Abused for the first time at 44

by Anon
(KL)

This is the hardest thing I have had to admit: That at the age of 44 and meeting the girl I want to marry, I have actually found myself in an emotionally abusive relationship.

Without going into too much back story, I have for the past year found myself the victim of:

1. Being called stupid, moronic, messy, insensitive, unobservant and a whole raft of other character flaws.

2. Threatened with being left at least 5 times in the past year

3. Blamed for her problems (I'm always tired because of you, etc)

4. Shouted at for perceived things that have embarrassed her

5. That she is smarter than me

6. That I am useless at everything
and the list goes on.

I have read a lot of emotional abuse sites these past 2 weeks, and the thing I have found is that with the quizzes, they say that if you can answer 1 question with a "yes," then you are probably in an abusive relationship. So I have to admit that "yes," I am in one and it's awful.

We have just bought a house, I have relocated overseas to be with her and we have just registered to be married. I think that I have developed a Stockholm-type syndrome and cannot leave. I have never been one to lack self-confidence, but these days I find myself double guessing myself so as not to piss her off. However, I find that it doesn't really matter what I do; it is always wrong. And she has no problem telling me either.

It really came crashing home to me today with two incidents. One while we were having coffee where she wanted me to admit that she was smarter than me. I joked and said "yes, of course you are smarter than me," which she promptly followed up with "then tell me why you think that." I said I'm happy for her to belittle me, but I will not belittle myself. I still have some small shred of pride, to which she responded "hmmm, we shall have to work on that."

The second was an hour later when we went looking for wedding rings at Tiffany and Cartier. None of the rings suit her engagement ring. She got pissed at me and said that if I had bought her a Tiffany engagement ring in the first place, there would be no problems. This is a rehash of her hating the engagement ring I bought. In fact she went to a jeweler to have it valued. Then told me she hated it because the jewelery store valued it at less than I paid, and that the diamonds were not big enough. "I am so embarrassed and hate my ring," she said.

I am at my wits end, and just don't know how to stop this.