Partnership Abuse

I have just gotten out of an covert partnership abuse situation. Abuse happens in many forms and this one snuck up on me. I take responsibility for staying in it for the year than it happened. But, the abuse started benignly and grew to an obvious level. Here is the story. I hope that others who find themselves in similar situations will become more conscious of their own situations and learn to identify and get out of them.

My partner and I had six years together that were calm, peaceful and built on trust. We worked together very well and both grew in the areas of trust, honesty, and the meaning of partnership. Then her 44 year old son descended on us.

He is an untreated manic depressive, out of control, violent, ex-con. He had burned all his bridges and was so down and out that he had nowhere else that he could go but to come home to live at his mother's. He was negative, rude, had days that he wouldn't even talk to us and was a general black hole in the household.

I was doing a lot of traveling during the year and had a hip replacement so it wasn't a good time for me to leave, however, in retrospect I should have. He was subtle in his hostility toward me but as the tension built I became more and more aware of his hatred of me and his homophobia toward me and my partner.

In February he was watching the dogs and let mine out. She was lost in the desert for four days before I miraculously found her. After that Ladybug hated him and barked at him whenever he came into the house. I tried everything, including taking her outside when I saw him coming toward the house, to get her to stop. She wouldn't stop and nothing I tried helped.

The tension continued to build and this began to take a toll on my relationship with my partner. Blood is thicker than love. She promised me in a couple's therapy session to keep me safe, but when things happened she would back down and stand up for her son. I was getting more and more frustrated with the whole debacle.

Then in early August, her son came into the house. My dog barked at him and he came unglued. He got in my face and said he wanted to kill Ladybug. Then he said he wanted to cut off my head, my arms and legs and bury me in six holes. Needless to say, I left and called the police, who couldn't do anything because my partner and her son told them "a different story" so that her son wouldn't go to prison again.

I stayed in a hotel for two nights and then got on a plane to go to my sister's. I left Ladybug with a friend. This gave me some time to look at the situation for a distance. I was alarmed at how I had put up with the abuse from both of them for so long. I made the decision to get out of the relationship, get my things out of the house and go on with my life.

When I went to get my things, I picked a time when both my partner and her son were going to be gone. My partner became mean, abusive, and controlling. She did things like shut off my cell phone, tell the woman who was going to pick me up at the airport not to pick me up, changed the locks and hid the keys to my car. In spite of her trying to make it as difficult as possible, I was able to go through my things and get them out of there.

I have had no contact since. I am relieved that I am out of her son's covert abuse and the abuse from my partner. She got involved with another woman, who had just gotten a 13 million dollar medical malpractice settlement, while I was moving. You tell me what that is about!

I am better off now. I handled my self in an honorable, respectful, responsible way and for that I am very happy. I hope if you are in an abusive relationship you will get some help in therapy or talk to friends about it--and get out. Life is too short to live in those conditions and there are plenty of people who are much more healthy that you deserve to be with.