Dear Seaturtle:

Your Nov 24, 10:45 am post provided me with new information and it is a game changer for me in regard to understanding N and your relationship with him. First, I will attend to what you shared on the matter 3 days ago; second, I will re-read and comment on some of what you shared in the past in light of the new information of three days ago.

“The night before thanksgiving…  on our drive to the grocery store he was angry at a bad driver and called them the C word. This word makes me very uncomfortable, I have told him this numerous times. I told him again that it made me uncomfortable and to please not. He proceeded to say it again… he kept saying ‘oh the word c*** bothers you? I am not calling you (a) c***” just kept saying it. I called him an asshole for doing that and said the fact he continued to say it even though it made me uncomfortable was not loving and how you treat someone. He said “words don’t mean sh*t..‘”-

– (1) He used the C word repeatedly AFTER you told him on that occasion and in past occasions that the word makes you feel uncomfortable. (2) If the word he used was.. let’s say weasel when referring to the other driver and you complained about him using it, maybe he’d have a point about you being oversensitive to words used-  because a real-life weasel was not present in the car, and even if it was, it wouldn’t understand the word (or any word), and therefore not possibly be offended by it.. but the C- word is a word known by almost every English speaking human to be an offensive word, and ANY and EVERY girl or woman familiar with the word understands that the reference is to a private part of her body, and that the reference is very negative and derogatory. (3) If words “don’t mean sh**“- should you (if it was possible) not hear his words.. put on headphones all the time? (4) Let’s say he was referring not to ALL words, but only to the C-word. In this case, he is saying that your feelings of discomfort..  don’t mean sh**.

“He said ‘words don’t mean sh*t, get that through your head or you will be controlled by them the rest of your life‘…he was really annoyed at me for being impacted by ‘just letters.‘ We had a whole argument about it and one familiar feeling I had with him right then, familiar from F, was that I couldn’t explain to him why the word made me uncomfortable. I roughly said, it is more than a word it has a misogynistic historical reference and it held weight. He rolled his eyes. He lectured me about how he doesn’t let anything outside of him have control over him and how I should do the same and not let a simple word ruin our evening. He said ‘you get upset about things that don’t matter and I am tired of it.'”-

– (1) He was the one to repeatedly utter a very known offensive word for women (because he was angry and wanted to offend), but he handed you the responsibility for being offended by a word he chose to repeatedly utter. His attitude was as if the offensive word had an independent existence… as if the letters of the words materialized out of nowhere. (2) His attitude is also that of a man superior to you, saying: get-it-through-your -head, as if you are dumb. He dismissed your feelings as weird or unacceptable (rolling his eyes), and he referred to your feelings as such that “don’t matter“.

“We were in the store parking lot and he was trying to get out to go in and I could not bring myself to get out of the car with him, I felt completely repelled by him and wanted to shop separately if he was gonna be this way. He softened his tone and said ‘do you want to be controlled by a word?’ I don’t want to be, but in that moment I felt similarly to when my dad would manipulate me into believing my feelings were invalid. Confused I just agreed that a word/letters should not control me. I do actually still agree with that. But reflecting back I do not agree with him that ‘words don’t mean anything‘ what is prayer then?…”-

– (1) Again, he is talking as if the words he repeatedly choses to utter are not his responsibility, as if they have an independent existence, floating out there as independent entities, and you shouldn’t allow those independent entities to control you. (2) “Confused I just agreed that a word/letters should not control me“- he successfully confused you: you confusedly thought that words existed independently of him. (3) He softened his tone because you were repelled by him and didn’t want to shop with him.

“Yesterday morning I took him to a got yoga class, it was very nice and puts me in a good headspace, but I was pulled right out of it by an interaction with him. We went into the grocery store because he wanted some electrolytes following our class. He also grabbed a case of glass water bottles he liked and when we got to checkout looked at me cause he didn’t have his wallet. I am not in a place of spending $20 on water but I felt obligated because of how much he has paid for me over the past year… Anyways, at the store for the $20 water I pulled out cash from my wallet, I sold some furniture online and had some cash from my last paycheck. He looked at me in absolute distrust, which I guess I deserve, he said ‘um where did you get all that cash?‘ I answered ‘from the offer up furniture‘ he did the math and realized I had $20 more than that, he said ‘no that’s not all where it came from where did it come from?‘ Honestly his suspicion made me anxious and I forgot that my boss paid me in cash for a portion of my paycheck, so I said I couldn’t remember. He got so suspicious of me! I was so uncomfortable it reminded me of my financial relationship with my dad where I was co-dependent and questioned. I said ‘I don’t remember’ he said ‘that’s suspicious you never have money and now you just have cash?‘ It was right then that I remembered it was from my last paycheck”-

– He had no valid reason to be suspicious of you. His invalid suspicion of you is a controlling strategy meant to make you feel guilty and therefore in need for his correction, of his moral superiority to fix your .. moral faultiness. And he succeeded because in the paragraph right above, you wrote: “He looked at me in absolute distrust, which I guess I deserve“. 

“When he is irritated he puts on this act like nothing is wrong, it’s incredibly annoying but I am getting used to it. He asked if anything was wrong and I was like ‘yea I don’t like how you are talking to me, accusing me of doing something shady, asking me questions like I am untrustworthy‘ I told him his energy was bringing me down and he was being negative he then said ‘you never have money and now you do and me asking makes me an a**hole? You know what, f**k you.'”-

– (1) After the very wrong, controlling interaction with you that he initiated and executed, he asked you: what’s wrong? Again, freeing himself from personal responsibility for behaving wrongly and handing you the responsibility that belongs to him. (2) “You never have money” negates sincerity in what he told you previously about him being okay with you not paying rent.

“This immaturity just put me so off. We didn’t speak the rest of the drive but I wasn’t even upset I was just confused and disappointed. We got home and I took a long shower. I came to the conclusion that…  I had a bad relationship with money from my father so that is probably why I had anxiety and forgot. Him getting so frustrated and me not telling him was all just immaturity and miscommunication. I was no longer upset about the situation”-

–  He successfully confused you as you took responsibility for his bad behavior, downplaying his dishonest and abusive behavior as “immaturity and miscommunication“, when the truth is that he communicated very well to you what he wanted to communicate to you.

Second, some of what you shared about him early on: “If you read my last post you will see my partner is a stand up man, no question” (Oct 6)- Indeed, I didn’t question it (based on what you shared about him) until three days ago and this very morning.

“I want to explode and just be like ‘DO YOU SEE ME like do you actually see my spirit and soul over here exposed to you and walking in the world'”-

– When a person wants to control you, he/ she is not interested in promoting your spirit or soul. When a man repeats the C word, he does not see a woman’s spirit or soul.

You ended your original post with: “Idk maybe we are perfect for each other and I am self sabotaging, or maybe its the inner voice of my higher self telling me it’s not right“- I now agree with the latter part of this sentence. N is promoting your lower self: your self-doubt, confusion and invalid, unjustified guilt.

You wrote to me on Oct 13: “This is so hard, dealing with a parent with trust issues… I would cry every time my dad would go on this tirade, because I am someone who cares so deeply for people, so that he accused me of the opposite made me feel so lost, made me wonder if I knew myself at all. I wonder if this created self doubt in you? and how you overcame/ are overcoming this self doubt? My dad to this day still very often misinterprets what I do and who I am and it hurts every time, he thinks I am selfish and is probably why I have fears of being selfish or narcissistic. It is scary when someone tells you that you are coming across a certain way that is unbeknownst to you”-

-N’s behavior the other day at the store indicates that he has trust issues, having misinterpreted you having cash in your wallet and accusing you of having lied and pretended before to not have the money to pay rent. As a result, you doubt yourself.  N went on a C-word filled tirade with you only the other day.

Back to Nov 24, you wrote: “It is hard for  me to tell if it is a projection or if (N) is actually behaving similar to my father. But I am having a hard time trusting myself and the distinction between the two, because the part of me that would fall for my dads dishonesty scares me that it will just as easily happen again. How am I suppose to truly know the difference between manipulation/dishonesty and truth?“-

– (1) The examples you gave, his behavior in the car and in the store the day after, are indications that N is not the One for you because of who he (N) is, not because of who F is. (2) One can easily tell that N freeing himself from ANY responsibility for the words he repeatedly chooses to utter is.. part of a dishonest manipulation. And then asking you what’s wrong?.. taking no responsibility for any wrongdoing or wrong saying when he was clearly in the wrong.

“This feeling reminds me of how my dad made me feel, and the familiarity is confusing because it used to indicate me being manipulated, doubt in my own instincts that he was right and my feelings were wrong“-

– N is similar to F, unfortunately…

I don’t know if you are reading this and if you do, how you are feeling. I am feeling quite badly about my new understanding. I am sorry, Seaturtle.

anita