Shades After 056
Warnings for hints at past abuse in this page.
In much happier news this weekend I’m at Telford MCM Comic con- looking forward to talking to all you lovelies at cons again!
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Grrr… I’m liking his ex-wife less and less
Oh no! I’ve met two men in relationships like him. It’s terrible because they downplay it as their spouses are women. That’s the worst thing about abuse not being addressed with both sexes—especially as it gets passed on to any children involved.
I don’t necessarily get that this was his ex-wife — as he said “some people”, not “a person”, and we’ve had no indication his wife was into a punishment dynamic (or BDSM at all).
I get the feeling that this wasn’t BDSM experiences making him flinch, but actual abuse. I guess we don’t know that the ex-wife was one who abused Chris…but I’m guessing she was, because we’re only seeing this now that Chris and Anwar are getting closer.
And yeah, I know that sometimes men will take physical abuse from women because they’re afraid of being accused of domestic violence if they defend themselves.
They are also afraid of being called “wimps” and often get told to “suck it up,” because people tend to have a gigantic blindspot when it comes to female abusers.
I doubt it’s because of this – the solution to domestic violence is NOT to “defend yourself” with more violence, it is to get the hell out of the relationship.
The problem is only if a man has no place of his own, no money to get a hotel room, and doesn’t dare call the police because they could mistakenly arrest him.
She behaves very abusively. And honestly? She reminds me of an abusive wife of a friend. My husband even witnessed her hitting him very hard over the head.
I’m saying the ex-wife because I got the idea he was talking about real abuse not kinky fun-time. I had a male friend who had an abusive wife, and I mean she slapped and punched him as well as being an evil manipulative shit, but because he was a big tough guy and she was a twig anybody could throw over their shoulder he laughed it off until the point she nearly drove him to suicide. So yes, very much what everyone was saying about abuse knows no gender (and there is an additional layer of shame that male victims feel- like they are somehow immune from such things)
Ug, that’s the worst!!! I really wish there was a stronger movement to address abuse with both sexes. It’s starting to happen. I spent time at a domestic violence center and they actually took gender out of it. The counselor I knew told me that sometimes abused women can go on to become emotional abusers, too. Unfortunately, the rest of society hasn’t caught on. It needs more attention. If you only stop abusive men, there will always be more as little girls and little boys still grow up witnessing (and often being victim to) abuse.
On a different-but-same note, I totally agree about your conclusion of Chris. It’s really disturbing if that’s the case, too. If his wife abused him, she should not at all have full custody of the children.
Well, if this is originally 50 Shades (I know, it’s so easy to forget), then I’d think it’s possible this story has the abuser in Chris’ life be in the BDSM community. In 50 Shades, it was an older women when Christian Grey was a teenager who had sex with him and introduced him to BDSM when he was a minor. But, of course, this is loosely inspired (and I used the word “inspired” itself loosely) by the books, so it could go somewhere else.
In the book, though, *that* woman is praised by the awful Christian Grey. The “real” source of his trauma is the racial stereotype pimp who apparently beat him until he was four, which he says he doesn’t remember unless it’s convenient for him. Which his adoptive mother also refused to get him therapy for, and he didn’t get any therapy for until he was an adult (my bet is on court-mandated therapy for abusing his subs).
Even though Elena Lincoln was having sex with a very disturbed minor, we’re not supposed to see her as a bad person. So her being an hybristophile isn’t supposed to be bad, when what she did was just as bad as what the pimp apparently did to him as a kid.
I’m sorry if I sound angry. I have no patience left where that book is concerned. There is more I’d like to say, but I don’t want to drone on.
No, you’re 100% right about that depiction being wrong. But I was meaning more that if this comic follows the structure very loosely it would indicate someone other than Chris’ wife hurting him. I was looking at it through the lens of what 50 Shades could’ve been if it weren’t total shit = this comic? If that makes any sense.
I assumed it was some Dommes? That would also tie in to the source material (ick) more.
oh nooooooo
my heart just broke a little bit
This explains a lot about Chris’ expression in previous pages. I was thinking he didn’t just look like he’d been crying but I didn’t know why I thought that. Now I know.
I see Anwar’s door slam 3 pages ago totally differently now.
I’ve never been physically abused (thankfully), but the emotional abuse I received makes me flinch and instantly go into “watch every little thing I say or do” any time anyone is upset at me. & if someone is angry and knocks loudly on or slams a door? Even if they aren’t angry at me, I’ll be unsettled for hours, sometimes even days.
I recall the last time this happened to me; I had to get my boyfriend (he was not the loud-door-person) to take me to a hotel because I couldn’t sleep in that house any more.
Car doors slamming outside my window used to give me panic attacks. It’s been a long time since I lived in a place where my bedroom overlooked any sort of parking so that helped, but my point is… I understand.
I actually have sensory hypersensitivity, and the theory is that it was “learned” and reinforced at a young age due to abuse (mostly mental/emotional.) Loud door noises are definitely a thing for me too, and I’m also much more alert when my subconscious feels I “should be”.
Also, speaking as someone who has experienced all the major categories of abuse (to very different degrees) it is my experience that mental or emotional is often more long-term damaging than primarily physical abuse. That is just my experience and everyone’s experiences are different and valid, but it sounded to me like you were almost saying your experience was perhaps less severe because it wasn’t physical. Abuse is abuse, and the type of abuse is far less important than how it impacts the person experiencing it.
Hey, hopefully this isn’t me sticking my head where it isn’t welcome or stating the obvious to you, but just checking; have you ever tried to see a therapist to check out for PTSD? That sounds like one of the classic symptoms.
… With hindsight this is a dumb, DUMBASS question, and I am so sorry. You really don’t need to answer this – I’m an idiot.
It’s okay! But yes, it has been officially diagnosed by a psychiatrist as PTSD, and I regularly see a counsellor to “unpack” what we can.
Unfortunately, due to the fact that I was still developing as a person when it happened (in other words, a child/youth) it’s sort of become part of who I am. So some of it can’t be gradually “healed” because it is, if you like, coding in my operating system rather than a virus.
D:
I want to give Chris all the hugs… It really helps explain so much. I wonder how this will be taken by Anwar… Because in some ways he can be kinda naive and stuff…
“Some people” implies that he’s been abused by more than one woman, besides his wife. Oh poor Chris, that has to do a number on the ego.
Well, if it is true to the original, where Grey abused a number of women before meeting Ana, and it is the reverse here, then … prepare for more revealing of horrible past events.
CHRIS DARLING *cries*
NO! Chris is the such a sweet guy! How can there be anyone out there that can hurt him knowing that?? D:
ANWAR, MAKE WITH THE CUDDLES THIS INSTANT! AND COOKIES.
SCREAMING BABE NO ANWAR HOLD YOUR LOVER
50 Shades of Awkward, part 37
I feel for Anwar here. I experienced something like this with my sub early in our relationship. I’m the kind of person that needs to step away and process for a few minutes to derail emotional escalation over minor issues, and he had had several abusive Doms before me. The first few times I came back after walking out during an argument, I had to convince him that I wasn’t going to hurt him just because I was (or had been) angry. Thinking about it *still* makes me want to wring the necks of his former partners.