I’m sick for the fourth time this year, with norovirus. I’ve just stopped vomiting but I’m feeling fragile and exhausted. I’ve had the silent treatment from my husband all day and then when he was about to leave for the pub he said “you always act like you hate me when you’re ill”
We’ve had problems for a really long time but I’ve just kept burying my head in the sand, always a reason not to end it, eg. What about the kids, he’s going through a tough time, works stressful, I can’t afford life on my own etc etc
Whenever things bubble over and we argue I end up in floods of tears and he just screams at me. He calls me controlling and critical if I express any desire to do something together, and question his 5th visit to a pub in a week. He will often stop arguments and say my tone is “off”. I’ve shamelessly started recording our arguments as he will swear blind he’s not said something when he has - going as far as swearing on the kids lives.
I don’t know if I ask too much but I like to have an evening together just us two sometimes. He said to me when I suggested a film the other week “that’s your big plan is it? We can do that when I come home and then cuddle in bed”. He says in destroying his friendships because he “has to be at home with me every day” (he doesn’t stay home with me).
I was taken into hospital with a lung clot in January and he called me a hypochondriac the whole way there and then complained about not being able to sleep.
He thinks it’s normal to tell me to shut the fuck up, fuck off, call me a loser, call me a fantasist and mocks me during arguments saying “big words to make yourself feel clever”. When I say I’m stressed at work he’ll say “you chose to work, go on the dole if you can’t hack it”
He’s never hit me, but he’s blocked me going out of a room during arguments, he speeds in the car during arguments, he’s thrown things and said “you don’t want to hear shouting, I’ll fucking shout at you”
He’s put me in thousands of pounds worth of debt. He’s asked me to cover mortgage payments when he couldn’t and never paid me back, I’ve had to pay off some of his old drug debts. I buy every weekly shop, every takeaway. His response is “you earn more, it’s our money”. Now he’s asking me to take out a small loan for a new car for him as his is being repossessed due to missed payments. He’s badgering me asking for a budget. I don’t drive and don’t need a car.
Whenever I mention anything to him, he says “you’re stitching together old arguments and creating a new narrative”, “we sorted that out”, “stop bringing old shit up”. In pointing out a pattern but that’s wrong apparently??
I’m unwell right now and highly emotional but I just can’t do this anymore. he’s out at the moment and I feel like getting a taxi to my mums even though it would costs hundreds.
and then I think, is this normal? I’m no saint. I’ve raised my voice at him before. I’ve contributed to arguments, but I ask for nothing and get nothing and it all just feels like I’m wading through shit all the time.