Diana’s hubby never hits her, but with his constant criticisms, intimidation and demands, her life has now revolved around making him happy. He would go as far as encouraging their children to ignore her, and his favouritism towards Layo (one of their daughters) created conflict. Diana started seeing to see how much his attitude was affecting her daughters. She told him she was leaving; she says that although it has been difficult, life is easier now than it was living day-to-day with her partner’s abuse.
Now read the rest of Diana’s story as he narrates her pains as an abused woman…
At first, my husband made a big deal about being protective of me by constantly telling me that he would always watch my back. However, the mistake I made was that I did not see through the veil that he meant something different from what he said. Little did I know that he wanted to make all the decisions while I tag along.
Of course, we had our good times but once we were married, his desire to control everything became more obvious. He never actually hit me, but his behaviour constantly put me on the edge. He would push me, throw things at me, call me names, and humiliate me in front of friends and family members. Soon afterwards, he would apologise but then start harassing me to make up by having sex with him. He constantly demanded that I have sex to prove I loved him.
Things got worse after I had our first baby. Gina (our daughter) was an unsettled baby and I was beside myself from exhaustion from getting up in the night and struggling to breastfeed her. I would stop working and lost contact with my work friends. Feeling vulnerable and isolated from the rest of the world, I became very dependent on him. I tried making a lot of friends with other women in the neighbourhood, but he didn’t like that. Over time I had to cut myself off from them because he’d be so rude if they visited the house.
My hubby always like acting like a loving father to the outside world, but at home he did very little for our daughters. I had to do everything, all the housework, all the care for our kids. Even when I was really sick, he refused to do anything to help. Yet he always wanted to control how I dealt with the kids and how they related to me and each other.
He would also tell our daughters what to wear when going out and was always very critical of their friends. Our youngest daughter (Lucy) was his favourite – a fact which he made very clear to all of us. He’d say she was ‘his prettiest girl’, the ‘smartest’. This caused upset and conflict between our daughters.
The truth is that my entire life came to revolve around making him happy. At some level I thought the abuse was my fault; I was inadequate and couldn’t cope well as a mother. I was couldn’t open up to anyone because I was so ashamed of what I was going through.
As our daughters got older, I started noticing how his behaviour was affecting them. My eldest shut herself off from everyone and became very withdrawn. Meanwhile our youngest was copying his behaviour and became demanding and difficult.
Then I began to read books about self-esteem and relationships. They reminded me that I deserved something more than the treatment I was receiving from him.
Today I no longer live with him anymore, but a lot of emotional damages have been made, especially to my first daughter and then to my youngest daughter; but I know things would change gradually with time…
Dear readers, abuse in relationship is real and we just have to learn from Diana’s experience. Your hubby doesn’t have to be abusive when there is an issue between you. There are better ways of expressing your feelings to your woman without using abusive languages.