Content Warning: This article details some of the abuse I suffered in the 2010s. Names have been changed because I do not believe in shaming others for the sins of the past, but the stories are true. Everyone involved has grown and realised that what happened here was really, really bad. Still, it’s really important to me that I help others recognise abusive patterns in their own relationships. At the time, I genuinely didn’t feel like I was being abused. I thought everything was fine. Oh, dear reader, it was nothing even close to fine.
As I said in my last article: You can and should skip this article if you don’t want to read about that. Nobody will be upset at you and you do not need to 100% a blog. It is absolutely okay to not read it. I would hate to hurt you, dear reader, by exposing you to things you can’t handle. The cute Dalmatian living her best life will return after today’s article!
But it’s really important for the cute Dalmatian to tell how she was mistreated before, too.
I was in a romantic relationship with someone who was, and is, a friend of mine. We will call them Jan. At the best of times, we had what I thought was an idyllic relationship. But at the worst of times, they caused me some of the deepest pain I have ever experienced.
Power Imbalances
As the dog I am inside, I tend to defer to my loved ones for a lot of things. As an example the music I listen to when I’m alone can be quite different from what I’ll put on speaker based on who I am around, so that those around me are comfortable. Growing up, I would watch what the rest of the family was watching. There were shows I wanted to see that I just didn’t, because no one else was interested. I never made a big deal about it, and I’m sure if I had used my “big girl bark” we would have watched what I wanted to. I just never felt like it was worth it.
I mention all of this because I think this made me easier to abuse. That natural deference became a load-bearing wall that our relationship was built on. I wasn’t always comfortable with what we were doing, the things we were watching, or so on… but when I would say “I’d rather do something else”, the response was typically something to the tune of “oh, you’ll like it, trust me”. And since I was already conditioned to “go with the flow”, I just did.
Certainly I should have been more direct. But I did regularly say something, and it is at the very least a sign of disrespect that Jan did not care to understand that.
There was a particular time that I remember where Jan put me in a situation that was very humiliating. Asked about it later, Jan said “I didn’t think you would actually go along with it” – to which I truthfully responded “I said I didn’t want to, and you didn’t really give me a choice”.
I really wish I could grab younger me by the collar and tell her that she does have a choice. Leave the room. Just leave. Leeeeeeeeave. But I was petrified to leave. I thought that if I left, I would be disappointing Jan and I would be punished. Or Jan would threaten to leave me again.
This is a huge red flag. If you feel you do not have agency over yourself to make your own wishes known without being yelled at or threatened to be left, this is not a healthy relationship. There is absolutely zero justification for this behaviour. There is no way to rationalise it away. Agency is one of the core rights that an abuser targets, because if you exert it, you are able to get away from their abuse. And that is obviously not what they want.
Exclusion and Exclusivity
Jan had a lot of opinions about the friends I had. Most of my friends were actually mutual friends of the both of ours. The ones that weren’t, Jan viewed with suspicion. Sometimes, Jan would even go out of their way to find out “dirt” on them so that I wouldn’t trust them.
This could be defensible as looking out for me, sure. But it happened often enough that I started to dread introducing any new friend I made to Jan, despite being in a long-term relationship with them, because I always knew a long discussion was going to come after it. And it was going to be an uncomfortable one, probably involving my new friend’s character.
Meanwhile, Jan led a private life that I couldn’t always get insight into. I have never met any of Jan’s family members, despite most of our mutual friends knowing them. A few of my friends are actually good friends with Jan’s family to this day!
There were many times Jan would go to do things without telling me, and when I would text to ask what they were up to and if they wanted to do anything with me, I’d get no response for hours. Sometimes it would be video games, and I’d try to be supportive and ask how the games were going. I rarely got anything back. Well, until Jan became a streamer for a few weeks. Then I was able to watch the same as the general public, and it was really fun!
Meanwhile, on some occasions I went to play games myself. I usually told Jan ahead of time out of courtesy, but sometimes they were in school or asleep at the time. And if Jan ended up coming back before I was done and it took me even 10 minutes to reply, they would start in with “No response? You don’t love me?”. What does it say if no reply after 10 minutes means I don’t love Jan, and yet Jan would sometimes take four hours or more to reply to me?
These are my next red flags. It is normal for a partner to have concern for your well-being if a friend is treating you poorly or seems shady or suspicious. But it is not normal for every single friend you have that they aren’t also friends with to be a topic of hot discussion. Equally, it is normal for a partner to occasionally miss a text and maybe even have the other be a little sad about it, but it is not normal to be excluded from your partner’s life while simultaneously having them be angsty when you aren’t immediate to reply.
Combine Both: Exclusivity as a Power Imbalance
There was a point where Jan wanted to have an open relationship. This was after we were already engaged and I thought we were fully monogamous. Dogs choose a single mate for life, after all. But after much convincing, and imploring by Jan that “this is the way I am”, “if you love me you’ll let me be myself”, and similar conversations… I relented, like the stupid dog I was.
Jan started dating one of our mutual friends, Charlie, and did not include me in any of their activities. Jan and Charlie played video games together that I didn’t get to. The single game I ever played together with Jan was Minecraft. And I played Minecraft with many, many friends at the time. I wanted to trade Pokémon with Jan. I wanted to try Liberty Unleashed despite GTA3 being way out of my comfort zone. I wanted to get into Jan’s Super Smash Bros parties. Never happened. So, when I was a sad little Dalmatian at Jan about feeling left out and wanting to do things as a group with them and Charlie, do you know what their suggestion was?
It may not have even been a serious one.
Their suggestion was that I should find someone else too, so I could experience the true joy and magic of polyamory for myself!
And once again, like the positively stupid dog I was, I accepted. I was still pretty good friends with my immediately-prior girlfriend, Trix. So I asked Trix if she was comfortable hanging out and dating while I was in a relationship with Jan, because Jan wanted me to experiment with being poly. Trix was fine with that and we hung out together.
When Jan awoke the next morning and I told them the news, they were livid. They called my behaviour a “severe transgression” – that phrasing is still burned into my psyche to this day. The cardinal sin, apparently, was that I didn’t tell Jan who I was going to hang out with. This, despite Jan never saying that when telling me to “experiment”, and also already knowing Trix from the Internet. I was “tentatively forgiven” but remanded to never do that again.
I never did that again. I really didn’t hang out with Trix after that and I never again attempted to experiment at being polyamorous. It already didn’t feel right. The voice in my head was screaming that I was compromising my loyalty to Jan and my own principles. But I really wanted to be accepted. And I really wanted to make Jan happy by doing what they wanted me to try.
This leads me to my next warning sign: Jan was allowed all of these things, and I was not. Being in an open relationship by itself was unfair, since I felt pressured into it and it wasn’t something I would have normally agreed to. But even when I did, I didn’t get the same freedoms Jan did – Jan didn’t tell me about Charlie until after they had already been on a date. When I tried it out at Jan’s insistence, and dated someone they knew, I was told I had done something terrible and had to plead for forgiveness.
The Actual, Clear Abuse
Any one of these behaviours should have been enough to make me leave. I was so enamoured and raptured by Jan that I was blinded to the terrible nature of their behaviour towards me, despite the repeated nature of the abuse.
One incident that sticks out to me is when I was looking for work. I was having a rough time of it. My mum had just had her disability-causing injury and was back living with me so I could help take care of her, but she was pressuring me to apply to multiple positions a day. I needed a break after multiple rejections. I foolishly decided to vent a little at Jan. Jan’s response was that my mum was “dead weight”, which offended me deeply. And then for the real kicker: Jan proceeded to intentionally misgender me, saying that somehow my desire to care for my mum through her hour of need made me a “good ol’ Southern boy”. At first I couldn’t even believe Jan said that to me, but they doubled-down, even asking when I’d start speaking with a lower drawl instead of an English accent. Jan knew I was transgender, and knew just how badly it would hurt me to call me a boy, and did it anyway.
Another was when I was discussing the fear of flying I had back then. Jan said that the fact I wasn’t able to get on a plane because of my fear made me “worthless”, both “as a mate and in general”. Again, as the dog I am inside, I derive so much of my self-worth from pleasing others and seeing that I can make a positive impact on their lives. To be directly called worthless is one of the deepest cuts you can make to me, and Jan knew that – and weaponised it. I went to my bed and cried for hours over that.
I suppose in a way, that’s one reason that for many years after my relationship with Jan ended, I struggled a lot with letting anyone in or telling anyone about me or my thoughts. I didn’t want knowledge of how I think or how I am to be weaponised against me, and it felt like that was normal. Jan did that to me, so it follows that surely everyone else will also, right?
Another vivid incident that comes to mind is when one of our friends, Merle, decided to come down from out-of-state for a visit. I was genuinely happy, until Jan started saying that they were going to “get very drunk with Merle” and “who knows what will happen next!” I was in the clothing section of a Target when I got those messages and I remember running to the fitting rooms to have a small breakdown. I began frantically texting Merle begging her to not sleep with Jan. Merle was genuinely horrified at the thought and had no idea what I was talking about. And it was Merle that called me to calm me down and assure me that nothing was going to happen.
There was also the constant ridicule of anything I liked or enjoyed. Jan’s response to my enjoying My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic was to set their XMPP avatar to a photo of a dead, bloodied Rainbow Dash (for weeks). When I was proud of paying off my car and finally having it be mine, Jan was quick to point out how “ugly” it was. I really enjoyed using a Mac, and Jan ridiculed me so thoroughly that I finally gave up and installed Linux on my Mac just so it would stop. And of course, if I ever hit a driver bug, it was “the Macintrash’s fault”, not possibly a genuine fault in the Linux kernel. Then there was my music.
I noted above that I tend to adapt the music I listen to based on who I’m around. If you’re a hip-hop head, we can go for hours with Biggie and 2Pac, Lupe Fiasco’s old mixtapes, Gunna, you name it. Into classic rock? Tell me your favourite Zeppelin or AC/DC album. (In Through the Out Door is still one of my personal favourites!) The Smashing Pumpkins. Alanis Morissette. Janet Jackson. Kaskade. Calvin Harris. Pat Benatar. Taylor Swift. Fuel. Keane. The Beatles. Fall Out Boy. If it’s music, I probably like it, and I can probably enjoy it with you.
The problem with Jan was that all music was seemingly made just to be criticised. One of my favourite bands is Taking Back Sunday, and Jan always said they were “whiny poseurs singing about alcoholism”. My 90s pop was “horrible”. Jay-Z’s Reasonable Doubt was “a caricature”. Miike Snow’s debut album was “nothing but meaningless words strung together to sound good”. I always tried so hard to find something Jan would like, but never succeeded.
One of Jan’s other friends, though, linked them to In a Tidal Wave of Mystery, the debut album by Capital Cities. And Jan really liked it! Except I linked them to a song on that exact same album the week before, and they said it had “low production value”. “I can hear the demo version of FL Studio’s limitations in the mastering of this album”. But when Mike links it to them, it’s pretty good…
I still get a little pit in my stomach when I hear Kangaroo Court (the third song on that album), because that’s the one in particular that Mike linked, and it just reminds me how I was so close to actually finding something Jan could like.
Having differences of opinion is fine and normal in a relationship. It’s healthy, even – it’s great to express yourselves as different! You don’t want to “lose yourself” in a relationship. But at the same time, constant criticism of every single thing you like? That’s not normal or healthy.
But I think the worst part isn’t the music I listened to – it was the music I made. I love singling, playing the guitar and piano, and I’ve even dabbled with drum machines and synthesisers at various times. I covered three songs for Jan over the course of our relationship. The feedback for each:
- “That’s sweet” – that was the extent of their comments before returning to a comment about Big Macs being smaller these days.
- “That is way too mopey” – about a love song that was about being there for each other.
- My personal favourite, “don’t quit your day job”. Imagine the animal that you claim to love, your “soulmate” (Jan’s word for me at the time!), actually going to the effort of making a multi-track recording of a song expressing their love for you. What kind of animal responds to that with “Don’t quit your day job”?
Is it so much to ask for support when you’re actively developing a skill and want to include your life partner in that? It wasn’t like Jan ever told me not to. They never said, “I’m not interested in your music”. But the comments after didn’t feel supportive or even caring…
So, About That Half of the Old Blog
I’ve always been a dog in furry-land. Canine. It was during my relationship with Jan that I decided to experiment with being a fox, because being a wolf didn’t feel right, and I was still in denial about being a Dalmatian. (That’s a story for another time.)
And it was during that time that Jan encouraged me to try being a cat. I was slightly uncomfortable, because it didn’t feel natural, but I tried it anyway. It wasn’t bad, but I even said at the time that I didn’t really feel comfortable as a cat and I didn’t really want to be a cat very often. I said I’d consider growing into it as an alternate mode.
That did not satisfy Jan. They would constantly force the issue, not willing to engage with me as a wolf or a fox, demanding I use cat mode. I suppose it finally stuck, and that’s how I became the cat fox. My entire online identity for the latter half of the 2010s wasn’t even mine!
I should clarify that I do like cats in general. I have cats in my household and I love them very much. Melody is my baby that I raised from a little kitten and I would protect her fiercely the same way a mum would protect any of her babies. That isn’t what is at question here.
The problem was that I was forced to be one when I said at the outset I didn’t really want to be. And it became so ingrained in me that even long after my relationship with Jan ended, I was still in the mindset that “this is who I am”, not once questioning what I actually wanted for myself.
The Culmination…
So, what happened on that cold night in December? What was my breaking point? How did it all become too much?
We had hit a rough patch a few months prior, but I thought we were on more solid footing and really growing close again. We had made plans to look at cars to purchase together. I was very happy to finally be useful to Jan (as I have experience with cars) and it was going to be so fun to try out different models and see what each of us liked and disliked about them.
I woke up that day and texted Jan to ask when they wanted to meet up. No response. I had breakfast and thought about walking down to Jan’s flat, when I finally received a text message back.
Jan had just bought a car with Ruby, one of our mutual friends.
To say I was crushed is a mild understatement. Not only did Jan look at cars without me, which would have been a bit hurtful but easily forgivable, they bought the car without me! Still, I tried to take it all in stride. I asked Jan if they were going to drive over so I could check it out. And they said they would in “a bit”.
Two hours later, I asked how the paperwork was going. I know how much there is when you buy a car. And Jan replied that the paperwork was done when they texted before; they had taken their family to a theatre in Bixby (a town 25 km away) with the car. They said after they took their family back home, they’d be by to show me the car.
Three more hours passed. I did laundry. When the dryer was done, I decided to text again to see how things were going. It does not take three hours to drive from Bixby to Tulsa, and Jan’s family lived less than two miles from my flat. The clothes were folded, and I still had no reply. Jan always hated when I used the Find My app, implying I should “trust” them more, but I’ve lived a life full of friends being in car accidents, so I am prone to worry in these sorts of situations.
Find My showed Jan in Skiatook. Skiatook is a rural town 36 km away from us, in the opposite direction from Bixby. And it didn’t show Jan in the town, either, but on one of the dirt roads north of the town itself. It’s 11:09 p.m. on a Thursday night. There is nothing in Skiatook that anyone would do at such a time, and none of our friends lived up there.
I texted Jan again and said I was concerned. Since there was no reason for Jan to be anywhere near Skiatook, and it was a new car, I feared they may have been carjacked. I took a shower and talked to my mum about what I should do next, and after an hour and eight minutes, I texted again and said I was going to call the Oklahoma Highway Patrol.
Very soon after that, while I was looking up the proper number, I received a text message.
From Ruby.
“Please don’t call OHP. Jan went out here to ‘see what the car can do’. Going home.”
I waited for Jan to come home. Ruby was still with them; I was so livid at Jan that I barely even acknowledged her. I still remember to this day how she seemed almost scared of me in that state. Ruby is tall and strong. She is the sort of woman you do not want to meet in a back alley. She is the Garnet of our friend group. That tells you all you need to know about how I was.
I told Jan how upset I was, and how I thought something could have really happened to them. Having a car now means they really need to keep me informed on what they’re doing if they’re going on long trips because I didn’t want to have to worry. Jan somehow tried to twist this and said I was being controlling and invading their privacy. I said it isn’t controlling to want to know where my fiancé is going when they leave for hours at a time, and it isn’t an invasion of privacy to simply want to know when Jan would be back.
I couldn’t take any more and said I needed to be alone to process everything that happened that day. I said I just need a little space and we can talk more tomorrow. It was nearly 1 a.m. by this point. I went to my dining room and just cried under the table. Then I heard a loud knock on the door.
It was Jan, banging on the door at 1 in the morning, waking the neighbours. My next-door neighbour at the time was a preacher. And Jan is over here, yelling “Please! Please open the door! I just want to comfort you!”
I told Jan that it was too late for comfort and what I needed was space. Jan was always so huge on having their own space. When Jan said “I need space”, by all things holy, you gave them space. I didn’t think asking for the same would be such a problem. And yet, it was.
I said that I would call the police if Jan didn’t stop banging down my door. That threat is what it took to get Jan off my doorstep that night. And that was the end of our relationship. I called Jan 33 minutes later and ended it. I simply couldn’t take the stack of disrespect and torment that I was dealt, all rolled into a single day.
In closing…
If any of this sounds familiar to you. If any of this makes you think “Haha, yeah, my {boy/girl}friend does that too! Poor Spots!”. If any of my story feels painfully true to your own story.
LEAVE.
I cannot stress this enough. You are worth so much more. You deserve to feel loved. You deserve to feel safe. You deserve all the best things in this world. You do not deserve to be treated like this. A true love, someone who truly cares for you and genuinely wants the best for you, will not treat you this way. You think you have a true love that is flawed. You have a toxic cycle of toxicity that will continue to fester and grow until someone gets hurt, whether mentally or physically.
Don’t be the kicked dog that I was, begging with sad eyes for it to stop.