Rumata, there’s a book that you need to read: The Gift of Fear, by Gavin de Becker. He has a lot of clear information there about listening to your own gut and how to see if you’re trapped in an abusive relationship. Please, please read it.
I try to stay out of threads like this because I’m in no way a psychologist, but this statement sends chills down my spine.
IMHO from reading through this thread? She’s mentally ill, unmedicated, and she’s using you as her emotional punching bag. And, like anyone who has been emotionally abused for awhile, you’re making excuses for her while you continue to be her punching bag.
In addiction parlance, you’re her enabler. There’s part of you that knows her behavior is off the wall, or otherwise you never would have started this thread. OTOH you’re so enmeshed in her drama that you can’t even fathom an an actual exit, OR, if you can fathom it, you’re so enmeshed that she’ll drag you back once you actually exit.
I’m speaking as someone who has not only been a victim of emotionally abusive relationships, but who also has had close friends who were victims. It took me a lot of therapy and a lot of time to not only unravel myself from the dynamics, but also to recognize the dynamic enough so I wouldn’t go anywhere near it. Nowadays I have little to no tolerance for such relationships. As much as I empathize, I never let that override my self-preservation.
OP, you need more help than strangers on a message board could ever give you. Please get out of there. NOW.
So if you’re the source of her problems then she’d be better off without you right?
Yes. Because it’s one less thing that keeps up the appearance that everything is OK.
I second this.
Get out, get out now. This is not a normal relationship. Instead, it is incredibly damaging to you. The longer you stay, the more you lose your grip on what a normal, healthy relationship is, and the more it seems normal to be a victim of this kind of abuse.
If she won’t accept criticism of any kind, there is no way that she will change her behavior. Why would she? This is the situation she wants-- you willingly take her abuse. You are a willing participant in this cycle because you are still in the relationship.
You know what? This “good side of her,” it’s just part of the manipulation and deceit. If she were horrible 100% of the time, you’d leave right? She’s keeping you in this relationship, and keeping you as her punching bag, through the hope for the good times.
She’s not going to finally understand what she does to you, because she wants to keep being able to do this to you.
Just get out. Get out now.
Start by calling a domestic abuse hotline. In the US, the resource is 1−800−799−7233, at http://www.thehotline.org/ Abusers often turn the most violent when they think they might actually lose you forever, so please let professionals help you with this.
Right - the reason you “want to think” that is because it gives you the illusion of control. And hope. And a chance to redeem yourself, too; most likely you were similarly abused by someone in your past, with whom you were powerless to negotiate. So you’re trying to argue with them via your wife.
You’re seeing her reality just fine. Accept it.
Also, EVERYONE has good sides. That’s just life. We’re all complex. The point of a relationship is that it should be mutually beneficial, not a job. It shouldn’t be so hard.
And you can’t earn affection. It’s a gift.
(apologies if someone else already said this, I read that post and felt compelled to respond before reading the rest of the thread)
Get out and don’t look back. She won’t get better. She won’t learn. She will never see your side of things. You will always be “responsible” for her emotional state, regardless of her actions or inappropriate, over the top responses to things. She will attack you and bitch you out then immediately expect you to comfort her. She will demand that you move heaven and earth to “make her feel better.”
Reading your description of her behavior sent chills down my spine because it fits exactly what I have experienced with my wife. And I second whoever said that people with this type of behavior can be especially dangerous when you try to separate.
Oh and don’t let her fool you into thinking that you owe her anything. Not help, not support, not kind words, nothing! Get out and don’t delay.
Good Luck!
One very important thing I learned from de Becker’s book is that if someone is manipulating you, they’re doing it on purpose. Abusive partners don’t accidentally treat you badly and those few nice moments are not their true self. Being really sweet every once in a while is part of the manipulation, it keeps you from leaving.
If this is as bad as some of us suspect, it involves our old friend Borderline Personality Disorder.
“Borderline” as in borderline psychopath. That means zero empathy for you as a fellow human being. Instead, you are a device to be manipulated (for the ego boost that provides), blamed (so as to avoid developing emotional maturity), and abused (for the sheer adrenaline rush: raging on you is an addictive drug).
Get out. And then get help, because another BPD will find you as easily as a hawk can find a chipmunk from 1,500 feet up. It’s not about her and her abuse: it’s why you readily offer yourself to her abuse.
No it doesn’t make sense. It’s right up there with “Well your Honor she was wearing very revealing clothing,and I couldn’t help myself so I raped her. She provoked me.”
She’s responsible for how she reacts to things that upset her in her life, not everyone else. All of us go through things that upset us but it’s how we react to them that separates the human beings from the certifiable. Also to add, I can’t think of any situation that would warrant verbal abusive language. Especially coming from your SO.
Is she like this with everyone or are you her only victim ? I commend you for trying to stick around and help her. But as mentioned you’re just enabling her if you put up with it, and from the sounds of it you’ve been in it for some time now because your even questioning whether she’s right or not, your stuck in a toxic relationship buddy.If you stay she’s going to bring you down with her.
You need to have a talk with her telling her you’re not going to put up with her abusive treatment of you anymore, and if she does it again your going to walk. This will no doubt leaving her to flipping out right as soon as you say this. This is when you go and grab that bag you have packed and leave for a week if you can.
Come back in a week and if she shows signs of changing, and I mean she needs proffesional help if she doesn’t do that it’s just a matter of time before she flips out again. When it happens again you need to leave for good. Divorce her, you’re lucky no kids are involved.
Best of luck to you.
I don’t recommend giving her yet another chance. That’s what you’ve been doing all this time. She’s already demonstrated that this is who she is. Every time you give her just one more chance, you prove to her that you’ll keep coming back for more. And you will. You need to make the break and stick with it.
Then, in that case, there’s no fixing it. She doesn’t want help, she doesn’t want to get better, and she doesn’t care enough about the relationship or about you to make any changes. Run.
I’ll be honest-- in the beginning of my relationship with my husband, I was extremely emotionally abusive. I had an abusive childhood, and was abused in my first marriage, which ended very violently, and then i was a single mom struggling really hard to get by. Once i realized shit was stable and I was safe? I was ANGRY. At the whole world. But the person it was safest to take that out on was my partner.
The only reason we’re still together is because I was able to recognize what I was doing and get therapy, and I have great friends who tell me when I’m acting like an asshole. I was diagnosed with PTSD, and I still have really rough days, but I’m able to put my anger on pause and decide if it’s a valid thing to be angry about.
SHE HAS TO WANT TO DO THE WORK. YOU CAN’T CHANGE HER. AND NO ONE DESERVES TO BE TREATED LIKE THAT.
If you’re already walking on eggshells around her, then you’re in an abusive relationship. Read the list on this website and see if any of these excuses describe why you stay with her:
I wish you the best of luck; I was in an emotionally abusive relationship with someone for fifteen months several years ago and I was literally a shell of my former self by the time I got brave enough to toss him out of my life.
The thing is he wants to give her a chance, that’s the point of his OP. Yet he realizes he’s at the end of the rope with this person but needs confirmation before he leaves her. If she’s nutty beyond hope the best thing for him to do is keep his willy wrapped, leave, and not look back.
Rumata - You know that you’re in an abusive situation. The title of your OP states that. If anyone else came to you and stated that they were being abused, what would you advise? You would tell that mythical person to get out. You need to follow your own advice.
StG
I came out of a ten year lurker status just to reply to this.
I am currently going through a divorce from an abusive relationship. The vast majority of it has been emotional/psychological. We’ve been together for a long time, and I did not realize what I was going through until about a year ago.
For the sake of your mental sanity, find yourself a therapist who has experience dealing with victims of abuse. Mine has been a wealth of information and support, I honestly don’t know if I would be as strong as I am without her. And I promise you, I have been exactly where you are; telling yourself that you know there is a good person underneath or thinking that you can help them, those are normal thoughts. You invest so much of yourself in your marriage, it is normal to grasp for something to not face up to the reality of what you are going through.
I wish I could make my ex happy with his life, but there is nothing I can do for him. These are his demons he has to work through on his own, if he were to ever have the courage to face them. He’s been in therapy for years now, he’s on various medications, and he’s making very little progress. Most of that reason is denial and likely a personality disorder. Like someone else mentioned, that is very difficult to treat.
Trust me, this hurts like hell and you are going to have some very low days. Please know that there is a richer life for you out there and you WILL feel better. You deserve better than this. You need to find the courage to walk away before you lose yourself. It’s easier said than done, but build up a support system, you will need it in the coming months.
My heart aches for you.
This website has a crapton of stories similar to yours and a metric crapton of wise advice for dealing with it: http://captainawkward.com/ Check the entries under the ‘abuse’ tag. And read the comments! They’re well moderated and helpful.
Please be careful. When a victim of abuse tries to stand up to the abuser, the abuser will escalate the abuse to try to get the victim back under control. It sounds like you’ve left her once before, so you have an idea of how she’ll behave. Take care, and get thyself to safety. 
(I second tiny one’s suggestion of therapy - it’s so nice to have an experienced, non-judgemental person to help unpack WTF has been happening. If you’re a guy and you run into the very rare counselor who doesn’t think that women can abuse men, walk right out and flip them off as you go.)
You don’t need support for emotional abuse, what kind of ‘support’ do you think you’ll get? You’re married to a lunatic and you aren’t going to make it any better by staying (unless you’re getting something out of it). DTMF. Easy for me to say, very very hard to do, but it’s your life.
“And so, it is not astonishing that, though the patient enters therapy insisting that he wants to change, more often than not, what he really wants is to remain the same and to get the therapist to make him feel better. His goal is to become a more effective neurotic, so that he may have what he wants without risking getting into anything new. He prefers the security of known misery to the misery of unfamiliar insecurity.”
- Sheldon Kopp, “If You Meet the Buddha on the Road, Kill Him”
I just wanted to thank you for this link - fascinating blog! I can’t believe[1] some of the abuse stories though - the guy claiming the coffee made him so uncontrollably horny that he just had to molest his friend? :eek:
[1] I mean, I do believe them, but a lot of people really suck 
Okay, one thing I wanna say is that I really don’t understand why people stay in these kinds of relationships. When I was a kid, I had no choice but to be completely and utterly at the mercy of my parents. To hear people describe going through the same thing when it is completely 100% within their power to walk away… I just don’t get it.
I don’t mean to sound judgmental, but dammit, why put yourself through that if you have the power to change it?