He Used To Tell Me That If I Tried To Say No To Sex That I Was Being Manipulative. My Witholding Was

He used to tell me that if I tried to say no to sex that I was being manipulative. My witholding was "punishing" him in an emotionally abusive way.

So I'd wipe the tears off my face, take a few deep breaths and let him have whatever he wanted.

I can smile and turn on the charm and climb on top of your dick five minutes after you called me a useless cunt. I’m so good at at “ getting over it ” for you; I can swallow my pain and rage for an eternity.

I've started a new job teaching English to new Canadians. It is the first time in my life I am actually making Good Money and feeling like I am doing something worthwhile.

It's also a problematic job for me. As my mother ( a highschool teacher) says about being a teacher : congratulations, you've won an excellent job that will make you insecure in your abilities and your effectiveness every day forever.

What have i done?

Who would I be if I had broken up with him the first time he cheated on me?  Fifteen years later I can barely tell you who I was before I met him.

Abusive parents will keep you feeling like you always have to fight to prove yourself. Any single thing you do can become a proof that you’re worthless and be an excuse for humiliation and baseless attacks, even if you do it perfectly, they will go on and nitpick and go against reason to find something wrong with it.

Another tactics they like to use is moving goalposts, meaning they will berate you saying you’ll never be able to achieve something, and once you do, well then it doesn’t matter anymore! Suddenly this thing you were supposed to be too stupid to achieve is a minor and perfectly achiveable goalpost and you’re forced to feel bad you didn’t achieve some other thing! You get nastily compared to someone else who had nothing to do with it, and you’re left feeling as if all that effort you put in to prove your worth, was for nothing, because it’s meaningless now. Also, as soon as you prove one thing they were wrong about you, they will find 10 other things you have to prove, right there on the spot. It doesn’t matter if you did something good yesterday, can you do it right this second? Can you prove you’re not going to fail something else in next 5 years? You can’t. Nobody can. It’s not a game of determination of your worth, it’s a game of diverting from your srengths, diverting from your accomplishments and pushing you into seeing nothing but flaws and weaknesses in yourself, and imaginary ones at that. No person on earth can live proving themselves every second of their lives, it’s inhumane to demand it. Nobody deserves to be attacked over their worth by their very loved ones, who are supposed to value you no matter what you are, or aren’t capable of achieving.

They do this to keep you in the constant loop of feeling desperate, incapable, not good enough for anything, and thus never realizing you’re in fact, smarter, more sane, and more decent human being than they will ever be. They wouldn’t be doing this if your achivements and abilities weren’t a threat to them, if it didn’t bug them so much that you can do things better, more efficient and with more common sense they could ever hope to gather. They’re watching you thru eyes of jealousy and desire to destroy your capability – even if they have to traumatize you to do it. Nobody should be forced to see themselves thru their eyes. Even they know they’re lying when they’re acting like they couldn’t be less impressed with you.

He did not understand sentimental value. I keep little things that people give me or that remind me of special times.

Some people keep pictures in this way. These things are fabrics in the tapestry of your history But not to him. Junk. Hoarding. Wasting space.

His mom gave him old pictures of him and his family. He didn't care and was really angry when I insisted we keep them. So he made me hold on to them, and here I am still holding on to them out of guilt.

These things are all sacred. I am having such a terrible time trying to throw them out.