This is long but I'm ready to break.

[teacoupons]

DP is 25. When we got together he had a DS from a previous relationship who was a few months old and I had a DD from a previous relationship who was 18 months. He was a drummer. I supported him but he was unemployed, brought in no money and I provided for him for the next two years.

I fell pregnant. While I was pregnant we had a few issues with his drumming and drinking/other women he'd previously slept with around him all the time. He gave up drumming to be a family man and started taking a class in college to become an electrician for a career. He told me drumming was a pipe dream and a distant memory for him and he'd never go back as he was looking forward to our life together.

He's been lying to me for two years. Since the birth of our daughter (who's 11 months) he's been in college one full day a week, working five days a week and being at home for the rest. Tonight we go out for a few drinks to celebrate my birthday and he meets an old friend who has just been signed with his band.

I get back from the toilet and he tells me his friend is setting him up auditions and he's going to them. He wants to be a drummer. He "hates his life" but loves me and his DC's. He wants more. He wants to be in a big band and get signed to do tours without regard for me, his DC's or the lack of time he currently spends with us. He wants to take his two days off a week and drum it all away. He would give up work to drum. He wouldn't do anything for our family.

So, I find myself at a crossroads. He has lied to my face about the drumming for two years. He is adamant he's doing it and doesn't care how it affects us but wants both drumming, his job, his college and his family. He is a man child who is all about him and I am broken hearted, defeated and feel like a mug.

I honestly don't know where to go from here. Please, help. AIBU to think his dream should not come before his family that he wanted and he built or am I being selfish?

I agree with you Thepollydolly.

There is jealousy on my part with the other women. Not jealousy in the usual sense but that they are still thoroughly infatuated years after their brief encounter. It seems they're there wherever we go and three years on are wrecking my reputation, spreading rumours and going so far as to smack and spit on me involving the police. Over him, of course.

I think the issues came up during pregnancy as I was high risk and was surging with hormones. Couple that with the man you.love drinking, drumming and being out at all hours around his ex's and girls throwing themselves at him while I'm home with DC's, I felt disempowered and abandoned.

He is a man child who needs to grow up, accept responsibility and be here. At the same time I will not be the woman responsible for holding him back.

We have compromised. He'll not drink and drum. He won't speak to his ex's as he hates them for the hell they've put me through. He will arrange babysitters so I can go to as many gigs as possible etc.

Above all else, he was a sponger first and foremost when you met him and I don't know why you thought that would change, despite what he said.

One word of wisdom my mum always told me -- don't marry someone in hopes of changing him. Maybe that's not really helpful to you at this point though..

I know he has made all sorts of noises about manning up, but it seems you have been the one providing the impetus towards his electrician dream and even providing the fees for his course.

How about you asking him for a refund of the fees before he embarks on the drumming thing so he can earmark the first £1700 he makes with the band for repayment of what he owes to you?

I would be very inclined to see if you can get back to finish university and look into becoming self supporting, with a good job. Then make a decision as to whether you need the drummer in your life.

I haven't given up university. I'm still doing my degree three hours a week in class and home study on top of work.

Did I say I had given it up?

Some people have a vocation and will never be happy doing anything else. My dh is one of those; a guitarist and singer, song writer etc. He tried to do an office job when I was pg and we have never recovered our happy relationship (and, believe me, I didn't even want him to that job, I just wanted him to play guitar, so there was no pressure from me at all).

I have lived my whole life with professional musicians. None of them would have been happy with a 9 - 5 secure job.

You are going to have to decide whether you can live with him as a musician, and all that entails, or as a miserable git.

Sorry. Some can and some can't, no criticism of either. It sounds to me that you can't, so I think you would be better off being honest with him before you both get so bitter and resentful that you can't bear the sight of each other. Tell him now. You have a better chance of being friends when you split and everyone will benefit from that.

Sorry, misread -- and good for you to be keeping it up.

Everything you've posted points to what you said a few posts back being very true -- he is easily led. There is therefore always the possibility that you will only ever succeed in getting lip service to whatever you want from him, while he will be also behind your back paying lip service to everyone else, including the ex gf's. He doesn't come across as someone with much of a backbone. I don't think he will have the strength to get rid of the groupies/ex gfs.

I think you are hearing only what you want to hear, even from the counsellor, and building your hopes of marriage and a future with him on very shaky ground that is mainly composed of your hopes and dreams. To be fair to you, I think he is likely to be feeding you the lines he knows you want to hear too. From your posts, I think you are too smart and too responsible to your children to be doing this and I wonder why you are telling yourself you can make a silk purse out of this sow's ear someday.

He drinks and has an anger problem. He has children and yet no obvious way to support them. When you first met him he was a sponger supported by his mum. He didn't support you emotionally when you were pregnant or financially until the last 9 weeks and apparently the weight of that on his shoulders has crushed him. All of this spells out a bleak outlook. Look at what he does and not what he says.

'This wasn't what I wanted him to be. This isn't what he wants to be. '

Are you sure you love this man warts and all?

(1) 'FWIW, he put his drumming before my DD who he treats as his own and is the legal parent of and me who was heavily pregnant and contracting while his DSS was running a fever. He said he would be home at 11pm. He strolled in at 4am off his tits on weed and alcohol after drumming.'

(2) 'He is violent. He gets violent on alcohol and has shouted at me, threatened me and pushed me on occasion. He hasn't in some time now though.'

-- Do you really think this man is the man for you? It is just going to be uphill all the way. Do you want this for you or for your children?

I think you love having a man or the idea of a relationship leading to marriage but there is a little voice in your head that is telling you to notice the big differences between your ideal and reality. You should listen to that voice.

The quote was misconstrued. I meant this wasn't what I wanted him to be BECAUSE he didn't want to be this man. I don't try to change him, make him a project or try to fix him because I met him as he was and loved him for who he was and is. I expected change but not major change. I just expect consideration.

I can almost certainly guarantee that you will be abck on here in a few moths because either-
he will have cheated
he will have let you down over dcs/money/responsibities
he will become a piss head again
he will be violent again

He wont change-he has told you this catagorically. Listen to what he is telling you. More fool you.

But apparently he doesn't want to be that electrician man now and says it was never him, ever. I think he has been saying things he knew you wanted him to say for a long time and meanwhile has been doing a lot of the opposite behind your back.

When you met him he was a sponger and if you approved of that and loved him for it then why did you pay for an electrician course for him?

I think Pink is right. You could save yourself a lot of heartache by standing back from all of this and taking stock of what he has actually been doing.

He hasn't been doing anything behind my back. He rarely goes out, doesn't socialise and mostly drinks at home.

I paid for his course because he said he wanted to do it and always has been interested. It's not that he doesn't want to be an electrician now, just he hasn't found an apprenticeship and has bigger aspirations than just being an electrician.

teacoupons I really feel for you. But can be a little bit blunt?

He was a drummer when you met him - and whether you like it or not, part of that would have been the initial attraction. There is something about blokes in a band 'choosing' you (I mean that as all women going out with musicians) over all the other women throwing themselves at blokes in a band. (Because they do. God knows why, but there you have it.) It's his passion. He now sees his mate's band going somewhere and he's probably got this little voice in his head going 'what if? what if?' and that little voice will also be whispering fame and fortune and a life away from the hum drum 9-5 which is what he has tried to do but it's probably making him crazy. He's also probably justifying it to himself on maybe being able to give you all a lifestyle he could never afford as an electrician. (Although electricians seem to earn a bloody fortune these days.)

He's also 25 - which is not a baby age, but it's still young, and too young to see your life ahead of you and fear that it will just be the same old. Especially if you are someone of a creative bent.

Yes, he's got responsibility to you and your DCs and his DC from previous. All this is true. But nobody 'falls' pregnant: both of you got pregnant, and you too have a kid from a previous relationship so it's level pegging there.

From experience, drummers (nearly all the ones I know) are just eternal teenagers. I can think of one who is a family man, and she is a woman. Music is my passion, and it makes those of us who do it for a living ever so slightly immature for longer than most people. We do eventually settle down, but a lot later in life than many. (Just from observing mates, nearly all of whom are musicians.)

Anyway, if he's any good, he'll make a go of it; if he isn't, he'll quickly have to accept that he won't be able to make a living from it. It might take him 'til he's 30 when reality will bite him on the arse. You just need to decide if it's worth hanging on in there.

You're not a mug; you love someone, had faith in them, supported them, and you feel let down. His alcohol=anger pattern is a serious warning sign, drummer or not, that's just arsehole behaviour, and inexcusable. But it does sound like the behaviour of a frustrated person who explodes because of dissatisfaction with their life. It could be something that continues if he isn't being himself, unless he's able to sort his shit out. Not good for you, not good for children to witness. That would be the most immediate reason to get out, IMHO.

You're saying different things now from the things you said at the start of the thread, and you are also contradicting yourself within sentences. This is from your OP:

'He gave up drumming to be a family man and started taking a class in college to become an electrician for a career. He told me drumming was a pipe dream and a distant memory for him and he'd never go back as he was looking forward to our life together.

He's been lying to me for two years. Since the birth of our daughter (who's 11 months) he's been in college one full day a week, working five days a week and being at home for the rest. '

He has so been doing things behind your back. What was he lying about for two years?

This is what you are saying now:
'It's not that he doesn't want to be an electrician now, just he hasn't found an apprenticeship and has bigger aspirations than just being an electrician.'

You are tying yourself up in knots to avoid seeing the real person you are dealing with.

I wouldn't care about the drumming, I would care about the pushing around, the aggression, the drinking, the immaturity, the other women and children (presumably all unpaid for as well). I think you know the truth of the situation but cant' bear to let go at this moment, having invested a lot in this dream (and not the actual reality of the man). I would though, if someone pushed me about.

Well, you have to decide what you want.

You can't control him, you can only control you.

If he isn't what you want in a partner then you are going to have to move on. He can't have it all, no one can. If there was a way for him to drum and hold down a job and be a good husband and father that would be one thing, lots of people manage to have hobbies.

He has responsibilities, kids don't feed and clothe themselves, he didn't have to have kids, he choose to, so that means if he needs to man up. If he won't then there is nothing you can do about it.

So he went from his mum paying for everything to you paying for everything! No wonder he didnt fancy getting a job sharpish...why bother when everything is being handed to you on a plate!
I say good on him for following his dream, albeit ill timed with his responseabilities but I hope it works out for all of you.

Was he a drummer when you met him? If so that's what he was and you should have accepted it or moved on to someone more reliable; 9 to 5, monday to friday perhaps.

Do you have no life of your own? I mean some independence to do what you want too? Sounds like you rely on him for reaching your goals a little too much perhaps.
Could you not get him to have the kids one night a fortnight or something so you can go out with friends and get drunk or just for a meal and a chat? Or even go to college yourself?

I would insist he finish his course though as it would be a waste of time and money not to and he won't get the qualification at the end which is a shame, as it's something to fall back on if/when the drumming doesn't work out.

However I get the distinct impression it is the drumming that is the problem; if he was out of the house for the same amount of time doing something which you approved of would you still be angry?

He does sound a bit selfish- like you say a man/child- but you also sound a bit miserable and controlling. Sorry if I'm wrong and it must be a strain on you but maybe you could think about it all differently to make yourself happier.