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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To be fed up with dh reaction to Coronavirus

100 replies

tiredandgrumpyx · 12/04/2020 00:31

Ok so my dh and I have a two year old and 3 month old dd I'm work for the nhs but am on maternity leave. My husband has some mental health issues one of which is health anxiety. He literally cannot have anything wrong with him without him thinking it's cancer or something else awful and it's left to me to reassure him. Well since the COVID has happened he has been unbearable he's been abusive verbally he's put us into isolation even tho no ones had any symptoms we had to take our baby for vaccinations which took me a whole load of begging for him to even allow us to go to the drs to get them and he was so anxious that he kicked off at me because I hadn't put my mask on he literally gave me no time to do it he was shouting at me so bad that the nurse had a dr phone me that evening to check I was safe and ok.
Every time he gets like this he threatens to take my children off me and divorce me when this is over because I don't care if they die of Coronavirus
Tonight he's had a panic attack because he's had a bit of a tickly cough I've tried to explain that we have a high pollen count today and that's probably it he has no temperature at all he's been hyperventilating being vile and I literally can't take anymore of it I'm tired I have two little children to care for I can't escape it I'm not sure what to do with him
I'm drained I've literally got nobody to talk to I feel bad but I also feel like he's using his anxiety as an excuse to be abusive

OP posts:
fuzzymoon · 12/04/2020 07:22

Oh my goodness.

I am worried his behaviour is escalating!!!

Please ring for help. 999 then press 55 because you can't talk. If you feel at all scared about him doing something to you or your children.

It is not just him having anxiety he is also being psychologically abusive. The threat of taking the children. Listening in on every conversation you would have. Blaming you if something happens to him like being sectioned.

He may have mental health issues but he is refusing treatment. It's not your place to be effected by his actions to this degree.

This is ringing alarm bells. He needs help. You need help to get him help.

CodyBurns · 12/04/2020 07:23

As many others on this thread have already said, your husband is using his health anxiety as a smokescreen to ramp up his abusive behaviour towards you. You mention that health anxiety is a problem for him (indeed it may be), but this is not an excuse for his conduct towards you and the children.

Honestly OP he sounds deranged. He may well need support for his mental health but I’m more concerned that his behaviour might escalate. Listening to your phone calls is very controlling, as are the threats to take the children away from you when you don’t obey him and pander to his selfish unreasonable behaviour.

Your local DV service may have an email address you can use to get a message to them. Another poster has already mentioned calling 999 and pressing 55 to make a silent call.

In your situation I’d be looking urgently to get out with your children. You can’t live like this.

loserssaywhat · 12/04/2020 07:34

I suffer from terrible health anxiety but I never behave like your husband. Even now when my anxiety is at its peak it's not an excuse to be abusive to my family.
Anxiety doesn't make you abusive, being an abuser does.
Just to echo what pp have said, please get some some support from WA.

LouHotel · 12/04/2020 07:37

OP, look at his threats to take your children away logically.

He was verbally abusive to you in public so badly that a doctor did a welfare check, this will now be in your gp notes.

If he ends up sectioned he’ll take your kids.....how exactly will he achieve that from a mental health facility?

He is displaying deep coercive control by threatening you with your family, isolating you (further than current restrictions), listening to your phone calls!

It sounds like your a nurse, if you had a patient describe what is happening in your house, what would you do?

MumInBrussels · 12/04/2020 07:59

Echoing what everyone else has said, this is not normal and your husband is being abusive. He may also have health anxiety, but the two are separate issues - and his anxiety shouldn't be your problem to manage.

His threat to divorce you and take your children away from you is meaningless. It's not his decision, it's a judge's decision. And nothing you have said suggests a judge would consider you shouldn't have custody of your kids - your abusive husband, however, they might decide is unfit... He's just using the threat as part of his abusing you and controlling your behaviour.

I hope you can find some help - the gp and the nurse you've seen recently are a good place to start. Good luck, and please take care.

Newme19 · 12/04/2020 08:15

I only have one line to add to above. Ask everyone you know to help Mum, Dad siblings and call Social Services, police, women’s aid. Can you move with children to a relatives house? You must not fed his abuse of you. He needs help? Do it asap before his illness spirals out of control. Please, please speak to people who know and love you, him and your children. Flowers

LannieDuck · 12/04/2020 08:16

Are you 'allowed' to go out for your 1-trip for exercise a day? All of the government literature says that's allowed.

Do you have a garden? It's not good for a 2-year old to be inside for 3 weeks solid.

Either he has a medical condition, or he's abusive (or both). Does he accept he has a medical condition and is choosing not to seek help for it? Have you made it clear to him that the impact on you and your child is unacceptable and unsustainable?

DrReed · 12/04/2020 08:18

Please leave now, while the kids are still little. He can't take you children, but he will damage them if they grow up with a father like that.

mathanxiety · 12/04/2020 08:19

He won't except help he thinks he will get sectioned and if that happens it will be my fault and he will take my children away

He will not take your children away.
He can threaten til he is blue in the face but it's not going to happen.

You sound so beaten down and so weary of the pressure and the insanity. And it is insanity. You don't have to deal with any of this.

Please, please, please call 999 and then 55
When police come, tell them he is abusing you, that the abuse was witnessed by a nurse and doctor when you managed to get the baby out to have vaccinations, and that you don't feel safe with him at home. Tell them he listens in on your calls, you had to fight with him to get the baby to the doctor, that he has threatened you that he will take the children away from you. Emphasise that you do not feel safe and that you have the baby and toddler to protect.

Tell then you want him to be taken for a MH evaluation and kept out of the house. You can get an Occupation Order stipulating who can and who cannot live in the house. You and the babies stay. He finds somewhere else.

He sounds as if he should check himself in to a MH facility, or be sectioned. Obviously he doesn't accept that he is unwell.
He has lost touch with reality.

Can you leave the house with the children at all? Go into a garden? Make your call from there if you have a mobile phone. Or go to the bathroom with the children, lock the door, and call. Is there a lock on the bathroom door?

Is there any way you could quickly load the baby and 2 yo into a buggy, maybe when he's using the loo or showering, and simply run from the house? You will encounter a police officer pretty soon if you live in a built up area.

Can you email the doctor's office and ask for help? Describe exactly what you have described here. Remind them you are the woman they contacted to check up on and tell them he is listening to your phone conversations and you couldn't speak freely to them when they called.

Do you have a relative or friends you could email and ask for help?

@tiredandgrumpyx I am divorced from a man who had traits like your H's, including the crazy anxiety and threats to divorce me and take the children from me. I will never forget him waking me from sleep before 7 one morning after DC2 was born, shouting at me to get my lazy ass out of bed or we would starve. Why starve? He had been reading a novel about the Irish Famine. (He had had a fight with his boss while I was heavily pg and had walked out of the office in a huff so we had no income).

Before the relationship ended, years later, he stuck a steak knife into the pillow that would have been mine if I hadn't been sleeping in another room that night. Just recently he sent my youngest DD a 24 pack box of pot noodles and I heard he had sent texts to all his siblings telling them that DD and I are starving, that I have no job, no income, and not enough sense to get a job. One exSIL called my oldest DD with her chequebook at the ready. I am working, earning, have food, and better still, toilet paper.

This man gets an idea into his head and runs with it. After we divorced he took to calling me by my maiden name though I had not changed my name back. He used my maiden name on a document he filed in court and contradicted me in front of the judge when I pointed out that he had my name wrong. He used my maiden name on a child support cheque and was rebuked by the judge. Nothing can shake his convictions. He told everyone who would listen while we were married that I was a slob, that he had to wade through filth and dirty laundry at home, that I never cooked, that I let the children run wild. Our family photos tell a completely different story.

He spent just under a week in a psych ward and got a prescription for ADs, which he decided he didn't want to take. He blames me for his hospitalisation. 'YOU drove me to the mental hospital!' Yeah right...
But he did not take the children from me.

You can be seriously mentally ill and also a totally malign, abusive, angry, hate-filled, controlling force who will destroy your family's life. The two states are not mutually exclusive.

Please, please try to get your H taken away from the house and barred from re-entry. I did not realise the seriousness of the effect my exH was having on me until he had left. Quite honestly, you won't know yourself when you are free to live like a human being again.

Please stop believing his threats. He cannot take the children from you.

Porpoises · 12/04/2020 08:23

This man is abusive :( I have had health anxiety, it's awful, but it does not give him any right to shout at, threaten or control another person.

Can you text or email the medical staff who were worried about you? That could be the easiest way to access help.

ChewChewIsMySpiritAnimal · 12/04/2020 08:25

He's abusing you and the anxiety is an excuse. I have severe anxiety and have not abused my husband. You don't have to live like this. Please contact women's aid and make plans to leave him. What would happen if you didn't disinfect all the shopping?

tiredandgrumpyx · 12/04/2020 08:42

Ok thanks everyone I'm able to use the garden which we have been doing and mostly he's ok it's just when something triggers his anxiety ie the news or a health illness symptom
The children are fine he happily plays with 2 year old during the day most of all this happens in evening and I just "behave" during the day in front of children
When this is over I'm seriously considering leaving

OP posts:
Sewrainbow · 12/04/2020 08:44

Ring 999 and 55

LIZS · 12/04/2020 08:46

If it is his anxiety why are you having to do all the cleaning, childcare etc. Why can you not go out alone? That is where it has become abusive. He is setting it up so that if someone becomes ill he can blame you.

brownandpurple · 12/04/2020 08:48

Your children will know something is wrong, trust me. If you can't get help for yourself do it for them!

CodenameVillanelle · 12/04/2020 08:51

The children are only fine when you 'behave' and when they get old enough they will have to 'behave' too
This is not fine. They are not fine. They are not allowed to go with you on a nature walk or whatever you want to do with them because he isn't allowing it. This is not fine.

ememem84 · 12/04/2020 08:54

Leave now. We don’t know when this will be over.

Billben · 12/04/2020 08:55

The children are only fine when you 'behave' and when they get old enough they will have to 'behave' too

😥😥😥😥 This literally brought tears to my eyes

LIZS · 12/04/2020 08:56

Does he work?

Doobedoobedoobe · 12/04/2020 08:57

OP a good test to see if this is his anxiety making him abusive, or if he is using it as an ‘excuse’ to be abusive to you, is to see if he is like this with anyone else. Does he lose his shift and shout and scream at strangers/friends/other family? Or is he nice to them but vile to you behind closed doors?

If the answer is yes, then he is abusive and it is deliberate.

I’m sorry OP but I’d get out of this marriage as soon as you can. I’d be terrified that he’d kill the children because ‘he can’t keep them safe’ from disease etc and it would be kinder for them (especially as you work for the NHS). Sorry if that’s a horrific thought but it’s what popped into my head straight away.

TopShelf · 12/04/2020 08:58

Womens Aid email: [email protected]

OP for you. Flowers

Dieu · 12/04/2020 08:59

I wouldn't be able to put up with this. And I never say that lightly. Even without the abusive tendencies, his behaviour would drive me loopy. I think he either has to get help for his issues, or it's over. You can't put up with a lifetime of this. Sorry OP, and hope you and the kids are ok Thanks

Darbs76 · 12/04/2020 09:01

Bless you. Call back the GP and ask them to help you. They will be able to point you in the right direction. You can’t live like this

Davespecifico · 12/04/2020 09:04

Get this moved to relationships.
Read up about domestic abuse.
Start making your exit plan, but make sure he is unaware of it.

iamkahleesi · 12/04/2020 09:04

This is a time of increased risk for those living in abusive relationships. Can you imagine being shut in lockdown with someone who emotionally abuses you, belittles you, loses their temper, physically abuses you, or worse? Having to walk on eggshells afraid to say something wrong. A prisoner in your own home, not a sanctuary of safety but a place of fear and threat?
Just remember, you are strong, you will get through this, and you are not alone.

24 hour National Domestic Abuse Helpline number – 0808 2000 247 – run by Refuge, and www.nationaldahelpline.org.uk

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