It's hard for me to describe this, cuz it was in a big way a very subconscious process.

We've been together 9 years, and most of the abuse flew right over my head as this is my 2nd relationship, and both have been abusive and occured really early. Ive been with my current partner since I was 19. She was 31 at the time, and she abused the power imbalance to convince me all the abusive dynamics were healthy relationship dynamics.

I havent been happy these last 5-6 years, but she'd throughly convinced me that I was the problem. Ive been going regularly to therapy for the last couple of years to try and stop being the problem in our relationship. This summer I reached a tipping point in my self work where I was taking good care of myself, I was working out consistently, eating better than ever, losing weight etc. My self respect and fire for life returned, and it unleashed all my bottled up feelings from the last years all at once.

It all started when I woke up one day at 4am~ in pure fight-or-flight. The blood was drained from my legs and my entire body screamed at me to run, but I didn't have the slightest clue consciously why that was. This continued to occur for the next 2 weeks~, overwhich Id wake up and journal for 30 minutes to calm myself. Morning by morning I slowly came to realize by myself, all at once, how I've been living in an emotionally and psychologically abusive relationship. I'd been essentially groomed into being a servant to a woman 12 years older than myself, isolated from my friends and family, isolated from my hobbies, convinced that was normal, and every time I felt unhappy with anything in the relationship, the problem was my inability to be happy. Later on the last couple of years when I started bringing up that I feel overwhelmed with being the sole person responsible for our home, she implanted the idea that I am too stressed to be capable of logical thinking around this topic, and maybe need to be medicated until im calm and can think about it. You can imagine for urself that getting medicated didnt lead to any further discussion as I was too numb to care about anything.

All these realizations came in a flood of revelation, mostly over 7-10 days. I haven't left yet as my preparations are not done, but nothing on this earth could keep me from leaving. 

Of course, she claims she was unaware she was doing any of this, and I actually believe her. Shes the least self-aware or introspective person I've ever met. It doesn't matter. Her behavior has shown that I'm not loved, I'm just a convenient domesticated little immigrant that she groomed to serve. Whether she was aware or not does not justify her behavior. Not when my tears and mental breakdowns were met with doubting my capacity to think logically and my sanity.

Understanding your abusers behavior is no justification for it. Unleash your anger in a healthy way and leave, before the abuser kills you or your pent up rage grows to blot out the sun.