Starting a new relationship, currently in one or married? Something important to note down

Dear friends,

wow! It’s been a while.

I hope you are doing well, sending energies of optimism to you as I simply can’t believe it. We are so close to the end of this year.

I don’t know, I feel that this article might just be the most important one you could ever read. I had no idea it was going to come up, but I believe it could be the best one out there and it might just be the one you need to read right now. I believe that this article will seal the topic around domestic violence off nicely and it will get you to think about how you plan to enter your next relationship, even how your marriage or your romantic relationship is going right now. If you are already in a relationship or married then please get ready to receive revelations you might not like, admit or accept. My job here is to leave nothing unsaid as I believe here is where I will ultimately close off the topic around domestic violence. I’m not sure if it’s going to be once and for all, but I believe there are new horizons out there.

I wonder if we can agree that what was presented in a lot of my blog posts even before Corona Virus arrived has effectively become one of the largest diseases that affected and still affects millions of homes during Corona Virus and lockdown? This disease is known as domestic violence. I hope that our society sees right now really how dangerous we have become where all frustrations are being taken out at home. I have had a few conversations with people who have been in domestic violence and some who have made decisions to leave toxic relationships. Three recent conversations in particular are what led me to this topic. You know, I was like, “Ahhhh! How could I have missed this topic out of all the information I have provided thus far?” So what I really want to talk about here is how the less powerful person in a relationship can be fragmented down to such an extent that it’s almost inevitable that they are tired, down to the idea that they have zero personal power, that they have been robbed of their true entitlement which not only leaves them worse off and the healing journey is even harder having to be so rock bottom especially after investing their life into what was supposed to be an everlasting marriage or romantic relationship. This is such a complex topic especially when little kids are still in this equation.

COVID has assisted in keeping many kids away from their parents this year, while some people say it played in the benefit of those less powerful yet righteous it has also played its course in the favour of parents who use their children as a weapon against the other biological parent. The most toxic situation isn’t the one where there was domestic violence with two people instead the most toxic situation is the one where one of the parents still have the most control over their children than the other biological parent even after separation. The toxicity still carries on from there, that energy still prevails until both adults decide to change.

So I am going to go into the cases where the statistics talk the most and that is of women who have been in one or more relationships where they have had some form of abuse be it psychological/emotional or physical. Now there are worse cases than these, and these are foreign women who are in a relationship where there is domestic violence, and they don’t even get protection of their rights overseas. She is the most vulnerable of all and worse when there are kids involved, the likelihood of her winning the whole thing is very low, the likelihood of her losing her kids even though she wasn’t the abuser is high especially if she doesn’t appear anywhere in the foundation that she helped build through any official documents.

Let me just take you to the moment when I had letters arriving at my door, I didn’t tell you that I had emails coming to me just as fast. Before I could just sit down and look at things, breath, action anything, take time to look at everything, see what documentation I needed to change back to my name, reapply for, or remove my ex-partner’s name off, my lawyer in Spain dropped me an email, apparently, you know who (no not Voldemort but my ex) went to them as well. This is where the beginning of the anxiety and panic attacks started. The first panic, “OMG! I got to call my lawyer in Spain about that email they’ve sent me. Did I break the law? What is going on?” I didn’t stop, breath and ask myself why my attention was being diverted to mountains of things that I couldn’t put meaning to or understand what they meant. Why am I being asked to sign and post documents when we’re not even married? The conclusion was quick for me to get, we signed up as living together partners, i.e. Pareja de Hecho in an official relationship in Spain and some small print somewhere which I really didn’t know of or care about (because I don’t focus on these things) in the law stated that the partner of the Spanish national can take a percent of his/her wealth by law. “Hello, after the damage was done and all my energy drained two and two adds up!” I remember thinking when I figured it out finally.

I just want to tell you that I was stopped from processing what was going on in terms of the emotions and the shocks that reached me of all the things being done and I was thrown straight into action mode without knowing what I am actually actioning it but I was pushed actually shoved in different directions to action things without even knowing why.

Why am I telling you the above? The last three conversations in October 2020 with three women had the same element. Now pay attention. This is one of the most important things that anyone will tell you in your life if you are reading this.

• Before you begin a romantic relationship two people have to be on the same page not just verbally but mentally. Mentally meaning, authenticity has to be a number one element that gets both of you together, the mindset should be first and foremost around trust i.e. the relationship should be built around trust, not half-hearted trust but one hundred percent trust, and to build trust these two people should have a mindset of building something everlasting together. Trust doesn’t just happen it takes time and unplanned events to build it.
• Legalities should be put in place in advance in anything you both do together, not as a symbol of mistrust but as a symbol of what is fair and just to each of your contributions. It allows freedom instead of binding you together under pressure. “What’s better? Knowing that you are free to leave at any time without resentment of losing what is your entitlement or feeling like a prisoner to something that you want out of because you know that you are not free to leave?” – T. Dench Patel, 2 November 2020, 15:21

Why?

When a person in the relationship or marriage knows that they have to change but won’t even though the issues are causing problems in the marriage or relationship then the relationship grows toxic because the person who doesn’t want to change those issues in themselves want their partner, wife or husband to accept their habits which are not healthy. When those habits go accepted and ignored yet still causes problems or inconveniences to their wife, husband or partner then the person with the unhealthy habits feels more powerful and feel that they have more power over their partner, wife or husband. The boundaries keep crossing over and then the toxicity increases. It’s basically stealing and fragmenting the personal power of the healthy individual in the relationship turning them into an enabler when the relationship goes completely toxic. The person taking the abuse is fragmented to such an extent that they can’t see their worth, they still believe in the hope that the relationship can turn around and things can change for the better. Why? Because they believe they were in it for the vision they had from the beginning which was a lasting marriage, partnership or relationship. The moment the person with the least personal power in the relationship with domestic violence gets the courage to walk away they’re still dealing with that initial shock, purely because the idea of “forever,” is now broken, they’re still dealing with this while the abuser goes straight into power mode pressing the power button, i.e. using law enforcement in their favour, using what is under their name officially, they play with all the power they have, (understand that those who abuse their partners, wife or husbands are acting from power that has gotten to their head).

So, when I was going through the many diversions put in front of me, I was still in a shock that I was dealing with a psycho (every time a new thing happened I was shocked that this was the person I was with for four years) four wasteful years, I had no idea that the wounds would take almost double that time to close. So not only loyal in the relationship but the loyalty to oneself that you will pass all of this and trust yourself again.

Two of the conversations in October 2020 out of the three and I’d say from my own account this is what we all ask.

“So, I finally had the courage to call the police (for others this is the courage to walk out – different depending on the individual), I had left my own home, the home I lived in for many years (I’d ask her/him before you do that, do you have kids?), I’m a foreigner (my account as well as many who lived in the UK and Spain), I didn’t do anything but help build what I saw as a vision of forever, but he’d/she’d fall back into his/her old lazy habits or toxic habits, so leaving the relationship just meant I am leaving something/someone toxic.”

Let me forewarn you here especially if you are in a toxic relationship ready to leave one.

The abuser sees this as a betrayal “full stop”. Forget thinking that the rest of the equation is going to go healthy especially if you have built much with this person. They don’t see the loyalty you have had for many many years taking the unfairness, staying up late at night knowing he/she will win the argument at the end when you are just drained, that’s it, drained. They don’t see the trust you have put into them let alone all the little things you have done over the years. They don’t see that you had no reason to not be trusted. This leaving them is all it takes to be seen as the ultimate reason to not trust you when it’s in fact very twisted, i.e. that you trusted that they won’t cross the line and still took it for many years. So, you will (all the stories here that I heard) you will ultimately be taken on a ride to feel drained or distracted so that you don’t have the energy to fight for what is your entitlement. What was common in hearing all these women speak was this, “I don’t want to take more than that which is not mine.”

From me to you, say it out loud, there’s nothing to be ashamed of. Say it out loud, “I want what is my entitlement, that’s all!” I want you to say this, find the energy, fight for it and if you have kids, my friend, then find the forces to help you fight just for what is yours, and not for what isn’t.

It’s not a bad thing to have legal boundaries as protection or even as accountability. Try and make your marriage or relationship with your partner as fair as possible. It’s the meaning you and your husband, wife, or partner are putting on things in the end. Often it isn’t what’s written down in black and white that is corrupt, it’s just that one-day people change, or they end up holding back their true colours until that one day arrives unless you both truly share the same beliefs and practices and walk the talk in all that you implement in your practices, i.e. gratitude, affirmations, exercise routines, meditation, etc. You have no idea which colour you could be potentially facing unless you are building something right from scratch, right from the truth. When things are fair in your marriage or romantic relationship that is when people to stay together.

I have seen women pay a price (naturally) for claiming more than what they were entitled to, maybe that’s Karma, I don’t know. Too many “powerless people” in domestic violence have walked away letting abusers have their share of the hard work, it stops here.

My account is this, “I have walked out of the relationship with domestic violence in December 2013, while living in the UK, with only my clothes, my collection of writing/creative work and my laptop. I couldn’t keep my job because of him. Much of my stuff was still at his parents’ house in Spain, none of which was returned back to me. I thought I’m walking away from a normal person, that I could still talk to normally in two to three months’ time or at least one day as a friend. I thought I would still be able to pick up my stuff from his parents’ house. It turned out that I was walking away from something which was definitely out to strip my life off me, there was no energy left in my body on the day I walked out. He started a war and now we ask what he has gained from all of that over the last seven years?”

Holding finances against your partner’s will, your wife’s or husband’s will to keep them under severe control is classified under domestic violence as financial abuse.

“I am proud of what “it” made me!

Goodbye domestic violence. You didn’t break me; you have made and saved me along with those who now read all my blog posts!”

Yours sincerely,

T. Dench Patel

Thank you for the comments and support. Thank you for offering to donate if there was a donate button on here. I prefer not to take donations. You can support by purchasing my books (Paperback or Kindle), The South African: True Colours, The South African: Roamer or my children’s book Light. These books can be found on Amazon mainly and other sites in your country.

The audiobook for The South African: True Colours is available on iTunes, Apple and Audible. The South African: Roamer and Light will be released soon.

Note: Do keep referring back to this site as much as possible, as I grow, a more profound perspective may form and so I will always come back to each of these articles to re-evaluate them.