Isolation is one of the common techniques of abusers and predators. If they can keep you from having solid relationships with your family or with ladies at the church, then they don’t have any competition to acknowledge the pain of your destructive marriage.
One of the ways my abuser did this was to constantly and consistently tell me he hated my voice.
If he walked in and I was on the phone, he would tell me I was shouting, and I shouldn’t be talking to them. When I got off the phone with family, he would tell me that I was too dependent on them. That my relationship was unnatural and that I am supposed to “leave and cleave”. I do understand that there are times when these relationships can get out of hand and have poor boundaries, but that was not my case. We didn’t even live in the same town.
I had nine children with the predator. I lost twins at one point. I wasn’t allowed to grieve them since they were “only 16 weeks”. Friends from church helped me through it, but no comfort came from the abuser.
As I was raising the kids, I really wanted them to learn how to maintain their stuff and help with the chores. I created a dinner chore duties wheel that worked well for supper time chores. Every Saturday, I gave the kids 2-3 chores to do before they went off to play. If they finished those chores then they could be hired out to do chores for money. I am sure I came up with the system after reading a book or magazine article.
So, things were going very well with my system and the kids were learning to do chores and completing tasks well. Every time I did these things the abuser would either leave the house or sit in his chair reading the newspaper.
Finally, one day the predator started telling me how he hated to hear my voice when I gave the kids their chores. It was an insane thing to say. He wasn’t around if I corrected them or praised them. He just hated hearing my voice.
I did not want to give up on the kids learning chores, so I came up with a voiceless chore system. I put all the tasks on index cards, and I laid them out of the table under each child’s name. When they had finished a chore, they turned the card over, so I knew to go check on their work. If they finished everything, they could ask to be “hired out” to earn money on some more difficult tasks.
As I think about all this, I really don’t know what was on the predator’s mind.
Did he think he could kill me off for making me responsible for everything in the home and exhaust me to death?
Did he hate my voice because I loved my kids, and we were doing something together?
Did he just realize I was succeeding as a mom, and he wanted to undermine it?
No one really knows. But the fact that I had to create a voiceless chore system is proof of ongoing emotional abuse.
Does your partner tell you he hates your voice? This is a giant red flag you may be involved with someone with a seared conscience. Do you need someone to talk to?
Please reach out to me at seekingpeacecoaching@gmail.com if you need any help.
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