I speculate that part of the reason why people react as they do to stories like yours is that they desperately want to believe they can tell a psycho pretending to be a good person from an actual good person. If they can explain away (to themselves) your story by assuming you knew the guy was abusive and got together with him anyway, they can hang onto their false assurance.

The sad truth is, many psychos are excellent at hiding their abuse behind a facade of niceness. They even buy into their own facades, which is probably what makes them so believable. It doesn’t even require that one be young and naive to “fall” for their acts: they are consummate actors.

Re: Scarlett’s comments about insidious abuse that sounds so nice when you try to explain it. That’s one of the most frustrating kinds of emotional abuse to deal with because it’s so hard to explain. People say, “I’m sure he meant well” and “you’re reading too much into it”, but that type of abuser is a master of disguising digs as faux compliments. When you try to retell it, it sounds like you’re a spoiled fool who expects too much from the poor guy. That’s what my dad was so good at – any single one of his tricks sounded innocent enough. And I could never get anyone to listen to ALL of them at once so they could see just how hopeless the pattern was.

And, frankly, my mom totally is that. But so very many people I know did not have that, and the cult of motherhood makes it even more difficult for people to talk about their abuse at their mother’s hand. Whenever I talk about Don’s mom’s latest attempt to weasle back into his life and treat him so shabbily again, someone always comes along and says “But, she’s his mom, and she obviously loves him!” Cuz, you know, people over the internet who have never even talked to *me* about it, let alone Don, can totally tell that by the few comments I make here and there on the subject.

Cuz, you know, moms are ever perfect.

I don’t know exactly how to define emotional abuse – I think it’s different to verbal abuse because in my case at least, he never yelled at me or called me names. I think emotional abuse, like all abuse really, is about undermining someone’s independance and faith in themselves.

With my ex, a close mutual friend of ours – who was far closer to me than she was him – talked a lot about how he was so upset about me leaving him and what a difficult position she was in, caught between us. Did it occour to her that if he had any speck of maturity or responsibility for his actions HE wouldn’t be putting her in the middle like that? So what if he was upset – was I supposed to stay with him forever more just because he *needed* me? Was I meant to sacrifice my happiness and sanity so he he could have things *his* way? I wonder now how much of it was *her* not wanting to think that maybe this great guy who’s a close friend of her husbands was an emotional abuser… nope, far easier to think of me as the bitch who left him

their response to her (gah! drives me crazy, because if just a few people would stand up, people like that might actually back down)

Oh in this case she would, but she’d then go all passive aggressive and make everyone else’s life completely miserable. I got to see it first hand when I turned 21.

In early February of that year I had completely smashed my ankle and the surgeon put me on strict bed rest for 3 months. In mid-March my father died. 2 weeks later she was visiting, gave me a check for my birthday, and then did the same manipulative bullshit she always does and “jokingly” commented about cancelling it when I disagreed with her over something unbelievably trivial. I snapped. Maybe it was the large doses of narcotics, maybe it was the fact that the only person who’d been as horrified by her treatment of me as they should have been* had just died and left me to fend for myself, I don’t know. I’m not very proud of it but I did. Went off on the rude snitty comments she’d made about the state of the house, told her that you’re supposed to give someone a gift because you love them not so you can control their behavior and, since I wasn’t allowed up the stairs, locked myself in the bathroom until they left.

She spent nearly a year treating me the same way you would a dog you’re not entirely sure isn’t rabid, which was great. But she made my aunt and grampa positively miserable, and my mother when she could get a hold of her. (Which is when my aunt gave me the silent treatment. Oddly my grampa didn’t and I think in fact became more chatty.) Since then I see her either at Christmas or Thanksgiving, never both, and then mainly because even though my mom knows it’s healthier for me to stay away there’s still a part of her that doesn’t want her kid to be alone on holidays. She doesn’t mention it and in fact assumes I’m not going, but I can deal with it now that my GM can mostly hold the evil in for one day a year.

I still have the check, uncashed of course. For the record the cost of my freedom was $75. Not sure you can put a price on the first hand proof that the scariest of bullies from my childhood could be a coward.

*(Dad had declared at Christmas that he was never going to her house again after one of her tirades directed at me. Turns out he was totally telling the truth. Heh.)

@Scarlett, it often is one person doing all the work. I think relationships are supposed to involve both parties working? *sigh* And you’re right about how it creeps up. Sometimes it’s an overnight Jeckyll and Hyde switch, too. Some men maintain a facade of niceness until you move in/marry them/invest yourself in some way that makes it not so easy to break up and leave, and then BOOM you meet the abuser.

@Maggie, that IS my definition of emotional abuse. You’re probably right that it’s not most people’s, but I think psychiatrists would back me up on that. Hell, systematic undermining at work can be considered a form of harassment. For all we know, your grandmother was heroically well-adjusted given what circumstances she came from. But her treatment of people – and their response to her (gah! drives me crazy, because if just a few people would stand up, people like that might actually back down) – was all wrong (except in the isolated incidents you mention).