As a bit of a backstory. My partner and I have been together for 10 years and other than the odd frustrated argument we’ve been pretty steady. On the weekend I attended a friends bucks party. I had been drinking since 11am, not heavily but pretty steady where I was happy. My girlfriend had offered to pick me up, but messaged later in the day asking what time, as she wanted a glass of wine. I honestly didn’t know as we weren’t given any details of the events (It was all a surprise). So I told her to not worry and I would Uber home and to enjoy the wine.
I get home around 10pm, quite happy (Stopped drinking around 9pm). She was also in a good mood listening to music and had 3/4 of a bottle of wine. I told her about the events of the day, had a laugh and went back and forward sharing new music we’d found. As most intoxicated evenings end up, we were discussing politics and the ways of the world. By this time it was around mid night. My girlfriend was discussing a pretty controversial topic, I had read up on the subject and was trying to explain it wasn’t as simple as that and both sides of the argument etc. Basically agreeing with things on both sides and winding back to “It’s not an easy one to solve”. That’s when my girlfriend got stuck on a loop and latched on to me agreeing to one side. I then reiterated that I agree to things on both sides and was just trying to explain the situation, satisfied the conversation wound up and I tried to change the subject. Then the loop started again, I tried to shut it down and say we can discuss it in the morning, it’s late. But she was demanding an answer and why I would think that way, so I laid out what I knew albeit a little frustrated at this point. She didn’t understand and looking back I don’t think she was actually listening, so I threw the argument back at her, not angrily, just tried to get her to see it from the other side.
This is when she *absolutely* melted down. She started screaming, then started hammer fist punching my arm moving up to my head. I was in disbelief and just remember saying “Are you really doing this!?” at this point she grabs my hair and starts slamming my head into the bed. She is only 5’2″ and 110 pounds so I didn’t feel in any real danger, but it hurt! I then grab both her wrists along with a heap of my hair and roll her off the bed and onto the floor. Crazed she just started clawing at my arms with her nails to get me to let go. At this point I’m mad and just yell “F\*\*K THIS! I DON”T HAVE TO PUT UP WITH THIS” and grab my pillows to head to the spare room. She runs and blocks the doorway and refuses to let me leave. I yell at her to get out my way and she doesn’t budge. I don’t want to lay a hand on her and escalate it any more, so after a couple of attempts I just sit down on the chair in the corner and stared at her blankly, while she’s yelling “What the hell did I do!?” and a whole heap of other things I didn’t really listen to, I only replied “You punched me in the f\*\*cking head…”. After 20 or so mins she falls asleep at the door. I move her out the way and patch my arms up and head to the spare room with the dogs and lock the door.
You think that would be the end. But about an hour later I could hear her looking around the house. Eventually finding the locked door of the spare room. After asking if she could come in I replied “No, I can’t let you in, go to bed and we’ll discuss this in the morning” So after pleading a couple of times the shrieking started again and she starts pounding on the door for me to let her in. All I replied was “I can’t let you in”, this send her into another rage and I’m assuming she tried kicking and shouldering the door to get in while screaming, it was loud! Honestly like something out of a horror film. After about 10 mins of this she’s on the floor having a full panic attack. I open the door and calm her down (Panic attacks I can deal with). I make her a cup of tea and re-iterate that was NOT okay. She’s still stuck on me coming back to our bedroom. So after *a lot* of back and forth reluctantly I agree and go back making sure she’s asleep before going to sleep.
In the morning she made me a coffee and did everything to avoid talking about what happened the night before. Other than trying that argument again, where she actually listened this time and saw I was taking no sides, just explaining to the best of my knowledge. Then she head off to work. Since then she’s not outright apologized, just offering excuses of why she may have acted that way, saying therapists are expensive, asking sheepishly if we’re breaking up and avoiding me. She did ask to take me out to dinner, but I wasn’t interested in going anywhere. It’s just all around awkward now.
She’s usually a sweet bubbly person and I’m not sure if this was like a one off psychotic episode… Maybe the wine messed with some of her medication or something? We’ve gone through a lot over the last 10 years and this is the first really bad thing that has happened. But I can’t help but look at her differently now. I really at a loss as to what to do from here. Any advice would be appreciated.
**TL:DR** Girlfriend of 10 years and I drunkenly got into a political debate. Where she full on attacked me and wouldn’t let me leave and sleep in another room and I don’t know what to do.
33 comments
INFO: what was the controversial political issue?
When it’s ok to do it once, it makes a second, third, fourth time that little bit more excusable. You need to take action not let what happened be avoided.
Letting her go from facing up to what she did and instead going back to the debate was a mistake in my eyes. That debate is over the second fists were thrown.
I’m not surprised you’re seeing her differently. She abused you.
Not “had a meltdown”. Not “had a panic attack”.
She abused you.
And, to add insult to literal injury, she hasn’t even had the grace to apologise.
OP, I realise you have invested a LOT of time into this relationship. You obviously love her.
But this isn’t right.
Even if it was her mental issues and the wine, it isn’t right. There are no viable excuses that make this okay.
She abused you, physically, and then emotionally by manipulating you back into the bedroom. At no point has she thought about your needs, just whether her actions are going to impact hers.
I’m not saying leave. You’ve been together a decade and from what you’ve written, this is the first time.
The thing is that it also needs to be the last time.
Your girlfriend needs therapy. She has issues she does not have the tools to fix. This should be a non-negotiable boundary for you, because you do not deserve to be her punching bag. Literal or otherwise. Therapists are expensive, she’s right. She just needs to decide whether your relationship is worth that expense or whether she’s fine with your relationship never getting back to what it was.
Get the heck out. Next time she snaps it could be with a knife. Before you even think about going back she needs a brain scan and a trip to a psychiatrist. Edit to add: I’m serious about the brain scan and psychiatrist. When someone does something so completely out of character and violent it’s possible there is a medical issue. Brain tumor, chemical imbalance etc. she needs to be looked at by professionals. A serious conversation needs to be had but you need to be out of the house. This level of incoherent violence is dangerous and you’re just lucky there wasn’t a weapon nearby. Good luck and update us if you can
You need to sit down and talk to her about this. And if she won’t own it, then I think you give her some time to reflect. If she continues not to own her bahaviour then you should consider if this is a person you want to spend your life with.
I think others are right that she may have some unresolved issues that surfaced that night. Perhaps she has been really good a repressing this behaviour but the meds and alcohol plus the heated discussion resulted in this unacceptable abusive behaviour.
I’m sorry but physical abuse is non-negotiable. It’s not something therapy can just make go away. You need to break up with her and get out of there because if you don’t she’s going to think what she did was tolerable and it will only escalate the next time it happens. Seriously OP, protect yourself and get away from this woman.
If she won’t go to therapy, time to dip out.
Okay, so you were discussing abortion, and you were physically attacked, and pretty much help hostage. Now you are asking what to do.
You know what you need to do, you are simply stuck on the fact you have 10 years together. What if you had another topic you discussed, or you had kids together?
Updateme!
What ever you do, you need to make a statement here and tell her that this is not accepted behaivour, and if this would come from any other person then her, you would call the police and take legal actions(well, this could still be an option, if you feel for it).
Dont just “forget” this and move on.
You have been togethet for 10 years,
you both deserve to be totally upfront with your feelings, always. Tell her that this have alterd the way you se her.
And then you together decide if that is something you can work on.
You are stil a team, so this is an issue for both of you.
(Engish is not my native language)
I can’t tell you what to do with regards to the relationship, but whatever you decide, I think it is super important to tell other people this happened. The fact that she is trying to rug sweep and hasn’t apologized makes it seem like she wouldn’t acknowledge responsibility or culpability if this happened again in the future. You are male and larger and if you need to defend yourself, it’s more likely that she would be the one to be injured. If people don’t know that she has acted this way before, they are much more likely to believe you are the abusive one, and her behavior so far indicates that she would very likely deny responsibility and try to lay all blame on you.
I don’t think you necessarily need to leave her for this, but she needs to go get psychiatric help and accept full responsibility for the way she behaved. She abused you. It’s not ok and there’s no excuse for it. She needs to stop drinking and figure out what happened and why she did this. It’s very concerning that she hasn’t even apologized yet. She owes you a sincere apology without blaming you for any part of this. She also needs to take steps to ensure this NEVER happens again. If she’s not willing to do those things, you should consider ending this relationship. The last thing you want to do is make her feel like this wasn’t that big a deal, or she could very easily decide to do it again. Do not sweep this under the rug.
My seccond reply.
If you feel that you have a hard time argue with her.
I know that me and my 10+ gf have a black belt in interupting eatchother, you could write a letter to her. Have her read it with you.
And just tell her that you talk after she read it.
UpdateMe!
What medications is she on???
You realise a completely random attack is not normal….. but clearly she was a lot more drunk than what you realised.
I’ve often drank a whole bottle of wine then started on another one and my bfs never realised and thought I’d only had half.
Another thing that might be coming into it is there were a pile up of issues in the relationship. I’ve had meltdowns when I’ve been pushed to the absolute brink…. as in, boyfriend went out and slept with a girl, then admitted he was still texting her so he “wouldn’t be rude” to her.
You just came back to the house from a bucks party…I’ll presume there were naked women prancing around. Maybe, just maybe, your longterm partner felt upset.
I think she needs to stop drinking first of all. Then apologize sincerely to you and seek therapy. If she isn’t willing to put work into fixing herself then she doesn’t really care, does she?
If it happens once it can happen again. I get that you’ve been with her 10 years and this hasn’t happened before but it shouldn’t have even happened in the first place.
She chose to become physically violent towards you to the point where you felt like you had to lock yourself and the animals in another room. That’s not acceptable behavior and it’s absolutely a reason to break off the relationship.
If you really want to be with her then give her a certain amount of time (like a couple months or even six months) to learn how to control her anger (with professional counseling or anger a management classes) and if you both still want to be together at the end of that time then so be it. She needs to prove that she can and wants to change.
**If she doesn’t respect you enough to give you an apology for something she should know is wrong then she doesn’t deserve to be with you**
Honestly I’d walk because if YOU got drunk and hit her, blocked her when she tried to leave, then tried to break down the door to get at her again, you’d be sitting in a jail cell and everyone would be telling her to leave.
But if you chose to disregard that, at a minimum she needs to acknowledge and apologize, get in therapy, and no more alcohol or drugs other than prescribed.
Make it crystal clear to her that ALL are non-negotiable, or you walk.
honestly, your description of the event is absolutely horrifying. there’s a huge huge difference between a single slap or a punch (a lot of people would be willing to forgive and forget that; i’m not one of them, but moving past such incidents does happen) and an all-out psychotic assault. no amount of apologies or therapy can fix that, and she’s not even offering either so this seems like a slam dunk case for an immediate break up.
She’s an abuser. Leave before it gets worse. I know yall have been together for a decade, but trust me you don’t want to spend the rest of your life with someone like her. You deserve better. Also report her to the police.
You saw the real her first the first time. Run.
The righteous side of me wants to agree with most other comments, she needs help this is abuse etc etc. and thats all perfectly correct. It is abuse and its not ok.
But theres also a part of me that says, you weren’t scared. Shes not a threat to you. And this is once in ten years.
Men and women aren’t the same, especially in the question of physical danger.
You seemed to handle the situation well, safely and with maturity so the pragmatic side of me is asking: is this something you can handle?
Obviously if this becomes a recurring issue then the game changes but right now this is an isolated incident and i think for the sake of 10 years loving relationship, is it something you can handle quickly and forget about?
I think personally i would sit her down and say “I still love you (if you do anyway) and we’re not over. But that shit is not acceptable and it cannot happen again”
Deal with the fallout for a few days but make her feel forgiven and then move on.
As i say if it happens again then its a real problem. But if not then… no harm done i guess.
Your in shock and that’s ok it’s not easy realizing ur in an abusive relationship… my ex almost killed me in a black out rage and when he came to he tried to kill himself and I broke the door down to stop him even tho just meet minutes before his hand was on my throat bashing my head into a wall. I should have ran after that not gone to help him but I was in shock I didn’t really feel in control and never ever looked at him the same. I’m sorry your dealing with this and I hope u get out and get help she’s not safe for u to be around and u now know that. It will be ok eventually with time. Again I’m sorry this happened to you.
You need to end this. There is no reason to ever attack another person. Abuse will get worse if this happens now. Men don’t report abuse as a norm, but please run, now.
UpdateMe!
You need to get out now. You do know if this happens again and even if all you do is grab her wrists to try to keep her from hitting you and leave a bruise on her wrists, if the cops get called it will be your ass getting arrested. I have seen lots of guys get charged with domestic violence when defending themselves from an out of control woman. Get your stuff, get out, and don’t look back. She’s not worth getting arrested over.
If this is truly out of the blue, and very strange, take her to the doctor.
Tumors can cause sudden and violent mood swings…
Violence is not ok. That she’s refusing to acknowledge her actions and apologize are the icing on the cake. If I were you, I’d leave because imo violence is never acceptable. However, only you can decide if it’s possible to work through this. Some suggested couple’s counseling, but it’s important to note that it can be dangerous (and is usually not recommended) to see a couple’s counselor with an abuser. She’s an abuser. Say that to yourself a few times. She’s an abuser.
I’m sure it hurts knowing that someone you’ve invested so much time and energy in, someone you’ve been growing with, showed you a very ugly side of her that you didn’t even know existed. Don’t look at it as wasted time, though, if you do break up. These last 10 years helped you grow and learn who you are, learn boundaries and how to maintain them, and learn what you want out of relationships in addition to what you can offer.
You deserve better.
Honestly leave her, make her get out of your place.
She’s punches, hit, pulled your hair, and scratched you, and let me tell you it doesn’t matter if she’s 10 pounds or 10,000 pounds it doesn’t matter, if you lay your hands on someone you lay your hands on them and it’s never right to do.
If you let this go without at the very least making her move out and start the relationship from square one then it’ll only be easier to do it a second, then third, then fourth time.
its dangerous to stay with this woman. What if you have kids and she treats the kids like this?What if she decides to use a weapon next time she goes at you? What if she decides to lie about you to the police or to people you know or threatens to as a form of control? Just lots of things she could do and no real reason to trust that she won’t do this again, especially if she won’t admit fault or get therapy or anything.
If I were you I would file a police report. She did a lot of damage to you even though she’s a petite woman. She is dangerous no matter what her size is. And she could easily make it sound like you were the abuser, even if you think she won’t do that. You probably also thought she wouldn’t abuse you until this happened.
At the very least, if you don’t want to go to the police about it, then document everything. Take pictures of your pulled out hair, scratches, any bruises, etc. If she damaged anything in the house too. If it’s legal to record audio without telling her, you should record the convo you’re going to have. Just cover your bases. And stay safe.
You got amber hearded my man. Escape before she poos on your bed
Your girlfriend was wearing a mask for 10 years and she finally let it slip. This is what abusers do they plan the long con and get you too invested/vulnerable. Leave now before things get worse. She will only escalate things. And she could make accusations to ruin your life, hurt herself then call cops, etc.