Financial Abuse

Most everything on this site feels so familiar...

I don't want to share the entire website as my blog, but this one is worth mentioning:

http://www.abuseandrelationships.org/Content/Behaviors/financial_control.html

Way back when the kids were little, I was told, in no uncertain terms, that I had to take over the handling of the checkbook and the paying of bills. If I didn't do this, he would end up yelling at the kids. He told me I had no choice.

As a side note, here, a friend cut me off after hearing this story by saying that this was him setting boundaries for himself. Um...no.

Anyway, he ended up yelling at the kids (and me) so my compliance did not nothing to prevent it. Then he would take money out of my purse and I would have nothing to buy groceries. Money was tight in those days, so a missing $20 was several days worth of food.

Once, we were using American Express. At that time, the entire balance was required for each payment. The balance got higher and higher until I could not pay the whole balance. I told him about this but he gave me that "You're out of your mind" look and went about his business. Then, when they denied the card, he came home in a rage because I obviously wasn't handling the money correctly.

This is only one of many instances in which I was told I didn't handle money correctly - even though he required that I take care of it.

At one point I asked him (bravely) to take the check book and paying of bills back. He said he would. Whew! But then he seethed for nearly 3 weeks. And I can't count the number of times he told me, "Now that the checkbook is back under control..."

Insert face palm and weak primal scream here.

Now, he 'needs' my paycheck, which would effectively leave me without any money because I have to ask for anything that comes out of the mutual account. In fact, one day at the grocery store, I asked for something..."What are you going to give up in order to get that?" he asked. O.O

I don't have any answers to this, because I still have trouble saying 'no' to him. I'm conditioned to respond in his favor. Since I'm a prisoner to his whims...well, all I can say is that I'm packing my things.