Can he forgive me for getting a restraining order on him

[whoami]

I am married, but have a restraining order against my husband. He has been physically and emotionally abusive. Here's the problem, I still love him and want him back.

 

He has been gone for 6 months. When I talk to him, he says I caused all the problems and I have to fix them. He wasnt coming home for days, he did not work. He would come home drunk, and break things or throw me around. I got the restraining order because I was afraid. His anger was building and I was afraid he may not stop. He has a crack problem.

 

He is not the man I married. How do I help him? He is depressed and angry.

[befuddled11]

1) he's a crackhead

2) he's an alcoholic

3) when you were together, he'd be gone for days

4) when you were together, he couldn't be bothered working

5) he emotionally abused you

6) he physically abused you

7) he damaged/destroyed property in your home

8) he's angry

9) he blames you for his barbaric behavior and takes no responsibility for himself

10) you were so afraid of him that you had to take out a restraining order

 

And you love him why exactly?

 

Nevermind the man you once knew or fell in love with. That's not who he is now, and likely that never really was him.....just someone he pretended to be.

 

How long were your married to him (well, I guess you still are, but you know what I mean)?

 

What ages are you both?

 

Do you have children together?

 

There is absolutely not one thing you can do to help him. Speaking as someone was once in a very similar marriage (short of the restraining order, though I went one step further and had him charged with assault and unlawful confinement after 1.5 yrs of his crap and abuse), these guys don't "get it." No woman is to blame for this kind of abuse and mistreatment. These men are cowardly little boys who feel a sense of control and power by hurting those who they're supposed to love. Their only step to changing is to undergo extensive, intensive therapy specially designed for men who batter........but it starts with them getting honest with themself and admitting they have a problem....and most don't get to this point.

 

You need to find the nearest Battered Woman's Shelter in your area, and get in touch with them........because they are a great support for women in your situation. These women who work/volunteer there, have been victims of abuse themselves and they can totally understand all the emotions and second thoughts and feelings of guilt and all that goes with being a victim of abuse.

 

The very vast majority of people, including women, do NOT understand what it's like to be an abused woman. You need counselling and support that a Battered Woman's shelter can provide, free of charge (also called Domestic Abuse Shelter).

 

If it's easier, here click on the following link which is the website for the National Domestic Violence Hotline Website.....they have a toll-free # that you can call to talk to someone, who can then put you in touch with an organization/shelter in your area.....so you can get support locally:

 

http://www.ndvh.org/

 

Their # is: 1-800-799-SAFE (7233)

 

It is extremely hard to stay 'strong' when faced with what you're facing. You have been brainwashed into believing that you're a bad wife and you have tremendous guilt.....and that everything that was done to you was "your fault." It's going to take time and support and learning to love yourself again, to begin your journey to healing.

 

Call the #..talk to someone.....you will feel like a heavy weight has been lifted off your shoulders, I promise.

[befuddled11]

Your subject line of your post...you wondering if your husband can *forgive* you for getting a restraining order against him. See, that shows you right there just how brainwashed and emotionally battered you are....because you admitted that the reason you got the restraining order against him was because you were afraid of him, of what he might to do you....so why should you ever be sorry for simply wanting to keep yourself from being further hurt, or worse yet, killed?

[gaia]

I suspect that one of the reasons you want him back is because years of abuse have battered your self esteem to the point that you no longer have any confidence that you're worth better. You are - believe it! If you can't believe it, go and see a counsellor who can help repair the damage.

 

Whatever you do, don't have this man back in your life.

[Arabess]

PLEASE take Befuddled's advice!!!!!!

[feeling silly]

This quote comes from a book titled "Battered Women", by Maria Roy.

 

"Once a wife has been hit, it is likely to recur; some standard, some barrier has been broken down, and anger in the husband is likely to increase........In a long-standing relationship which is continued in spite of assault, the only reasons the woman does not end the marriage are dependence (emotional or practical), and fear of change and the unknown. These are often masked as love, or so the woman deludes herself. But essential to love is self-respect; where a mutually supportive and collaborative relationship does not exist, love does not exist."

 

Try your local library, you will find many books on this topic. I assure you that by taking him back you may be signing your own death warrant. Please, find some help, these situations don't get better.

[dario]

I once went out with a girl who told me that her ex used to beat the crap out of her. Upon hearing this my heart sank....how could she alow this? Why didn't her family come to bat for her? I felt angry at this person whom I ad never met. What made it worse was that her family didn't come into bat for her. From that moment on I committed myself to treating her well and administering as much care as posible...when she broke up with me she went back to him. It puzzled me...and I'm still dealing with it as she still gets hurt phsyically...but how does one step in? She loves this man with all her heart. During a period when I was 'trying to get her back' she told me to quit it...this was a man who she loved and there was no changing her mind. I pointed out th obvious...she's getting hurt. I said things like, 'If he touches you again I'll deal with him...' She basically told me that she'd call the cops on me. I haven't seen her for years. Love.

[SoleMate]

Dario, you ask a question that is so hard to answer. Why would anyone "choose" the insults, slaps, punches, and hairpulling when they could have real love? I too have watched and wondered. One part of the answer is that I have noticed that people who grow up truly confident and secure in the love of their parents or other primary caregivers almost never fall into relationships like this. I believe it is because they have learned the pattern of real love starting from their infancy: that it feels good, and safe, and satisfying to both parties. That love "template" shapes their future relationships with the opposite sex.

 

People who grow up in unhappy homes learn a different template: that "love" includes dependency, abuse, and rejection. A young child cannot choose to reject his/her parents or rationalize away their neglect or aggressiveness; he/she accepts it as the norm, and learn to conform "love" behavior to whatever enhances survival in that particular unhappy home.

 

Adults can be brought to an intellectual understanding that this process has happened and that one's template is distorted and will lead to bad relationship choices, but it is harder to change one's emotional responses, which have been learned and reinforced over many years.

[reasontosigh]

Befuddled is 110% correct here. Please take heed.

[moimeme]

One part of the answer is that I have noticed that people who grow up truly confident and secure in the love of their parents or other primary caregivers almost never fall into relationships like this

 

Not true. People from all backgrounds, families, life situations can get caught up in such relationships. Apparently, one of the characteristics of women who stay in these relationships is that they are religious and believe that divorce is wrong. A lot of women learn about the pain in the abuser's life and want to help him.

 

You can't understand until you have been in such a situation that these men aren't all bad. They can be loving, warm, kind, and all sorts of other positive things, and that makes them hard to leave. Besides, being abused is almost a surreal experience; afterwards it seems unreal.

 

Don't ever think that a person's background will predispose her to fall into dysfunction. Brilliant women have fallen for con men because people think they can always spot a liar/troublemaker/addict. You cannot and if you believe you can, you lull yourself into a false sense of security.

[reasontosigh]

Besides, being abused is almost a surreal experience; afterwards it seems unreal.

 

Truer words were never spoken.

 

There is something to be said for the two sentences that precede it, moi, but I don't know if I'm being a bit bitter about it or simply realistic (in retrospect, of course) to say I guess Mr. Ex wasn't as warm, kind, loving, etc. to me as I thought he was.

[reasontosigh]

Brilliant women have fallen for con men because people think they can always spot a liar/troublemaker/addict. You cannot and if you believe you can, you lull yourself into a false sense of security.

 

She's spot on with this as well

[midori]

Originally posted by SoleMate

One part of the answer is that I have noticed that people who grow up truly confident and secure in the love of their parents or other primary caregivers almost never fall into relationships like this. I believe it is because they have learned the pattern of real love starting from their infancy: that it feels good, and safe, and satisfying to both parties. That love "template" shapes their future relationships with the opposite sex.

 

If only that were true. I think that one can grow up experiencing healthy and solid familial love, in a healthy home and still have tendencies that make one more susceptible to falling into an abusive relationship.

 

Knowing you're loved, and how to love, isn't enough. There are many other issues involved in abusive relationships. I don't speak from experience, thank goodness, but I suspect that a big one has to be a woman's sense of self-worth. I don't mean that over-hyped "self-esteem" that is bandied about without any sense of what it actually means, and which people try to artificially instill in kids by telling them how terrific they are for putting on their own clothes each day. I simply mean that people who don't feel that they have a raison d'etre are perhaps more willing to surrender themselves to another person's control.

 

I really believe that anyone involved in an unhappy relationship, whether abusive or not, needs to ask themselves why they're in that relationship. I'm willing to bet that in at least 90% of the cases it's because they are using the relationship as a proxy to deal with internal issues they haven't been able to cope with in their own right. These things might include feeling insignificant (a common symptom of abused women; but I suspect it's there in some way even before the abuse began -- otherwise why tolerate it?), financial dependency, or fear of being alone (which I would link to feeling insignificant).

 

I imagine it's even harder for the women who do come from healthy & loving families to cope with being abused -- they probably don't dare reveal their abuse to their loved ones... how could they justify staying?

 

A tangled coil, for sure.

[reasontosigh]

I also enjoy consulting the Gospel Of Midori:

 

I imagine it's even harder for the women who do come from healthy & loving families to cope with being abused -- they probably don't dare reveal their abuse to their loved ones... how could they justify staying?

 

Yes, I would say it is indeed harder.

 

My family had suspicions something was not right. Never did they suspect (nor I, of course) that he would ever beat me. The minute I called my dad after the police took him away, the entire family (spread out at that time between NY, PA, VA & SC) banded together to pull me out. (One positive side effect was that all sibling squabbles came to an immediate cease-fire, at least temporarily.)

 

One cannot reveal (even inadvertently) what one cannot see themselves. Only after I was taken 6 hours north of where I was living then did I start to see the pieces fit into the puzzle, which did not start to happen until the shock began to wear off nearly 2 weeks later.

[moimeme]

have tendencies that make one more susceptible to falling into an abusive relationship.

 

Again, while this can be true, and I believe that many people who end up in abusive relationships do suffer from poor self-esteem, this is not necessarily the case. Sometimes there is no clue to the potential for abuse until the couple lives in close quarters. Men from every profession, including psychologists and priests known and loved by lots of people can be abusive and it doesn't require that a woman have tendencies or character defects or anything else.

 

In some of these replies, I see a desire to distinguish; to say that 'not me' are the people who end up like this. Ladies, it could well be you; despite your good self-esteem, wonderful family situation, or anything else. There but for the grace of God, really. Never believe that 'not me' are the people who would (insert any sort of problem here). That sort of thinking is what may well lead you into just such a situation.