My friend is dating an emotionally abusive guy

[Guest guest]

One of my best friends is dating a very emotionally abusive guy and I don't know

how to get through to her! Here's the situation:

She's in her early 20's and is fairly immature/inexperienced. This is her first

boyfriend so she is quite attached.

He's my age (three years older than her) and comes from a similar household as I

do: his father emotionally and physically abused his mother and his mother has

finally moved out of the house and is proceeding with a divorce. While he was in

undergrad he finally stood up to his abusive father and took out loans. He went

NC for 4 years and it sounds like it was a healthy experience for him. For some

reason, since then he has started to worship his father and has been financially

supporting him. He even says things like " I would defend my father even if it

cost my life "

I hope that I'm not projecting, but he seems to have some BPD traits, or at

least that of an emotional abuser. He gets mad at her randomly, constantly

accuses her of cheating on him, and goes into these manic psychotic rages that I

think we're all familiar with. During these rages he says horrible things to her

and attacks her character. He always says " no one else would ever date you and

put up with you " , and since he is her first bf I think she believes him. They

have been dating for 8 months and so far he's gone into " rages " four times.

After they're over he acts like nothing happened and he apologizes for his

" anger issues " and then it's over.

I have tried to keep my opinion of him to myself and be a supportive friend and

good listener. During these " rages " I tell my friend that it isn't normal and

the things he puts her through are horrible. During his last rage I talked to

her for hours and flat out said that he was emotionally abusive and wasn't going

to change unless he got help. She agreed at the time but he apologized so she

forgave him and ignored any of their issues.

She constantly defends him by saying he has a lot of baggage and comes from a

broken home, but then I tell her that I do too. I've told her that I'm in a ton

of therapy to change myself, while he isn't doing anything to break the cycle.

He went into a rage over the weekend because she forgot to tell him she went out

to dinner with a girlfriend and a male friend. He told her no one's ever hurt

him as much as she does by lying like this and it makes him worried that she's

cheating on him. She actually agrees with him that she shouldn't " lie " and

should always remember to tell him who she's with and I keep telling her that's

not normal for him to always have to know where she is and who she's with.

During our talk I said, " what did you say the last time this happened? " and she

said, " I said if this ever happened again I'd break up with him. " And I told her

I just wanted to remind her of that. We haven't spoken since this conversation

although I know that he has apologized again and she's forgiven him.

It's SO frustrating to see her voluntarily put herself in this situation

although she'll acknowledge that he's abusive. I really don't know what to do-

it's becoming hard to even stay friends with her because I don't like the person

she's becoming. She's becoming a very weak, self-doubting person who completely

idolizes him and can't talk about anything else. I would love any advice!!