What made you leave him?

[Hackneey]

What was the last straw/light bulb moment?

When a year in I found myself staring at the back of his head hoping he’d die in a car accident. Left a couple of months later.

My heart breaks reading all these stories, but I am so glad all you lovely women found the courage to leave and are doing better. What strong people you are and I actually admire the hell out of you all.

OP, we are all here to support you in making the right choice. I hope you are okay.

When, after staying with him for a year after his affair, he opened his Xmas card off me (it was a funny one about sprouts and farting!! It’s all he deserved) and said, ‘don’t bother getting me a Xmas card next year, if you can’t write anything nice in it’!!!

See ya....entitled, cheating, manipulative, controlling, lying narc twat 👋🏼👋🏼👋🏼

When he got aggressive and intimidating with our 10yo ds. After a few days of him refusing to leave and the abuse ramping up I called the police and reported him for domestic abuse and he left. I thought I was sheltering my dc from it all - as a lot of women do - and that it was ok as long as it was directed at me but I was wrong. In the aftermath of him leaving and my ds coming to terms with his rage that he has always been too scared to express while he lived with us, he said to me one night ‘you should have left him sooner, you have ruined the first 10 years of my life’.
I had let him down and it absolutely broke my heart.
Now we have never been happier - my ds and I are v close and we now live in a safe, relaxing environment. Just remember tho that when you think the kids aren’t affected - they most definitely ARE.

When we were having a calm conversation one day, and I asked him "If I did everything you wanted me to do, would you still hit me?". He thought for a bit, and then replied "Yes, probably".

I'd spoken to my friend, about finances, as she was a single parent, and phoned the DHSS as the benefits office were called then, to see how much money I could claim, did the maths, and knew that I would survive financially.

I told him I wanted him to leave. He agreed, but it still took a few months until he found somewhere to live, and I had to couch it as a temporary separation, but it was such a relief when he left.

Not mine but my DM's final straw with my not so DF when I was 18 months old.

He came to the flat steaming drunk and 3am and proceeded to start pounding on the door & screaming all over the block that my mother was drugging me and abusing me because every time he 'visited' I was asleep.

DM tried to calm him down but obviously there's no reasoning with an alcoholic on a rant, he pushed her called her a whore and slapped her, she was so scared that he was going to get in to my bedroom that she said something snapped in her head & she grabbed him by the shoulders, kneed him in the stomach and threw him out for the last time.

He stayed outside for a while shouting until my uncle came and removed him from the building.

The way she told me when I was 12 and now over 15 years later is exactly the same it's like it's burned in her memory. I never saw him again either, he died when I was 16 of liver failure due to alcoholism.

It breaks my heart she went through that, she was and still is the best single mother in the world she's a tower of strength and I love her so much, OP and every other woman on this post sending you love

There were a lot of little turning points. One was when I spent a few weeks staying with my sister and her husband on holiday without my H for the first time in years. I was suddenly reminded how nice normal people interact with each other in a relationship--without daily contempt, criticism, and foul moods, and realized that was what I should be able to expect in my own marriage.

I am ok ferntwist, he's giving me the silent treatment now and I don't care tbh. Looking back he always used to ignore me after arguments and not speak to me for days, back then I would chase him and apologise even though I did nothing wrong. I just wanted it to end and I wanted him to start speaking to me again. He's been EA from the beginning, I just didn't know what i was back then. I would also make excuses for him and thought as long as he didn't hit me it was ok. I thought that was the line, him hitting me but tbh he crossed that line long time ago.

TheParis I had the same exact thoughts about him sadly.

Heartcurrent I want to make my DCs proud, i want to leave him and be the best single mother i can be. I want my DCs to say what you said about your mother about me 15 years from now

Some of these stories are horrific.

My ex after 18 years of him isolating me from all my friends, putting me down, always checking up on me to the extent where he actually followed me up the High Street as I was out shopping. My family also took his side constantly to the point where I'm LC with them.

My final straw came when I had a nervous breakdown and he cheated on me. I decided that I wanted my life back and deserved better so had a year of counselling and CBT to help me work on my issues.

2 years later, I am much more confident, relaxed, live in a lovely house alone and feel so much happier. At the moment I'm working on self-love and trying to lose 5 stone.

Op, you deserve so much better. Please leave this abusive arsehole.

and for everyone on here.

We'd been to the funeral of my 34 yr old best friend and got home with 15 minutes to ourselves before our 3 tiny DCs were dropped back home. I was very emotional and sobbing. He asked if I wanted a cuddle.....I did. He then suggested I get on all fours "for a quickie".

That was me done.

@Hackneey
I'm sure you already are, and you will give them that life, just focus on it.
She saved her own life because she knew she deserved and wanted more than that.

When i was having a horrible asthma attack and he stood over me shouting at him for waking him, calling me a drama queen, refusing to call an ambulance as they have 'real' emergencies to deal with and started to throw clothes at me telling me to get dressed and he would drive me to hospital if i needed it that badly. Then expected me to take the kids to school.

I was admitted to hospital where they kept me for 2 days before i could go home again. It took another 6 months or so before i felt able to leave, but that was the moment i knew.

When I realised I got more physical contact from a junkie I'd befriended (mostly just leaning against me to stay upright!) than I did from my DH.

When he hurled abuse down the phone at me.

ExH when he pinned me against the wall and threatened to kill me when DD3 was 12 weeks old, he was never violent but pretty aggressive until then.
Strangely we get on great now, he got councilling and anger management, now we are good friends and he has an open door to see his DC.

EXDP when he punched the wall screaming at me for being manipulative and horrible because I found out he had cheated on me a few months after having DD4.
He regularly cheated and would blame me for not fulfilling his needs.

Now with a fantastic DH that puts up with me and my illness, I’ll be dead within 10 years and he is the only person I trust to look after my DC, he is everything a man should be.

You will find happiness again OP, whether with someone else or by yourself.
I hope you are ok

And another thing. He would wait until the children were in bed asleep before screaming and yelling at me for things I hadn’t done and wouldn’t even think of doing. I begged him to stop because he would wake them up and hear their father screaming at their mother. He never would.

I would walk out of the house late at night so he wouldn’t wake the children and walk into town to save them from hearing all the shouting.

One night I was in town walking in the snow and I looked up and there was our car with the children in the back. He said ‘get in this car. If you ever walk out again I will drag these kids out of bed and come find you’. It was 10 at night.

Because I couldn’t walk out again I took our little dog and a sleeping bag and went to sleep in the greenhouse to get away from his screaming at me and protect the children. He said if you don’t get back in here now I’ll throw this brick at you. I refused and next thing I was stood there showered in glass.

Bastard. I hope he rots in hell.

I too used to apologise for his behaviour just to get back to some kind of normality. Soul destroying

I'm so sorry to hear that Olympiathequeen how are you doing now?

Oh my goodness these are awful stories. I am so sorry you all went through this stuff and you all sound so strong.

Mine is actually quite funny.. So a bit of light relief for you all... The light bulb was him saying

'I have met someone and he is a man'

I said... Well '' he "wouldn't be a woman

I had subconsciously known for 15yrs...

We left each other...

When I was running around like a blue arsed fly and he was laid on the sofa. Ds asked if he was going to help and he said "No I have no investment in this house" despite living here and being my husband for 28 years. I was used to him doing nothing but hearing it was different. He has been gone ten months now and life is so much better and funnily enough I don't have to run round like a blue arsed fly now I don't have his cooking, laundry or cleaning up after him to do.

1st: He held a knife to my throat and I thought, I will literally die if I don’t leave.

2nd: He refused to come to my grandparents funeral as he would be bored.

I sure know how to pick them. The second one spurred me into counselling though and I am now very happily married

First Ex - when I grew up and realised what my life would be like if I stayed with him.
Ex No.2 when I realised he would never put me first. Controlling mother, hell bent on him marrying a good Irish catholic. I was none of those. He wanted us to live together (in secret) ffs! He's doing exactly this with his current Gf and has been for years.

Ex No.3 when I realised I couldn't spend another day under the same roof as him. Found out after leaving he'd been having affairs, was an alcoholic and generally had form for going on 'fishing trips' with seedy mate that actually involved visiting brothels in Prague! It was a rebound relationship that I regret bitterly. Divorce took 5 years as he tried to hide money, assets etc.

When he came in from the pub one night and pinned me up against the wall by my neck.

Stayed up packing my stuff all night, left the next morning, haven't spoken to him since.

I have a list of 'final straws' and 'next time will be the last time'.
The very last FINAL time was him dragging me from the sofa by my hair and trying to force me out of the house with DS in my arms, who was screaming.
Now looking back and all these risk assessments show what I have put up with and not really realised. It was an eye opener.