My Friend is in a Two-Way Abusive Relationship

So I don’t exactly know what to do. I have this friend that I’ve known for literally around 16-17 years now. He’s like a brother to me but the truth is that in the past year or so we’ve had a bit of a falling out. We used to be best friends but we’re not as close anymore. It’s a long story but basically I started getting more and more annoyed at his treatment of women and his treatment of me (I’m also a woman) and gave him several warnings about it. I told him if he didn’t change his ways we could no longer be close. Well, he didn’t change so our friendship changed instead.

Like I said, he is like a brother to me, so many years of friendship will do that, but the certain best friend-like closeness is just not there anymore. In fact, we’re not even really that close now (trust me, if you heard some of the stuff that had come out of his mouth in the last year you’d know why), but I do still care about him. But anyway, this is the problem. He’s in a relationship with this girl and it’s not good. In fact it’s very bad. I would call it abusive definitely. On both sides.

He has a problem with women (which is why we are no longer close friends). A long time ago he was hurt by a girl he was in love with and so he’s come to believe that all women are cheaters. As a result, he calls all women liars and whores. But he likes to say it in that cute little joking way that you can tell he’s really serious though. Fun right? When he drinks it gets even worse. Then he’s not even trying to use his joking voice. Then he starts cursing along with the insults and will call whoever he is dating at the time these horrible words to her face. He is very insecure and wants to know where his girlfriend is all the time. Who she is with. When will she be home. Why she didn’t call him back right away. And on and on and on. It’s bad.

See, I didn’t know all of this before exactly. I knew some of it but not entirely. But now I’m friends with his girlfriend and that’s how I found out all of this stuff. And to be frank, it reminds me of my ex-boyfriend…my ex-boyfriend who was abusive.

And of course it gets worse. The girlfriend is apparently violent. When he starts to call her all these horrible and mean names she starts to hit and scratch and kick him. He doesn’t ever hit her, he just is emotionally and psychologically abusive. But she’s physically abusive. So it’s just bad all around. And then they’re both telling me about it, and I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. I tell them that it’s horrible and I think that they need to seek some sort of help for what’s going on. That it’s abusive and not normal in any sort of sense. And that, in all honesty, I don’t think they should be dating, that they should probably not be dating anyone until they figure out what is wrong in their own lives. My friend (the guy) told me that instead he was just going to stop telling me about when this stuff happens because he didn’t want to hear me tell him it was bad anymore.

I mean, I know this post is kind of scattered but I just don’t know what to do. Talking to them about it is triggering for me but I don’t want to just stop talking to them because I’m worried about both of them. I’m worried that at some point my guy friend could become physically violent (although I think he’s much more likely to hit a brick wall with his fist and break his hand then hit her, but you never know) and I’m worried that she could end up doing some physical damage to him also. I have one friend who is male whose girlfriend threw a frying pan at his head! Also the emotional damage cannot be overlooked. I know that I’m still very much in recovery from just the psychological abuse of my relationship that happened over 5 years ago. It really messed me up.

I know they’re not MY responsibility but still. I’d love some advice as to what to do. Or just to hear other people’s stories would be helpful as well. I actually think sometimes that’s the most helpful thing for me on this site. To hear that other people have dealt with the same kind of stuff, you know?