Turning on the Gaslights

She recently told me to get to writing and start building our fortune.
Which she is absolutely right about one thing. If I were ever to hit any kind of fortune, it would not be my fortune. It would be mine and my partner's. No question.
The only thing is, she never treated me the same. She never treated me as such.
With her unwillingness to help in such a small way, she uses the cop-out, "It is my feminism." I say that definitely gives feminism a bad name. Isn't feminism about helping other women? In this case, helping another woman with trying to achieve a brighter future and attain her goals? To not help another woman is no form of feminism. To help other women is not only the highest form of feminism, but also altruism.
Yet she has complained that her ex husband did nothing for her. And he should have. And she is right about that. He should have. But then she turned around and $#%^ on me in the same way.
She is not altruistic at all. Whatever she does for me, she has made clear that something absolutely must be done in return. She claims I have done nothing for her. Which is the first thing that made me cut this awful relationship off again. I am tired of not being seen or appreciated. And then she tells me I throw things in her face, which I do not. I feel this falls into her hands perfectly to belittle my character, because the only time I will start listing things I have done is when she claims I have done nothing for her. I started working on her yard when I did not even live there. The only thing I was waiting for was grass seed that she said she was going to get as well as duct tape to move the trampoline, both of which never happened. Did I get anything in return while I was not living there? No. Did I expect it? No. I started helping to work on a room in the basement she claimed would be mine but was still dictating what would be in there and how it was going to look (there was no guarantee or foreseeable evidence it would be mine as she has given and taken so many times) while I was not living there and feeling like I was being treated as an outsider and probably always would be. Did I get anything in return? No. Did I expect it? No. She claims while I did live there I didn't do anything. Yet I did indeed mow the lawn, clean the house, do the laundry, fold her four very capable kids laundry, got on the roof a couple times to clean out the gutters, etc. Many times I even cooked for her. A couple times I did these things while I did not live there. Did I expect anything in return? No. Then she belittles all that work and tells me the only things I did were things I enjoyed, like painting. Actually, painting got real old real fast. And even this comment baffles me because, even if that were true and it were the only thing I did, and even if I enjoyed it, who cares? She didn't get to keep the cleaning I did, the laundry I did, the gutters I cleaned, the dinners I cooked. But she benefited because she, due to my work, has an incredibly beautiful home inside. Due to my choice in color and my work, she gets to keep something. I benefited in no way from this relationship.
Instead, I am afraid. I am afraid to open up and be the person I once was. The person that a few different people actually followed to tell me I have amazing energy. I am afraid to write due to her threats. I am afraid to do so much as greet someone without feeling like they might be judging me behind their smile or thinking I am weird or ugly. I am afraid to open myself up to anyone for fear of experiencing something like this again. I never knew it existed.
So she likes to say she is always willing but in order for her to be able to help, she has to know. I never would ask. I never would say. She liked to SAY "if I can do anything, let me know." Which almost got irritating for me to constantly hear because my gut instinct knew it was just words. Last year, I asked her to help me get to school. She told me no, it was my responsibility. I took this travel job in hopes to be able to save for a car. The two semesters I took off that I didn't want to take off, as promising as it seemed that I would have a car and enough to live off of, was defeating. I was not able to save for a car. I did get a scooter. She works where I go to school. She is headed there anyway. So this year, when I asked for a measly ride...what she could do to help, as she offered...it turned into a fight. It turned into me never doing anything for her. It turned into the ware and tear on her vehicle, as if a thing has more value than a person. Then she claimed that just because the one thing I am asking for is a ride to where she will be anyway (if I can find a way back when she is not going to be there, fine), that I am looking for her to support me, but I am supporting myself just fine. Then compared me to another girl whose ex claimed she was a gold digger (I have never gotten anything monetary from this woman I spent over two years with and never asked. If a ride to help me get in a better life position is gold digging, a ride to where she is going anyway, no less, then I am speechless). Then she just stopped texting, although not addressing my feelings anyway, and texted the next day all about her daughter and then the next day all about her. Two whole days with no concern for me or how I was. Nothing. As if all this were not a turn off enough, it also turned into these texts, verbatim:

"Maybe I'll try that speed dating, it has the words SPEED in it, would that help me move on fast?? Faster than one of your online dating apps or sites you use, ehh??" (This is a false accusation that she is super fond of. She likes to use this when it is convenient for her because I did take a look during some points we were broken and she had treated me like crap in a similar fashion.)
"And maybe if this pattern repeats itself with enough women I could knit myself a quilt, with this lovely pattern. What do you think??"
"Professionals network?? You don't say?? Shucks, as much as I'd loooove to go, can't. Maybe next month. (just thought I'd save you the effort of going to spy on me)" (Which funny she should say this because I have never once spied on her. It is actually she who has told me what I was wearing in the parking lot of the place I lived once, telling me she sat in her vehicle hidden in the adjacent parking lot for hours. It is she who has paid a company to take all of my email addresses to find everything I have ever written on the internet as well as all of my accounts. It is she who scours the internet on a frequent basis searching for anything having to do with me. It is she who has checked my phone and accounts, etc...) So I told her that is her m.o. and that I've never spied on her and she says:
"Does m.o. stand for multiple orgasms?? Because I kinda miss the days of having those. I used to have m.o.'s, when you didn't beat down my self worth & self esteem. It's still a possibility in my near future. I am in my prime after all." I told her to have fun, though I was horribly hurt. I kept asking her to stop texting me. And I get this:
"I most definitely will, thank you! Bon chicka wa wa!!" (did I mention sh is 42?)
"Touched? Hell I'm going to be touched, kissed, licked, and ###$!! Oh yeah!!! No more shitass waiting! This is my prime baby! Prime!!! Holla!"
I point out how horrific that she could actually insert words of pleasure with the hurt she is inflicting on another person. I told her to move on and that if she doesn't stop I will take it to the police station. She continues:
"Okie dokie kind lady. Will do"
"Well as much as I've enjoyed this conversation, as they say in the cartoon world.. The the the that's all folks!"
"(bow, exit to the right)"
"Um, your 'pain' is self inflicted."
She then went down the street to a venue within visible distance of where I sleep, cheesing with someone she claims uses her. Okay, let me reiterate. The woman I was with says that this girl uses her. That the only reason she ever invites her to breakfast is because she knows she will pay for her. Also, she complains that she has paid this girl's rent and that this girl asks for money. My ex has given this girl money. In the hundreds. Has paid her rent. Yet I have never asked for a penny and for asking for a ride, from someone who is supposed to be my partner, I am accused of using, being a gold digger and asking for a free ride.
There is something wrong when someone treats their partner lower than dirt and an outsider, has no empathy or compassion toward them, but goes and portrays this opposite persona to the outside world.
And now I can not even enjoy events in this town or the surrounding area. For instance, I can't even go to a live Tender Forever show I really wanted to go to because she immediately jumped on the invite list and then proceeded inviting everyone, rallying her troops, so I had no one to go with and would no longer want to go because it would no longer be a good time.
What I do know is this. Love is selfless. It isn't a score card. If your partner needs help, you help them. With no expectation of anything in immediate return, because that will come in time. You should have the confidence that they love you and be secure in that, and thus also be secure that with that, you can't accuse them of taking advantage of you. If you don't think they love you, you shouldn't be with them. If you don't have faith in them, you shouldn't be with them. That is where her head should have directed her.
Here is where my head and heart direct me. If you feel more alone with someone than without them, that alone is a huge red flag. It is not a partnership. Also, some emotional abusers are not aware that they are gaslighting or emotionally abusing. Those are the worst kind and thy are highly unlikely to change. When they kick you low enough that you finally bite back and say one or two things that you normally would not say, it plays into their hands well to bring you down more. They can then be able to throw this in your face to say, 'well, look, you do the same thing.' And make you feel like even more of a horrid person. What I know is that if you tell someone that something hurts and they repeat it, and not only repeat it but repeat it in worse ways, they have no concern for your feelings. And the statements and the lack of concern over the pain it causes or even after they do the damage are forms of emotional abuse. Again, if you say something hurts and they continue with no concern to your hurt or no instinct to comfort or come to a resolution, it is not normal to a healthy loving relationship and it is a form of emotional abuse. It is more covert. But just because you are being hit with a stick rather than a metal rod does not mean that you aren't still being hit. When it comes to emotional abuse, sometimes the "lighter" hits do more damage. What I know is that a healthy relationship produces partners who are more than happy to comfort and prove the amount of love they hold for their partner until there is a complete clarity on whatever subject for which the questioning party needs the explanation and reassurance. When no sympathy, empathy or support for your feelings are available, it is a manipulative punishment and also the abuser not wanting to empathize because perhaps in their delusions of superhuman grandeur, they would then have to take responsibility to being an "imperfect human," or in the least the one who caused the hurt. They may instead try to tell you your reality and your intentions, thus taking away your self power and have you question your perception and intuition, as well as turn it around on you and tell you that your hurt is self inflicted. They may even try to accuse you of attacking them and having horrible behavior. Just for stating your feelings. What I know is that none of this will ever offer a solution to the problems between couples because only genuine love can comfort and understand, an intimacy that is a must in a relationship. What I know is THEY won't change. But YOU will. And not for the better. You begin to question your very opinions and instincts and uniqueness and acquired wisdom through instinct that you had formerly collected about surviving in the world. You may even reassess instinctual wisdom you had formerly relied upon throughout life. You begin to question the core of who you are and your place in this life and your very reality.
What I know is that healthy relationships need two partners who are both willing to listen, understand, share what is inside them. Without true caring for the other person, one can not relate to the other in honest sympathy or heartfelt sincerity. Gaslighting and abuse, even in its subtlest forms, involves a denial of these things. When someone refuses to listen and address, does not have concern for your feelings, appears to misunderstand what they are completely capable of understanding, or declines sharing their emotions, or gives the silent treatment, thy are "withholding" a part of the essential intimate actions of the relationship. When a partner really does not understand the other, then at least the intent to understand and compromise should be there, with perhaps a request for the partner to help them understand somehow. An abuser will also emphatically call into question the memory, thoughts and ideas of their partner, and even further use it at a later date as a countering tactic. They may also twist the stories you trusted in sharing with them while you opened your heart to them, using your very vulnerabilities as an assault. Even if it seems this cruelty can not become worse, the abuser's tactic will effectively counter by throwing their partner off the subject matter.
What I know is that when you are constantly told that your memory, experience, feelings and instinct are emphatically wrong, chances are, you might start to believe them. Regardless, it will change you. You will question yourself like you never have, and like you never should have to.
Blocking and diverting is a method where communication is controlled and manipulated. They will refuse to comment or answer (maybe claiming they're not going through this again) and will close the discussion on things they "have already discussed" (even though you feel nothing gets addressed and you could list a ton of things that got skipped over and never answered). They will withhold and also prevent all possibility of coming to a fair resolution, or in giving comforting knowledge and reassurance to you.
What I do know is that healthy partners do not want to see their partner feeling bad or hurt, and instead desires to comfort or heal their pain. What I do know is that healthy partners do not want to see their partner struggle and instead desires to enhance them and help. What I do know is that healthy partners never show pleasure in hurting someone and then go smile for the camera as if nothing happened while the other is just a block down the street crying.
Alternatively, the goal of the abusive accusations is to blame the partner for her anger, sadness, irritation, insecurity, thereby proving the anger/abuse she is enduring is justified because she is actually at fault or in the wrong for the way she reacted to something the abuser did.
What I know is this is not genuine love. What I know even more is if it is not genuine love, it is not love at all.