I love your site, Allison, and how beautiful are you? Wowza, girl!

I think, as women, we expect way too much of ourselves and try to fulfill that expectation. Even though I have no children at home and had all the time in the morning to write my morning pages, it was still difficult for me. Handwriting is tough. I began to just read the chapters and underline what spoke to me.

Something of interest: After we've left an abuser who demands so many things, we continue in the pattern of demanding from ourselves. For years, I would have a lazy afternoon and want to take a nap and would even try but my guilt of not doing something would take over and I'd be back up doing something. There wouldn't even be someone in the house to make me feel guilty but it happened anyway.

Many victims will leave the abuser to only continue in self-abusing ways. It's almost like we feel that we deserve it.

BTW Allison. I have a close friend who went from a size 22 to a size two. She did it with healthy eating and exercise. After losing that much weight, she had a ton of excess skin that was hanging so had this new technique/surgery to remove it. No anasthesia, if you can believe it. He used a local on the areas. Then, after four days, the doctor removed the stitches and used a medical glue to replace them. She has absolutely no scars. I mean, nothing! The doctor who performed this surgery has passed away since then though.

Dianne, where is your picture? When I got married to my now husband, I used to list for him all that I had done during the day, including my job. "I went to work, I answered 77 phone calls, I did the laundry, I ..." as if to justify my existence. This was a pattern that developed for me as a child, when I had chores to do after school, and my step-father "inspected" my accomplishments. "The faucet on the tub should SHINE" he'd say. "Now put a SHINE on that faucet!" Then, the man I was married to in my twenties wanted to know how I earned my keep (he did not want me to work: "No wife of mine is going to sling hash!" he'd say.) So I'd list laundry, and other household chores. My now husband (since 1988) told me more than once that I do not have to justify how I spend my time. Yet, here I am on BWS, feeling guilty for not doing anything I thought I'd do today. Some of the patterns are hard to dissolve! I am grateful for TAW because it helped me to get in touch with creativity, rather than thinking that chores was my only reason for being!

Hi Everyone! I think this is my first post here, but I have lurked on this site for a long time! I am a friend of Dianne's and I actually got to know her through her book. I was in an abusive relationship that I finally broke away from 5 years ago. While living in that abusive relationship I was very much in need of reading a book by someone who had actually gone through the same thing. Dianne's book was that book. After reading it I found her website and we connected through email. Dianne helped me in ways I can't even tell you here. Just let me say that she was a Godsend. Since then we have remained friends and recently were able to finally get together in person when I went with her to San Diego for the Hay House parties. We had such a great time!

Allison, I am the friend Dianne mentioned above who lost 135 pounds. I looked at your website and you look GREAT! I know first hand what a tough road that is....

Here's a link to my website. I don't have any before photos on there (I need to add some!) but there are six pages of pics of me since the weight loss. The Honeymoon Cruise page and the Wedding page are probably the most recent!

http://members.tripod.com/jeepgirl_2-ivil/

Back to Dianne...she is an awesome woman, a talented author, and a person with a great heart who has a sincere desire to help others!

Lynnie, were you married to my first husband? Sounds just like him. Didn't want me to wear make up, yada, a long list of dumb demands. He also told me I did nothing during the day. So, I started doing nothing and asked, "How do ya like that?" He shut up on that point but not on anything else. Today, he has a shrunken brain from drinking so much and a brain tumor.

I always keep our flat clean, laundry done, bathroom clean but I do it out of respect for David (and myself) because I know he likes a clean home. I would never do it if he demanded it.

I had a girlfriend who was married to this jerk wad that demanded the bathroom be "sanitized" four times a week. I say, clean it yourself.

PJ!!!!!! You've arrived! Look at her pics. She's so beautiful but more important, she's that way on the inside too. Yep, she was my partner in crime in San Diego. And...she is now married to a wonderful and loving man and it's about time! She earned it.

Welcome PJ!!!! You are beautiful and so is Chloe!

Dianne...you're supposed to clean bathrooms???????

I guess so, Jane. I read it somewhere. My husband uses this hairspray that must have super glue in it. It's so hard to get off the bathroom counter. If I didn't clean it every single day I'm sure I'd have to get a bomb or something to blast it off.

I'm so bad...when I found out my first husband had a brain tumor my immediate response was, "Don't you have to have a brain to have a brain tumor?" He's been a missing, horrible father to my three oldest kids and it really hurt the two oldest ones. The youngest one could care less.

Dianne,
I taught Allison everything she knows...I swear! And talk about hair spray, mine could last through any Alabama tornado. I love this stuff.

I was never physically abused by my hubby, but mentally, yes. By silence. I know it's not the same thing, and it doesn't "harm" you physically, but it still hurts and some scars still remain, inside. Dianne, do you ever encounter anyone who says they suffer from this type of abuse?

JJ

I did. From my mother. She could torture you with her silence and it wasn't until you apologized for the unknown sin (how could I know what it was if she wasn't speaking to me?) that she would slowly start talking to me again. I might add, she did this to my dad as well.

In a physically violent relationship, there is the tension building stage. This is when the abuser stops speaking to you or grows quiet and won't answer questions. For me, this was worse than the actual violence, which always followed. It can unnerve someone. Plus, I never knew what brought it on.

It is truly torture and I'm sorry you or any other woman has had to endure it.

Holding hand up JJ, waving wildly shouting me, me, me...