Domestic abuse...
For a time I lived with a woman who tried to kill me on multiple occasions.

As most of you are probably aware, when you're in that situation it's very easy to think that it's normal. Or that it's somehow your fault and that you deserve to be treated badly.

Of course, it wasn't that she was always vicious. At times she could be very caring and considerate - doing things like my laundry and cook meals for me, even offering to help me with my essays (when I was a student) and so on.

But at other times she'd do all sorts of nasty stuff to me from the insidious to the outright vindictive and vicious. Some examples include:

She once told a car full of my mates that I was better than all of them and that the person that was provably better than me academically would "burn themselves out soon". Maybe it was meant in a "supportive of me" sense, but it just came across as rude and arrogant on my behalf and made me feel so embarassed and turned them all against me. (It was actually one in a long stream of similar barbed comments she'd made and refused to accept she'd said, but this one I actually witnessed.)

She once collected up all of the belongings I had left strewn across the floor of my bedroom and told me she'd thrown them all away because I didn't deserve thigns if I couldn't keep a place tidy. I was absolutely gutted. There were all sorts of irreplacable items including a family heirloom that had been passed down to me, some Lego models I'd invented and made and was trying to write down the design for others to copy, various books and so on. I was distraught for the best part of a fortnight before finally coming to terms with what had happened. On that day I got told they'd actually not been binned but had been put in black bin bags and hidden in the garage, but because I'd made such a scene over losing the stuff she threw them out a ferw days ago - setting me off again for another week.

She once actually threw me down the stairs, and a few other times just pushed me down the stairs, and then blamed it on me being clumsy when questions were asked. She was so good at lying and being manipulative she even managed to turn my own father against me!

She tried to attack me with a knife on several occasions - one notable time for "reading a newspaper in a way to deliberately wind her up", luckily only managing to slash the paper to pieces leaving me relatively unscathed.

She once start to drive off whilst I was only half-way out of the car after being given a lift somewhere. I only just managed to extricate myself and managed to only get one foot run over rather than being dragged along. For a while I had such a phobia of this happening again I refused to open a car door to get out unless someone had turned the engine off and had the keys out of the ignition. Luckily I'm over this now.

There were all sorts of other minor incidents, but for some reason the above really stick out.

Of course she wasn't just like this to me - everyone she was ever close to she treated just as badly if not worse. When her father died she didn't bother going to the funeral. Heck, she didn't even bother sending flowers. When her mother, who she never got on with and had told she wanted nothing to do with in any way, died she ended up contesting the will because she hadn't been left anythying. She had a daughter who she would send into floods of tears at night on occasion by making a big scene of leaving and not answering if she would ever come back - and I did what I could to soothe the daughter, and decided I'd rather take the brunt of her hate and anger than put the poor child through that again.

The list of examples really does just go on and on.


The thing is, I'd known her all my life and she kept on telling me she loved me and I didn't know what to do about it.



The lucky escape?


Well, I managed to sort my life out enough to manage to get a place at university and left the place we were living in. (By then the daughter had grown up enough to know how to look after herself, and whilst she still cared for the mother knew not to get too hurt by her.)
Whilst I was at university I managed to meet a wonderful person who fell for my charms. We fell in love, and I decided to drop out of university to get married and start a job I'd been offered.

As I made this decision I knew, then, that I'd never again need to see the psycho-bitch that had made my life a misery.


Especially as my dad was in the process of divorcing her.
I really am a lucky son-of-a-bitch.
(phyphor, Wed 25 Aug 2010, 13:32, 6 replies)

Good story, well written
Not what I was expecting.
(TheColonel, Wed 25 Aug 2010, 13:53, closed)

Cheers.

Unfortunatley it's all true.

Heck, I left all sorts of stuff out as it's not too relevant to this QotW. But there are all sorts of other examples of craziness, or more detail about the ones I've already given, that I might go into another time.
(phyphor, Wed 25 Aug 2010, 13:59, closed)

Why are
so many second wives cunts to their new partners children....

Have a click for getting away.
( bane, Wed 25 Aug 2010, 16:28, closed)

Actually this was my birth-mother (hence the "son-of-a-bitch" line), and her daughter is my sister. I just didn't want to spoil the reveal that early in the story.
She really was a crazy, crazy loon. And very good at pulling the wool over most people's eyes. I think she disliked me the most because I saw through her bullying ways and stood up for myself (and my sister) and because she couldn't physically hurt me very much (I got used to pain).

For what it's worth my dad has re-married and his new wife is a lot better all round. He's certainly a lot happier. As it happens I'm going to the wedding of one of my step-sister's this weekend.
(phyphor, Wed 25 Aug 2010, 16:59, closed)

It must be hard to come to terms with the fact that...
...your mum is a bit of a mentalist?

Kudos.

Good story too
(god_is_a_ghoti Carpe Deum., Wed 25 Aug 2010, 18:21, closed)

Sometimes ...
I went through a phase of calling her my spouse's mother-in-law as I didn't consider her to be myh mother (she gave birth to me, but she sure as hell didn't do much else), but I'm over that now.

On the plus side, though, whenever anyone insults my mum (which still happens, even though I'm in my 30s now) I have a great excuse not to be in any way upset by it.
(phyphor, Wed 25 Aug 2010, 18:28, closed)

She sounds like my ex..
My daughter fucking hates her and regularly asks me why I married the "stupid, drunken, fucked-up tart".
( His Popiness the Hole Invaded Poland on, Wed 25 Aug 2010, 22:52, closed)