AIBU pregnancy with an unsuitable man ALL over this site

[SiriusBlack94]

It amazes me that EVERY day there are multiple posts with...

My DH is so lazy —— I’m 30 weeks pregnant
My DH is a narcissist how can I leave him —- I have a baby on the way
I don’t love my DH anymore - but I’m 28 weeks pregnant
DH drinking all the time/doing drugs/ controlling/ doesn’t help around the house —- but I’m pregnant.

Like seriously. Why are women so casual about getting pregnant with men that aren’t suited to them or who they aren’t in a loving relationship with. I know in some cases a man can turn abusive during pregnancy but in the majority of cases it’s things like ‘my DH drinks 4 times a week’ or ‘my DH never helps around the house’ which you would’ve KNOWN but still got pregnant.

I just don’t understand it and they are then tying themselves with often multiple children to these men.

Yes OP your point was clear - I was answering pp's about why have a second child, not you

I can't speak for everyone, but until DS was born, OH lived between my house and his DMs as it was more convenient and economical for his commute. I did pretty much all of the household chores, dealt with all bills etc, which was to be expected, as I was there full time, and was already paying all of the bills (he gave me his share, I wasn't bankrolling him). He would do pots and the odd bit of hoovering, but pre-DC there wasn't anything else for him to do.
What I didn't anticipate, was him still maintaining that attitude to housework now we're living full time together in a joint house, or his disgusting attitude if I ever comment on his shitty attitude to parenting and running the household.

My DP and I have been together for seven years. It's only when our second child was born that he turned nasty and lazy or maybe it's only now that I need him to help me and it's just come to light what he's really like.

My DP's behaviour coincides with his father getting unexpectedly sick and dying within a two month period then DP coming down with an imaginary illness (he's been sick on and off for a year, seen multiple Doctors NHS and private and nobody can find anything wrong with him but nobody has considered a psychological problem).

Also people can change over time.

@ FudgeBrownie2019 - I completely disagree. To have an entire personality change is unheard of especially given the intellect of the people we are generally dealing with here. Criminal masterminds, serial killers with IQ’s off the scale slip up left right and centre along the way. Dave the drunk brickie from Wrexham really isn’t going to be capable of keeping the mask from slipping for very long at all.

Some men change when they realise that they wont be top dog in the house anymore.

Ohwhen is definitely onto something there - I thought xH with his wandering eye was a peach in comparison to my dickhead father

I agree with you OP. My ex ramped up the abuse when I was pregnant but the signs were there, I choose to ignore them, I stupidly thought things would get better (saying that I went into my marriage knowing I would get divorced). I got out quickly and have a good life if I had more than one child this would be so much more difficult

Well, not every single abusive, lazy partner springs up out of the blue.

The best proof of this is the many threads on here where women describe lazy horrible partners, who they don't have dc with. The op will often mention that they are "going to TTC soon". Most every poster who replies says "do not have dc with this man!". But they will.

Its a fine line because obviously some people are in abusive relationships they feel they can't leave, and pregnancies can happen. On the other hand, it does women a disservice to say that every women who isn't in a good relationship is just helpless and probably can't ever leave.

I’m alway amazing by women who are having sex without using any form of contraception or only using contraception for some of the time but say they are not trying for a baby. Surely they know how babies are made.

Op is clearly talking about women in relationships with men that are clearly useless or abusive in the outset and questioning why women go one to have children with them. A lot of the posts are defensive, yet op clearly acknowledged that some partners become more controlling abusive as a relationship develops and she is not talking about women in such relationships, unless you have a crystal ball how would you know how your life will pan out!

It is hard to have sympathy when a post starts off about how useless a partner is with regards to housework, mental load but the poster is considering having yet another child with him despite the fact he does not do anything for the elder children. What kind of miracles do they think are going to happen, apart from making a bad situation worse! Women in these types of relationships do need to take some responsibility for themselves and consider their own judgements before they add more children to an already unhappy situation. I agree with the poster above that there are women out there that choose to have kids with men that are not suited to being dads and then complain.

We can spend time asking and analysing why men behave badly and abuse women...or we could just not be in a relationship with such men.

I know which one I'd be telling my DD, because I'm not going to be interested in analysis after my DD is dead.

For all the reasons women stay in abusive relationships, there can be as many reasons a man abuses them. As the woman has witnessed poor relationships, so has the abuser.

He may have witnessed his mother accept such abuse and for him...it's normal... but that's a whole different issue.

Right. So previous posters who've said that their Husbands became cruel abusive shitbags once they were pregnant are lying? Posters who say that their Husband only began to show his true colours once they had their first child are lying? Is it at all possible that your own experience of humanity isn't the only experience of humanity, that you don't know everything?

I strongly doubt that you've witnessed friends in abusive relationships. If that's true, congratulations. The reality is that people do hide who they are, they absolutely do change once they know they've "got" someone and to suggest otherwise is downright rude towards posters who've clearly experienced harrowing relationships with abusive people, some of whom are experts at hiding their behaviours until it suits them.

Maybe the truth is there aren’t enough good men to go around. And if everyone wants a baby some people will end up with arseholes

My ex became emotionally abusive when I got pregnant. He was very careful to do this only in private and publicly he managed to give the impression that I'd somehow self-reproduced myself, as some flowers do, and it was All a Bit Too Much For Him to Handle So He Wasn't Going To. Since I'd never been pregnant before to "trigger" this side of him had never emerged. In retrospect, looking back, it's amazing how many people except me, accepted his view of things.

I suppose the sad thing is all the children being born into these relationships who will grow up and go on to forge exactly the same ones.

Sandyy2k

But you see there's the thing - you're obviously going to educate your daughter. Many women are not being educated, they don't have loving caring families. They've grown up seeing completely toxic relationships.

But somehow they're expected to make healthy choices.

Excellent post ohwheniknow

That's certainly my experience. No sense of boundary setting because I was walked over, chastised, bullied.

I married my mother. I'm lucky to be alive and kicking now but it's on my like a horrible shadow. I still suffer massively from self doubt & sabotage. Hurts badly

Aren't something like 50% of pregnancies unplanned?

I think that old saying "when you fail to plan, you plan to fail" also applies to pregnancy and contraceptive use. It isn't really an unplanned pregnancy if you don't use any, imo, but many on here disagree.

@FudgeBrownie2019

You have totally misunderstood the OP.

None of that is what was said

For the many posters who seem to have missed the OPs point about knowing the men were useless before pregnancy...here you go from her opening post.

I know in some cases a man can turn abusive during pregnancy but in the majority of cases it’s things like ‘my DH drinks 4 times a week’ or ‘my DH never helps around the house’ which you would’ve KNOWN but still got pregnant

@Nanny0gg I was replying to the poster who said People do not lie about who they are. They tell you, from one day, you just choose not to listen because that suits you at time. not the OP. I feel that comments like that, one a thread like this, aren’t appropriate and aren’t correct.

Well I guess that there's an aspect of truth to it - in that those who abuse aren't "lying" about who they are when they are nice to start, the love bombing at the beginning is just a part of who they are.

@SiriusBlack94

1. Like your username 😂
2. You will never convince the hard core Mumsnetters 😉
3. People don’t like taking responsibilities for their own mistakes... easier to blame it on everyone else 😔

Yabu. When there are only 2 adults in a relationship it is easy for the man to be perfectly normal and loving
Many don't show their true colours until the woman is pregnant or has a baby

YANBU. In a world with so many men being absolute pieces of scum, women really do need to do their due diligence when choosing a partner. Sure, it would be lovely if we didn't have to, but we do.

If a man is messing you around at the start of your relationship, you can take that as fairly strong evidence of how he will be further on down the line.

Far too many women think they can "help" or "save" a man with x, y and z issues. You can't. Pressuring him to marry you is a red flag. Him being a lazy bastard around the house is a red flag. Him being petty over money is a red flag. Him having debt is a red flag. Him having addictions is a red flag. Him describing all his exes as crazy is a red flag. Etc.

The sooner we all wise up to this behaviour and cut them out of your lives by month 3, rather than year 3, the better.

Sure, some men are extremely good at hiding this. They trap women and abuse them at their most vulnerable. But most of them are very clearly shit people from early on. Women stay with them because they want to be the one for them. The one that saves them. The one that fixes them. And they become obsessed with the idea.

And I say this as someone who did this myself in my late teens and early twenties. Stayed with a guy who outed himself as an ex drug dealer because I felt like I could help him better himself. Stayed with a guy who hit me because we'd been together 4 years since my mid teens.

However, I learnt the hard way. You can't fix or change anyone. Luckily, I didn't fall pregnant or make any big plans with these men. But it did teach me exactly what to avoid.

We need to share the honest truth of these situations with women who are engaged/buying a home with him/TTC, etc, before it's too late. It is unhelpful to class every shit man as an abuser, purely because it pushes the image that a woman is too weak to do anything about her own destiny.

We can all help ourselves.