Was my ex emotionally abusive?

Hi there.I am just looking to see if my ex-partner was been emotionally abusing me.

I was with my partner for 14 months and i noticed that he had trouble with his anger,anger which culminated last year in him getting very petty and emotionally aggressive and dumping me but then making my life hard after it.Anyway we subsequently got back together and he accepted that he had a problem and would get it sorted and his behaviour improved significantly.However,that behaviour had regressed over the past couple of weeks or so and he had put me through emotional hell.

There had been tension between us lately and i told him a few weeks ago that i had become afraid of his anger emotionally (not physically as he would never hit me) and he reacted badly to it.He wouldnt take my phone calls and was non contactable for a day or two.We were supposed to go away the weekend just gone and he hadnt gotten back to me about arrangements so when he finally did it was to tell me that he was going by himself.I then asked him if we were over and he said yes.I told him that that was ok and that i wished him the best and i was getting petty texts back.anyway 5 mins later he rang saying that he didnt want us to finish.he also told that he had been taking anti-depresants fo self diagnosed depression that he had gotten from his mother and he demanded that i take partial responsibility for that which i would not do.i told him that i would consider taking him back if he was going to change and he said he would.

However after i sent him a text following morning clarifying a few things on me going back (which admittedly may have come across as abrupt) he rang and verbally attacked me again and eviscerated me for giving away a ticket that i had gotten him for a play after he dumped me.He also called me stupid in this conversation.He calmed down later and was easy to deal with but he started up again yesterday and it culminated with an abusive voicemail.

During the relationship i have been told to shut,f**k off,called a bully and an overreactor and he said things to me that he knows would undermine and hurt on numerous occasion in argumentative or dispute like situations.In situations like this he had a tendency to make seemingly banal comments like "you take too much of an interest in my family","you overcompensate with the amount of times you tell me that you love me" and "the way you slurp your coffee annoys me and my mother" (but later said that he was lying about his mother thinking that.All seemingly banal comments but all very clearly intended to undermine me in a situation he didn't like.

Over the weekend a few weeks ago another situation developed whereby he accused me of making paranoid (this may be to do with the fact that i asked that we only spend weeknds together for the foreseeable future until i get myself back on track after his abuse),he gave out to me for not wanting to go to a birthday party with him (i didnt want to go as there were friends of mine there who know whats going on and are concerned for me as i keep taking him back and also i wanted to ease my way back into the relationship and not be playing the happy couple)he told me that the present situation was about him,he asked me if i had told anybody about his behaviour (hie is very concerned with what people think of him) and he accused me of being not supportive enough of him despite me being incredibly supportive of him,he ended the conversation by ending the relationship with "we're done".I contacted him the night after to sort things (as i always do) and he accused me of playing mind games with him because i went out to the birthday party that he wanted me to go with him before he dumped me as i didnt want to be home alone yet again crying because of his behaviour.


A few nights later he rang crying and sounded very remorseful about his behaviour and was very hones with himself and things that he was feeling which seemed to have been causing the behaviour so i took him back.

Unfortunately a week after this i lost my grandmother suddenly.He was great that week,so good but a week after i buried her he started up again when i tried having a conversation with him over the way i felt due to his behaviour.This continued on the next day and he was quite emotionally aggressive so i decided for the first time to end the relationship.I told him i wanted things to be amicable but he didnt want that and i asked him if he would contact me with results he would be getting for an STD test which he said he would be getting (he told me that he was getting this test when i took him back which i found strange as he had told me months before that he was fine as i am very cautious about these things but he said he knew that he was fine but he was just getting it for peace of mind) to which he replied "i'll think about it".I was shocked that he would play off our sexual health like that purely to get at me.Bare in mind all of this a week or so after me burying a family member.


Anyway a few nights after i broke down crying and (unwisely) texted him and the conversation ended with him accusing me of various inaccurate and baseless things.

I am now feeling the extent of his treatment of me on being away from him and i do feel abused but i guess what im asking here is if he was abusive to me emotionally?I wasn't perfect of course (nobody is),i do have a tendency to go on about things and i have OCD which led to me being quite cranky and snappy with him at times (not a huge amount of times though).Since the split i have realised the full effect of his behaviour on me and my OCD has gotten crazy in terms of overthinking in terms of was i partially to blame?,did i in some way drive to his treatment of me at times?,was i abusive?,did i fail him in some way etc. eg did my OCD play a part in some of the argumentative incidents us which led to some of the comments (though i know in my heart and soul that that wasnt the case,i recognised that there was something that needed to be spoken about and i was only trying to solve this with him).And even if OCD was related surely it was no excuse for his behaviour?I feel very robbed at the moment and decimated and have lost some of identity and self worth after him.Help please!

P.S. apologies for the length of the post.

Hun, perhaps the biggest thing that you could do to empower yourself and regain your sense of autonomy is to TRUST YOUR FEELINGS. If you FEEL that you have been emotionally abused, then you have. This behaviour does sound abusive to me, but that is not important. What is important is how YOU feel about it.

Emotional abuse has a "gaslighting" effect, in which the victim doubts his or her own perceptions, and may deny to themselves the full extent of the abuse. A huge part of your recovery perhaps needs to be to rely on your own judgements and perceptions, and to be certain as to what is and what isn't unacceptable behaviour.

Emotional abuse takes its toll on a person, and it can take some time to recover. You need to treat yourself with kindness, and to grow in autonomy, and to TAKE ON BOARD the fact that you didn't deserve any of this, and that the fault at all times lay with him and his behaviour and not you. He alone is responsible for his reactions and there is no way that you should be made to feel responsible for them.

Therapy can help you to make sense of all the emotions that you are going through, and help you to rebuild your self esteem.

I wish you well hun.