@PourPatrol there are a lot of people here looking out for you. I don’t have any specific advice I could provide with enough experience but thinking of you and sending a lot of virtual support.
Try to calm yourself down as much as possible, decide what you want in the end to happen (from posts I would suggest it is to split from your husband) and slowly chip away at that plan. Feelings of guilt because of your children or anything else is just noise that is expected and will distract from the end goal. Give yourself time to think about all
that noise and ultimately you will come up with solutions, so long you keep the end goal in mind.
As many people said, stay calm, if at all possible try to emotionally detach as much as you can and think about it as what you are doing is best for your children. They might not think that way at the moment but let that not stop you.
This is just an idea, and my phrasing will probably come across the wrong way but maybe start thinking about your husband like he is a big toddler. What I’m trying to say is rise above everything he does and says as, not always, but normally we know toddler behaviour is a developmental stage and there are tactics that can be deployed to make the transition out of toddlerhood easier (stay calm remains the theme here). But ultimately you know what you want from your toddler and will find a way how to get them do it (be it throwing less tantrums etc..) with as little crying and as few tantrums as possible. Why am I drawing a comparison to a toddler? Because ultimately toddler is a child and even if things get a bit better and you start thinking maybe we can mend things (assuming his behaviour would change slightly because of your hard work of emotional detachment) we don’t merry toddlers / children. We merry grown men who should be our equal partners.
Again, not too much experience here, but I believe if you remain emotionally detached, calm and practical your children will also adapt. There was a thread about someone who wanted to tell their young child that their father, who never sees them, is a twat. The OP wasn’t planning to say it in these exact words and wanted to be age appropriate but lot of the posters explained, many from experience, how being factual, not emotional and letting the children find out for themselves was in the end beneficial for the children. Of course you are not there yet but if you are worrying about your children ultimately happy mum separated (so long not poisoning them against their father but also not sugarcoating) is better than an unhappy mum still with the father.
If anything break the cycle, you mentioned your father didn’t treat you well. Don’t let your children live with a father who doesn’t treat them well, and see their father not treating their mum well. Of course they will be saying they miss him, as they are only little at the moment and it’s all very confusing. But if you are their rock, it doesn’t matter what drama is someone else trying to create. Temporarily it might be hard for them and they will miss him, but long term they will be just fine and most likely better for it.
Every action has a reaction. What ever step you are thinking of doing think about what reaction it might have. MAKE SURE YIU STILL CARRY OUT THAT STEP but if you think the reaction will be undesirable think about some other way how to do the same action but get slightly less aggravating reaction. It will be tiring and require a lot of focus but in the end it should make achieving the end goal easier. There will be hiccups along the way, that is expected, but keep the end goal in mind and keep coming back to the strategy of staying calm, emotionally detached as much as possible, factual, and every action has a reaction….
You can do it!!!!