“You may have been better off staying with him,” says my sister.
She’s echoing a sentiment I have often exercised. I word it a different way on the days I don’t think I can take any more of his punishment, control, and abuse.
“I wish I had never left him,” I say.
How could I have known? If someone told me I’m not sure I would have believed them. When you escape someone doesn’t it mean they have less control over your life?
Or so I thought.
But it only escalated his control
It doesn’t seem believable but this is why. When we were together he still successfully controlled me. He was satisfied. The day operated under his world order. He got what he wanted.
My tears meant nothing to him.
They were the satisfaction with a job well done by the controller. It meant he was doing well. I wasn’t getting my way. He was putting me in my place. He was correcting me when I was wrong.
He wanted me to make more money so he would withhold things.
Health insurance, transportation, food, and mortgage payments.
He would force the outcome he desired. But he underestimated me. I had been raised by a single mom. I wanted to stand on my own two feet. I wanted to be a success story post-divorce.
His abusive bullying and controlling tactics didn’t motivate me.
They undermined me. They spoke to my Achilles heel. My deepest worries. My need for financial security. They kept me up all night. They landed me in the hospital with surface blood clots from a hereditary blood disorder. My internist thought it was from the stress of the divorce emotional and financial abuse.
The controller was trying to control me.
Instead, he was immobilizing me.
Left to my own devices I would have ironically provided him a better outcome.
I wanted to be self-sufficient.
I always say I was more controlled in divorce than in marriage. During our marriage, as long as I didn’t get in his way, he didn’t care what I did. Hence, why my sister said it might have been better to stay.
I would have been off of his radar.
He would have been content as long as his world revolved.
I remember being with one of my best friends from high school.
“Colleen can do whatever she wants as long as it’s not a headache to me,” he says.
My friend is offended and she lets him know it. It’s not the first time she has called him out. One day we are sitting on the beach when he speaks about our rental properties giving himself credit.
“You mean the real estate investments Colleen made?” she says.
My husband is caught off guard.
He’s not used to being called out on his behavior.
He’s got zero response. He knows she’s correct. It is my idea to save for our first rental property and I am the one who got the part-time job to begin saving for a deposit. I am the one who made sure we had six months of insulation when we bought it and paid down the mortgage.
But none of that matters now.
I am in survival mode.
My controlling marriage has gotten out of control because I left him. I’m stressed, panicked, frightened, and sleep-deprived. I’ve never asked for help and now I’m asking anyone who will listen.
“Please make him stop,” I say to his friend.
“Please make him divorce me,” I beg his other friend.
“Please do something,” I plead with his family.
I text two of his friends.
“My kids can’t take anymore,” I say.
“I’m frightened,” I say.
I’ve grown up in a family of extremely strong men. My grandpa, uncles, cousins, and brother are kind, loving, and decent. They are firefighters and cops.
They help strangers.
I am confused no one will help me.
I wasn’t raised around this archaic ‘Bro Code.’ My family doesn’t know the word no. They recognize a need and they fill it. They risk their own lives for those outside their four walls. They adore their mothers, wives, and children.
They do the right thing.
I am married to and escaping a man incapable of this.
Worse, he’s surrounded himself by those who look the other way.
Men and women who know our children are suffering. They don’t need to be involved in the day-to-day to grasp this. They don’t need to be our neighbors. They don’t need to know the ‘he said’ or ‘she said’ of it all.
There are indisputable facts.
I made myself financially vulnerable as a stay-at-home mom. I left him. He didn’t leave me. I retained a lawyer. He refuses to do so. He has control of all of the money. I do not.
The divorce lasts five long excruciating and abusive years.
My children and I survive we do not survive.
The controlling man makes our world completely out of control. Our home becomes a battleground of financial and emotional abuse. He arrogantly gets away with it.
Because society awards the controlling man.
As do his silent family and friends.
They both look the other way. Controlling people are even more controlling in divorce when they herald themselves the primary provider. I’ve raised my boys to do the right thing.
They are confused adults they know choose to look the other way.
Why are they reprimanded at home, at school, and on the playground?
When their father gets away with bad things. There are many days I don’t think it was worth leaving a controlling man. It wasn’t worth watching my children suffer so their father could hurt me.
I have to reconcile that for the rest of my life.
My choices, the man I chose, how long I stayed, and the fact I didn’t reduce my vulnerabilities before leaving him…I am accountable for that.
I am the one who let my children down. I should have made sure I was able to support myself before leaving an absurdly controlling, money-obsessed, empathy-lacking abusive man. If I had done so, they would never have suffered a five-year-long outrageously destructive and life-altering divorce.
I have forgiven myself.
But I haven’t denied my responsibility.
I always say in divorce, multiply a person’s personality by ten. If not, you won’t be prepared for the proverbial trial before you. You won’t begin to understand what your spouse is capable of — especially an abusive, punishing controller who doesn’t get their way.
I am several years out of my divorce.
Some days I’m still tired and stressed enough to say…
“I wish I had never left him.”
Likewise, my sister worries about me and occasionally says…
“Maybe you shouldn’t have left.”
But down deep we both know the truth.
She told me I was smart enough to leave.
I was wise enough to know she was right.
*Follow my quotes on Instagram or me on Twitter or LinkedIn or Facebook
If you would like to read more of my stories and support me as a writer, consider signing up to become a Medium member. For just $5 a month you will get unlimited access to Medium.
—
This post was previously published on medium.com.
***
All Premium Members get to view The Good Men Project with NO ADS. Need more info? A complete list of benefits is here.
 |
 |
 |
 |
—–
Photo credit: Drew Colins on Unsplash
