So, last night we were planning on going to bed early but I needed 10 minutes to do something first. We have a small apartment and I needed to move a storage bin out of the closet where he put it. It was blocking my access to the closet. He kept telling me no, don't move it now, wait until we have time. I told him I needed to move it now because I needed access to the closet.
This is where we had problems. He said no, don't do that tonight. I said I could do it withiut his help and it wouldn't take that long. He kept telling me not to move it, and I kept politely telling him he didn't have to move it and that I would do everything, and that if it was keeping him up at all would stop. He told me that if I tried to move it, I would cause a huge argument.
Without a word, he angrily gets up, throws stuff on thr ground and loudly moves it all himself. Then he gets really upset and tells me I don't care about his boundaries and that I was keeping him upball night (this whole thing took 5 minutes to do, by himself which he got mad at ME for even though I said he didn't need to help).
He spend thr next 2 hours telling me that I didn't care about his boundaries and that I was harming him. I admit that it probably could have waited and that I just wanted to get it out of thr way, but he just kept telling me over and over that I didn't respect him and that I was harming him by not just dropping it like he said.
Then, after thr argument escalated for a few hours, he gets so mad that he punches the storage bin pretty hard, which scared me. I have severe ptsd and I get triggered really hard when people throw or punch anything, especially stuff around the house. I panicked and told him to get out. I had a panic attack in thr bathroom and then afterwards we just agreed to try to sleep in separate places in our apartment.
I'm lost and not sure what to do or even where our relationship is at. I feel like he was ignoring my need to access the closet, which was completely blocked. He feels that I harmed him just by telling him i would move the bin for no longer than 5-10 minutes.
Tl; dnr- my boyfriend ended up punching furniture because he felt like I wanted to do something that would have kept him up. He did it for me angrily and then escalated thr argument for hours.
So he argued for hours about a task that would have taken 10 minutes? Time to put together an exit plan.
Your cat was stuck behind the bin and you needed to get your clothes for the morning. It’s unreasonable for your bf to want to leave an animal shut in the closet all night.
You keep asking what your responsibility was here, and your weren’t at all. This is a pattern with him and you.
You need to think about whether or not this is something you want to live with for the long run.
>I have severe ptsd and I get triggered really hard when people throw or punch anything, especially stuff around the house
Then why live with someone who does that?
He was so annoyed that you refused to let him control your actions he spent two hours of the only life you get on this earth making a thing about it, and showed signs of physical abuse along the way. Throwing objects is just a substitute for hurting the person they’re angry at. Dump him.
Your boyfriend is a toxic abuser in the making. He is using gaslighting techniques (I.e., making YOU question your boundaries and behavior because of something they have done) and my personal favorite projection (where they tell you their reaction is your fault). No, every person is 100% responsible for how they behave and react at any given moment. This will escalate.
Moving an object is not violating boundaries. He is using therapy talk as a tool to gaslight you because he wants control. You may want to consider an exit strategy.
Yikes!
Does this sort of thing happen regularly?
Sometimes people react to things in anger when something else is bothering them and they just take it out on the nearest person…
My girl.
Not sure if you’ve been following the recent Jonah Hill stuff in the news, but basically he’s getting called out for being a bad partner, and more specifically – his use of “therapy language” to be controlling.
Your bf is doing the same thing here. Disagreeing with him doesn’t “violate his boundaries”. That’s not what a boundary is, nor how boundaries work.
You keep insisting you need to understand your responsibility here, so I will give it to you straight out:
Your only issue here is that you are still with your abusive partner.
Are you even listening to your description of the situation? Because all I read is: this bin was blocking the closet, so I said I’d move it, as it will only take 5 minutes. Boyfriend told me NOT to move it. I said it would only take 5 minutes. Boyfriend then SCREAMED at you for 3-4 HOURS and punched an inanimate object.
Did he ever offer a reason other than “because I don’t want you to”?
That sounds a whole lot to me that he was just trying to exert power over you and resorted to therapy language nonsense to insist YOU are somehow the problem. You’re not.
More straight talk: your boyfriend is abusive. You are dating an abuser. It only gets worse. He’s hitting inanimate objects now, it’s only a matter of time before he hits you.
“but I know he wouldn’t ever hurt me”
Uh. No you absolutely do not know any such thing. Plus don’t you think every battered partner thought that at some point? No one gets into a relationship with someone and thinks “this person will eventually beat me black & blue” and then keeps dating them? That’s how abusers work. Once they have you hooked in – feelings, a baby, marriage – then the mask starts to slip.
“bUt I lOvE hIm So MuCh” – so? And do you? Or do you love the person he was at the beginning of the relationship before he screamed at you for hours over nothing before punching the bin, triggering a trauma induced panic attack in you – his partner he supposedly loves?
This will be the first in a long line of mask slips if you continue with this man.
You are not safe. Make an exit plan, and leave.
Good luck, my girl.
It sounds like he is hiding something in the closet.