Posted by sunny10 on May 13, 2005, at 8:26:34
In reply to Re: Can I ask you all something? **trigger** » pinkeye, posted by Tamar on May 13, 2005, at 5:00:20
okay (deep breath in for me)...
No, I don't respect myself as much as I should. I was raised inconsistently, like you. One minute I was told that I need to study hard and do well in school and be successful; the next minute I was told that men don't like smart women. The way you wrote your post really hit home for me.
And I do feel that when I am depressed, I put myself down more, and I treat myself badly. And I think that on a primal level, my SO responded to that and started to view me as somehow less than him and started treating me accordingly. Instead of dealing with his own issues and anger, he started taking them out on me- much the same way I take my angers and frustrations out on myself.
But, when I am not depressed, I am strong and refuse to be treated that way. And I was no longer depressed when my SO strangled me in that hotel room. He took things WAY too far- violence is MUCH different than yelling (mostly in that it is concrete proof of disrespect). Now we will go to anger management, pinkeye. I need to learn to be more assertive and speak up when I am angry- not stuff it all inside until I become depressed and start treating myself badly. And he needs to learn to express his anger in acceptable ways. Violence is not an acceptable way. Neither is putting someone else down (berating them, treating them like a second class citizen, et cetera).
And at the same time, I am going back into therapy for myself to learn to treat myself better and not present a doormat to the world for all and sundry to walk upon whenever they feel like it.
So, yes, I understand you when you say that part of your marital issues are how you feel about yourself and how you present yourself to your husband. BUT, you do not have the power to go into your husband's brain, send brainwaves to his arms and fists, in order for them to hurt you. Only HE has that power. And it is a power of primates; sorry if I am going to speak poorly of your Indian town, but it is NEVER okay for men to regress to primative thinking. The human race is too evolved to allow that type of regression. It is a profanity.
Sorry I couldn't get online last night- I tried, but with dial-up, and going through my company's servers, I couldn't get into the separate posts... it kept crashing my laptop.
I have presented a somewhat different point of view from the others now, though.
Can you see that it's still not okay for your husband to hurt you?
My experience with my SO has been of short duration- I nipped it in the bud by leaving our shared house and demanding therapy if there is to be a future for us.
Yours has been of much longer duration and your husband is a cult follower, my SO is not. Your husband's cult allows (probably expects) this type of violent behavior. In my opinion, unless your husband leaves this cult and enters therapy with you, you need to leave him.
Your very life may depend upon it. And then it won't matter that you haven't figured out what you want in life because you won't have one anymore. Yes, you may feel young and immature. But you have many years in front of you to grow up and grow wise IF you give yourself the chance.
I fear that for you to stay with him will remove your chance to grow and become your own person.
That is my opinion. But I think you know this. Even when you mention that you don't think you'd go back to India if it was your own father dying, you mention that there is something inside you that knows it would be inherently wrong to do that. You DO know the answer. You are afraid. And that is okay. Everyone has to do things they are afraid of. Be brave for yourself. No one else can do it for you- although a shelter can help you if you need time to get yourself back on your feet, financially, before you can live alone.
Will you talk to your T about all of this? I know that all of our different posts have scared you and confused you. Can you print them all and go through them with your T? Let T help you figure it all out, okay?
Praying for you,
sunny10
poster:sunny10
thread:496916
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20050513/msgs/497229.html