This is an OTT reaction from crazed DP isn't it??

[LemmysMole]

I feel like I'm going crazy.

Earlier dp confused me for his ex for the 2nd time in two days (another thread). On top of this he's been really argumentative and snappy with me for the past week or so - example was recently snapping at me when I mentioned our upcoming wedding saying he was sick of hearing about it. He also seems to have gone off sex and even seems reluctant to kiss me giving me a quick kiss then pulling away.

So tonight when he again confused a time with his ex for a time with me I got upset, told him I was pissed off and when he came to hug me I declined (he does this to me ALL the time! I very rarely do it).

Anyway he shut himself away in the dining room. I gave him 20 minutes or so then went in asking if he was going to watch the movie with me. He said "no". I said "don't be like this, I was upset, can we forget it?" And he went into full blown crazed mode - said I wasn't to touch him or go near him, said he was going to call the police if I went near him, started to call the police when I went to hug him. Told me to fuck off and "do one" ... I started to cry (unusual) and told him I didn't want to argue and he carried kicking off at me - physically pushed me away when I went to hug him, refused to talk to me, said he was 'livid' with me and didn't want me near him and when I begged him to stop it (honestly he was acting like a mad man jumping around saying I was abusing him) he imitated me saying I was a drama queen and how hard must it be to live with such a bastard.

Even if I initially over reacted about the reference to his ex (which I fully admit) surely his response is bat shit crazy?? Or is it me?? I really wonder some times

Another one who is begging you not to marry this man. It will only ever get worse.

Yep, as bad as you feel right now, WAY WORSE!

You have dc. You can't afford to fuck up their lives by sharing theirs with a man like this. He's not good enough, and doesn't want to be with you. Take him at his word and get the hell out.

OP, I didn't realise you also have children. Even more reason to get out of there quickly. How is your current DP around your kids?

If you can't sell, he should buy you out.

Find a place to rent first though. Don't tell him you are doing so, just do it and go, without telling him where. Then get a solicitor working on the rest.

As for your six month probation, I am sure you will be fine. It could take several months to sort out everything regarding the house anyway.

Lemme, you said you had no one in RL to turn to, but you've written wedding invites. Look at your invites list, love. These are the people closest to you. There must be someone there who cares about you and your DC, and would take you in for a short while so you can have some breathing space to sort your head out.

Even if he gives you grovelling apologies later, tell him that you accept it, but you don;t want a relationship with him anymore and the wedding is off.

Oh blimey you poor thing. Calling out his ex gf name twice is a major red flag when you put it together with the aggression and behaviour.

Why would he have ex's name on his mind if he wasn't seeing her now?

I hope he is at least calm today and you get to think clearly.

Oh crap, I didn't know there were children involved
When he's calmer, I think you should talk to him about moving out, much easier for him to go than you.

It's good you have a plan but will he cooperate? You're telling him it's over, the wedding's off, how will he react? Even if it's what he wants he might still react irrationally (given how he was last night). I think you're taking a risk staying in the house and should look for a way to leave asap. Hope it all works out for you x

Ah, you have children too? In that case my advice to save yourself becomes: save yourself and if you don't see that you're worth saving, save your children, they definitely are worth it!

I may be misunderstanding but your initial plan to split up seems to depend on him agreeing, giving you his blessing, and collaborating in a plan to live together for half a year purely to help you get away from him in a financially secure way.

Why on earth do you think he would do that? You are imagining a completely different man from the one whose extreme and erratic behaviour is wearing you down and causing you such distress.

You can't expect this man to do anything except carry on hurting you and scaring you. You cannot expect kindness or support. Or rather, you can expect it but you won't get it!

You need to get away from this man, and when you split up from him, he will become more of a risk to you and your children, not less. He won't be rational will he? This is the man that screams at you, manipulates you, is so weak he'd rather destroy you and turn you into some kind of reviled baddie, causing you so much pain that you'll either break or leave, the same man that can't even seem to remember who you are, mixes you up with exes, is addicted to smoking dope and sea to have a very tenuous grip on reality...

Please don't make a plan that relies on him being a good, fair and supportive man who will help you get away from him.

Leave. Don't keep following him into rooms where he has gone to be on his own because he is angry. Don't keep trying to hug him again and gain when he has asked you to leave him alone and shut himself away. Don't keep on at him. Let him calm down. Calm down a bit yourself.

It looks as if he does not want marriage - but you do. This is never easy. Really it is probably best to calmly break it up as best you can. I had to do this once. Every time I mentioned marriage, kids, buying a place together there was a row - it got worse, he said I was hounding him, but he wouldn't finish it. (He did care about me, it had been seven years, the sex was good, we had mutual friends, we had fun...)

I broke it off - by phone from another city. It was awful.

Roll on five years and I am happily the mother of a gorgeous baby and I find out through mutual acquaintance that he was married. Both happy.

The sad part is I think I've always known he didn't want to be with me but whenever I've brought it up he's made out that I'm being paranoid. If he doesn't want me, why can't he say "yes you're right, I made a mistake and I don't want to marry you". Why all the confusion and uncertainty

It is quite possible he does want to be with you. He just doesn't want to be nice, or faithful or considerate. He wants you thete to blame.

My x used to say I was ruining his life, I was awful etc. And I'd ask why he didn't just leave then. He just wanted someone there to blame for all his problems because without me he'd have to look in the mirror.

But who cares what he wants or why.

You deserve better. Glad you are making plans to split.

Be brave it is for the best

You could ask him to move out for a while, yes. He might agree if he desperately wants out but doesn't want to have to be the one who says it (what a dick, by the way).

I'm glad you're doing the short term pain, long term gain option here. Otherwise, you'd get married, not be happy on your wedding day, and spend the rest of your life feeling upset, insecure and emotional - and that way madness lies.

Glad you have your own job and account OP. You can do this.

aeroflotgirl's plan is much better. Use the savings as a deposit and get the house sold, that way you do not have to spend 6months trying to buy him out.

yes you have to do that, and then contact a solicitor about selling the house or disposing of it in some way.

Just because he was happy writing out wedding invites one day does not mean a man will not be "sick of hearing about it" a couple of days later. that's just not the way we work.

Other than that it sounds like a bad tale to me: four possible reasons immediately spring to mind:

1. Really has had enough of the wedding planning (I had a little input to mine but ultimately didn't care what the wedding favours or orders of service looked like).

2. Having second thoughts about getting married and doesn't know how to voice concerns. It is a big step and one that most men are conditioned against accepting by 'social norms', this fades with age though.

3. It is possible he is cheating on you, guilt about such a thing often manifests itself as aggression. If this is the case then the Ex could be a prime suspect.

4. Something else, most likely only going on in his head: i.e. stress or depression - both of which could be caused by impending wedding cost and what marriage means. Cannabis could make either of these worse, especially if using skunk (particularly strong cannabis strains with a very strong smell).

All of the above would need to be approached carefully and most likely talked out at a calm moment.

Despite the above, I think it's very difficult to judge for your from a short description on a forum. Ultimately you know the situation best, what does your gut tell you is going and what do you think needs doing about it.

Sorry, post above was based on earlier in the thread, didn't realise this one had snowballed so much

Yes, don't make buying him out your problem. If he wants to stay in the house, he needs to raise the cash but otherwise, it should be sold. You are cause spite for your self trying to do the right thing by him. I agree that you want to act decently but this causes too much difficulty for you.

I hope you are ok x

'Causing'

Lemmy, you are sounding pragmatic and a lot more together this morning.

My sis cancelled her wedding - they got some of the money back, but I'm so glad she did. She'd found out her intended was a compulsive gambler, and had been embezzling money from his work. For months I thought she was going to forgive, but she saw the light in the end. She worked for the same company, and this made her job essentially untenable too.

I think she probably felt she had no-one to turn to, she was jobless, homeless, she moved back in with mum & stepdad and gradually pulled her life back together. It took a lot of time - but she's happily with someone else now

Hope today is ok for you - remember, we do not have to put up with feeling unsafe, insecure, unwanted in our own home. Better alone than that!

The cannibis use in the house would be a real worry, dealbreaker even, for me too.

Okay; first off, yes cannabis can have a de-stabilising effect on someones personality, especially if they are perhaps a little unstable or have a mental health issue (diagnosed or not). And I'm saying that as someone who has used cannabis as a pain control med due to health issues.

Skunk is a particular form of weed/cannabis that is especially strong and is linked with mental health problems.

I would suggest at the very least that you talk to him calmly and say that you feel it best to delay the wedding until you are both certain that is what you want. While we are only hearing one side of it - yours - his behaviour isn't the normal behaviour of a man who wants to get married. My DH was more excited than I was!

You need to be able to keep calm and have a conversation with him. If you feel yourself starting to get upset, you need to excuse yourself and come back to it later. Don't give him the excuse. If you think you're going to struggle with saying it ad-lib, then write it down first and practice saying your piece.

Be honest with yourself about whether this is really a relationship you want to stay in, or whether you are just feeling scared at the thought of being alone. As someone who was incredibly shy growing up and is still an introvert, I do understand that feeling. But you deserve to be happy and right now it sounds emotionally abusive. Don't remain in a relationship out of fear.

Have just re-read through the entire thread (sorry, hadn't slept all night).

I'd say that you really do sound a lot more practical and decisive today.

Listen, two joints a night is really not mild use. My brother, DH and I once sat and smoked three between us (passing round) one night; my brother chucked a whitey - paranoid as all hell - and practically ran out the door. Two minutes earlier he'd been laughing like a loon. And I'm telling you now that my brother is so laid back he's almost horizontal.

To have smoked, what was it? 6? Plus booze. Sheesh. Not good.

I still think you need to keep calm and don't make any move to touch him. If I'm being honest, I don't like to be touched if I'm upset about something - a work colleague once told me that in a particular situation she'd have hugged anyone else, but knew I'm not a tactile person (her words). Has he ever asked you not to touch him before? In a calm and sane manner?

If not, how could you know that touching him would have the opposite effect of what you intended? For now, stay clear and don't initiate anything.

Don't let him get you worked up - believe me, I know that's difficult, as I'm a little over-emotional at times (partic with my mother). If he starts acting like a total dick, leave the room. Calmly.

Think about speaking to a women's aid or domestic abuse support service local to you to discuss your options with them.

I hope you're able to figure out your best course of action for you and your children. Neither you nor they deserve to be in a situation where such emotionally fraught and abusive incidents happen. Take care of yourself, hun.

I am not thinking you are trying to gaslight her on purpose, I just think that trying to hug someone who you are meant to be in love with and about to marry when they are upset, having just written your wedding invitations out etc, is not abuse!

Don't worry about the bluntness.

I'd just like to add that I absolutely did not say it was abuse, and also that I did not at all mean that the DP could lash out after such an 'assault' and claim it was self-defence, no way. But she does need to realise that she doesn't need to touch him and he has a right not to be touched (I believe it's assault only, that is, none of the things he's attaching to that idea, like it being abuse and that he could hit her as a result, or even that the police would be at all interested tbh as long as she stopped pretty quickly).

I do understand the feeling of panic and desperation and the need to be close to someone and feel like everything's ok by hugging them when they're shutting off/upset though. I try to avoid that kind of thing these days, I was always embarrassed about my behaviour later on and worried I might have come across as clingy to the point of crazy (where the attempt at hugging was to reassure myself rather than the other person, that is).

Your plan sounds quite sensible, OP. The fact that you legally could get more money out of the house than you feel you are entitled to might be a good point in your favour to convince him to move out for the moment.

You say you have no RL support and say it is because you are introverted. However you describe an abusive man, are you certain he has not contributed to your isolation as that is a classic first step in an abusive relationship.

Agree with Topseyt at Sun 03-Jan-16 10:05:05 and at Sun 03-Jan-16 10:11:55.

Assuming you can still get to work as normal this should not affect your job, certainly a lot less than living with a drug using abusive man will.

was/is he providing child care or doing school drop offs/pick ups for you? If so you will need to find an alternative but I am sure you would want want this man looking after your kids anyway.

If you are not living with him will your child/ren's father pay something?

amistillsexy re Lemme, you said you had no one in RL to turn to, but you've written wedding invites. Look at your invites list, love. These are the people closest to you. Brilliant, we often miss those closest to us. Maybe the Op doesn't want people to know things have gone wrong in life. Lemmy if this is the case, this is the pride you have that all is well, but all is not well and honesty is much more important for you and your child/ren than keeping up a charade. Honestly.

Completely agree with MiscellaneousAssortment re "I may be misunderstanding but your initial plan to split up seems to depend on him agreeing, giving you his blessing, and collaborating in a plan to live together for half a year purely to help you get away from him in a financially secure way.

Why on earth do you think he would do that? You are imagining a completely different man from the one whose extreme and erratic behaviour is wearing you down and causing you such distress."

Please do not make your plans for your safety dependant on a person who clearly is not interested in your feelings or security. If he was he would not smoke six joints and start pushing you around and accusing you of abuse!

Do you think it would be worthwhile seeing a solicitor regarding the legalities of the house? My understanding is that unless he legally protected his larger share of the down payment, then the value of the house is shared 50/50. I think for me it would come down to how long we'd owned the house together. If we'd bought it a year ago I'd feel differently on a 50/50 split than if we'd bought it 10 years ago. But that's just me.

I haven't looked at any prior threads. Are the children his?