I Bought A Lipstick Today. He Got Angry When I Spent Money On Things That Werentessential, So I Felt

I bought a lipstick today.  He got angry when I spent money on things that weren’t “essential”, so I felt naughty. 

Reality has set in:  How messed up is it that a $6.00 lipstick is a victory?

He’s calling again.

My trainer, who I should probably just refer to as my friend, asked me during our last session what it would take for me to get police involvement.

She made me set a boundary.  So here it is, and you can all call me on it:

If he shows up somewhere I’m at again and I have even a hint that it’s anything other than a wild coincidence, I’ll be pursuing a restraining order through the family court system.

It’ll be 16 weeks no contact on Wednesday.

I have my group therapy intake tonight. I'm feeling sick.

“An abuser tries to keep everybody—his partner, his therapist, his friends and relatives—focused on how he feels, so that they won’t focus on how he thinks, perhaps because on some level he is aware that if you grasp the true nature of his problem, you will begin to escape his domination.”

— Lundy Bancroft, Why Does He Do That?: Inside the Minds of Angry and Controlling Men

Scraps

This has been sitting in my drafts for 4 months.

I was going to post it because it made me feel vindicated at the time. He would have just come home from a vacation with another woman.  The one where I paid approximately 65% of the costs.  

Clearly there was literally trouble in paradise, and the satisfaction that he was "gushing” about me and not her was immense.  Something prevented me from hitting post on it though.

Fast forward through the subsequent months of bullshit I have endured and I can see through all the backhanded compliments.

He just wanted to soften me up enough to agree to come fuck and do his dishes.  

Amazing.