Whose Life is it Anyway?. Deborah Thomson

affection because I’d done something that didn’t suit him. His sexual domination together with my acquiescence to his demands increased his sense of security.

      Saturday 26th October

      Wayne said he hoped we’d stay together as he really liked and trusted me. I think I’m starting to like him but I’m sure I’m boring him as he seems to get down and rather quiet when he’s around me. I still find it hard to talk to him; he’s not open to me and hardly listens to me. #

      I didn’t realise it at the time but Wayne had unrealistic expectations of our relationship and very different ideas to me regarding what I should have said and done to make him feel better (another crucial warning sign). He expected perfection from me wherein I was supposed to provide scintillating conversation even though he often told me how boring I was or that I was such a ‘ball and chain’ that he was justified in not making conversation with me at all. He expected and demanded that I wait on him, obey him, in short, meet his every need. These needs extended to feeding his voracious appetite for sex and to dress provocatively both at home and in public. The bugbear with the latter was that I would dress to go out in high heels, stockings and short, tight dresses as per his instructions, feel utterly uncomfortable in this style of dress and as the night progressed, increasingly distraught because Wayne would become belligerent and abusive due to the stares and attention I’d receive from other males. Wayne would inevitably accuse me of encouraging other men when it was him who had forced me to wear such clothes in the first place! Alternatively, he would often accuse me of being slovenly and that I should ‘dress up’ more to enhance my looks. He constantly told me that I was ‘ugly’ when dressed in house clothes, the inference being that if I made the effort to dress to his liking I would be much more appealing and worth his time and effort. Wayne seemed to think that if he continued to be hypercritical of my appearance (he constantly compared me to other girls he knew or to television personalities where I would fall far short of their looks and style) this would compel me to always look my best in his presence.

      Saturday 2nd November

      Went to a disco at the Grand (hotel) and I was happy. Wayne turned up and was distant and we hardly talked. He said: ‘I saw you in a car earlier with Dave and Carl,’ (both friends of Wayne’s) and he became annoyed and ignored me then. As we were leaving the Grand the aforementioned Dave gave me a hug and kiss and Wayne accused me of ‘pashing him off’. In his caravan (Wayne lived in his parent’s van in their backyard as he couldn’t afford a rental while he was in a low paying job at the time) he said he was so angry about me being in Dave’s car and not letting him know. # All I had done was get a lift downtown with the man. He became really agitated and in a dirty mood and said: ‘I don’t know where your morals are. All women are the same.’ He then screamed: ‘I hate you all and I’m always getting hurt by you bitches.’ # Every time I’d say something to defend myself or to try to calm him he’d yell at me that he didn’t trust me and couldn’t handle being hurt again. He wouldn’t listen to me when I said the kiss was nothing to worry about and he yelled that he wouldn’t forget it and he should go and flirt with a chick in front of me and see how I liked it. We got around to having sex after that, at his insistence, but I was so uptight from his yelling at me that I couldn’t ‘perform’ well. Sleep eluded me also so I tried to get Wayne to talk about it but he wouldn’t, he just kept saying: ‘You forget about it. I know I won’t.’ I despair when guys are angry and won’t talk about their feelings or build mountains of meaning from insignificant events. # Wayne’s behaviour is so typical of that, he is full of pride and paranoia about women. He was shouting so loud his parents would have heard it all but when I mentioned that to him later (about his yelling being heard) he brushed it off and said they scream at each other all the time so it’d make no difference to them. I went to sleep at 3am. This incident was one of many interrogations I’d endured by Wayne regarding who I’d talked to that day, where I’d been and what I’d done with whom. He often implied that I needed his permission for whatever I’d planned to do on the day and that I was somehow being underhanded if I did not seek this permission. # He would also see any innocent gesture of affection that I’d give to other males as indicative of my loose morals or as evidence of an imminent break-up with him. Even though yet another meaningless event (my lift with Dave) had been blown out of all proportion, given his assumptions of my lowly character, he was in his mind justified in verbally and sexually abusing me.

      Thursday 12th December

      Wayne rang again tonight before we went out (I’d gone to the Gold Coast to see family for Christmas and had only been there for four days) and asked me if I’d gotten the letter from him saying how much he missed me and how he was depressed and couldn’t stop thinking about when we’d be back together and out raging. Then he got angry for my not calling him first # and said I sounded like I had a cold. Last time he rang he’d asked me if I was drunk. Said he hated talking to me on the phone and wasn’t used to it. Then he said: ‘I’m coming up in the van Friday night and I’ll be there Saturday morning,’ because he didn’t like me ‘hanging around all those millionaires’.

      Despite ‘hiccups’ we were still together at the closing of 1985. In my mind, I was lucky to be with anyone at all. I knew he had problems, but they seemed to be minor ones which might be ironed out the longer we were together. I was seeing the relationship in the context of Wayne being ‘normal’ while he saw me in a completely different way as someone who would put up with his abusive behaviour and therefore, useful to him. As I write this I begin to understand that already my sense of reality was skewed to his advantage. His abuse though not violent yet, was insidiously soul-destroying. Worse than that I justified Wayne’s behaviour and felt that the longer we were together the more I would convince him of my ability to improve his life, and in so doing, prove my usefulness to him.