Dating Violence - Rosa 20

“Gave him space.”

I have been with my husband for five years now. The first three years of our relationship were good, and he loved and supported me. However, things changed two years ago when he turned 27, and I noticed that he became negative, unhappy, bored, and unfulfilled. He was so different. I thought he was experiencing a mid-life crisis, although it was too soon for that. Everything made him so unhappy. I neither commented nor complained about his behavior, instead giving him space to find himself and his path back to happiness and fulfillment.

Keeping the peace

This negativity slowly started affecting me both physically and emotionally. In the last two years, I have constantly been sick and experienced a lot of anxiety. I feel the need to tiptoe around him and have to watch what I do and say. I was constantly walking on eggshells in this relationship; he became very controlling, such that everything had to be done his way or else the man threw a tantrum. I always allowed him to have his way of keeping the peace in our house.

“This is what marriage looks like when you have been in it for so long.”

Eventually, he started evading his responsibilities. He was always travelling, working late, or shopping. Something was always keeping him busy. I felt that he was doing all this to avoid coming home. Finally, he ultimately shut me out emotionally, and when I addressed the issue, he told me that I was overreacting and stated that “this is what marriage looks like when you have been in it for so long.”

More Loss

I have been through a lot in the last two years. I lost my mom to cancer, had a miscarriage and lost my baby, and I was in critical care after the miscarriage for two days. Yet, he did not show up to see how I was doing. It was like I did not exist in his world and received zero emotional support from him. I knew that this was emotional abuse, and it was not right.

Living in hell

In addition to the emotional neglect, there was endless gaslighting. He was extraordinarily vindictive and manipulative, had affairs all over, and lied all the time, even about the little things. I had slowly become depressed due to all these things.

I was living with a toxic person, and it felt like I was living in hell. His behavior took a toll on me entirely, and I felt like life had been drained out of me. Then, on the 30th of May, during the COVID-19 lockdown, I caught him cheating on me, and I managed to get evidence on my phone that he was cheating. It was a phone conversation between him and the lady he had an affair with. When I confronted him about this affair, he got angry and stormed out.

New beginnings

He returned home later, and I told him to pack his stuff and leave and that I was filing for divorce. It was not a threat. I filed for divorce because I was tired of his shocking behaviour and emotional abuse. I am still waiting for the divorce to be finalized.

It has been a tough two years, but I am glad that I realized I was going through emotional and psychological abuse and was brave enough to end the toxic relationship and break the pattern. It was difficult to do, and I have no regrets about my decision.