Tuesday

The Joy of Knowing You are Getting Out: A Checklist Toward Freedom from a Controlling Husband

Right now it doesn't look like it.  You have been with a partner for years and have tolerated much.  From the lying to the emotional and/or physical affairs or worse beatings, you know in your mind it is time to go, but when?  "When" is not a question you rush to answer.  One's steps to end a miserable relationship are careful, calculated, and consistent.  Each step moves you closer to freedom!

Check your mind.

If you are no longer finding yourself hoping/wishing/waiting for something to change in the angry or abusive mate, you are well on your way toward independence.  If you are still caught up in a world of fantasy, you are merely hindering yourself emotionally and physically and it will continue to feel like you will never get free.

Check your heart.

Still in love or like when he or she does something nice/funny/thoughtful?  Time to put the sentimental emotions in a box and store them away in a closet or a shelf, but not in your heart.  No more letting that heart flutter when an emotionally and physically abusive partner finally decides to be good to you.  It's all smoke and mirrors and when something like a holiday passes i.e.) Valentine's Day, it's back to mean-spiritedness maybe sooner or maybe later, but evil will be back.  Protect your heart!

Check your family.

As much as they think they are helping matters by offering their unsolicited advice, service to kick your rotten partner's @ss, or barging in on your family unannounced, you won't emotionally or physically let go of the toxic relationship any faster.  Remind them of their place/role in your life and if they can't respect your wishes, go low or no contact until you are free of your abusive mate.

Check your spirit.

Those who believe in God and prayer, you know better not to worship man, but you do every time you disobey God.  He created your spirit; therefore, He knows the desires of your heart.  When we pray, we expect God to answer and when God speaks, He expects for us to listen.  It is difficult to hear Him when you are more concerned about all things related to a controlling spouse.  So get around some sisters and brothers in Christ and let them pray for you!

Check your bank account.

No more assisting the abusive person in your life with saving him money!  No calling on family and friends to assist with his needs, projects, requests, and more!  Consider this, every time you buy something for the household, save, or give him money, you stagnate your potential to: save, invest, spend, and donate the money you have earned to assist yourself FIRST!  Part of that assistance is using your hard-earned finances to MOVE!

Controlling men could care less about all of what women have done since time began to assist them, kinfolk, and household!  Wives and mothers have saved the heads of households thousands when they refused to marry or didn't want weddings, applied for rental/grocery/healthcare assistance when they didn't have jobs, stayed home with children, shopped for groceries on sale or went without, advised partners on where to get the most for their money, shopped around for cost-saving services, personally cleaned, cooked, ironed, organized, sewed, etc. for these ungrateful mates! Yet, controlling men and their ignorant relatives and friends don't bother to see any good in the victims.  These women are supposedly all-bad, deserved to be mistreated and more.  These women weren't broken and tired when they met their abusers.  However, when anyone stays in a miserable relationship long enough, that's what you become!  Therefore, you owe it to your self to continue to keep your eyes on the prize: FREEDOM from a controlling man!

Be consistent in taking each step toward your healing.  You work independently, you entertain yourself without him, you make your own friends, you have your own bank account, you save your own money, you search for your own place, you manage your own schedule (and he doesn't need to know every d@mn thing you do!) and most of all you worship your Creator without him!  Be joyful in the Lord, He is the one who knows you better than yourself and if you trust in Him, He will direct your paths!

Nicholl McGuire

When Sons and Daughters are Protective of their Mother

God didn't put you with an abusive mate. Your flesh did.