Clarity, 3 years since he left.

Over the last few months, there has been a lot of emotional detachment from Peter, which has occurred organically from just seeing him the way he is. It has been difficult to fully detach since we separated as we've continued holidaying together for the sake of the childrens safety and wellbeing. 

Our most recent summer holiday together was emotionally traumatic for me and I'm left wondering if this can continue. All romantic and sexual chemistry between us has now dissipated and I've noticed that unless Peter is able to overstep my emotional boundaries, as he often was doing until Christmas of last year, he makes things intolerable. 

In the summer, during our holiday together as a family, I felt I had to get out of the car we were all travelling in twice because of him interferring and trying to control what I was doing. When we returned from the holiday, I specifically told him that I was leaving one suitcase of clean clothes packed as I was taking the children to visit my mum two weeks later. The first thing he did when we returned? He unpacked that suitcase whilst I was making dinner for the children when I'd assumed that he was outside putting the bikes and paddleboard away in the garage.

There has been years of this sort of behaviour. Doing the opposite. I can't really fathom why- perhaps he was jealous that I might not experience any packing stress on visiting my mother. He knows I hate packing. There is something deeply wrong in him I've realised. In autism, people need to control their environments to feel safe, but what I've discovered is that Peter's need to control me and my environment has absolutely nothing to do with autism. Because my life, my environment no longer impacts him. I feel this is a development of his condition, due to it being left undiagnosed, unmanaged and even celebrated in his family of origin. Peter's autism has developed and manifested into a whole new disorder alongside his autism and this manifestation, I believe exists on the spectrum of narcissistic personality disorder. 

I've been perhaps unwilling to write about this for a while, feeling that I'm failing our autistic child by viewing him in this way. But I see her empathy, her kindness, her willingness to love and care for others, her celebrations for others achievements. Things I don't see in him. I realise that autism is not to blame, but unmanaged autism is where his parents have neglected supporting him emotionally at all throughout his upbringing. Peter and his parents have always celebrated his lack of emotion and that is a pride born of dysfunction. 

Peter has distanced too recently. Its brought me a lot of peace, but I know that with this will come issues with his parenting when the children are with him.

His parents and sibling haven't spoken to me in three years and recently, I began bumping into his sister almost daily whilst taking my children to school. She parks her car along our walking route unnecessarily, another opportunity to poke at the bear. My children came to collect something on their way to school last week on the day that their grandparents were taking them whilst with their father, and my youngest told me her grandmother was rude about me when they got back in the car. 

"Quickly, let's go she's waving at the door." So we're now navigating the impact that their dysfunction towards me has on my children.

Coparenting issues and his family dynamics remain and continue to impact me and my children. It often feels like I'm stuck in a nightmare. I have contemplated moving away several times, away from his hometown but it's tricky because his hometown is now my childrens hometown and they are happy and settled here. I'm not sure when I get to be fully happy but I find microdoses of happiness where I can: yoga groups, my gym, writing, meditation, work and mostly my greatest blessings- my children. 

I can't even fathom dating yet. I'm still traumatised by the relationship I've endured with him and the insanity that his family have projected on our lives over the years. I still don't recognise myself. My body is bigger that the body it was before him, I am older, wiser yet scared, tired, hurt and exhausted. As a child raised in an unhappy home, I couldn't wait to grow up so that I could create a happiness of my own and feel loved. I'm thankful that I no longer have to share my home with him, but this life isn't what I envisioned either.

 Financially we are still entwined and until the children are older, we are emotionally enmeshed for their sakes, just like he and his family have always been. I don't think he'd have it any other way.

 He got what he wanted in the end: a family without sacrificing his freedom, his parents looking after him (he STILL lives with them 3 years on), no intimate relationship demanding anything of him, financial investment in property (the one I live in) that he doesn't need to clean or maintain and he gets to be a part-time parent when it suits him. 

What do I get? A bit of peace. No black cloud hanging around the house, no disappointment from unmet, reasonable expectations, no daily antagonism or oppositional defiance, no questionable passive aggressive remarks berating my value and worth, no competition, no loud noises, no being woken in the early hours by bright lights and heavy footsteps, no secrecy and no loneliness caused by his hollow presence. I feel proud of myself for giving him everything he ultimately wanted in the end because one day, when he's old and lonely, he may realise that getting what he wanted was actually a consequence. I already know it is.

Life isn't perfect. But it is better.

This is the clarity that I cling to. My home feels better without him in it and over the years any connections I need to have with him will gradually change and fade as they already have. He's out of my space so I don't need to force anything else just yet. 

Women are already at a disadvantage in a misogynistic world but to become associated, enmeshed, connected to these men is dangerous. For now, I've no desire to attract another potentially dangerous man. How do I trust myself not to find another one when Peter was so wonderful in the beginning? For now, I focus on my girls and showing them that no woman has to tolerate poor behaviour from any man, regardless of the excuse. 

2 Years and 2 Months Separated.

The start of this month marked 2 years and 2 months since Peter moved out of our family home.

This separation has been unlike most other divorces or separations where children are involved because we continue to co-parent very closely. I'd be lying also if I said that our relationship hadn't become inappropriately close on occasions, most recently before Christmas, after several months of hoovering from Peter. The last time this happened was the previous Christmas. I'm currently endeavouring to distance from him once again after (surprise, surprise) the mask slipped.

I find it ironic that being in an unhappy relationship (we never married) with Peter whilst being woefully miserable was more acceptable to society than our current set up of living apart but parenting together. There appears to be a societal view that once those final words of divorce or separation are spoken, then it's time to rip off all the sticking plasters, go your separate ways and argue in court over custody of the kids whilst blowing thousands of pounds on lawyers. 

I knew I would never do that. 

However, as many Cassandras know, we often end up having to over-parent to make up for the shortfalls and mindblindness of their fathers. We do it to keep them safe. This is why so many Cassandras stay. Society thinks it's ok to stay unhappily together/married but not ok to separate and remain in each other's lives like we have. I have never been judged so much as I have since separating this way. 

I figured out today that Peter is nicest to me when he feels he needs to make up for something. He's never nice for the sake of just being nice. He's being nice currently because I'm distancing. But I'm tired of the dance. 

Last week, we attended the birthday party of a mutual friend. We travelled together with the children and I drove us. I was reminded of the old black cloud I used to have to continuously endure when we were still together. I mentioned that I was stressed as I was trying to get myself ready for the party whilst also making dinner and he was chauffeuring the children to and from their extracurricular activities. He was immediately insulted. I later discovered that this was because he perceived his responsibilities at that time to be more stressful than mine so I had no right to state that I felt stressed. 

This led to him barely speaking to me and ignoring me to and from the party and whilst we were there, despite neither of us knowing many people. It also caused him to become hugely insulted when I informed him that my friend had offered to care for our children on the day their school had to close as I had to work. He assumed I must have told her that he had refused to care for the children. This of course led to eye rolling, passive aggressive remarks and him refusing to drink his beer any faster when the children became tired and wanted to go home. 

I sat wanting to cry as I watched him overcompensate for his own misery with the strangers in the room, pretending to be fun, warm and friendly. In contrast,I felt small, belittled, on edge, nervous. Intimidated by his sulky, angry presence which only I was enduring so again, I was reminded why I no longer live with Peter.

My home is peaceful now.

Children no longer cry before school. 

Voices are quieter.

We laugh.

We listen. 

We praise. 

We engage.

Bedtimes are smooth and loving.

Meal times are less stressful (although we still have our moments).

We are happier, kinder and warmer. 

 I do still ride the Cassandra roller coaster. I ride it for my children. But one day I will get off completely, because they won't be little forever.

 I don't miss him. I don't miss wondering if he'll share a bed with me, or wondering what I've said to upset him. I don't get woken by thundering footsteps and slamming doors whenever he decides to go to bed, on edge that he might wake the children. I don't miss wondering if he still loves me. 

Peter's ego will always rule and dominate his fragile self esteem. I believe that when a person with unmanaged and untreated ASC is faced with an emotionally neglectful childhood, where praise and reward is born of only achievement, status and wealth, the perfect conditions exist for narcissism to root. He seems to swing between over helping, over compensating, being overly kind, to being passive aggressive, controlling and insidiously critical. He is complex like so many husbands of the Cassandra and this makes him dangerous.

One thing I've learned is to focus on how we feel. If we feel terrible, if we feel low and stifled, the situation probably is as bad as it feels. That's why this time, at the party, I didn't question myself for a moment. It's who he is.

These men create vacuums between us and other people as they present such a kind-hearted, sensitive soul to the rest of the world, whilst we are being mentally and emotionally abused on a daily basis by them. The false reality of the outside world and our own worlds never collide, so we become isolated and alone. We can keep calling our truth to the world, but we're rarely heard. The abuse we endure is insidious and virtually invisible. Those around us assume that we're loved and cherished by these warm and selfless men, they would never imagine the neglect we live with everyday. We may even be known as the difficult one, the complaining one, the one with all the opinions, the controlling one who makes all the decisions perhaps. 

Poor Peter. 

Sometimes separations are messy and hurtful and the financial hardship can be immense. But sometimes, you don't have to go all the way if it's not the right time either. Just having your own space, your own slices of peace can make all the difference. Life will change whether we want it to or not, we are changing and children are growing and eventually, we can leave. 

For Peter, it appears that being in an intimate relationship places an expectation on me to comply with his thoughts, his ideals, his opinions. To protect his ego at all costs and ensure that his ego is an anchor for my own behaviour. It's like being held hostage. 

That isn't a life for me. 

We have to remind ourselves that men like Peter don't love. We are mere objects. Players in their perfect lives. But once we begin to find freedom, we find ourselves. My muscles are more relaxed, my laugh is louder, I move my body more quickly, I feel less stoic somehow, my tone of voice is more varied. 

The key is staying free. 

To avoid the breadcrumbs.

And to rebuild a future which is free of them and full to the brim of love. ♥️

The Reasons your Marriage/Relationship failed.

Luckily for me, I  can now label Peter as my ex, although I still have a lot to do with him because of the children. 

Since separating, when arguments have arisen about financial, domestic or childcare issues, he's taken great joy in reminding me: "well it was YOUR decision to separate!!"

Psychologically abusive men use this line to escape all accountability for the demise of the relationship. They genuinely believe that we are unreasonable for ending our relationships and marriages with them. They pushed us to the brink, over our tolerances, made us feel worthless, devalued and unimportant. Yet we separate from them and divorce them for no reason in their minds. 

They are delusionists. 

In the early days of separating, this comment would really drag me down. It is difficult to hear that we are purely to blame for wrenching our family apart whilst he disregards all the many parts he played to make it fail. He knows it hurts me. So he plays on it. Here is a reminder of why you left him or made him leave:

1) He had a better sexual relationship with himself and with pornography than he ever had with you.

Men like Peter like to have sex with themselves whilst fantasising about airbrushed porn stars and probably women they work with. Having real sex with a real beautiful woman who they share a life with is just too honest and too real. They stick to their sexual fantasy world instead. Even if they never skulk off and have affairs (and I'm told that many do), they're always having emotional affairs, they just can't commit to you.

2) You were emotionally alone for many years. 

I often come across the meme which says that there is nothing lonlier than feeling alone when you have people physically beside you. It's very true. You were blamed for causing him unnecessary problems and challenges for daring to share your feelings with him when they did not comply with his desired easy life. You were punished with silent treatment, belittled and constantly invalidated. The person who was supposed to be the most emotionally safe in your life turned out to be emotionally dangerous. For this reason, your nervous system was tormented and you were probably developing physical ailments s a result. This sort of emotional abuse wreaks havoc on your digestive system, your joints, your skin, hormones, hair, weight. To stay would be detrimental to your health. 

3) He was disloyal.

And in so many ways. 

I remember when Peter found out that I'd been confiding in my friends about how unhappy I was, he told me angrily that I was betraying him. And when he found out I'd anonymously reached out for support and advice on an online support forum, he was livid and lectured me about disloyalty. I see it as him deflecting now. 

There is nothing more disloyal than showing more respect, more understanding, more empathy and more patience to others than he ever showed to me. He may never have complained about me outwardly to others but he behaved as if I was insignificant and beneath him. There is nothing more disloyal than allowing his mother to disrespect me all the years we were together and then blame me when I confronted it. There is nothing more disloyal than allowing his sister to troll me online and post negative comments and tell me that it's normal to be so curious (stalkerish in my opinion!). 

Everyone was doing a better job at everything than I was too. He put down my efforts and compared me to other women who were "managing to work full-time AND raise the children." I was never enough. Yet he admired everyone else. 

Peter went to the lengths of belittling me infront of our friends regularly. He enjoyed making me the butt of his jokes, flagging up my anecdotes as incorrect and putting me down infront of them. I used to wonder why others weren't picking up on his attitude towards me. Maybe they did. But he was so gushingly nice and agreeable towards them, that I think he genuinely made me look incompetent and a bit pathetic to everyone else. They enjoyed being around someone so complimentary of them, just like I did when I met him.

4) There was no room for you in his life.

I said this to Peter towards the end and I could see that it made him evaluate my reasoning. When his life is filled with special interests, hobbies, pornography, a tendency to drop everything to help a sibling or a work colleague, the strong necessity they feel for alone time, a job which depletes them and when also raising young children, they have nothing left to offer you. Peter had no time or energy for dating, for relationshipping or loving me. He used all of his energy to pursue his hobbies and to achieve at work (they care much more for how others perceive them at work than how they are at home) so I was left with only the leftovers, the remnants of his energy. There was no room for me and he didn't see why he ought to make room either. 

5) He didn't like you and you knew it.

I'm not sure they're really capable of loving us either, but they do see us as  possessions. Our men are so helpful and kind in the outside world that they barely get criticised, whilst growing up they sought so much solitude that they were always described as "easy" by their parents. 

We come along with our expectations of intimacy, connection and love, which they always fail to deliver on eventually, and we are villainised. This is the narcissistic side of their personalities. They can not take any form of criticism. They have never had to. The contempt they feel towards us as the relationship draws on over the years intensifies. They couldn't have a loving relationship with us even if they decided to try because we are so vehemently disliked for shining light on their flaws. They also learn to dislike us for being better than them at some things. Peter always hated that I was the better cook and couldn't bring himself to compliment my efforts without me highlighting the fact. 

6) He was demand avoidant. 

I've come to realise that there is another layer to Peter's condition. Not only does he not have the wiring for intimacy and love but even if he did, he wouldn't be able to give me anything I needed. Men like ours have a tendency to always do the opposite of what we need. They decide to go and mow the lawn at the most inconvenient of times, when children are needy and dinner needs making and accuse you of being ungrateful. They'll rebel against the family calendar, opting to do their own thing, even when they can clearly see that there are other commitments. You'll go to relationship counselling and agree to have a conversation once a week about your feelings and he'll come down with a migraine most weeks or suddenly need an early night when your evening comes around. He'll obsess over doing something you really don't want him to do. For Peter, it was loading the washing machine. 

Mindlessly and constantly washing clothes and leaving me with the drying and putting away despite requests for him not to keep doing this. It even got to a point where he was putting the machine on in the early hours of the morning when I'd stop him during the day time. They will always do the opposite. For this reason, an intimate relationship just isn't possible with men like ours because intimate relationships demand effort and connection. I often wonder if they were paired with someone as avoidant as they are, whether they would suddenly become more attached. But, I imagine they're more attracted to empathetic Cassandras and most of us Cassandras aren't avoidants. In supportive, loving relationships, we become securely attached too.  

7) You rarely felt enough.

Peter was a bit of a perfectionist and it was obvious to me that I was a disappointment to him. He seemed to have an idea in his mind about how I should feel and I didn't comply. I often felt like I wasn't allowed to be human. You're not supposed to dislike his overbearing, disrespectful mother; you're not supposed to have fears or anxieties which get in the way of what he wants to do; you're not supposed to have your own commitments when they interfere with his; you weren't supposed to need help with child rearing and maintaining a clean home; you weren't supposed to have dreams that he didn't have or desires he didn't desire; you weren't supposed to get ill or hurt; you weren't supposed to have tough pregnancies and you certainly weren't supposed to disagree. The fact is, that nobody will ever measure up unless they prioritise his wants and needs at all times. You are unfortunately, an inconvenience.

8) He had the emotional intelligence of a toddler.

Peter often made pathetic, passive aggressive comments about how I "probably" thought this of him and probably thought that. "You probably don't even think I did a good job do you..." comments along these lines very regularly. He was very Eeyore-like. You've wounded him by seeing his flaws, a symptom of narcissism. You'd feel guilty for sharing your sadness or upsets with him as he'd take on a victim mentality. He'd gaslight you, invalidate you, put you down, but your reaction would always be the problem. You were his favourite scapegoat.

Suggestions from our relationship counsellor for him to work on certain behaviours would result in mini protests at home where he'd declare "but I like me. I don't want to change me!" You easily feel like you have another child to care for. 

9) He bored the life out of you.

I remember looking forward to Peter and I spending quality time together when the children were very young and then when it materialised, I'd find the conversation monotonous. A counsellor once told me that you realise when your marriage is worth saving when it's in the trenches of raising young children and you still love each others company when you're alone together. I discovered that whilst I loved dressing up, the freedom of being out of the house without the children and eating a meal I didn't have to cook, I wasn't enjoying being with Peter. There was no joy. Just endless informative monologues about people I didn't know and his special interests. He was a gossip. And a bore. 

He learned early on that he wasn't very interesting to others and so he learned to gossip to engage people in conversation, but that's as deep as it gets. Some probably don't even do that!

He also used to ask lots of mundane questions that would feel like an interrogation and usually about the timings of my days and weeks. He was obsessed with times. By the end of our relationship, whenever we were due to spend time together as a couple, my IBS would always kick in. I think my body started to tell me in many physical ways that it didn't enjoy being around Peter. It's important that we listen and pay attention to those signs. 

10) Contempt breeds contempt- you learned to dislike him too. 

You eventually dislike him as much as he dislikes you because whilst love breeds love, contempt breeds contempt. You'll develop the "ick" and perhaps notice his stims and quirks more and more. The odd noises he makes along with the persistent foot tapping, loud yawning, habitual ball scratching, lack of hygiene,the way he neglects his appearance, his clothes. His funny walk. You'll crave intimacy and yet even in the throes of sexual frustration discover that you can't bring yourself to have sex with him which is always the same predictable experience anyway!

These are reminders of why you left or made him leave. He didn't have the tools to be the man he made out he was in the beginning, the man he'd like to be. But not the man he'd like to be for you, not anymore. I think we probably get to know them too well and as they don't really like themselves at the core of it all, they assume we can never love or like them either and so they push us further and further away. We were never supposed to leave though. We were supposed to embrace our maid-like presence in their lives and comply and pretend to the outside world that we are in a loving, fulfilling relationship. They are fraudsters and we are victims of emotional fraud and most of us, victims of emotional abuse. Let's keep moving forward and if we ever look back for a second, let's remember why we left in the first place.

But he's not a covert narcissist... is he?

Yes. I've come to think that yes. He probably is a covert narcissist.

Of course, neurodiverse people have their challenges, their routines and triggers, but most will show willingness to alter their behaviour if it is hurtful to others. Particularly if it's hurtful to those they care about. They don't become resentful, rageful or ill meaning just because their spouse asked them for something. Like a narcissist would. 

Expecting behaviour change and expecting someone to change their personality is not the same thing. We're not asking anyone to change who they are fundamentally, but to behave differently to cause less suffering to others. Neurodiverse people have the power to work on their behaviour and to learn respect and loyalty even if they struggle to empathise. They have choices like everyone else and the power to hurt people less. Should they wish to.

Most women in my online support group for Cassandra Syndrome are in there because they have pleaded, raged, begged and pestered for change, for help, for support for love, for any molecule of acknowledgement and support. To ignore, to deny, to blame, argue and dismiss is mean. Neurodiverse people aren't intrinsically mean... are they? But we know that Covert Narcissists are. 

I'm done with looking for the motivations for mean behaviour, done with excusing it. Done with it. If he speaks like a covert narcissist, acts like a covert narcissist, behaves like a covert narcissist, then it's time that we acknowledged that we are dealing with, marriaging with, parenting with is a dark and stealthy form of narcissist. A sneaky, sly, vindictive narcissist, who to the outside world, is a loveable, likeable fella who'll do anything for anyone. 

Let's stop denying what we already know.

We are all Cassandras of covert narcissists here. And the only way up is out.

The Ways I Felt Exploited By Him

In two months time, it will be two years since we separated. If I look back and think of an adjective to sum up the way he made me feel during the majority of our relationship, I'd choose the word "exploited."

I've already written about the huge impact that internalised mysoginy has on men like ours. They've spent their lives trying to fit in with a patriachal society, they willingly absorb all it stands for and become the epitome of patriachy themselves, feeling accepted as a respectable, upstanding male chauvinist, particularly if they are also white and of middle-class. 

Our men become easily moulded by the old fashioned, mysoginistic views of their own fathers who they place on pedestals. The very men who saw women as mere domestic appliances. Yet, they are swept along easily by a modern, economy-driven society (due to their own practical and materialistic values) which happily forces women back into work and away from their children long before it's time. Who do women think they are to think that they're exempt from contributing financially? There is no value in care work, only work of financial gain. The care work goes purposely unnoticed. She must complete such dismal, unappealing, non-valuable work on the side, quietly and invisibly.

For many of us, we're expected to do everything and to do it without complaint. We ought to work like we don't have children with a home to run and run a home and raise children like we don't work. But also, we must never expect love and affection in return- afterall, it's a wasted commodity to men like ours. It's sad for me to admit it, but I think that some love, affection and appreciation would have softened the continuous, monotonous blow of modern marriage or cohabitation. Without a bit of love glitter to cover the turd, all women like us (Cassandras) are left with is a pointless, useless turd of a relationship and piles and piles of thankless tasks. 

He exploited me in so many ways.

From my first sickly pregnancy and me not being able to work easily, him telling me, "it's the job of your employer to get as much work out of you as she can; of course she's pissed off with you." It told me everything I needed to know about him right then. I realised at that very moment that I'd always remember him telling me that. It was an insight of what was to come and I think my subconscious warned me so.

The fact that I was pregnant in the first place was the result of him "forgetting" to withdraw having previously agreed that we would use this method temporarily. Once I was pregnant, I was supposed to ignore the fact as the side effects of our unplanned, yet reckless pregnancy inconvenienced him and his life. He was however conscious of how he came across to the outside world and persuaded me to move in with him long before I was ready to:

"Let me look after you..."

"You can't be pregnant with my baby and not live with me..."

So I gave my landlord a month's notice and off I went, to live at his house where he made very little room for me and my things for months, despite my pleas. All to save his reputation as everyone's favourite helpful handyman and now family man.

My freedom was exploited after our baby was born, she seemingly belonged to his family and I was the mere vessel for birthing her. I was expected to spend my maternity leave with his mother, which I declined repeatedly through desperation rather than assertiveness. I was a nobody. My wants, needs, my wellbeing my desires were all unworthy of importance, everything that made me who I was, faded away. My sadness fell on deaf ears, it was easier for him to label me as "intolerant" than it was for him to question his own family. I was just the complaining woman he lived with now, but as far as the outside world could see, I was much more.  As soon as it was too late for me to easily leave, he seemed comfortable into trapping me into his world of selfish comfort whilst I suffered. I just needed to stop being so negative he would say. My lovely, helpful, kind Peter was delivering a nightmare.

I lost my income, my career prospects and friends whilst his life continued as normal. He exploited this by demeaning any financial decisions I wanted to make- it wasn't my money afterall. He was the earner. I was exploited by motherhood, because he allowed me to be. My vulnerabilities were always used to benefit him. 

When breastfeeding our second child, he once said "just because you can't go out without the baby, doesn't mean I can't!" This was in defence of his social life when I needed his support at home with a toddler and a baby. He gladly exploited the fact that our baby needed my body in order to survive and he capitalised on his hobbies and free time more than ever. I was his childcare because I had to be, what did it have to do with him? This is despite me and the baby relying on him to do a bottle feed each evening to give me a break during the first three months, but he'd just drop the responsibility mindlessly, he couldn't understand why he should be bound to one feed a day, even when I was bound to so many. 

We talked about marriage during my first pregnancy, he said he wanted to marry after her birth. As it turns out, it's been easier to separate whilst unmarried, but my rights as a mere cohabiting partner in Britain are dreadful. Whilst his pension has blossomed, mine has dwindled due to part-time working whilst the children were little. Had we have been married I'd have been entitled to a chunk of his pension and to more equity of the family home. He knowingly exploited my vulnerabilities yet again when I communicated my concerns for my stability and he found every excuse he could for us not to marry post children. He was however, happy to have a second child with me.

To defend his lack of engagement with mundane domestic work such as cleaning he'd say "it's more important to you than it is to me, so why should I have to do it?" Cleaning was a choice he argued- my choice. He felt the same about cooking. He would argue that he would have been happy to eat cereal for dinner, so why should he have to share the cooking? Although Peter did contribute domestically, he resented it and blamed me for him having to share these tasks and he'd quietly seethe and sulk. He was mentally disengaged, so I needed him to contribute practically, the mental strain of parenthood was all consuming for me and non-existent for him.

I was expected to push down who I was as a person; he made it clear that I was too colourful, too opinionated, too outspoken and he'd correct me in public, humiliate me and gaslight me. I think this form of exploitation hurt the most, the way he exploited the essence of who I was to bolster his own ego.

And then, I was persistently giving. 

Washing, cooking, cleaning, decluttering, form filling, worrying whilst also trying to earn a living. He valued none of it, labelling domestic work optional in his own mind. I know he felt exploited by my expectations for him to contribute to the family life which we had created together.

I wouldn't have minded as much if he'd given some love in return, but it was always withheld when I'd pointed out his shortcomings, or cried or shouted for more support. Shining a light on his misgivings never caused him to look inward, he only hated me more. 

As time went on it became clearer that he had absolutely no desire for a relationship with me at all. I was only there to make his life easier, more comfortable. A live-in housekeeper and nanny. 

Love has always been my love language: talking love, giving love, showing love, receiving love. Practical tasks in my opinion have little to do with love at all despite what the books say. I realised that if I didn't want to drown any further, I needed to begin speaking his language. So when the children were a little older, that's what I did. I used him for DIY and childcare and cooking and other practical tasks whilst mapping out a life away from him. Yoga in the evenings, womens meet-up groups, dancing at weekends, I found friendships again. I started going out more than him.

One day he said to me when I told him that I had yet another commitment and needed him to stay at home with the children: "I feel used."

It's funny how the tables turn. 

He's now living with his parents and the only thing I need from him now are his financial contributions towards the family home which the children and I have remained in. He has no domestic responsibilities anymore, reduced childcare (the children stay with him twice a week), no more living with a nag like me, his household investment taken care of by myself each day. He lives where his loyalties have always lay: with his parents. He now has everything he ever really wanted, yet it causes him discomfort, and although I know he will never realise that he caused it, I find some comfort in the knowledge that he instigated it all. 

"I'm not happy with this situation" he has said to me. And I say "really? when you got everything you really wanted in the end?"

I imagine he'll be painting himself to be the poor homeless victim now, paying for a home that he's not living in. His male friends shaking their heads at the injustices that such a nice guy like Peter has been left with. I can easily imagine them saying amongst themselves, "Poor Peter, exploited by the woman he loved."

Why he's more loyal to his family of origin than he is to you.

For a long time, I couldn't get my head around why he seemed to like his mother, father and sister more than me. He always valued his father's judgement over mine on everything, his mother could seemingly behave however she wanted to and he always deemed her right, his sister was always his favourite innocent victim. 

He'd chosen me and yet appeared to have more emotional loyalty to them. He was emotionally enmeshed with them. When his mother hurt me with her criticisms of my parenting of a newborn that I dedicated my everything to, I was always being "too sensitive" and "intolerant." He could admit that she was interferring, that she was overbearing but excused her as "meaning well."  He was absolutely more comfortable with my discomfort than he was with theirs. 

When we were dating, he once left my bed to go to his 27 year old sister in the middle of the night because she was upset about splitting from a  boyfriend a few weeks beforehand. He had been called to her by his mother who was consoling her at 3am. It was an open display of where his loyalties were expected to lie. It was a very clear message sent to me early on. I was not invited either. It was family matters. A few years later, I found Peter consoling his sister at her 30th birthday party after his mother upset her and they had both disappeared. I found them upstairs, where my presence was clearly unwanted and I was told to return to the party and that they would be down again soon. The details of the upset were never divulged to me. Family matters never were. 

Unknowingly, I blamed myself for far too long. 

I just wasn't cutting it. 

I was a troublemaker.

I really was too sensitive.

I'm pushing him away.

I'm unlovable.

I create drama.

I've disappointed him. 

Thank goodness I disappointed him. This is the main reason he was more loyal to his family of origin. I'd disappointed him for calling out bad behaviour, for being intolerant and noncompliant, for saying no, for not being more accommodating. 

Many of our men have never been challenged or criticised by their parents and so they gravitate back to them when life with us becomes tough. We are not their caregivers, we don't provide them with financial gifts or endeavour to meet their every little whim, where often their parents have done so. They deem their parents safer because they excuse him, demand nothing of him and in many ways, still povide for him. 

He was an older brother to a sister who was several years younger than him. 

He was always admired, always put on a pedestal, perhaps due to her own undiagnosed neurodiversity also. Family bonds don't change, fade or end in enmeshed families, they are all one and cult-like. Peter has always been made to feel very important by his family of origin or was left to his own devices without any expectations of him and so, when I came along with my expectations of him, he felt challenged and victimised. Naturally, he gravitated towards them more so. 

When I expressed my unhappiness to his mother with a young baby in my arms and a toddler at my side, she excused him like he excused her. "He needs his down time." I needed mine too, but my needs were not her priority or anyone's priority, certainly not his. They collaborated with each other albeit rather silently at times. They were all of one mindset, all one entity like nothing I'd seen before. A cult.

When I was encouraged by his sister to confide in her about our failing relationship, she listened only to know things. Behind my back, she was collaborating with him and creating a divide between us, pulling her brother back to her. I imagine her subconscious whispering "I have zero expectations of you, unlike her, she's unreasonable... I'll massage your ego like she never will..." 

Because he belonged to her. 

He belonged to them all. He wanted to belong to them. You can't marry when you're already married. My criticism of his negative behaviour became her ammunition in the end and he excused her anonymous online trolling of my blogs and posts and even her accusations that anonymous posts in a group were mine (they weren't). He even praised her for it, let alone defended her. I'd dared to reach out in a private group asking for help with the dysfunction which she'd been accustomed to and she found it, screenshot everything, shared it with the cult and continued being pleasant with me on the surface. Then she began attacking my personal blog anonymously. He refused to believe it was her, but was happy to believe her untruths about me. I'd spent years getting him to see that his mother's behaviour wasn't ok and we'd made progress, but getting him to see that his innocent little sister's wasn't ok came at the biggest price. 

He feels important and powerful around them and victimised when he's expected to contribute to family life or be in a loving, functional, intimate relationship when he was with me. He'd never really been expected to be a grown-up. He had particularly never been expected to make sacrifices. He'd never had to make any sacrifices at all before. It was a foreign feeling to him. 

" His life has changed enough" his mother once told me. Despite him remaining in his hometown, maintaining the same job for almost 20 years, the same friends... Whilst I'd moved towns, carried two babies and had huge body changes, developed an autoimmune disorder, lost friends, made new friends, moved away from my mother, lost my job, gained another and reduced my income significantly by working part-time and impacted my pension contributions. 

His life had changed because he suddenly had responsibilities and expectations of him which had never been placed on him before. Thats what she really meant. In his mother's eyes was a wounded victim and he often behaved that way. They gave me the feeling that they thought I'd victimised him, that I was spoiling all his fun. I guess Peter was eventually saved from me by his family of origin who he has been living with since our separation almost two years ago. 

It's odd that I always thought that the family he'd created with me, the loyalty to me which was building slowly, would prevail in the end. But it never did. Our men will always gravitate to the place and people where there is less challenge, where truths are unspoken and where there is comfort, familiarity and ease. 

I'm grateful for disappointing him these days because it means that I was loyal to myself. Thank goodness I wasn't loyal to him. It took me a long time to realise also that he disappointed me too and to value this fact.

Peter asked me recently, after he'd had a couple of glasses of wine, "have I disappointed you?" He has never once asked me a question like this before. Peter does not do vulnerability.

"Yes, most definitely." I responded without elaboration.

"I guess I have disappointed you also" was my response.

"Yes" he replied uncomfortably, without elaboration.

But I sat comfortably with this, knowing exactly what this disappointment meant for him, knowing that disappointing him was the only way I was ever going to emotionally survive. Disappointing him means that I am free. It means that I've said "no more." 

Of course, it is his family of origin who have disappointed him really. But he isn't capable of pinning that responsibility on them and I doubt ever will be. Them disabling him with their interferring and lack of expectation of him (which ultimately set me in a negative light) has given him the idea that they are kinder and good to him. 

He really is a victim the more I think about it. A victim of their control, of their enmeshment and manipulation. A prisoner of their beliefs, their mentality, their habits, their values, their family "loyalty", their excuses. It has cost him hugely. His disappointment will forever be directed to me because my morals, beliefs and values are unfamiliar and impact him. I think of all the sacrifices and life changes I made to be with him, the requests for love and affection, the desire for a fulfilling family life-- which ultimately is what has disappointed him. I realise that his disappointment in me is rooted in him feeling pulled away from his family of origin, away from his old life and away from all that is familiar. I offered so much. And it is that which disappoints him. 

And so he gravitates back to his family of origin, relieved. 

When Comparison Steals Your Joy

It's not just our men who steal our joy, but thanks to the kind of lives they force us into, so does our tendency to compare ourselves to other couples and other families.

"Comparison is the thief of joy!" I hear from the wings.

"We're all different, you can't compare!"

"Everyone has their struggles!"

But most Cassandras know that our other couple friends aren't experiencing the same kind of intricate, emotionally abusive troubles that we are. 

I'm currently on holiday with Peter and our children. Still, we are holidaying together to minimise the impact of his recklessness and thoughtlessness on our children. If I didn't holiday with him, he would holiday with the children without me because he deems it his right to, even if he wouldn't enjoy himself.  Everything comes down to rights with Peter. Even after separating, I'm still having to sacrifice parts of myself and my own wellbeing and needs to keep the children safe. Additionally, I believe that it's important to maintain some level of travel and life outside of the daily drudge of day to day living. I want to show the children other places and worlds and I need to experience them too. There are negatives to whatever solution I throw at the situation, so I choose my negatives carefully. 

But, I am starting to wonder if my foolish resilience is beginning to weaken. I don't like Peter as a person anymore. Peter is not my friend. Peter's lack of motivation to do anything at all which didn't benefit him personally wrecked our little family. I put the children to bed in the evenings and I'm left with him, beer in hand, no conscience, no care in the world acting completely normal. Can I keep doing this to myself? 

I am struggling hugely during this break.

Friends of ours are also holidaying nearby, a family we have holidayed here with in the past. They have taken extended family away with them too and are renting a lovely big house overlooking a quiet beach with stunning sea views and a private swimming pool. It was suggested that we meet up by the mother of the children in the family, but I can't face it. 

We are around a mile away from them in a small, pokey cottage that is a little tired, with no views due to having to leave our booking until the very last minute as I never know what the situation will be like with Peter to book in advance. I never know if we can endure another holiday together until the time is almost upon us. I envy them also taking their extended family away with them. They will be able to enjoy evening meals as a couple as they have family to watch the children. Peter and I never got to experience this due to the overwhelming, critical and interferring nature of his parents, particularly his mother. Peter, in retaliation wouldn't entertain bringing my mother away with us either because he deemed it "unfair." Like a toddler might. Our holidays have always been the four of us which has been isolating, something I think Peter enjoys.

What I find so difficult is that I've looked at this cluster of cottages that our friends are renting so many times before, longing to book the smaller one. But it's always gone by the time it gets close enough for me to accept that I can just about withstand holidaying with Peter for another year. 

But I lie here in the small bathtub of the pokey cottage that we're in with paint peeling off the battered tiles, wondering if I could tolerate this better if the destination was a little more luxurious and larger. A bigger space to get away from Peter more. Maybe I should book in advance afterall?

I cry for the life I never had with Peter, the one I see our old friends living now. I am green with envy and heavy with sadness.  Intimate suppers overlooking the harbour whilst their parents lovingly put their children to bed, the matching dry robes and matching kayaks that they own (Peter would never entertain partaking in any activities that I enjoyed), the swims at dusk in their private pool and family days out with extended family, having other adults to soak up the noise of hyperactive, tired children.

I know that no family life is a fairytale but I am tired of "making the best of a bad situation." If I hear this advice one more time, I genuinely might scream. I find myself thinking, why can't I have the best for once? Instead of making the best of the shit I have. I'm lonely here. 

Holidaying without any emotional connection and no love or friendship is tiresome in the throes of parenting young children. Is it time to let go? Time to accept that Peter will always be their father and that the risks are now out of my control? Save myself from the slavery of family holidays? Perhaps one day enjoyable family holidays will be in my reach once again, with a loving person who I deserve to share them with. But I guess I need to let go first...

The Dangers of Relationshipping with an Emotionally Unavailable Man.

Emotionally, our men are very different. I am referring to men who make Cassandras of their wives and intimate partners, regardless of the cause. 

We've all heard of abusive relationships. Emotional and mental abuse is making it's way to the forefront of what we now know about abusive relationships. We talk about it, we no longer make excuses for it. Verbal abuse is as bad as violence. But what about when the emotional turmoil is invisible? When the suffering is caused not by anything they do particularly, but what they don't do? It might be easy to blame our expectations, to gaslight it all away. But this type of (sometimes) unintentional, intimate abuse rocks us to the core. We're uprooted and we're disoriented by inner upheaval caused by the uncertainty of our outer worlds. 

I'm going to compare the way an emotionally healthy man may respond to elements of an intimate relationship, compared to the way many of our men appear to respond, to try and shed a bit of light on the darkness that they douse us in. 

Firstly, one of the elements of healthy intimate relationships which was missing in my relationship with an emotionally unavailable man was eye contact. You know when you're in company and someone makes a joke that totally resonates with the two of you and you look over at your other half and share an intimate glance? Well, that never happens. I realised just how greatly this was missing from my relationship with my ex on watching a video we made together during covid for our child's birthday. I'd written a funny poem about her birth and kept looking at Peter who stood next to me at the odd punch line, but he stood, stoney faced, awkwardly staring towards the camera fixatedly instead. In the video, I look like I'm desperately reaching to him to emotional connection with my eye contact, whilst he looks like he's doing everything he can to avoid it. It's uncomfortable viewing.

I've seen the way my friends husbands look at them when were all together, the way they look back. Miniscule intimate moments which create connections and links. These do not exist in our relationships.

Secondly, when we point out an element of themselves which they don't like? We suffer for pointing it out. They don't have the objectivity to step back and think, "that triggered me, what could I do differently?" Instead, they turn on us for daring to shed light on their shadows. The suffering isn't always direct either. It's often silent sulking, demand avoidance or ruining special occasions. We often don't get to actually learn what it is we've done to upset them, but boy do we know about it when we have. 

Thirdly, if we raise an issue that we're upset by, it will always be our fault for raising the issue. We can never win. The only behaviour they accept from us is tolerance, silence and blind compliance. We were never meant to complain, or have needs. We either suffer in silence or suffer for not being silent. 

Fourthly, they'll be jealous of us. We excel at work or receive a compliment? They'll hate it. Have a birthday? Don't expect to be celebrated. They may pretend to be pleased for us, but they won't be. We are competition. They feel us inching away from them if we become more successful or happier than them, and their disapproval emanates through their negative energy. 

And don't expect anniversaries to be noticed or celebrated. Anniversaries don't exist along with any other special occasions which mark any relationship milestones. They will feel discomfort when it comes to reminiscing about your historical romance, they'll make out you're overly sensitive for wanting to mark your time together and love with any form of celebration. 

Also, It's quite normal to make plans for the future together. But don't expect that from an emotionally unavailable man. They have no intention of committing any future plans or time to you, it may happen, but not through any conscious effort of theirs. They will not contribute to intimate discussions for the future, they will shut down. They wouldn't dream of making themselves vulnerable enough to share any of their future goals or agendas with you. They are one entity. They'll be maddened by these discussions and irritable. They don't appreciate being pinned down. You'll be talking to a wall which repeatedly responds with "ok" and "I don't know." You'll never know where you stand or what they want and that is how it's supposed to be. 

Then, you'll offend them over and over again but you'll never understand why. They are governed by deep inner beliefs, left by the deepest of wounds. If your values don't align with theirs, they'll be insulted and you will be punished, indirectly, subtly, insidiously. Sometimes,they may even push you to the limits of your tolerance levels as your needs wishes and boundaries are repeatedly ignored and broken down by them through silent revenge. 

And then, you'll be treated as an appliance. There to support and facilitate their lives. Their job will always be more important than yours, their time, their career. And you'll lose out on your own time, your own career because you're expected to slot in with childcare whenever a sudden demand is placed on them and they expect you to already know about it or to jump at short notice and set your own professional needs aside. You are their appliance to provide all necessary child and house work. Your uses are practical.

Sadly, they'll never miss you.

They aren't capable of it.

You'll feel out of mind when they're away from you as communication will be sparse. And that is exactly what you will be- far from their mind. They won't tell you they love you or miss you as they can only focus on what is right infront of them. The text messages of love and bonding that you might expect through periods of absence just won't exist in a relationship with an emotionally unavailable man. 

They'll gaslight you.

Emotion just doesn't exist in their world so how could it possibly exist in yours? They'll accuse you of imagining things, of being too sensitive, hysterical, crazy, turbulent. 

He might love his mother more.

Most of us grow out of the FOG if it ever existed throughout childhood and adolescence (fear, obligation and guilt) as we mature and find our own views of the world and begin to honour our own needs. Emotionally unavailable men often don't adapt and reprioritise as they begin families of their own. His mother will always be the woman he needs to please the most. They never feel new love deep enough to cut those binds with her and so she remains his number one, his priority because she is the deepest emotional connection he's ever had. 

Emotionally unavailable men are silent, non-proactive, dismissive and dangerous. It's incredible how doing very little, how omitting love, avoiding connection and belittling your needs can cause so much destruction, but it really does. 

Some men weren't made for love.

If he's not emotionally available, he isn't available for any form of intimate relationship... so if you can, run for the hills. And if you can't, you must detach.

Making Space

Meeting someone new is going to be difficult unless I make space for him. Up until now, I've been healing and the last thing I've needed is a rebound relationship, but now I'm ready. 

A poster in the Cassandra Group pointed out to me in similar wording that some of our men only respect other men, who they often feel intimated by. They unfortunately do not respect women. That dating someone else may be the initiation he needs to finally respect my boundaries. I can't help thinking that she's on to something, but I know that meeting someone else for this purpose only wouldn't be at all healthy either. However, as I begin to wrench open the gap between us, I can't help feeling the need for protection from another male. 

He isn't taking it well. 

No he doesn't shout and scream, but he does play games and the passive aggression in his messages regarding the children has ramped up enormously in recent weeks. He has taken to openly mocking much of what I say and challenges my requests for notice regarding changes to the childrens' routine with attacks about other things which he argues is no different. It makes me realise that I've allowed him to cross my boundaries so much since we separated, in some ways, to protect myself from his emotional cruelty when I don't behave the way he likes or dare to question him.

To make space for someone new, I am having to go longer without seeing our children, which is anxiety inducing, leaving them in his care for longer periods, as "care" isn't something which comes naturally to him. I have asked for more calls with the children as a result and I'm met with responses like "if there's time."

Yet, if he children were ill or needed him, he still has access to our home, which I do not have where he lives as I am not welcome there by his mother.

Even occasions where I have sought to collect the children or drop the children off directly at his parents' house I've been directly accused of "making things difficult." The irony. Having the children in a space where I am not welcome to deliver them to or collect them from, let alone visit, is extremely hard, and he has the audacity to call me difficult. He is governed by inner most beliefs that to the outer world, make little sense. That's because these beliefs are routed in his parents wants and needs and rules and anxieties, but he is blind to it. 

I will go 36 hours without seeing my children twice a week from now on, knowing that they are likely going to have illnesses ignored, emotional needs neglected, that any schooling needs which fall out of his usual routine will be cast aside and that if it's a hot day, he will not apply suncream or provide extra water. Their diets will consist of processed packet food during their time with him and they will not be encouraged to eat any fruits or vegetables at all. They will go to bed late and wake up tired and I'll pay for it all during my own time with them. 

It's a hefty price for myself and my children to pay, but it's time to make space for change and for love. 

Last night was the beginning of one of the first 36 hours away from them and I ashamedly drank gin and tonic and ate airfryer chips until late. This is what I worried about. That during the time away from them I'd engage in negative behaviour myself as a means of coping. Hopefully, next time, I'll use my gym membership instead and try to use my time positively. But I don't know. 

The space makes me anxious.

Yet, I can't help feeling that this space is much needed now if I'm going to move forward in my life and find someone worthy to finally share it with. The challenge of course, is getting used to sitting with the space initially. Space where I should be near my children, space which he never deserved to fill. 

Going Back In Time

Recently, I've been struggling with low mood. At first I blamed the cold and dreary British weather and the slow start to summer, then I wondered if my vitamin levels were in check and even questioned if I was beginning peri-menopause early. Maybe it's the weight of responsibility: a child with additional needs, an energetic dog, a job to work, a house to run single-handedly.

I've filled my life with so much since he left: book clubs, yoga, meditation, dog walks, nature walks, friends, dancing, music- all the things that make me feel good. Yet, I still haven't felt good and have been too afraid to stop going.

I told my counsellor last week that stopping and slowing down worries me, yet I am exhausted. I don't want to sit in the silence and I'm petrified of returning to the lonely little girl hiding away in her bedroom that I once was. I realised that I am never giving myself the opportunity to sit and take in my surroundings because this isn't the life I'd planned or imagined. A single mum in a large house that I can't afford which is ageing around me and crying out for improvements. All the designs we had planned for our home are out of my financial reach now. It's a shell. A graveyard of dreams that will never be. Family holidays we'll never go on, family togetherness, love and happiness which will never be felt. Ideas of romance, gone.

My counsellor told me that if I don't stop, my body will make me stop. So over the last two weeks I have stopped a little. 

Yesterday, I decided to go back in time. I don't know what I was looking for really, answers maybe about what life had been in the beginning with Peter. 

I drove to our first home together, which had always been his home and never mine because it belonged to him first. I parked near the rear of the house and I could see the driveway and the window of the back bedroom which used to be our eldest child's room. 

The house always felt claustrophobic and oppressive. The windows were small, the house long and narrow, nestled between two other houses on a narrow country lane. 

The memories of that house and the feelings which surfaced made me sad, as I realised I'd never ever been happy there. There was no joy looking up at my child's old bedroom window, just an ache for the lonely woman that I was in that house. Any happiness was always prompted by my hopes for us for the future. I always thought that our future would be better, happier, closer, more intimate somehow. Then I considered that I'd spent the entirety of our relationship in a state of perpetual hope. This was a bit of a revelation. Always thinking that the best was yet to come, but the best had actually been and gone. The best was at the very beginning, when I was unsure of him still and so he showered me with a short-term fixation which felt like love. 

It occurred to me that I can't lose what I have never had in the first place. So what do I grieve?

The house backs on to fields and so I took my dog and retraced my past footsteps over the paths and around the wooden fences which brandish the greenery. The walk took me, mentally, back to my old self, ten years ago, post-birth and suffering post natal depression. How lonely those walks used to feel, how isolated I used to feel; no friends or family close by, just these empty walks over empty spaces with no company. I remember feeling so heavy when I lived there, the pram felt so heavy, the weight of motherhood and the strain of his overbearing family, but I also remember Peter seeming much happier there somehow. I think he loved his life in that house before I arrived; it was his sanctuary, his hideaway on a small country lane, surrounded by fields. 

I think he might have loved it.

Further down the paths, I used to walk past a small cluster of houses on another lane, owned by a housing association which helps find homes for low income families. I remember at the time, thinking that I could apply to move into one of those homes and be free of him and his family. But the prospect of more loneliness a little further down the road from him never appealed to me and so I stayed in the narrow townhouse with him until I managed to convince him to move to the family home I live in now. 

My current home was the house of hope that I used to envision on my walks around those misty fields, a home surrounded by friends, close to my childrens school, near to the local shops. Community and support. This house where there are bigger windows, more light, more space and room to breathe. We had so many plans for it. But he never moved in with us. Not really. His mind was still closed and narrow, isolated and sheltered, so in the home I chose for our family, I outgrew him as I made friends, found new walks and became part of a community. He remained in his own narrow, dark space. 

I've come away from my trip back in time knowing that I am not grieving for anything that we've ever had, but for the hopes which never bloomed. It pains me that they very almost did bloom. We got so close. But in the end, he was never the man I wanted or needed, not even in the beginning, where it all began. I was still hoping back then.

I realise that I have always been on my own, just as much as I am on my own now. I haven't really been in a relationship since being in my early twenties. What I've been in over these last 12 years is a dangerous bubble of hope with a practical companion, a financial provider and an emotional oppressor. He has been unrelatable most of the time. 

However, I find myself thankful that I stayed and didn't move into one of the charity houses on my own with our first child ten years ago. I'm glad that I found my house- our family home. But I feel guilty too. Peter has lost both homes and lives with his parents once again. I know he resents me for that. I think if Peter went back in time for a few hours, I think he'd wish we were still living there in that house. Isolated. 

I felt sad for him on my walk near our old home and I cried for his losses, I'm not sure why I felt that so deeply. The seemingly lovely, lonely man that he was back then, should perhaps have been left alone all along. He has given me the two most precious gifts I'll ever have in my life, so I'm confused by feelings of gratitude and of loss towards him too. 

It's hard to grieve for something that you never really had, but atleast now my future is in my hands. Him leaving has given me real hope for a real love and a real relationship one day. It's actually been a very long time that I've been alone, I was perhaps more lonely in our old life than I am in this one, without him around as much. I grieve for what I thought our lives had been and would be. I grieve for not being loved and for having the love I freely gave rejected over and over again. Mostly though, I grieve for the lonely young woman with the pram who never realised that she was already grieving.

And I can't help but think to myself, it would be nice to be loved at last.

The High-Low Functioning Roller Coaster

I was recently reading an article which explained why experts in the field of autism are moving away from the term "high functioning autism" to describe autists who are able to achieve excellently academically and in other areas like arts and music. 

It explained that many autistic people have high functioning and low functioning days dependent on any triggers, stresses, biological changes etc that may have impacted them.

This has been quite impactful for me to consider as I always felt like I was going stir crazy when Peter's personality would completely change when he was on annual leave from work. The difference was so astounding that when I first noticed this in the early months of dating Peter, I thought that he was going on and off me. I'd often wonder what I might have done to upset him, then he'd be off work again a few weeks later and we'd be loved up again. However, as it turned out, Peter could not actually function in an intimate relationship and go to work at the same time. Too much demand. Emotional overload.

I am finding this in other areas of our lives too: he can't go to work and make parental decisions; he can't go to work and empathise with our child's emotional needs in school; he can't go to work and make plans for the future; he can't go to work and keep track of any family events at all.

When Peter is working he forcefully functions all day and he returns home a shell of himself. He sits in the quiet, scrolling mindlessly through his phone. He does not want to speak, he does not want to cook, he can't read, he can't have sex, he can just about exist. He returns home and stares a lot, his body is sluggish, he can not hold a conversation, he will keep falling asleep for a few minutes at a time as he sits with the children. At meal times, he eats and stares whilst his family connect all around him. He will eat dry foods mindlessly like crisps and crackers late into the evening, not realising how much he's eaten. He is completely unaware. He often can't remember his journey home from work.

Contrastingly, when he is not working, Peter is full of lively energy. He can not sit still. He has ideas of places to go and things to do. He has packed a family picnic before everyone else is dressed. He's impulsive. He wants to plan.  Of course, he ignores vital, important details and his time management is still crazy, yet he functions. He listens to our daughter's problems although still prioritises solutions over empathy, he chats at the dinner table, he cooks. He's a different person in the same skin.

It made me ask myself, could I actually consider Peter to be high functioning after a hard day's work? Absolutely not. He is a zombie.

Peter and I no longer live together of course, but the article made me reflect on the times of low functioning and on my own self doubts at what I was seeing and experiencing with him. 

 From the reliable, dependable, chatty, friendly personality that I'd come to know, that his work colleagues know, who was this vacant man who used to sit at the dinner table with us at the end of each day? I know now that he was functioning on his basic settings because he was depleted and burnt out. 

So many Cassandras are confused by the cognitive dissonance of their partners, unable to fathom how they can switch between two distinct personas. It's another layer to the cassandra syndrome- feeling like we're seeing and imagining things. But, we're not. 

Peter used to describe me as an emotional roller coaster and he was right, I was. But I now find myself wondering if this was a side effect of his roller coaster- as I had to sit next to him in his carriage day after day, functioning at his best one minute, to barely functioning at all, up and down, around and around. Yet, he was too mind-blind to even notice. And as often our men don't look inward, they only see that we are to blame. 

It's sad that he can not recognise his own limitations, get the support that he so clearly needs to enable him to be a better partner and parent. Autism isn't to blame for that, pride and ignorance is. I'd like to think that one day, he'll look back and wish he'd have committed to helping himself, but I'm not sure that he'll ever truly remember how much he needed help in the first place. 

Will I Ever Be Free?

Having two children with a man like Peter makes life difficult. He is emotionally detached, highly dysfunctional, neglectful, disinterested and yet possessive of all of us. 

We belong to him.

I've had to implement some harder boundaries over the last two weeks following a sharp decline in my mental health. Having his practical support which is so useful when I have no family support, comes at a price. I've had to explain to Peter that it is not ok for him to climb into my bed to watch the football after he's come to the house to put the children to bed, that he can't just stay over in the spare room when the feeling takes him and not inform me. 

It's been soul destroying to have to explain all of this to him because when you're separated, surely it's obvious? But they don't see or understand humane boundaries unless it's in black and white. 

I've driven myself crazy wondering if it's asking too much for him to continue walking our family dog a couple of times a week. Do I need to be more black and white? Should I pay someone, can I afford to? Because already, I'm paying for domestic help so that I can work and become financially independent of Peter eventually. 

Mostly, after 18 months, I long to feel loved and wanted. I am at a point in my life where I would like to find love again or even just date, but how do I do so when Peter is still so prevalent in my own life? How do I let go fully of the children when in his care? Will another man actually understand why we still holiday all together? When will it be safe for me to entrust Peter with care of the children on holidays? Will I ever? 

If I meet a man who accepts our co-parenting situation will it be because he's actually incapable of deep commitment and so I'll end up eventually with another Peter?

So many questions. 

So many worries and uncertainties.

Every time I've explored my values "freedom" is always my number 1. Freedom of expression, the freedrom to be me, the freedom to enjoy my life. I'm not free to enjoy my life whilst Peter plays such a major part in it and I don't see how he will stop playing a major part until the children are older. Then I foresee myself having to undo the consequences of his reactive parenting and his control over our lives. 

I am trapped.

So many women are. Because we prioritise the health, safety and well-being of our children above all else and so we live half lives until our time comes, hoping and praying that we'll make it to then. 

The Inquisitions

As many of our men are not engaged fully in the dynamics and workings of family life, they also rely on us as fountains of information which they will endeavour to suck from us whenever the feeling suddenly takes them.

They also seem to think that by asking us streams of questions, they are showing to be "taking an interest" and then, when we complain about the onslaught of questions, we're told defeatedly "I can't win."

This morning, I was running late, having been awake with a poorly child for much of the night and we overslept. He arrived to walk the dog (we still live separately thankfully) and he decided to help me pack the children's school bags. I was rushing around and trying to think all at the same time, which is tough as I seem to be the only adult who appears to really know what's going on. 

Perhaps, out of his own guilt, I was met by:

"How did you sleep?"

"How did she sleep?"

"What was her temperature during the night?"

"Are you sending her to school?"

"What is her temperature now?"

"What time are you working until today?" 

All of these things, he would know if he was engaged with family life in the first place. Maybe if he hadn't have had to move out of the family home because his loyalties and priorities remained with his family of origin rather than with us. Although, recollections tell me that he was never really very mentally and emotionally engaged before he left and even less so now. I'm already mentally exhausted as a result and so having to explain all of this to him on top of doing all the things is yet another chore.

I remember as a child, my mother becoming frustrated at my Dad's onslaught of mundane questions. One after the other in a monotone voice, him cornering her with his eyes as he demanded immediate responses. I remember her anxiety, her looking away from him trying not to catch his eyes as he worked to pin her down. It was his way of taking charge: his tone, his defiance, the grilling he was giving her all a rouse to cover up that actually, he didn't have a clue what was going on. She was managing everything whilst he ironically tried to assert his authority over her with his endless interrogations. 

Peter's questioning makes me whince. 

He's not aggressive like my father was, but he's there, extracting all of this information from me because he can't engage in the first place. And by the time I've finished answering his verbal questionnaire, I just know that I'll be met with an opinion or judgement, a demeaning sentence to demonstrate that he would have responded to or dealt with something differently- better. And I'll tense up because he doesn't have the right to judge, complain or criticise when he's so far removed from family life in the first place. And when I'm tired, I might snap at him and he'll wonder why I'm so horrible to him.

I find myself wishing that he is either involved or he isn't and thinking about how much I'd prefer him not to expect me to educate him on the ins and outs of our lives, because there's always a hope that he'll be interested, that he'll suddenly engage and care, but he doesn't. He takes his information, gives an opinion and makes his mental exit again, taking a bit of my hope with him every time. 

Beans On Toast Men

In England, we have a staple meal that is baked beans, out of a tin, on toast. Sometimes we might spruce it up with a bit of grated cheese, some barbeque sauce perhaps, or even a bit of bacon. It's a pretty bland meal, yet it's a dependable one. It offers the basics of what the body needs to survive: protein, carbohydrate, a little fat from the butter, fibre, a few vitamins and minerals, but you couldn't live on it because the body would likely be lacking in calcium (if you left out the cheese), vitamin B12, omega 3, potentially iron too amongst other nutrients. 

One evening a week, I make beans on toast for dinner. It's one of my favourite meals of the week because it' easy: it takes little time, little prep and leaves few dishes to wash up afterwards. But I wouldn't want beans on toast every night. 

Emotionally unavailable men are often beans on toast. They offer the very basics of a relationship, the nutrients that we require purely for survival, yet for most of us, the body and our minds can not thrive on beans on toast. 

There will be women out there who prefer only beans on toast, who shy away from anything spicy, adventurous, sweet or rich. Many of us are not these women. 

Unfortunately, we were served fillet steak with all the trimmings at the beginning of our relationships which has created confusion and dependency, only to be fed toast and baked beans once we committed to our men. Then they accuse us of having high expectations, of expecting too much. The irony of course is that we would have been quite satisfied with something less luxurious in the first place, like lasagne or perhaps thai curry. 

Nobody can be lasagne and thai curry everyday, we all need a baked beans on toast meal once in a while and we would of course have accepted this. Steak with all the trimmings would have been perfectly acceptable for special occasions only, but even on these occasions, we are now served the same old bland meal of beans on toast. So we are left craving more nourishment, because in the long term, baked beans and bread just isn't enough for our bodies to thrive. 

We continue adding our own pepper, frying off a bit of bacon now and then, sprinkling the same meal with cheese, in a bid to provide ourselves with the nourishment that we deserve. Yet when you strip it all back, the meal is essentially the same: baked beans on toast. 

And our men all say the same things:

"But I've always been beans on toast!"

"I like beans on toast!"

"You once liked beans on toast!" 

And they can not fathom that we have had more beans on toast than we can stomach. So now and then, when we turn our noses at beans on toast for long enough, they give us something fancier: spaghetti bolognese or maybe spicy paella. Our bodies devour the nutrients that we have so missed and plates empty, we hungrily return for more the following day and the meal we are given? 

Yes, beans on toast. 

Eventually, many of us become intolerant to baked beans on toast. We begin making our own meals from scratch, adding our own spice and nourishment in a bid to stay healthy and alive. We find ways and means of colouring our lives in other ways, whilst they continue to sit with their baked beans, wondering why they aren't being served fillet steak. So in our healing, we begin to keep the best ingredients for ourselves because they never appreciated them anyway. He perhaps now sees us as a selfish. 

In protest, our men may say:

"I don't have time for more than beans on toast!" 

"I'm too tired to give you anything more than baked beans." 

But together, as a team, creating lamb tagine or spaghetti bolognese isn't much extra work. Yet, he's frustrated because he can't be bothered to chop the vegetables and he doesn't see why he should have to because afterall, he quite likes beans on toast (unless you're eating something nicer of course!)

We are left wishing that we had never settled for beans on toast in the first place, perplexed as to how we accepted such a basic offering. We know that our bodies deserve more nourishment. So we have to nourish it ourselves whilst he continues to routinely load up his own toaster, as he looks over at our plates, resentfully, wondering why his meal still tastes the same as it always has. 

The winds are changing

A little over 15 months ago, Peter left our family home. We've ridden an emotional roller coaster since, from feelings of anger, resentment, guilt and sadness, to regularly returning to a state of functioning acceptance. 

Our separation has been far from conventional. There has been no line drawn in the sand, no divorce, no house sales, no holidays away from my children (yet), infact no long periods away from my children at all. I've kept Peter close in order to keep my children close because the thought of spending half their lives away from them feels wrong. It doesn't matter how many yoga classes I attend, or how many runs I go on, or how much I meet friends for dinner, it does not take away the feeling of emptiness when I return home and the children are with him and their beds at home with me are empty. 

They stay overnight with Peter at his parents' house but never for longer than one night at a time and he often brings them home to me the following morning so that I can walk them to school. But I know that this arrangement is only accepted by Peter because he gets to keep me close too, still residing in the family home which he still has access to. He gets to keep me whilst giving up on us. We are both getting what we want.

The legal system and the general patriachal world we live in will shout from above that fathers deserve 50% custody of their children. Not in our world. In our world when we leave these men, we have to leave our children part of the time, with fathers who are severely emotionally stunted, have very little danger awareness or paternal instincts and are driven only by their own self centred agendas. For me, an unconventional separation has been the only way to manage their safety and wellbeing. Also, to stop my heart breaking any more than it already has; all I ever wanted was to be a mum. A full time mum, not a part-time one. Peter is helping me practically when I need him, such as when I'm poorly, by being here with the children (I've caught flu twice since January!). He can be relied upon for all matters of domesticity, even if the outcome isn't quite as clean or organised as I'd like it to be. Practicals are his super power, so we make the most of it. 

But, something is changing. 

I no longer feel any romantic feelings towards him at all, yet six months ago, I still desired his love and affection. I have come to terms with the man he is and oddly, we have become good friends. 

I recently spoke to our financial advisor who knows our living situation and has advised me that now is the time for me to sell the family home and set up independently of Peter. I can not keep living in this home indefinitely from a financial or practical viewpoint. The house is too large and needs too much work. If I leave now, I will atleast have enough years left on my mortgage to buy a property large enough for me and the children and their needs. 

My therapist of five years, who has supported me throughout the realisation of Peter's challenges, through my own explorations of Cassandra syndrome and has been my rock throughout my separation recently spontaneously retired from her job after a turn in her health. To say this has been destabilising may be an understatement as my biggest emotional support has gone. But, it has made me question if the universe is telling me that perhaps I no longer need her because I finally I have all the answers I've needed. Perhaps it is time to take some steps forward. Our final session ended with her telling me that I had absolutely done the right thing by separating from Peter, perhaps conclusions have been drawn afterall. 

Peter has been the only man I've been in a relationship with where I've not thought of him when listening to love songs. Infact, I've not listened to love songs in around ten years, shortly after starting a relationship with Peter. I've felt uncomfortable and found them cringeworthy- why is that, I ask myself? We certainly don't share an "our" song or have ever danced around the kitchen together like people who are in love might do. So, this week, I've listened to love songs and although I've cringed a little through them, I'd like to think that one day, maybe I'll melt away into the words of a love song whilst in the arms of someone I love and maybe someone who loves me. 

I often wonder if I am even capable of being loved anymore? This relationship has made me harder, wiser, more suspicious of men, a strong feminist who speaks out about ingrained mysoginy. Part of me thinks that any man would run for the hills before falling in love with me. Or maybe just the wrong man would. Where do you find a man that has the deepened emotional understanding that I crave? Who has the type of heart that I could fall in love with? I'm not sure. 

But, one love song I can listen to right now with warmth and comfort is "To Be Loved" by Adele. A song which reminds me that women before me have made the choices I have, in hope and love for themselves, gifting themselves with an opportunity to be loved. Something that continuing situationships with these men can never truly give us. And as Adele sings so beautifully, choosing and believing that we deserve better love does not come without immense sacrifice and huge loss. 

I have prayed and hoped and manifested until it hurts that Peter would realise his loss and make the changes needed over the last 15 months: attend therapy, get a diagnosis, help himself to help us. But no. I see a man who is lost in this world, alone, depressed and hurting and still, he does nothing. How can I ever hope that a man who neglects his own suffering so badly, will ever choose to ease mine? 

So, I'm open to the changes that are taking place around me now, I will allow my life to evolve and grow away from him. I'll put my all into keeping my children as close as I possibly can, but I am open, open to new beginnings, a new friendship with Peter for the sake of our children and maybe one day, a new love for me. 

Misplaced Empathy

I'm writing this post after another member of the Cassandra group pointed out that our men are capable of empathy, just in all the wrong places. It gets misdirected, misunderstood, mismanaged somehow.

 It's often assumed that men like ours can not empathise, that they don't have the ability to put themselves in another's shoes or feel how another feels, but from the stories we share, this often isn't the case. By "men like ours" I mean the men who make us feel the way they do through their repeated neglect of our emotional, spiritual, mental and physical needs as intimate partners. The men who I am still reluctant to diagnose as anything specifically, as I believe that the key to Cassandra Syndrome is how they make us feel and not a definitive condition or disorder that they may or may not have. We can drive ourselves crazy trying to diagnose them, but the key to knowing what's wrong is within us and their affect on us, not in analysing their deficits. 

I remember once watching a documentary with Peter about a man who had criminal and inhumane ideations. He talked of having impulses beyond his own comprehension and disclosed that he had never acted upon them, but wanted professional help in dealing with his thoughts. The impulses he experienced were unnerving to hear, but Peter felt sorry for him- "He can't help it." What sort of person has sympathy for someone with a sadistical, warped mind? I don't think it was empathy, but definitely sympathy and a vibe of... it's not his fault. 

Peter can feel an element of empathy but in all the wrong ways. He feels it for those with no self discipline, those who omit responsibility and accountability, those who get swept along mindlessly in risky behaviours. One of this favourite phrases that he uses for lazy or arsehole behaviour is "he/she can't help it." Contrary to popular belief about our men, Peter is absolutely capable of empathy. He however can not feel it for those who are strong enough to speak out about injustice, or take control of their lives, only for those who "accidentally" get swept up in the wrong-doing. 

He felt empathy for his family of origin when I challenged them about their negative behaviour towards myself and our child.  But he never felt any empathy for me because I had the strength to challenge it. Empathy for our child was limited, because she'd had the audacity to be a child and to challenge his family in ways that children sometimes mildly challenge adults. She had broken the family rules which still limit him and keep him bound, tied and silent to this day. But our child is also my child and she doesn't live by those same rules thankfully. He does not question his own beliefs which means that he is caught up in a habitual, childhood pattern of feeling sorry for those he's been trained to be loyal to.

These men make great misogynists and not through conscious choice but because they make fantastic victims of social conditioning. Peter feels sorry for men when feminists speak out about gender inequality- men mindlessly going about their businees without a thought for gender equality have done nothing wrong in Peter's mind. He once even told me that feminists complaining about patriarchal behaviour exhibited by men are sexist man haters.  An interesting take on things. He also calls himself a feminist. 

His empathy naturally flows to the accidental perpetrators and away from those who speak up about them. It's ok to do wrong, provided it's done in ignorance or mindlessness or omission. 

He is protective of objects over people also, as if it might hurt too much to care for what is really important. I believe that the feelings of love and protection are so strong for him that he almost can't deal with it and so shuts them away and misdirects his feelings instead towards items like phones, keys and purses. Similarly to empathy, love, care and protectiveness manifests in all the wrong places. 

I often find myself wondering if they make Cassandras of themselves sometimes, are they forcing down their true feelings and hiding beneath a sea of empathy which they don't fully understand or can manage? Or are they as bad as the perpetrators they empathise with? Are their minds perhaps as warped as we fear they could be? Perhaps truth and good are threats to their impulses and ruthless absorptions and so they can never empathise with what is real and right. Maybe their empathy lingers in shadows, meant for the ones who get caught out because they themselves live in fear of being caught out by reality when the mask slips. I guess we'll never know unless we take a walk in their shoes and no matter how much empathy I can muster, his shoes just don't fit.