Forms of Abuse 44- Sexual

The next type of abuse he used quite frequently was sexual abuse. My ex was extremely concerned about sex. It was a main topic of conversation every day. It was weird because when we first started dating he didn’t want to touch me for a month, then he did, and then he stopped again for 6-8 weeks. I thought something was wrong with me, like I was too fat or not attractive enough for him. After I had asked him what was wrong he just said it had to do with him and not me. It had to do with his sobriety and I was ok with that. Then everything changed and he wanted to have sex every single day. I never really trusted him, but it was fine for a while. After he cheated on me though I lost all trust for him and the whole sexual feelings were gone. I never wanted to have sex with him and that’s when things started to change for the worse. If I didn’t want to have sex with him, he would be mean to me, ignore me, start a fight with me and start yelling, or accuse me of cheating on him or not loving him. I didn’t know at the time, but these were forms of rape through pressure. My counselor actually had to tell me that. I just thought that was how all men were. I’m glad I now realize this is another form of abuse.

Dick was sexually abusive in many ways, none of which I actually figured out until I was out of our relationship. He would talk me into sex, pressure or guilt me, he would use sex to make up/calm down, he would always make sexual comments, he used unwanted touching or grabbing in public, he engaged in dating sites and sexual affairs, and he was sexually sadistic. I explained the ways he would guilt or pressured me, but he would also talk me into it. These are other forms of abuse I learned about it my abuse group.

Like I said, sex was a normally a conversation we had every single day. He would tell me that by having sex with me that it was the only way he could feel close to me and show his real emotions. Most of the time he made me believe that was the only time he truly loved me. He also told me he was going to have sex with me on every continent. Maybe for a healthy relationship that would be normal, but for ours it was just a manipulation tactic used to make me believe we were going to travel the world. He believed he could have sex with me by taking me places. Sexual comments were very normal because like I said that was a main topic we discussed every single day. He’d talk about all the times we had sex and when I didn’t say anything back he would say, "You're just not interested in me" making me feel guilty or bad.

He was not an affection person whatsoever. He didn’t hug or cuddle, but he had absolutely no problem with having sex. Although he didn’t like hugging or holding hands, he also had no problem with slapping my butt, grabbing my boobs, or grabbing my vagina in public places. I can specifically remembering being at the gym doing an exercise and he grabbed my vagina. It was very uncomfortable because some old man watched him do it. I said, “That man just saw you do that” and he said, “I don’t care.” Normally, I would just push his hand away and say stop, and he would.

I already talked about his cheating scandals that I know of. I’m sure there were many more, but I don’t wish to know. I was told he use to go to church with a different girl while he was dating me and my brother one time told me that he saw him with another girl in the front seat of his car turning by Kwik Trip in my town. I was also told that multiple women would show up at his sons basketball practices because Dick was the coach. I am not aware if a sexual affair was happening or not though, nor do I care to know at this point.

In the past before I started dating Dick I had joined a few dating sites, Bumble and Tinder. I never met up with anyone off of them as that always gave me anxiety and I thought it was weird. Before I met Dick I deleted the apps off my phone. One day Larry had texted me saying, “Why are you on Bumble?” I responded, “I’m not. I have a boyfriend.” I told Dick that Larry had texted me asking that. I shortly figured out that I was still on it because I never deactivated the app, just deleted it. Shortly after that situation my friend texted me asking me why Dick was on the dating site Bumble. I said, “He isn’t.” I was wrong, she sent me his profile with his pictures and information. When I confronted him he said it was because he had to make sure I wasn’t on it and that he had no idea what it was. I later found out that one time when we were fighting he told his ex-wife that “he was hungry and needed someone to cook for him and all he had now was Bumble to find a new girlfriend.” I’m not sure if he actually met up with anyone from the site, but he was on it.

When I confronted him why he would ask his ex-wife to cook for him and use Bumble, he said, “I thought I was texting my mom and Bumble was just a joke.” Ha-Ha, so funny! I didn’t even know this was a form of abuse, but since going to counseling and support groups I have found out a lot. My abuser would also tell me quite frequently that “a lot of the clients that I coached are addicted to porn, but that was never an issue I had.” I’m not sure if he was being honest or not. He would always accused me of cheating, but he was actually accusing me of things he was doing. I never cheated on anyone in my life, so it would make sense if this was the case for the porn addiction too.

Lastly, I feel he was very sadistic about sex. It was very common for him to pull my hair and grab my throat and not like normal sex behavior. It got to the point that I would actually have to remove his hand from my throat and my head. I can remember one time thinking, “Holy shit, he’s going to fuckin kill me.” He was very aggressive to where I thought multiple times, “He’s going to break my neck.” His eyes were also not normal. He would look at me like he was looking right through me or as if I wasn’t even there. It was the same look he got when he was really angry. It was not normal. When he would get really angry and I would want him to calm down, he would tell me that he doesn’t work like that. He would then proceed to tell me if I really wanted him to calm down that the only thing that could do it would be have sex with him. I feel that is also very sadistic and not normal or healthy.

This is definitely something that has taken me a very long time to talk about. It is extremely uncomfortable and also embarrassing. The only reason I share this is because a lot of people don’t even know these are forms of sexual abuse. I was being pressured into having sex almost every single day for about a year and a half and I had no idea that was considered rape. I also share so other people know that they are not alone and that it is not ok for someone to treat you like this.

My sweet baby Beau!