To end my marriage tomorrow

He is clearlydepressed and overwhelmed as are you OP. Having one child with extra needs is hard enough but two is extremely difficult and at 68 under normal circumstances one would hope to be getting one’s life back and relaxing. I am not justifying his actions but he sounds like a person on the edge. Nobody really signs up for all this. I’m sorry OP. Give it some time and space if you can, but I wouldn’t leap to divorce. Maybe he would!

With divorce the starting point is 50/50 of everything which includes pensions, investments and savings as well as any houses, cars, jewellery and furniture.
The courts want to see that each party can put a roof over their heads and have enough income to cover bills and expenses
It is up to a judge to decide on the percentages

If he leaves - you'll have to pay for 2 households between you AND you'll be lumped with lion share of all caring. Is that really what you want?? Is he always so fucking useless or is he just having a bad moment tonight
**
If he leaves then the divorce will mean that
Youre about to get 700 posters telling you to leave the bastard - but they are not facing the actual reality of doing that - so take it with a level head

Not too sure why Shedding123
will have to worry about a second home to run. Where exh lives isn’t anything to do with her.
Also having done all the work regarding children with a side helping of shouts and general nastiness. The split will be just doing the same things with out the arguments and nastiness.

The reality is there will be less work as she won’t have him around upsetting children and making things 10 times worse
It will be peaceful and quiet and children will be easier to manage without someone swearing at them.

I can’t see any downsides

I can see huge issues if you stay together

OP, I am so sorry your dh has turned into a nasty, selfish, spiteful twat. What on earth has built him up into a volcano of hate.

Mood changes can be a sign of dementia, including that weird smoking fixation. Who knows what is wrong with him. You are still relatively young. Best to be rid of him. No point wasting even a second of your life caring for him.

You got to starting working out how to extricate yourself and your dcs from this situation. I can understand your concern about losing his contribution. I suspect losing his presence will lighten the mood in your house and you and dcs can breathe again.

Sleep over it. Things will be clearer in the morning. Then book an appointment with a divorce solicitor. Baby steps.

I’m really sorry.
It sucks when life takes a hard left turn.
I think you need to think about your children, and they’re still little enough that a lifetime of that bullshit is a lifetime too long.
Your husband is gonna have to provide for his children whether he retires or not - don’t let him threaten you with that idiotic nonsense.
Happy children are worth living in a cold one bedroom flat.
Happy children are worth living paycheck to paycheck.
Happy children are worth seeing their dad every other weekend.
What I’m trying to say is, you might possibly have to sacrifice in a life away from your husband - but your children will be happy, so every sacrifice will be well worth it.
You need to consult an attorney ASAP.
Sending love from faraway ❤️

You mentioned he still gets out to socialise 1-2, times a week. That's nice for him.

Also that he seems young and active and you feel run down with additional care work.

I have to ask: would you ever be able to take a few hours off for a bit of reading like him or to get out twice a week? More seriously, what happens if you fall ill? You're doing everything now as it is with him seemingly looking on or in a different room.

He doesn’t get to express hating his life by shouting abusively at his wife and daughter without their being consequences. So I find this irrelevant.

I agree with the poster who says you should divorce him asap before he retires.

He realistically doesn't have much longer he can work. Maybe 2 years full time. So after that you lose the £59k a year, he's even more angry and abusive, you are all even more ground down, and you will have the guilt tripping from him of "I can't believe you want to divorce me now I'm old and vulnerable". Also bear in mind he might get much worse when he retires if being around the children stresses him so much. He also won't be able to avoid the health implications of his previous addiction much longer. I'd expect a sharp decline any time now.

In short, now is the time to divorce before you get truly saddled with him with no escape.

I don't think he hates you, I think that he hates his life. He is 68 yrs old, all of his peer group will be retired and enjoying having grandchildren to treat and tease and he is still working and his two children with significant needs.

Is it worth divorcing him? It sounds like he won't be around too much longer anyway with the stress he feels under.

OP probably wanted to do just that, as would I, but she was being the adult in the room. Someone had to be!

Also, men are super-scary when they're really angry. I have a lot of experience of this, and it's really not as easy to stand up to them as you might think when they're on the verge of loss of control. Not for nothing would I never, ever live with a man again.

I think i would have let it go with both barrells shouted back and said similar words to the effect of ," How dare you shout in front of the kids like that, frightening Dd so much she was crying , spitting out insults in front of them and telling DD she's as rude as I. Is this what you want her to model her relationships on with you as the main example ...letting her partner in the future call her names and teaching her to blind do as she's told? What a fine example you're setting Who do you think u r?!"

Hi OP, I'm sorry to hear of your woes. It all sounds like a complete mess and no one is happy. It also sounds like the only thing stopping you from divorcing is the money issues. I expect you would keep the house and he would keep his pension, if he stopped work. And really, you have to plan for him being on a pension, anyway, since he's 68 and really anything can happen at that age, healthwise. Any extra working years at his age are an unexpected bonus and could end at any time.

So, assuming he's on a pension and you're on 29k, what would most likely happen is that he would get housing benefit, and maybe universal credit, and he would need to rent a one-bed flat, possibly in a cheaper area. You would keep the house since you paid a lot of it off and since you have two children with additional needs. You would also get universal credit, since you only earn 29k and have two dependents and wouldn't get much, if anything, from him.

Yes, you would all be worse off than now, but when you consider that the 58k salary from him is very much non-guaranteed due to age, you might soon end up without that 58k anyway - AND having to care for him!

You would be worse off, but you would all be OK, thanks to this country having a good safety net for vulnerable people like your children and their carer (you) and for seniors like your husband. And everybody would be happier. He might be in a one-bed rental, but he would have the peace and quiet that I bet he wants at his age to just read his book. And you and your children will live without his moods and temper, and you won't have the demands of being a partner, which it doesn't sound like you have time for anyway, caring for two children with no help.

It won't be easy to break up, but I think it will be an easier life afterwards.

Before you say anything to your husband, I think your very first order of business should be a solicitor and maybe also Social Services, to see what you'd each be entitled to, in terms of UC and housing benefit.

Best of luck to you. I escaped a marriage to a man with intense anger issues, and my life is a million times nicer, even if I have less money and won't be able to retire. I'd rather work until I simply can't anymore than live with a man like that again.

68 is retirement age so he wouldn’t be doing anything wrong by retiring . It’s a crap situation. He can’t work forever for that good wage and you can’t force him too sadly.

what was he thinking to have a child at 60. That’s purely selfish. I’m not surprised he’s moody all the time. He’s 68 and ready to retire. He’s got 2 young kids one of whom has a disability. He doesn’t want to deal with stupid squabbles that shouldn’t take 45 mins to dissolve. For both of you you need to split. Courts will be interesting though because you need the house security for the kids but him retiring means he needs security too and as you can work probably means he’ll rightly keep his pension.

There was only an 8 year difference between my parents and the difference in their "vigour" for want of a better word was obvious. My mother expected my father to have the energy of someone her age. As she hit each of those older years, she had similar capabilities to what he had at the same age. I think your husband is at a different life stage to you and physically can't manage what you can.

Not sure what you do. Using abusive language is not on and I wouldn't tolerate it. But honestly I cannot see him be able to take care and run around after young kids.

I can only imagine how difficult this situation is. He's got a 9 year old at 68 years... that should be the age of his grandchild.

Then special needs, health issues with DD in the mix and a room mate marriage. It's to stressful and he's unable to deal with it maturely.

It's not healthy for anyone in the family. This was a ticking time bomb.

In what way, shape or form is that helpful? OP was 28 and he was 55 when the first child was born, but it's done, nothing can be done about that but OP needs to do something to make life better.

I've no idea how that can be done.

This man's behaviour is appalling and concerning, you must escape from him.
Please keep a log of all events.