AIBU to ask all the women on here with shitty nasty partners and husbands to really think about how they can escape them as soon as possible?

They go for both. Vulnerability comes in many forms, not just financial. Many successful women with good careers have also experienced domestic abuse. Abusers are just ubiquitous.

i totally agree with this. in my case marriage would have given him half of my very good pension on divorce.
he has no pension except for the odd bits when he occasionally worked PAYE after the law changed and employers had to autoenrol you. he always 'joked' mine was enough for the both of us. and i was thinking not a chance was he getting it as i plotted my escape. i changed my death in service and pension beneficiary's to my children without telling him the minute the scales fell from my eyes.
we rented so no property to consider but i do agree marriage is not the answer for financial security for every woman,
my career did take a hit due to maternity leaves but i'm back on track now. he is living with a woman who has no self esteem and her children. unsurprisingly he isn't working consistently again, owes thousands in unpaid CMS and she has a good pension....

I don't believe they go for strong women at all, I think they sniff out the vulnerable like bloodhounds.

I live in an area of London that has a massively high rate of single mothers in council/HA accommodation and one of the highest rates of unemployment and child poverty in the country.

They usually go for these women, especially if they're on benefits and they can come in flashing a bit of cash and pretending they want to 'treat their kids as if they were their own' 🙄

The awful reality soon becomes apparent once they move in and lose all interest in the kids.

I'm genuinely sorry to hear that of your past, I can relate.
It was the way you referred to the subject, in terms of it being a partner.

I think that is a positive that you have gone on to meet a decent partner.
As unfortunately that's another issue that if you have DA in your home life, you are more likely to move on to male partners who are the same.

Absolutely. Although there is another comment which says they do go for strong women etc, something about because then they will be able to look like they are the victim.
They know they are on the right track with certain women and cling on, because other women wouldn't go there.

I wish no woman had a child until their husband had saved 2 years of childcare and half of their wives lost earnings.

But to make it fair, both the husband and wife would have to do that and with the cost of rent/mortgage/food/bills/transport that'd be nigh on impossible for the average couple.

Sorry being married to an abusive man is not an advantage.

We need a forum on mumsnet where the ill informed do not have a voice. Or take over debate. A safe space. A place where you are believed and a signpost to help and support.

Such a thing could never exist on the internet. There will never be a 'safe space' even if people weren't anonymous and this wasn't a public forum.

As for 'the ill informed do not have a voice', what if the ill informed are victims?

Do they not deserve a place in the debate so they can become more informed?

Not all red flags are easy to recognise. Not all lying is easy to recognise. No one who can't recognise red flags or lying wants to believe they are in a cycle of abuse.

You can't talk about this stuff in real life. We need a forum on mumsnet where the ill informed do not have a voice. Or take over debate. A safe space. A place where you are believed and a signpost to help and support.

I had to go elsewhere to find understanding, help and support.

'Active' is not the right place. Too much ignorance. But a lot of clicks. Depends on what you want mumsnet to be.

I wish every woman had an escape found even when their relationship is wonderful. I wish no woman had a baby without being married. I wish no woman had a child until their husband had saved 2 years of childcare and half of their wives lost earnings.
We women need to stop letting our hearts rule our heads and always have an escape plan. My Husband is lovely but i have a plan because you never know when they won't be lovely anymore.

Yep.

You don't realise it is bad because he didn't beat you to a pulp and put you in hospital. He only did ..Boiled frog.

Not until someone reacts to the "only did" with horror do you realise it might not be normal. Especially if you grew up in a dysfunctional family.

Also messages about how bad it is for children to vbe from a broken home are more prevalent than those about DV in homes. You worry about the children being alone with him thanks to the courts if you left, you want to be there to protect them in case he hurts them.

You don't want them to be used as a weapon or revenge.

No, as a DV survivor I can attest to that, it's not easy to leave.

Saying that, too many women give excuse after excuse to a cycle of lying, cheating, insidious degradation and general contempt that they or other women receive.

Perhaps I look at it from the otherside now because I escaped. But since, I have dated briefly an out and out narcissist who also turned out to be an addict with a criminal history and has framed himself as the 'rescuer' while also going out of his way to destroy me because I caught on it and left.

Don't ever ignore the red flags. Don't ever tolerate lies. Don't accept the cycle of abuse. Don't let anyone who is at war with themselves destroy your peace.
Walk away and stay away.

Well that must be a deliberate misinterpretation @FelixtheAardvark or perhaps you need to read it again.

Some men want to be both the destroyer and then the rescuer.

It's all about power and control.

This is alien to how most people live and not at all easy to spot. Because it is abnormal and cloaked. We can all spot an obvious wrong 'un'. Just because we have been played it doesn't make us stupid.

I stayed far longer than I should have because I felt ashamed and stupid. I thought my DC were better off if I stayed because he told me he would never do the same to them because he loved them.

To my shame I was on the floor welcoming death before my DS persuaded me to leave. Women's aid freedom program helped me realise there is life after 30 years of abuse.

It's not easy to leave.

So many women are 'friends' - IRL and on social media - with predatory males.

I agree with everything you're saying, OP.

I also think that women who are not in a relationship with an abuser/have not yet been, ought to look at the red flags of the men they keep close in one way or another. A man, single or not, following scores of women on SM and liking their pics/subscribing to dodgy pages is a womanising scumbag. Men who have had multiple failed relationships and cannot/does not see their DC? Why associate with this?

Agree with pretty much everything you've said OP. I do think that as women we need to stop pushing and supporting the narrative that being attached to a man and having children is the be all and end all. The any-man-is-better-than-no-man thinking leads to acceptance of terrible things.

I think it is sneaky victim blaming to say that abusive men target 'vulnerable' women.

Some men target strong women as friends/family are more likely to see the man as the 'henpecked' victim and be on his side so the woman is isolated from friends and family and has no support if and when things get worse.

Why do you think men are more likely to become overtly abusive during pregnancy and after childbirth, if their partner is ill or bereaved? They've already spent years portraying themselves as perfect and their wives as unreasonable and demanding.

Temporary vulnerability is part of the life experience. It does not invite abuse from the person you believed would support you.

I was recovering from c-section when my not so lovely DH at the time said 'I don't want to hit you but I don't know what else to do'.

It is very hard to deal with abuse when you are temporarily vulnerable and if you manage to become strong again, the abuse disappears and the abuser blames you or your hormones. Or can't remember it. And forgives you. And then lovebombs you. Mindfuck.

@Redruby2020 I agree with you, but really, pointing this out just makes people double down, like @Itsalwaysfools .

OP, I can see from your posts that you experienced significant DV and ACEs as a child I'm sorry this happened to you, and so pleased you have found a good man with whom to share your life.
When you refer to the "common or garden ‘pricks’ who, whilst abusive are not dangerous and can be avoided and left without harm." I think it's important to acknowledge that a) a woman can't really know whether her partner is going to be the type to accept a break up and agree to dissolve the family peacefully, or whether he will turn into someone with a 'fuck around and find out' mentality who'll pull out the big guns as she attempts to exit and b) what one might assume is a man fitting your description based on what a woman might say about her relationship may be far from the truth ‐there might be many things she is not disclosing. Being a victim of DV, including coercive control, is humiliating and degrading in part because other women 'rapidly run out of patience' or 'can't understand how' or any number of such things while, all the while, the woman in question is tying herself in knots trying to make safe decisions for herself and her children.

@Nc546888 's post sums up a key issue.

One huge problem with this is that abusive husbands can legally have their children 50:50. Unless a woman can prove the man has severely physically abused the children and get a court to agree, then the court will grant the man 50:50 as a starting point.

THIS is one of the huge reasons women don’t leave abusive fathers. At least if they are around they can protect their children to some extent from the father’s anger/moods/violence/ mild to moderate neglect/ emotional abuse. The threshold for men not to have their children is exceedingly high

It's not as clear cut to say first thing and you leave, clearly if every woman did that and could that would end all abuse.
If you are unlucky to get with an abusive man, I've never really heard of anyone upping and leaving after the first thing happens.
@Redruby2020
I agree. In order to leave at the first sign of any problems you need to be an assertive confident woman, the sort of woman who will not defer to a man. A domineering predatory man will not be interested in such a woman, his instincts and impulses will mean that he is drawn to women whom he feels he is able to dominate and exploit.

And that a ‘good father’ is someone who treats the mother of his children with dignity and respect. These are mutually inseparable from each other.

@Mrsredlipstick

My late mother was a police officer working in DV.
Her advice:
have your own money always.
Do not have children without a marriage. Make sure you leave immediately if you are subject to violence.

Great idea.
Well many had jobs their own money, they had kids within marriage, hasn't made it any easier from what I've witnessed and experienced.
Depends, does this mean violence as in physically or any type of domestic violence?
Some women from older generations seemed to have been taught or told themselves if their husband was physically violent they would leave.
This is *ullshit. So they put up with everything but that, plus the man breaking things, hitting things etc.
So what were they waiting for?!

It's not as clear cut to say first thing and you leave, clearly if every woman did that and could that would end all abuse.
If you are unlucky to get with an abusive man, I've never really heard of anyone upping and leaving after the first thing happens.

So basically, you have to put up with it and hope to god some "left wing" government (whatever that might mean) will enact legislation to improve things.

No wonder the Tories win more elections than Labour.

Even non abusive men do that, that woman has a home benefits in work, they don't need to do much.
I know one who because he lives with his family, and it was no longer possible to take his kids there for over night contact, he asked his gf if he could have his kids at her place.
She was in other accommodation for 6 years waiting to be housed, so though I don't think he sat and waited 6 years for her to be housed permanently, I do wonder what he was doing with his wages all those years, and what he would have done if she had got stuck where she was for even longer?!