. And on top of that I now have an incurable std that I will have to disclose to everyone I want to sleep with for the rest of my life. I can’t ever see how I will get over how he treated me.
Edit: just to add – I did have to kick him out eventually because after we’d split up he kept trying to prolong staying with me for some unknown reason. I tried to bring it up to him and he said he didn’t want to discuss it because he was stressed about his grandads health. I asked if his granddad was dying very soon to which he said no so I said ok well we’re discussing it – you have to leave. He dragged this out for another week until I had to basically say he needed to leave within the next few days. Thankfully he did. Oh and the whole time we were together he was excessively frugal to the point that it cost me money to feed him as he’d never give me quite enough money to cover his food. Turned out he was saving as much money as he could for when he could leave. I still can’t believe I put up with any of it.
Thank you to anyone who has bothered to read it all!!