Domestic Violence Relationship Story from H. - I wish I left when I saw the warning signs

by Hannah
(New Zealand)

So I met this guy at my 16th party and he seemed perfect at first, he was so charming and got along with me and all of my friends and family, he actually cared about me and was there for me. Soon being there for me turned into him expecting me to constantly be there for him, able to talk to him 24/7. After about 3 weeks of dating he'd be calling me every night and he'd get upset and guilt trip me into talking to him for at least 3 nights each week instead of hanging out with friends. He always wanted me to stay at home and not hang out with my friends, he'd say things like 'you don't love me you're choosing your friends over me' and I'd have to apologize a billion times saying I'm just hanging with my girl friends and that I do love him and would talk to him later that night. He'd then always be like 'I have work so I have to get an early night so either talk now or not at all'. one time I remember he texted me saying 'why aren't you picking up your phone?' and I said I was hanging with friends and he said 'oh k.'

I should have realized that someone who "k dots" me just for not being able to talk at a specific moment is a bad sign but I didn't. We'd go to parties with a big group of friends and he'd be in my room with me as I would be getting ready for the party and he'd put down every outfit I'd try on, giving me really judgmental looks saying clothes looked bad on me and some even looked ridiculous. Everything was either too low or too tight or two weird and if I didn't wear what he 'approved' of them he'd basically ignore me... he use to not talk to me for hours and talk to my friends, my friends noticed and thought it was weird, but after awhile they just got use to it and thought we were always having stupid arguments. I started to realize he drunk quite a lot, he'd never not have alcohol, and he'd always expect me to drink it. When we went to this party I met this nice guy and he was showing me a funny video on his phone and this other girl too and he had his hand around my shoulders and hers and my boyfriend got so mad when he saw this, he just came over to me and yanked me by the arm from this guy and made me leave to be with him, for most of that night at that party he didn't want me talking to other guys because he didn't trust me yet he'd be flirting with so many girls. Then later that night my friend said that he'd tried feeling her up and kissing her and I was so upset at hearing this because I didn't expect him to try to cheat on me after he'd made such a big deal about how much I meant to him and how he didn't want anyone else with me. I asked him and he denied it, so I eventually just believed him because he nagged and nagged and said that he would never do that and things like that to make me believe him.

I heard he tripped my friend over down some steps when trying to 'help' her later that night and then at one point the same person he tripped over was vomiting and he threw a glass beer bottle right at her face all angry saying she was being so loud. He then pressured me into having sex with him that night at that party in front of everyone right next to where that girls vomit was and I just eventually let him because he wouldn't stop touching me even though I said no and I didn't want to make a scene.

Another time he stayed for the weekend and he got annoyed at me and said I wasn't putting enough emotional effort into the relationship and he said he felt like I was just using him for sex; which was totally not true but the other way around! He was the one who'd been pressuring me into sex, yet here he was turning it all around. I just agreed and apologized and didn't stick up for myself. I thought I was in the wrong. I also found it hard to stick up for myself then because when he told me he was really up in my face and wouldn't let go of me. And there was people around so I didn't want to make a scene and humiliate myself.

The same night he got upset at me for not wanting to have sex with him, he'd literally told me to take it slow with him, and then wanted me to have sex with him when my friends were around. we were all staying in my garage for the night, drunk. He eventually stopped touching me and trying to have sex with him because I wasn't really responding. I was so confused with what he wanted. He then left and sat outside and smoked 5 cigarettes in a row and wouldn't talk to me. I asked him what's wrong and he just gave me the worst death stare. I told my other two friends what was going on and they acted like it was my fault and said I should have let him have sex with me, but they didn't know he'd been screaming at me just before for doing exactly that. I tried to comfort him and talk to him and get him to open up but he just pushed me away and told me to leave him alone. I'd never seen him so distant from me. I felt like I hardly knew him.

Then the worst happened one night. We were hanging out in a spa pool with a group of friends. When no one was around and it was just me and him in the spa pool we were kissing and being playful in the water splashing each other and things like that. He then pushed me 'playfully' but then got too rough and then he pushed my head under water as a 'joke' and I couldn't breath and he just held me head down for ages. I struggled but he didn't care, luckily I can hold my breath for ages, so I managed to not let my breath go and let the water flood through me when held under, but it was scary, after he finally stopped holding me down I was so shocked by what happened. I said 'why would you do that' to him, I was very upset, but he didn't care and said 'do what?' and acted like nothing happened. He then held me and cuddled me really tightly round my waist and my other friends came out to join us in the spa so that was the last we talked about it. I felt so uncomfortable when he was holding me and how we were just acting like nothing had happened after what actually happened, and I never told any of my friends about what happened.

When I stayed at his house for the weekend he pressured me into sex and oral sex. I bled lots because I wasn't turned on enough during sex, and he was always too rough about it. That night after he'd pressured me into having sex with him he started biting my ass and he literally BIT it until it bled and had massive marks, and I couldn't even sit down because I had painful bruises on it, and I told him to stop when he was doing it but he didn't. He use to take my phone from me and not let me check my messages or contact my friends so I'd have to hangout with him for longer. I suffer from bad OCD and have an irrational fear of the number 3, and he'd purposely hit me 3 times because he knew then I'd get so much anxiety and ask him to do it again to make it even because otherwise I'd end up in tears and I didn't actually ever want him to hit me and I'd tell him not to but he'd always do it. And then he's say 'oh but you said you wanted me to', and I'd tell him no it's because I'm scared of 3's, and he'd say OCD is bullshit. He's purposely open 3 draws in my room or do things which would cause me anxiety with my OCD.

I ended up breaking up with him after he had threatened that he'd stab me if he found out. I cheated on him, and he held a knife to me. He also said that if I broke up with him he'd kill me. He was laughing when he said that, but then he said 'no I'm being serious though' and he'd just glare at me. At school I started getting multiple calls in every class from him, he never trusted me and wanted to know where I was all the time. He would always talk to me about stupid stuff he was doing, but all he wanted me to talk to him about was where I was, who i was with, what I was wearing, and guilt trip me into ensuring him I wasn't cheating on him and that I loved him. He was moving really fast saying stuff like 'next year I'll move down where you live and we can flat' and already organizing flats and everything. I didn't even feel attracted to him by this point because of all what had happened. So I decided to break up with him, he begged me not to and said he'd change and treat me better, but I said no, and he threatened me, but I still said no.

It's been almost a year since I broke up with him and I haven't been in a relationship since. I have had trouble trusting guys since him. He broke into my house just to look around and didn't take anything one time months after we broke up, which was creepy. He didn't get caught though because I heard his voice and didn't do anything so let him leave my house without getting caught because I was too scared because I thought he'd kill me. This was months after we broke up that he was at my house, I don't understand why he was there if he didn't take anything. It creeps me out to think I let him get away with everything and that he knows where I live and can break in if he wants to. He has left me alone for months now which is good.

I unblocked him on facebook the other day only to find he'd been pretending to all his friends he was still with me for nearly a whole year after we had broken up, and he still had the photos of us up on facebook. I told him to delete them, but that creeped me out because we were long over, and I can't believe he did that. I didn't think things would get so out of hand with him because I believed he loved me even when he didn't. I thought his controlling behavior was him showing he cared, but really he was just possessive over me and viewed me as a game he could manipulate and mess with. I now know that warning signs of a potential abusive person need to be taken seriously, back out of a relationship if they threaten to hurt you, or start to degrade you.