So what’s the problem?
- annonymous
- Jun 22, 2018
- 2 min read
The problem, in a nutshell, are eggshells: The eggshells I walk on each day, never knowing when one of the dickwad’s moods will hit.
Some days are pleasant enough and lull me into wishfully thinking that it will all be okay.
Then SNAP. Eggshell. Actually, fuck eggshells. This is about military ordinance. I don’t tip-toe across eggshells; I spend my life negotiating a fucking minefield. It’s not so much SNAP as BOOM. BLAST. POW.
Not that I’m a battered wife. Apart from a handful of charming incidents (like the time he smacked me hard on the face after I had a wisdom tooth out) the dickwad's not physically violent. His violence is an emotional one. His blows are verbal and behavioural. They come at me as a barrage of insults, carefully chosen to weaken and wound, sometimes interspersed with powerplay threats (“I’m cancelling everything!”) which are designed to remind me who’s boss. These salvos are followed by a scorched-earth retreat (silent sulking or a sudden exit) that leaves me, the constant appeaser (we’ll get to that later) pleading for normalcy instead of telling him to fuck right the hell off.
All because I suggested trying a new restaurant, for example.
The result is that I’m perpetually on edge, ever modifying my behaviour in order not to inflame his, while absorbing the insults and shouldering the blame for anything that goes wrong. After 10 years of this, my mind is no longer my own. My ass and elbow have become interchangeable.
This is why I have to pluck up the courage to leave. I need my mind back.
While searching for an appropriate pic to accompany this post, I came across this article on eggshell relationships that makes for good further reading.