A
male
age
41-50,
anonymous
writes:My girlfriend regularly and violently freaks out over ordinary problems. This morning she was angry because I stayed up late on the internet in our room after she went to sleep (having put in earplugs, as we live above a main road, and simply said 'goodnight', without asking for me to also go to bed). I turned off the lights and continued reading (because of the streetlights outside she also wears an eyepatch for sleeping, so the computer screen doesn't keep her awake). I have often stayed up long after she is asleep as I lose my sense of time when I'm involved in reading something, and this tends to be the only time when I feel relaxed and able to concentrate - as a student I always wrote at night. We've argued about it before and I'd promised to try to sleep at the same time and said it'd be helpful if she could be explicit about when she wants to sleep, as I need to mentally prepare for it in a way.(Often she has said that she wants to read in bed, and I only notice an hour later that she is asleep.) I hate for me to cause someone to lose sleep, but for some reason it seems very difficult for me to be ready at the same time as her - we went to bed at 3am the night before, so this night it was difficult for me to move that backward to 12am.Her response was to scratch my face this morning, then shriek and scream while stamping her feet on the floor. She then threw things across the room. I apologised if I'd woken her up but also said that if she was going to be violent toward me I wouldn't hesitate to hit her back. She refuses to compromise - I promised to get to sleep at the same time if she could promise to be absolutely clear what time she needs to be asleep by.(I should add that the time she goes to bed is highly variable, between 10-3am). When I repeat this, she is outraged and incensed that she should have to do anything.Whenever we argue, I try to get at why she's asking me to do something and whether it's something I can easily agree to, or to make suggestions and respond if I don't accept the way she sees it. I think in argument I'm fairly engaged and clear about what I mean, but this attitude seems to aggravate everything - as if she wants a furious fight every time there's a trival problem.(And when there has been a big fight, she later wants a sign of making-up, some kind of affection - but I don't feel affectionate when I'm angry.) Typically in these arguments, when she feels she's not getting -as she sees it- her own way, she suddenly looks around for something breakable in the room and tries to destroy it. This has happened to other people too. In an argument in a flatshare- because she had stolen a bottle of wine from a girl in the house (she told me she thought no-one would mind if she replaced it afterwards) - she was being berated by one of the girls, when suddenly she screamed, threw the kitchen draining rack with the plates onto the floor, grabbed the kitchen knife and shouted to the girl, "I'm going to f***ing kill you". The police were called and we had to sleep rough in London owing to it. (She says that she just intended to scare her, and even after two years refuses to see it as anything other than asserting herself over the girl).We had a short course of counselling, attending together. She detailed at length why I was in the wrong about every issue, and the counsellor said "Do you really believe that as a couple he has to work on these 99% of things and you on 1%?" And she looked baffled but said yes. When he elaborated, "Don't you think there are some things you can also do to make things work better?", she said "No" and became flustered and irritated.So...! My question is, what to do? How to prevent myself responding violently to her? How, in general, to make an agreement when they seem to take more satisfaction in 'being right' than on solving something?
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reader, anonymous, writes (1 October 2008): This is verified as being by the original poster of the questionThanks for everyone's answers.
A
reader, anonymous, writes (1 October 2008): This is verified as being by the original poster of the questionThanks for the answers.
Tisha-1: Yes, she was an only child, and yes she left school early owing to her fear of the aggressive playground situation, and was then educated at home. I absolutely agree with you that that's important, because a problem from the beginning has been jealousy and posessiveness, including with her posessions. (For example, being offended if books are mixed together, or being suspicious why I moved something of hers.)
r.e violence - I'm not against using violence if necessary, but I grew up with a physically threatening stepfather who beat my mother up on a couple of occasions, so it's really distressing to have a partner who - when she loses her temper - tries to impose a situation where I feel I might have to use violence in defence.
I have to say that (because I wrote it that morning) I skewed the question too much towards the view of her as out of control and aggressive, which she rarely is. She is almost always very clear-headed about situations and troubles, which is why when she suddenly becomes enraged, I feel 'who is this?'
I also want to add that I've realised there's a strange thing she has about knives. We haven't had any fights since I posted this question, but a couple of times she has said in a jokey way not to leave the kitchen knife around near her as she feels impulsive about doing something with it. Written like that it sounds creepy, but of course she said it like someone would joke about having a hammer makes you want to bang nails or something. In any case, it makes me want to find out if anyone knows something about anger-management counselling or anything so that I can say, "this is a big problem, and this is what you can do about it".
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A
female
reader, Tisha-1  +, writes (24 September 2008):
 Hello? Your girlfriend PULLED A KNIFE ON ANOTHER HUMAN BEING and thinks there's nothing wrong with her? Reality check.
You have described a woman who is not in touch with reality. She has created her own fantasy of how life is or how life should be, and when anything happens that does not coincide with her highly individual view, she goes nuts and starts throwing things. This is infantile behavior, no wait, I'll give her a couple of years, this is toddler behavior. When a 2 or 3 year old, maybe even 4 or 5 year old do not get their way, they try to influence their parents by throwing a tantrum. By the time they are 7 or so, they should be over it for the most part. What you've described is a toddler throwing a tantrum, except she does it with lethal weapons (the knife), her fingernails and breakable projectiles.
Was she an only child, by any chance? And did she do poorly at school and have very few friends?
She does not realize this and like a child, believes it's all someone else's fault. Um, her reaction to counseling is a serious tip off that she is not ready to admit that she even has a problem.
You're not going to be able to 'fix' this; she's the one who has the problem, and she is making it yours by throwing these violent scenes. I would do as Emily and Eyes suggest and leave, only if I were you, I would seriously leave. I mean move out. I mean tell her that she has an anger problem, she needs to gain some maturity in how she deals with fellow human beings, and until she acknowledges this and does something about it, you're gone. You're history.
Unless you're willing to live a life walking on eggshells and requiring trips to the emergency room on a monthly basis (so that those cuts she inflicts can be stitched up) and buying an enormous supply of antibiotic ointment and a really large broom and dustpan, you're going to have to face this simple fact. a) She has a problem. b)She doesn't see it. c) You're going to get hurt and nothing you do or say is going to change this. (See a and b.)
If you respond with violence, you're not going to solve one single thing. It's not going to help. She's not going to snap out of it. She'll only escalate.
If you dearly love her, which I hope is not the case, then perhaps you can try counseling again, but she needs to GET IT. Otherwise, there's no hope for improving her behavior.
Sorry.
Please do take care of yourself.
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A
female
reader, Emilysanswers +, writes (24 September 2008):
You should never retaliate to violence, that will only make things worse. You are not an animal. If she gets violent or smashes something then walk out and don't return till she has calmed down.
It takes 2 people to argue to that point where she flips. If you stay calm then she can't escalate.
I would always advise someone to leave a relationship where there is violence. Man or woman.
If you walk out when she gets like that and stay at a friend's house for a night or two then she will realise that it doesn't achieve anything when she gets in a rage.
As for the sleep thing, you just need to ask her every night what time she wants to be asleep by and then get your routine going to get to sleep an hour before that.
Good Luck!! xx
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A
male
reader, FoleyIsGod +, writes (24 September 2008):
Yes I agree with eyeswideopen dump her like yesterdays news!!
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A
female
reader, eyeswideopen +, writes (24 September 2008):
 Gee Whiz Buddy. Instead of all that work and counseling I'd just dump her sorry ass and find a normal, rational, non-psycho to be with. Wow.
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