Please help!!

[Marielle80]

Hi
I have not posted before but read regularly I am not a troll etc. I am living overseas and am really desperate for some help / moral support. We were living in Lincolnshire until this year, now living near DHs parents (retired expats whom have never really approved of me). I was a SAHM and really happy back home near my family. I basically did everything for the DCs right from the word go, whilst DH did next to nothing (despite a lot of requests)and basically got away with it for years. DCs were never close to DH and his family extremely close to my family etc.

We moved closer to DHs family for financial reasons. As soon as we arrived in the village, it was as though DH transformed into some kind of psycho in an instant and became a mouthpiece for his disapproving family. He started accusing me of being responsible for everything he considers to be wrong in our lives and keeps saying that I have failed as a parent because (variously) I never went back to work/ never let him smack the DCs/ breastfed/ stuck to routines for meals and bedtimes/ encouraged the DCs educationally. He says my bad parenting is entirely to blame for DC2s behavioural issues even though all I ever did was seek out information, resources and help and loads of people back home thought otherwise. I could go on.

He told the Dcs that my educational input has been worthless as I have failed to educate them in the school of life. As a result, the DCs have been shunning me and resisting even a 15 min reading session. for the first time ever, they are openly saying that they "hate" me and do not want to go out with me. They try to push me away when we go out as a family saying that they only want DH. DH is really milking it and taking them out for hours at a time without even asking me or telling me where they are going. This can happen several times a day. It has got to the point that as soon as I make a phonecall back home, I see him getting their shoes ready and ushering them out. His mother has been dropping massive hints that she does not want me around saying things like "let her go wherever she likes if she can`t cope living in our village, we shall look after the DCs here and there are always the school holidays for her to come and visit".

Yesterday DH says that his feeling towards me are ambivalent and that he stopped caring as soon as I reported him for small-scale DV a few years ago. This being despite the fact that he was completely in the wrong and I had him taken off the hook by withdrawing the allegation. He said that he only stayed for the DCs even though he would not even get off his backside to take them anywhere, teach them anything or even interact with thjem.

I am just so desperately sad and spend more and more of the day crying in an empty home to which I do not even have the key not knowing what he is doing with my precious children (and their minds) and wondering if they really hate me all of a sudden (and if so, why) and whether they will come round or i will end up being driven out by myself.

I want to take them back home but he has pushed all sorts of forms under my nose to sign in a foreign language to strengthen their residency here (even though they are British and we have not been here that long). Also, I no longer have a house (my parents cannot keep us for other reasons, I could rent i suppose. I am worried he would somehow remove them from the UK unless there was something I could do to prevent this; he has behaved terribly towards them for a while prior to adopting this Mr Nice Guy act.

I cant believe that this is happening to me. I am so much more effective as a parent than he is, yet he is discrediting me on every score. I dont know what to do with myself. There is no guarantee that he will drop his act or they will see through it. And he has so many people who would support him here regardless of his incompetence.

[LeoTheLateBloomer]

I'm so sorry for you

I'm afraid I have no useful advice but I didn't want to read and run.

How old are your DCs? Are they old enough to see what he and his family are doing?

[Marielle80]

Thanks Leo - I don`t know what to do either a you have probably gathered. Dcs are 4 and 7 - atm it seems as though his family are doing a streling job in turning them against me

[SilverSky]

That's horrid! He sounds like a very insecure man who is being controlled by his parents recent presence.

Im sure that someone with knowledge can help and point you in the right direction. I can't believe that there isn't anywhere you go to for advice.

Try and stay strong.

[savoycabbage]

Shit! That is awful. I live overseas too and I know how isolating it it. You are in a terrible situation. Where are you?

[RandomMess]

Can you come back to the UK to visit your parents and just not go back?

I would play the game and pretend all is well and engineer a way to get you and the dc back. Ask you dh what you can do to be a better wife etc.

Worry about the finances etc once you are here.

[buzzsore]

I think you'd do well to talk to Women's Aid, they should be able to advise what your options are.

[savoycabbage]

So would I. You have got to get out if there and a way to do it is keeping your head down and then taking them home for a holiday.

You need to find out some legal info on where you stand. You could post a question in the legal section. Make sure you have a thread title that says the problem so you can get advice from people who can help you.

[LeoTheLateBloomer]

Is there any way of finding out what you've signed?

[ihatecbeebies]

This sounds absolutely awful I am so sorry for you that you are in such a horrid situation. I don't know much about the legal stance in this situation but if the forms are in a different language then does that not mean they wouldn't stand as you didn't understand what you were signing? Is there any organisations like the citizens advice bureau that you could visit for advice? Personally i'd try my hardest to go back home with the children if I was in your situation. Could your parents or a friend not temporarily put yous up until you find a place? Or contact Womans Aid who could offer you and children refuge?

[buzzsore]

I'm pretty sure signing something you couldn't be expected to understand would make your signature meaningless and invalid in most courts. If you're abroad, could you contact the British Embassy?

[ihatecbeebies]

A few days ago I also came across a website offering legal advice which lawyers etc went on to advise people, there was an 'online now' section which showed lawyers etc that were online that you could talk to. I don't remember the site but I'm sure there will be many sites available you could do a search and see what help is offered

[Marielle80]

I wanted to take them to a relative in another overseas country when the situation started deteriorating. I had almost finished booking the tickets online when he pulled the internet connection saying that he had changed his mind about letting us go. The forms were to do with dual nationality for the DCs which seemed like a good idea at the start as I had moved over here ingood faith despite reservations about particular relatives based on past events. I dont think anything has gone through yet as we do not have a permanent address

We are in Europe. I just know that if I got out then I don`t think I could set up home with him again as I cannot stand him tbh.

He is coming back to the UK for business soon but will not let us come. I want to escape then but my mother said that relatives could only put us up until the start of the school year.

I will post in legal - thanks

[RandomMess]

well make sure you can get hold of their passports easily and enough money to get you all out of there and to the UK.

In all honesty I'd do a midnight flit, just leave and get back.

[Marielle80]

IProblem is that I vaguely knew what the forms were about - when he cancelled our online booking he pressurised me intro agreeing to signing the forms as a pre-requisite for being àllowed`to take the DCs abroad to anywhere except the UK. I was feeling fragile, my parents told me that he was the only person I could win over in my situation. I was hoping things would change as we had been getting on OK for a few years with no hint of my parenting being an issue.

[SilverSky]

Ditto. Get the hell out first. Longer you stay the worse it will be.

Sounds like doing it whilst he is away would be the best time to do it. Assuming you have access to your passports?

[RandomMess]

In fact i wonder if you can turn up at the british embassy and be repatriated, I really think you can. Can you try and talk to them without your H finding out - in case you can't get their passports?

[Horsemad]

I would be making plans to get the hell out of there - FAST. Start planning now, get the passports hidden so you can access them quickly if need be. Make sure you delete your pc history, so he doesn't find out what your plans are.

[RandomMess]

I'm very sad to say I think he has pre meditated this from the off presumably he wants you out the way and to come back to the UK without the dc or perhaps to be stuck into saying and being the subservient "wife"

[Marielle80]

I have passports, and enough money for tickets but he will have PIL on my back while away. I have never been in such a hellish situation. He just returned back with DCs - apparently, his whole family had a get together at PIL house and he did not want to tell me until afterwards as "I would have not wanted to come".
He said he was taking DCs out again to his friend`s house to collect something. I suggested that since he had already been out with them for most of the day (while I was stuck in a flat to which he has never provided me with the key) then maybe he could go alone to allow me to have some time with the DCs alone as well (which was pretty much how we lived for the last 7 years°.

He said that he pities me and my routines and they have done the DCs great damage and spouted some nonsense that children should be allowed to eat anything without looking at the ingrediants (even though DS has intolerances) and stay up until midnight if they feel like it. He left saying that I have the DCs all night (referring to the fact that my four year old shares the bed at night s as is insecure being in another country.

[buzzsore]

I'd just work on plans to get back to the UK with the kids. Once you're here, there's state help if you need it. It may not be ideal, but it's better than having your children turned against you and being treated like you're less than nothing.

The record of previous DV may still be on file and support your case if it came to court and would help regarding you signing things under duress.

[vintageteacups]

It sounds to me from your first post, that he is planning (with a big input from his parents) to take the children from you and quite possibly getting them on-side and making it look as though you're incompetent in the mean time.

I think you need to leave and come back to the UK before he makes it impossible. Make sure he doesn't let the kids stay at his parents without you and once he's gone back to UK, you need to leave.

Can you get their passports/know where they are?
If not, you could always go to the British Consulate in the country you're in and ask them for help. Could you scan the passport pages and take if your DH would notice? Do it when he's in UK - sounds a very weird set up and he sounds like he's emotionally abusing you.

Once in the UK, you will be able to get a house with the DCs from the local housing authority. Do not worry about having a house; your situation means they will prioritise your situation I should think.

Let us know how you get on - good luck.

[BertieBotts]

If your parents can only put you up for a short time that shouldn't be an issue. Agree if you can speak to women's aid they should be able to sort you out some emergency accommodation. It doesn't matter if there is violence in the relationship or not, he is certainly acting abusively.

[vintageteacups]

Do you worry he'll take them out and not come back? If so, you need to leave with them asap.

[Marielle80]

I am really beginning to feel like the worthless bad parent he is constantly telling me I am. But what could I do to keep him away from us once we are there? He has been using corporal punishment against the DCs here despite my vehment objections and this has also happened in front of strangeers - would that count against him?

[RandomMess]

Does he go to work?

You need to play the game and as soon as you think he has gone for the day you leave with the dc and get the hell out of there and back to the UK, book flights, get taxi/train out of the country you reside in etc

Just leave the flat unlocked, I wouldn't even pack many clothes etc just the minimum to not look suspicious at the airport.