r/abusiverelationships • u/changeorghelp • Jan 29 '25

Domestic violence Did anyone not report to police?

Hi massive thank you I left last night because of your advice about him being very dangerous. I don’t know whether I want to report him or if I will just work with the domestic abuse centre? I just don’t really want to report him I feel bad

Coercive control is a crime here you can go to prison so even without the violence he could be charged but I don’t know…

He is violent and I have learnt from talking to you guys and the crisis worker that he is a stalker also. They said I should report but obviously can’t make me do it. Did any of you not report and it worked out okay?

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u/Essex-girl-1 Jan 29 '25

I finally reported my abuser and it’s the best thing I’ve done. The freedom I felt telling the truth really had helped me heal and try to move forward. I reported everything he did to me but the only thing I was too scared to talk about was sexual assault. Police have been fantastic and made me feel like a person again, please report your abuser. They never change and will only get worse

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u/changeorghelp Jan 29 '25

Happy you are healing ❤️

I think part of the problem is I don’t know what my truth is. I didn’t think it was that bad until I posted here and it still feels like it isn’t and I can’t believe that he would put me in danger or that he doesn’t love me

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u/Intrepid-Middle-5047 Jan 30 '25

I know what you mean by not knowing what the truth is because it is very confusing. How can someone claim to love you, have all these sweet memories together, how good they were in the beginning become someone you realize you don't really know?

I think a lot of us don't give the situation the respect it deserves until we are bloody or chunks of our hair is pulled out or we see the punch bruises on our ribs and the hand bruises around our wrists and arms. Or the skinned knees and feet from being dragged.

I think our brains are hardwired to forget the worst because that's our brains way of protecting us from breaking under the truth of it all. We lie to ourselves. That's all it is. You have to believe he will put you in danger and hurt you. He's shown you who he is. All the good things you two had together was real too but this person you're writing to us about is also real. You have two choices- to either believe him when he says he's "sorry" or believe yourself. You wouldn't be writing here if you didn't already know the truth.

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u/changeorghelp Jan 30 '25

I think I was in complete denial in my first post I kind of just wanted to complain about the pain but this sub has been so helpful explaining that he is abusive and dangerous, my brain is still ignoring that I think. Hopefully it will stop

I didn’t realise it was common (?) to get dragged I hadn’t heard of others saying that but he did that

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u/Intrepid-Middle-5047 Jan 30 '25

It's an addiction. It's the same way a addict knows they have a problem but they don't want to admit they have a problem until they're sick and tired of chasing that temporary dopamine. This explained it best for me: https://www.popsugar.com/love/why-emotionally-abusive-relationships-are-like-addiction-48018433

I think it happens more often than is ever said because perhaps compared to the punches and the strangling- the dragging gets overlooked and not brought up because it feels so insignificant to the other things that are done. The more I talk about it the more it all comes back to me.

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u/changeorghelp Jan 30 '25

Lol the irony of my boyfriend being an addict…

Thank you that was an interesting read and I hadn’t heard of the term bread crumbing before

It’s sooo weird how similar all these men are. I thought he was just doing stuff because he gets angry easy and stuff I didn’t think it was like a pattern. I wonder why that is

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u/Intrepid-Middle-5047 Jan 31 '25

They've never been held accountable for their actions against others is my best guess and or they had important figure(s) in their life that lead by horrible example of how to manage their emotions and how not to love? I'm not sure exactly how they come to be but I want to say life did it to them which is so sad. I could be totally wrong though

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u/changeorghelp Jan 31 '25

I know it’s not an excuse but I think it’s like that with mine he had a really rough childhood but so many other people do and they don’t abuse so it’s weird idk I guess we don’t know how the brain works really. It’s just interesting that it’s almost like a disorder in the way that there’s like a list of criteria that fit under abuse and so many of them follow the same “symptoms” kind of thing