What is passive aggression?

Passive aggression is nasty. It’s what manipulative people do to hide behind. You can’t call them out on being openly objectionable. They’ll say you’re being silly; you’re looking to create bad feeling where none was intended. There you go again, over-analysing everything.

You can’t point out that they said they would do A and actually what they’ve presented you with is B because they’ll just deny saying it in the first place. You didn’t hear them properly. You misunderstood.

When they say they’ll be an hour, they’ll be all day. When they say they lost all track of the time, they’re covering up what they were really doing: being passive aggressive.

I’m no expert on psychopathy/sociopathy/narcissism. I can only speak from my own experience of being on the receiving end of confusing behaviours. I’ve still a lot to learn and, as I’m going along, I’m also learning more about myself. You’d think I’d know what was what at my age. It’s embarrassing to have to admit I’ve been duped into putting up with unacceptable behaviours for 10 years. I guess the old saying rings true: there’s no fool like an old fool.

But when you’re targeted at my age chances are you’ve been selected by a dysfunctional person who has had a lot of practice in duping partners. He’s a master. He’s learned which buttons to press. He has all his answers and excuses on the tip of his tongue. He knows which ones will work with you. For him, it’s a power game. He’s letting you know who is in charge here. He’s only ever going to do only what he wants to do. Don’t try to insist he does something that isn’t on his agenda. He’ll find enough displacement activities to last till this time next year. And don’t ever try to stop him from doing something he’s decided to do. Or you’ll be punished. But not in ways you’d expect.

Always being late is a classic passive aggressive behaviour. Procrastination is his middle name. Promises? Forget ’em. He’ll dodge those promises and keep on ducking and diving all the while making it look as though you’re the one being unreasonable. And all the time he’s doing this he’s making it look to everybody else as if he’s the ideal partner, loving and kind. In reality, he is unable to form an emotional connection with you. He cannot deal with any problems in your relationship. He would rather simply walk away.

He forgets things ‘by mistake’. There might be a half-hearted apology but it won’t be sincere. Your personal belongings may go missing or even be broken and it’s such a small thing, isn’t it, why should you make a fuss over it? It’s just a glass candlestick – he didn’t see it there on the shelf. It’s only an ornament; you could always get another.

If he feels slighted by you he will hold a grudge forever. Again, you will be punished. You might get the silent treatment. Either he completely ignores you or gives a one word answer. He will withdraw all intimacy between you. He is a sulking child who doesn’t know how to deal with adult differences in a grown-up way. Maybe he can’t cope with a real woman like you. Maybe he really needs a mother.

Personal examples

In my previous post I wrote about the watering system that went into someone else’s garden rather than our own. I’d waited years for that to go into our own garden. He won a triple-dupe on that one by scoring ‘nice-guy’ points with a neighbour and being paid for the work at the same time as letting me down.

There’s a pretty resort I’d always wanted to visit just down the coast from where we lived. Every time we made arrangements to go something else would come up. There was always something he had to do first. That something would take the whole morning and then it would be too late to make the journey and be back in time for my stepson coming home from school. I never got to visit that place.

When he broke anything it was always just an ‘accident’. Except that it wasn’t. The things he broke were always items important to me. The glass candlestick was the one I’d bought to have on the table at the gathering after my mother’s funeral. If I had a favourite coffee cup it would be knocked against something and chipped. Another glass candle holder was the one my sister bought for me. He’d ‘accidentally’ spill chemicals on new bed linens I had bought. Drop china dishes and so on.

I had a Fire Dragon.

He sat on top of the log burner breathing his scented smoke. My sister bought him for me.

Nobody knows how he got broken. N said perhaps his son had knocked him over with his school bag. I don’t think so. What did I do? I wrote a short story featuring a broken ornament and how the ensuing ‘fix’ helped glue a troubled family back together. I sold the story to a UK women’s magazine.

When I look back at the time I was writing those words, I know now how much wishful thinking was going into it. The broken ornament was real: the hopeful ending was what I wish could have happened in my own life.

Why didn’t I act on my feelings? Why didn’t I read him the story and then tell him this was how I wished it could be for us?

Because he wouldn’t have cared. Actually, he wouldn’t have understood. There would have been another of those confusing conversations where I felt I had to explain human emotions to him. I knew there was no point. I was already conditioned to accept the way things were. His way.

I bet he was pissed off I’d turned a negative event into a positive and earned myself some money by selling the story. He wasn’t proud of my writing achievements. Never said so. He liked to tell me how well other people were doing instead.

Passive aggression is covert bullying

Look at the words in the illustration:

I could go through each one and give examples of how I tried to cope with all of them. N deployed each and every one, always shifting the goal posts so I never knew how I was supposed to react. I must have done the right thing most of the time: we were together 10 years. But as my usefulness wore out, particularly after my accident, communication became even more strained.

I changed tactics. I didn’t engage at all. I agreed with everything he said and walked away. Of course, I didn’t know he had his eye on his new woman to replace me so it wouldn’t have mattered what I did. There was only ever going to be one ending: the full discard with all its cruelty and callous tormenting.

The strange thing is I hardly care about the other woman. I guessed who it was straight away. I’d seen how she looked at him; knew she was available to him. In some ways I feel sorry for her. She has just what he needs next: someone to help him through his poor language skills. She’ll be able to get him into the foreign social security system. Maybe she has some money. She’d better be careful with that. When he has got from her what he wants the devalue stage will begin.  I hope she doesn’t persevere for 10 years like I did.

I wouldn’t want him touching me ever again now I know what he’s capable of.

But I do care about my stepson. I wouldn’t have walked out on him had I not been forced. The most terrible thing that can happen to a young child had already happened: his mother had died when he was only three years old. Now he’s sixteen and he knows the truth of what his father has done. And he knows it isn’t my doing that I had to leave. I hope to continue a relationship with him but it won’t be easy hearing about what his father is doing.

So is this passive aggression linked with psychopathy? Not all passive aggressive people are psychopathic but I think passive aggressive behaviours are one of a psychopath’s tools to manipulate their victims.

I should have made a stand right at the beginning. I should not have tolerated it. I deserve better.

(to be continued)

Don’t be shy. Leave a comment. Share your thoughts. FOLLOW CELIA for an email telling you when I post again. Your email address remains private.

(Edited. Removed from public display in May 2015. Restored November 2017)

Sign in for news of my next book People Who Hurt. Publication early 2018.