The Big Lie that Trapped Me into an Abusive Relationship
The Big Lie that Trapped Me into an Abusive Relationship
A major red flag everyone needs to know about
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He’d had another job. He’d been a policeman. Something terrible had happened, something that made him quit. He couldn’t go into it, but he hinted at trauma. I shared my own, to see if he’d open this box. But it was too much for him, whatever happened. I’d get to know it in time, I supposed. We’d only been together a couple of months. He told me what he liked about policework, though. How he and his friend Tony, who was still in the force, used to mock-arrest girls at nightclubs, use their handcuffs, take them to hotel rooms for sex.
Typing this is sickening. But I was 22. Coming from a difficult childhood, I hated making waves, and I swallowed my discomfort. Was he testing me to see what I’d accept? If I was the feminist I claimed to be? If he poked my tough exterior, was there give? Beneath the trousered woman drinking pints, with a first-class science degree and a talent for coding, was I just another “nice” submissive female?
I met him in a corporate job. He was not my type. He was avuncular, jolly, conventional. Liked a suit. Got the rounds in. He was not a romantic prospect. And yet, within a year, we’d be engaged.
My secret was that I wasn’t so far from a breakdown. But two years on, I’d grown a new shell. No longer the vulnerable mollusc, I’d pretend with the best of them. And we were the best of them, according to our corporate employer. We were the bright stars of their Graduate Trainee scheme.
He was on the scheme before mine (the 8th), graduating as we (the 9th) were inducted. But the two groups socialised. We, and trainees from previous schemes, were brought together for a team-building stay in the Isle of Thorns. Raft-making races that ended with some people sinking. A 2 am treasure hunt for breakfast tokens that triggered my “food apartheid” trauma response. My three (male) teammates being too drunk to get out of bed, we collected zero tokens. No food for me; literally my nightmare. The trainers had to comfort me, then break the rules and feed me. Visible proof of my vulnerability.
He was five years older than me; older than most of us. Didn’t have a degree, had come through some back door. I’m now wondering if he did so with a false CV. This was the Graduate Trainee scheme, after all. And friend, as you’ll learn, he wasn’t averse to a lie.
He was President of the Moon, the first time I saw him. A part he’d devised in a drama the 8th cooked up at the end of their training. In the mini-play, he — the President of the Moon — went mad. Something I saw in his face was very convincing. I remember thinking, “This man is dangerous.” I thought to avoid him. But people I clustered with clustered around him. We had a drink or two. He seemed harmless enough, when he wasn’t acting. And now I’m thinking, “harmless enough” was the acting.
He became a friend, more than the rest of them were. I can barely say how we ended up together. He was a friend, a friend, a friend and then —
Marjorie said she fancied him. Fancied him? The idea was ludicrous. I probably struggled to contain my disbelief. And yet it was true he was kind. He was generous. He was fun. A person could do worse. And I, of course, had done a great deal worse. Had been hurt again and again. With his extra age and his booming laugh, he seemed safe.
Marjorie’s statement changed my perceptions. Wondering how she could fancy him, I looked at him with that question in my mind and began to see it. I began to not want them to pair off. The core of my friendship group was, by now, the three of us, and I thought if they got together, they’d shut me out. Hell, I don’t know. Maybe she was his wingman. The wingman concept didn’t yet exist.
He asked me out on a walk in Partridge Green. I remember some kind of bridge. The rest is hazy. It wasn’t romance. It felt like safety. He was 28, but to me, he seemed like 40. Beer belly, conservative values. As I say, not my type. But I’d lost my father at eight to divorce, and that no doubt played a part.
And now, we are together. Some weeks go by. We kiss, but don’t have sex. He is hesitant, and I’m curious about this, being somewhat forward by nature. Men are rarely reluctant with me. He hints he has a secret. And who doesn’t enjoy a mystery? I press him to tell me, sharing more of my own vulnerabilities so that we are even. I wonder if it has anything to do with why he left the police. But no, a different secret. He had testicular cancer. The treatment has left him impotent and infertile. He’s afraid that I’ll reject him. Infertile, I don’t mind; I’m not planning children. And if I was, I’m not planning them with him. But impotent?
Yet I think about my brother. There’s more to life, I say, than penetration. And there is, but let me add, this is a blow. I’m possibly more than averagely keen on sex. Still, I feel compassion for him and can’t reject him. Not on the basis of being a cancer survivor. Not when my brother died from that same disease.
We set up a special weekend to attempt consummation. Perfect conditions, dictated by his needs. He’ll take me to where he grew up: the city of Wells. He’ll show me his childhood haunts. We’ll have a lovely dinner, plenty of wine. Then maybe the fancy room above the pub, with the four-poster bed and the wood-panelled walls, will work its magic.
But on the M4, driving down, I discover his lie.
How simply it unravels. He is at the wheel of his russet brown Austin Princess when a police car goes sirening by in the outside lane.
“Bloody pigs,” he says.
Bloody pigs? His former colleagues?
Something shivers through me.
“I thought you were a policeman,” I say. “Why would you call them pigs?” He starts trying to stitch up the tear in reality. But he can’t think fast enough, and now I know. It was a lie. He never was a policeman.
It’s like the floor of a lift slid back, and I dropped down the shaft. I don’t know what to do, but I know it’s over. I don’t want to be in the car with him. I don’t want to be in Wells with him. I don’t want to be his girlfriend, or anything else.
But here we are, on the motorway, unable to stop until at least the next junction. And by the time the next junction comes, through sobbing anger, I’ve agreed: I’ll go as far as Wells. At least from Wells, I can get back on the train.
If he gives me the fare. I’ve nothing with me, little money, and I don’t have a credit card. All my trainee pay can cover is rent and groceries. This fancy weekend in a four-poster room was his treat.
And by the time we get to Wells, I’ve agreed again: I’ll stay for food. He’s as sorry as can be; he couldn’t bear it if I’m on the train, still hungry. So food in the pub, and drink, and we both get emotional. Or he seems to; years later I’ll learn how well he can act, the man who thinks tears a manipulation tool. By the end of the meal, stretched out by his explanations, and by my need to soothe my confusion with alcohol, I’ve agreed to stay the night. Not for sex. To sleep off the pints and emotion.
And in the extra time – the time before bed, the time before breakfast — he works my compassion. He somehow persuades me to give him a second chance.
Why lie about being a policeman? Here’s his version: he thought I wouldn’t want him; he wanted to impress me. As if being a policemen would impress me! Being a professor, perhaps. Being a philanthropist. But a dozen years later, after I finally escape him, I learn that this story I tell is not unique.
A lie is common test for coercive controllers. They often pretend to be authority figures. Policemen, military men; models of manhood. And the point is, if they test, and you fail – if they tell a lie this big and you let them persuade you into forgiveness? Now you’re marked. You’re the perfect prey. You’re in the bag.
Is there no redemption in this post? Is there no light? What is needed to — truly — write a better world? Young women everywhere are still getting tricked into relationships like these, after childhoods that train them into self-doubt. I would say the light falls in two places. Firstly, if we know the patterns and tactics, sharing them to raise awareness is the positive side of this negative post. Secondly: oh boy, did I need to grow. I needed more than anything to learn my innate value. And this is the valuable lesson my first marriage taught me. If there are big things to learn, we often have to go through big things to learn them. But the pain is worthwhile only if you can get to the other side and take the growth. So if you’re in a relationship that diminishes you, no matter how trapped you may feel, believe you can escape. And start looking for a way out…
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I’ve only recently discovered your writing and story and very glad I did. The biggest lie I ever told myself went on from my childhood until I was 44 - that I could have a healthy and loving relationship with my mother. I stopped telling it in 2017 and my life has since been transformed!
I admire you so much for telling this story. I was in a psychology abusive marriage in my twenties, and it took me a long, long time to admit the shame I felt for having put up with it and then more time to stop being ashamed. I hope that what you’ve written will help someone pack their things and head for the exit.