H has turned into a monster after DC's birth

[sheepo]

Posting here for traffic as not sure if it's me and my hormones or whether or not my 'd' husband actually has turned into a monster after our second child's birth.

Husband has had a rough childhood and is very LC with his parents. I'm NC- they're a very toxic family. When our first child was born, I experienced PND and high levels of anxiety. Instead of support me, husband claimed to be suffering from depression himself (nothing wrong with that and I'm not disputing he didn't) but I felt my husband upped the ante so to speak by making things harder for me- leaving a very needy child all to me to sort out- feed, sleep, handing him over and at one point leaving him crying in a sleepyhead (on the floor by my bed) because he was struggling to soothe the baby and I was in deep sleep so didn't wake up straight away, starting arguments and then gaslighting me, etc. We've spoken at length about the first time and I thought we were determined to avoid the mistakes we made then and to change things this time so we were all a bit more settled and calmer. We started off okay but a week in and my husband is repeating some of the same behaviours as last time :( we're lucky we've got a baby who sleeps this time around and is generally low maintainance. I've also felt a lot more at peace with myself and am fighting hard not to slip into depression again. My biggest motivation is to provide as much consistency as I can for my toddler who is naturally struggling to adjust to the newest addition to our family and is acting up a bit. My husband has responded by starting loud arguments when he's felt overwhelmed, accusing me of nagging him or shouting at him or overwhelming him when I've asked him to do something- eg. Take the rubbish out, etc. I feel nothing I say/do is right. I'm fed up of arguing with him- we can go round and round in circles for hours. If I refuse to engage with him, he'll keep at me until he gets a reaction and I'm ashamed to say- out of frustration, I can give him as good as I can get. I'm shattered as it is and feeling guilty I can't be as hands-on with my toddler as I've been up until now and my husband is adding to my stress levels. I've got a HV coming over in the morning to check up on me. Would IBU if I mentioned my husband was being a shit? Or would I be opening a can of worms and risking our family being reported to SS? Help.

Poor you, don’t feel ashamed. You’re clearly having a shit time and I agree with pp that having your own children drags up lots of the damage in your own childhood.

If you’ve both had abusive childhoods you may not have been set a good example but my husband and I always say you know what NOT to do, behave like or accept from others.

It is very hard without any family support, you only have each other to properly rely on and that is tough, you are both the foundation of your family and they need to be strong foundations to survive life together with kids and all the other crap! I think you should definitely confide in friends as support for yourself (without telling him they agree or what Mumsnet says). His behaviour is unreasonable, but of course you know that.

"... pride and shame- I never thought I'd be at the receiving end of any kind of abuse anymore. I thought I'd left that all behind."

But, Sheepo, why should you feel shame? You haven't done anything to feel ashamed of... but your husband has, and should!

For the sake of not only your own MH, but also that of both your babies, you have to tell someone the truth of what your life being married to their father has become. Because if you don't? This entire situation is only going to get worse.

When I was born, my father didn't appreciate not being the sole focus of my mother's attention. A lot of men don't, but the excuse back then was that it was normal. Expected, even. He also took to the "poor me"/victim mentality with gusto. When I was 7 weeks old, my older brothers (not my father's biological children) helpfully shared their chicken pox with me, to the point where I was pretty much covered with the blisters - and I was, understandably, miserable. My father had one blister, couldn't go to work because he rode horses for a living, and had my mother running herself ragged looking after both of us. There was a bad snowfall during this winter (early '77) and he sent my mother out, on foot, to buy him a magazine from town, only for her to come back and have to go out again, because it was the wrong one. Oh, and she had to take me, a tiny baby covered in blisters and contagious, with her the second time because he couldn't make me stop crying. Why she didn't take me and leave him, I don't know - but I wish she had, because once they adopt the poor victim mentality, and start to get attention from unwitting outsiders? They tend to plant their feet very firmly there. I'm in my 40s now and my parents are still married to one another, but my entire childhood was awash with insecurities and anxieties, which left me prone to all sorts of horrible things. I was beaten, abused, blamed by my mother for them having stayed together ("oh, I only stayed with him because of you!" sort of accusations), for the fact that both of my older brothers refused to live with her... I was dragged into the middle of their arguments (I can remember being 4 years old and pretending there was a snake in the kitchen in an effort to make them just stop shouting horrid things at one another - the snake was one of those rubber ones, and they didn't stop!) and as I grew older? I thought that abuse was all I deserved. It took a very long time for me to work out that it wasn't, it isn't, and actually? My mother stayed with him because she chose to. Nothing to do with me at all.

Don't do that to your children. It's a horrible life - for you, as much as them. Talk to your HV, get support, don't feel shame about something that is beyond your actual control. You're not the one doing this - your husband is making that choice all by himself... but it will impact upon your children's lives, their happiness, even their health as they grow. And surely it's better to get help for it now, than to wait for the visit from social services because they unwittingly mention something to a teacher at school, and safeguarding kicks in? Or to watch your daughter end up with a man just like her father, who will treat her like shit on his shoe - and know that it's because that's all she's ever known? Or your son turn into a man just like his father, who treats his partner like shit on his shoe, because to him, that's what men do...? Enough of us know that statistically, that could happen. Realistically, it will, if you choose to keep quiet through fear of feeling ashamed of behaviours and choices that aren't anything to do with you, but everything to do with your husband. Talk to people in real life. Your GP might be a good start, because you need help. You need help to see that this? Isn't your fault, or your doing. At all. But if you choose to stay? To keep quiet. To put up with your husband's abusive behaviours...?

It will be.

Please listen to contrary13
I have had a similar upbringing, nowhere near as extreme, it is really really damaging. I wished for most of my childhood that my parents would split up, it's horrible to have 'we stayed together for YOU' spat at you, as if I had a choice in the matter. If I did I would have chosen to be sent far far away from it all. I would dream of boarding schools.
Lovely family days out were always stressful and miserable, despite the smiling photos.

Refuse to be a burden, because you are not. And never let anyone let you think otherwise.

He sounds awful. It's sad he had a toxic childhood, but he won't change.

Please leave, take your children and don't go back. Otherwise he'll just end up inflicting the same on your kids as he went through, and you won't forgive yourself.

'As for sharing with others IRL, they'd never believe me. We look like the perfect family/couple :/ the handful of people we know are my friends and because they know me (vocal, confident, assertive) and my husband puts on the perfect martyr/hard done by act, they'd always think I was to blame for the way my husband has become.'

How's about getting back in touch with some of the friends you lost touch with? They might have a less entrenched view than those you currently know, and as you've said, they may even ave seen something you didn't/dislike him.

I also think you might be pleasantly surprised at the reaction of your current friends if you describe what's happening.

That is just an incidental point though really, but they do say one of the first things people being abused can benefit from doing is telling someone.

You know life doesn't have to be this way. Hugs xxx

Candice, because this: "I wished for most of my childhood that my parents would split up, it's horrible to have 'we stayed together for YOU' spat at you, as if I had a choice in the matter. If I did I would have chosen to be sent far far away from it all. I would dream of boarding schools.
Lovely family days out were always stressful and miserable, despite the smiling photos." is something that I empathise with completely. My mother has always blamed me for the choices which she made concerning her marriage to my father - they only argued about me, his affairs were my fault, when her own parents begged her to leave him and move back home with me, she refused to because I loved my Daddy...

I could have loved him in an environment where rows weren't the norm, where I was so frightened of them both that I internalised my own feelings, my own childhood, for fear of causing another fight, or accidentally drawing their attention to me. I still bite my nails and I sucked my thumb (self comforting) for years. I stuck to routine rigidly, because if I stepped outside of my comfort zone? I'd get shouted at, or hit, or blamed for others behaviour/choices. I acted out at school, too, desperate for someone to step in and... rescue me, I guess. But this was the late '70s/'80s/early '90s, and I slipped under the radars, I guess. I doubt very much that's so easy to do these days. As an adult, I avoid relationships as much as I possibly can, because I don't trust men, due to having grown up watching my father gaslight and manipulate my emotionally unstable mother - but also because I don't trust my ability to choose a decent man. Both of my relationships as an adult were abusive (one emotionally/physically and one emotionally). It is, what it is, and I'm okay with my choices - I own my choices rather than foist them off onto my own children. I learned first-hand how that makes an impressionable child feel. I know how it is to be powerless to fix things, to stop the shouting, the hitting, the cheating, the tension which you could cut with a knife.

And I wouldn't wish that on anyone, never mind a child.

My father's an old man now, still entrenched in victim mode, still prone to tantrum throwing when my mother's attention shifts away from him. He monopolises every single family event, and my mother learned to do the same. I'm dreading my own children potentially marrying or having families of their own one day, because I know my parents will make it all about them. Christ, the way my father talks about my oldest's birth, you would think he was the one doing all of the hard work, rather than refusing to leave the ward's waiting room because he wanted to be the first one to hold her!

OP, don't let this be your children's life. Don't let their father mould their impressions of life, adult relationships, in the way which he's shaping yours into some ridiculous notion that everything is your fault as opposed to his, or both of yours.

I even thought of writing a letter to her and asking him to give it to her.

Write her a letter but do not give it to him to pass on. He will no doubt open it to see what you have written about him and he won't give it to her but will use it to be an even bigger prick towards you. Post a letter to her as I guarantee he isn't telling her the truth of what goes on, or he's telling her his own fucked up version of events. I'd seriously consider separation. He sounds vile.

My XH switched when our second (high needs) child was born, because that was the point that I gave up full time work and became a SAHM (very few childcare providers back in the day, and second child was VERY high needs). As soon as I was no longer earning (ie, 'contributing to the household') I became a second class citizen in his eyes. He became patronising, unpleasant, bad tempered and would often call me a lazy slob (at home with two children under two - fat chance!).

Is there any possibility of you going back to work? I know you said you want to stay home for the babies, but it sounds as though separation will be on the cards at some point, so getting your earning potential back would be a good thing - even if it doesn't help your relationship. (And I know your DC2 is only weeks old so probably this advice isn't much help as of now!)

I'd love to attend one session with him just so that I can share my perspective on him and his behaviours. I even thought of writing a letter to her and asking him to give it to her.
Why? That's a part of you being fearful your are being mis-represented to someone. Does that sound familiar to you?
Your DH's issue is attention. Attention from a Loving Parent.
Before people have kids they can be the Loving Parent to each other.

In a new relationship the woman becomes the New Perfect Mother to the husband, then everything is beautiful. The husband is like the treasured only son.
Then kids come along and BANG! Husband has to share Mummy with the other kid.
From time to time, a part of your DH may be reacting to you 'as if' you were someone else in his past. We all do this to some extent without realising it.
You are having to manage his stuff, and your own shit relating to your own childhood AND be a mother to a toddler and an infant - that's a LOT for one woman. Why can't your DH continue in counselling?
There are control issues on both sides.
Please do not fight, raise your voices or be abusive, or aggressive with each other in front of your toddler. Your toddler could be posting an issue on Mumsnet in 25 years time... 'Mum and Dad fought all the time in my house. They were only interested in fighting each other and had no interest in me.'.
Have you access to counselling yourself? That will help you separate your issues from your DH's issues within the changing dynamics. I admit to being a trainee therapist
Fighting with someone is a great way to get their attention focused at you and away from others. In a busy house sometimes it seems like the only way. Fighting it still a type of relating, it's a type of 'glue' that creates a close dynamic. Maybe there's another way to notice that and react differently.

Yes, definitely talk to your HV. They've seen it all before, dealing with this is their job and they'll have advice and be able to signpost / refer you to other advisers.

There is a vast sea of difference between seeking help from a HV and SS involvement. (Though, if your case was so severe that SS involvement was required, then that would be because it's required to ensure your children's safety. Hardly something you'd want to prevent or resist).

From what you've said, I can't help wondering whether temporary separation might be helpful, to give you peace, give him space and let you both consider your options.

Husband has openly stated that he want's to divorce - even before the second child was born. OP tries to ignore that. If she would accept that and cooperate, he would already be gone. That's the reason he acts resentful. Divorce and co - parenting would be the best solution.

Hi OP

You said

Since getting married though, I've lost all my friends- some because they were fair weather friends and others because they didn't get on with my husband. I thought I was being loyal by sticking by my husband but maybe they saw something I refused to or couldn't see.

and I wonder, did he work towards this isolation for you? It would give him more power over you to remove external influences.