[Jess~]

Originally Posted by DanceCommander

Your boyfriend is following the typical pattern of an abusive partner. Episodes of violence, be it physical, sexual, or emotional, are followed by a period of consideration and affection. The partner may dote on you, may say sweet things, may buy you gifts; anything to look redeeming in your eyes and make you doubt the legitimacy of the abuse that happened. It's manipulation to make you stay so they can continue the cycle of abuse. You're left questioning who is the real "them" and who isn't. Your left questioning what's wrong and what's right. The whole time you are vulnerable to their attacks until the cycle is broken, whether that's by you or outside forces.

Your boyfriend choked you well beyond any "kinky" point. You did not even give consent of any form in the first place. You gave the signal to stop and he kept going. That's assault. Go to the police. Talk to a domestic violence hotline and shelter, do research, and find ways to leave safely. You're right; it's not always safest to just up and leave, contrary to what many people tell you when you tell them your partner is abusive, so you need resources to decide what steps to take in leaving him. I also wonder if, in addition to your counselors, you might talk to your parents. Parents aren't stupid. I'm sure they've suspected you're dating someone, and even if they haven't, any anger they might have will be secondary to the danger you, their daughter, are in, and to the fact that someone hurt you. They may be able to help.

Yes, it's serious, and yes, you deserve help. You also deserve to be in a healthy, supportive relationship, and I would suggest once you leave this one that maybe you take a little while to decide what that looks like for you. Generally there needs to be mutual respect, consideration for boundaries, and clear, open, and healthy communication. Fights don't need to happen, especially fights that lead to violence of some sort. You deserve better.

Originally Posted by ~Abibliophobe~

The most concerning thing is that he said "Just know that his situation wasn't your fault, but this one is. So when I do this in the future, just know it's because of something you did" He is blaming you and saying that it will happen again. He isn't trying to apologize and say how sorry he is like a number of abusers do he is letting you know that it will happen again but when it does he is not to blame.

I know he might have done some really great things for you in the past but please get away because this will continue to happen and it is likely something that will get worse. The fact that he is letting you know that this is going to happen again is also concerning because it shows, without a doubt, that he does not see anything wrong with his behavior and does not have any intention of changing. While I personally do not think an abusive person can ever really change ... I do think that if there is any chance of the abuser changing ... they have to know they have a problem and be willing to seek help. He is not going to be willing to see it as a problem and because of that he won't change.

No matter how good he has been to you in the past; the moment he put his hands on you like that was the moment that those good things stopped being important.

Thank you so much for this. After it happened I ignored his texts almost all day, so of course he got suspicious and eventually he called me. I told him I just don't know what I'm going to do, and he was terrified I was going to go to the police. So that tells me he knows it was wrong. I made a report against my rapist because I felt like it was the only power I had left against him, like the only thing I could really do to punish him for what he did. With my boyfriend, he honestly truly seems devastated that I'm "considering" breaking up with him. I dated my rapist for a short time a few months before the rape happened, and he was abusive too. But he never showed any emotion about it when I brought it up. Of course, I was a much less assertive person back then. But still, when I brought it up on the phone with this guy, he actually sounded like he was holding back tears.
I recorded parts of the phone conversation, just in case. Even though I definitely need to break up with him, I don't think I necessarily need to bring this to the police. After talking to him, I felt a little bit better.

I'm in a really complicated and scary spot right now, because as a person I have a lot of empathy and I often want to give people the benefit of the doubt. I want to know both sides of every story and above all, I want to help people when they're struggling.
And hearing my boyfriend on the phone with me, about to cry because I was about to break up with him. As terrified as I felt when I thought I was going to die, I almost felt the same amount of emotion, if not maybe a bit more, of sadness because I knew I was hurting him. And that's so scary to me, because the logical side of me, who knows what an abusive relationship looks like and the tactics that the abusers use, knows that he could just be trying to tell me everything I want to hear in order to get me back with him. But the sympathetic side of me really, really wants to believe that he realizes what he did was wrong and that he's not going to do it again.
I just don't know.

I really want to make it clear that I appreciate your advice so much, and I know that you're both right and that I need to get away from him. I just never imagined it would be this hard on me, to get away from the person who hurt me like that. I'm not trying to delegitimize what you said by any means, and I really don't want my confusion to come off that way. Just making that clear.
I still actually haven't broken up with him, to be honest. We are on a bit of a "break" now, which means we're not hanging out at all in person but still texting and talking on the phone sometimes. Sometimes he's still really fun to talk to and he still makes me laugh. But whenever I bring up what happened, he says stuff that I'd be stupid to not consider a red flag. One time he asked why I'm "bringing up old shit" and how he just wants us to get past that. He said that exactly a week after it happened. Another time he asked how many times I want to hear him say sorry, and I joked and said 1000 times. Then he said, "Well people in hell want ice water." And finally, on the phone tonight, he said he thinks I'm over it. I'm definitely not. Every time I go back to that moment where he was choking me, I can still feel how scared I was and a lot of times I'll cry just thinking about it. That tells me that I'm not "over it".
Thinking about meeting him up again is terrifying. Even though I don't really believe he'll do it again, I'm just even more scared of it happening again. Because he knows that if he ever does something along those lines again to me, we'll be done for good. So I'm afraid that if one day he can't control himself and he gets angry and hurts me again, he'll realize that I'm going to break up with him, and he'll be so upset about it that he'll just kill me then and there.
I know for a fact he doesn't have a gun, but I just keep running different scenarios through my head where he gets mad at me or tricks me into meeting him up again and then he pulls out a gun and shoots me.

I guess what I'm saying is that I'm so scared of the worst that could happen, but I'm also so lost when it comes to just ending it. I've never broken up with someone before, so I feel double lost as to how to do it.


Oh also, as some sort of "revenge", since I for some reason can't bring myself to break up with him, I have kinda been "cheating" on him. I haven't met anyone up yet, but I did go back on Tinder and have been talking to multiple people. I also have been exchanging pictures with one guy. So that makes it even worse, because I'm afraid if I do see him again and he finds out I "cheated" (idk if it really counts as cheating to be honest) he'll hurt me and maybe do worse, for sure.


I know this all sounds really stupid, because how hard can it be to just break up with someone who abused me? But I just don't know, I guess there's maybe some part of me that still wishes he could be a good boyfriend. Maybe deep down I'm really not ready to go back to feeling like I'm only good enough for sex. Even though he hurt me once, and I really have no feelings for him at all, there's still something to be said about someone actually wanting to be with me.
I don't know, I think I just really don't want to believe that all the relationships I've been in have been abusive or incredibly devastating.