I don’t know what more I can do

[PinkUser]

I’m not too sure what I’m hoping to gain from posting anything here, I think I’d just like some perspective that I’m not going insane.

My partner and I have been together 4.5 years. We have a 3 year old and I am 4.5 months pregnant with our second.

I work part time, 2.5 days (having given up a very well paid full time role to have our child). I look after our child 1 day a week one of of my 2 weekdays off, and the other day she is at nursery and the day is dedicated to housework / chores / “working for the family”.

I am responsible for all the housework in the house, laundry, cooking, cleaning, shopping, making beds, organising bills, and do the vast majority of the care for our child. I do bedtimes every evening, only I take her to and pick her up from childcare. I take her to her classes on the weekend. I make and clean up all her meals. (Please don’t mistake that as me doing that begrudgingly. I adore her - just for an idea of how domestic things are split.)

2/3 of my wage are for nursery fees and our family car, house insurance and minor bills which totals around £1200. The remainder is for my personal bills (phone etc). Our mortgage, utility bills, council tax, food shopping and holidays and paid for by my partner. He owns his own business and earns around 6 times my income.

Our Relationship is generally great, but occasionally come these outbursts which feel like a complete character assassination. I am called insults, lazy, sworn at, and a liar for lying about the amount of jobs / chores I am completing on my day of work for the family.

He doesn’t sleep in the same bed as me anymore, and has recently made comments (when going through my first trimester - rough!) that I’ve let myself go and I need to make more of an effort with myself.

i dedicate every hour of my Friday to cleaning our sizeable home, car, and doing all the invisible workload.

This evening before bed he asked what I’d done all day. He said I was a liar and nothing had been done, that I was watching tv or sleeping (I wish!).

In reality I’d take some bits over to a poorly relative on my way home from the nursery drop. Cleaned out our car and cleaned all apholstery. Cleaned the house and bathrooms. Hoovers the stairs, cleaned the windows, 2 laundry loads. All bedrooms and done a food shop, between the hours of 9:30-3:30.

picked our child up and of course played and made her dinner. He arrived home maybe 2 hours later to a home cooked meal.

i can provide timestamps and pictures of things I’d done but he’s says he’s not interested, that I’m lazy and I’m a liar.

Am I deluded? Am I lazy? I feel like I’m starting to go crazy and that I need to document my day as proof to him. I have never ever given him a reason not to trust me and I don’t understand any of this.

please help me

What more can you do?

You leave this awful awful man. What a creep.

You know you will be fine. You do everything anyway.

Please get out.

I’m really sorry OP. You don’t deserve to be treated the way you are being treated by him. I hope you’re able to find the strength to get away from him.

Very sad to see this. You sound like a lovely person but you have not had a good relationship modelled to you. His treatment of you is horrific and what your children will see as normal if you stay. Or even worse they may mirror his treatment of you I have seen this happen and it’s horrific. They don’t stay babies.

Martied 20 years 6 years was a sahm working now never once has Dh been anything other than supportive and loving. Calling you a “fucking loser” regularly while you’re caring for his kids? Unforgivable.

The thing is op he’s got you where he wants you now, beholden to him, tying yourself in knots trying to please him (what more can I do you are asking). Now you see the real him. Now he has (he thinks) the power in your relationship.

It's not a great relationship at all, he's nasty to you - he shouldn't ever call you names like that, it's really toxic.

@PinkUser

This stops now.

I think you either make plans to leave him.

Or you give him a ultimatum. He needs to very, very clearly understand that if you go back to work full time - that what you currently do cleaning, childcare will need to be PAID for by someone else doing that JOB.
And then why not do that? State that you will be looking for a full time role ASAP after your maternity leave and give him a whole long list of things to sort out.

I think you need to find your assertiveness which I imagine he has eroded away from you.

Bastard. Thank god your children have a good mum.

Oh yeah, I've been there. My exh was abusive and periodically he'd have these outbursts where I'd be called everything under the sun for absolutely no reason - everything about the past would be rewritten, I'd be the worst person imaginable, and then after he calmed down, I'd be the most wonderful person to him again. He got worse with time. Mutual friends pegged him as a covert narcissist. There was absolutely a cycle of abuse. The tension would build and build, there's be an explosion, and then a honeymoon period.

He's a complete shit. Sorry, OP. And he feels free to do this to you because, surprise surprise, you're pregnant with your second and he reckons he's got you locked down.

I'd demonstrate huge confidence in front of him, and I'd grey-rock him. Look up the grey rock method. Or you could just mock him, and instead of defending yourself, I'd say, "I lay on the sofa all day and dreamed of diamonds!" and if he calls you a liar, say "It's a lifelong habit! I really must try to stop myself!"

How dare he do this to you while you're pregnant! ARSEHOLE!

I would work more hours if possible. I know you're having a baby, but I'd make some longterm plans. Maybe plan to go back to work full-time when the baby's a year old, for example. Perhaps 2 days when the baby's six months. And do 4 days until you're off on mat leave. Anything not to be dependent on him.

Speaking from experience, be prepared for this to get worse, and to want to leave him in the next few years.

I'm so sorry, OP.

It's time to leave. You shouldn't even have to think about providing time stamps to prove anything. This is not normal.

This!
I also have a DH who has never once questioned what I have done all day. Even on the days when the house is the same mess it was in the morning and I have spent all day cuddling my child. He often asks if I got any time for me (reading, TV etc)...

Your partner is beyond abusive. He is nasty to the core.

This is the very definition of abuse.

The reason you didn’t recognise it, as you rightly said, is because your mother did the same. Not all relationships are like this.

You have said you feel you have to ‘prove your worth’ by working yourself to the bone, at your own expense, but if you did take more care of yourself so would everyone else if that makes sense? We signal by the way we care for ourselves, what we expect others to do.

This does not detract from the fact that you are being very clearly abused. It would not matter how much self care you made time for, he would still do this 100%, the only difference being that you would have recognised it much sooner.

Your child can not grow up listening and witnessing this terrible abuse op, she too will think it’s totally normal. You will be condemning her to a life of this as well when she grows up. Unable up see what healthy relationships even look like.

Please book an accredited counsellor, and get some proper support in place, even if you do nothing else at all.

I’m out the other side of this type of relationship. I have said to siblings “I married my mother, and I really wish I hadn’t.”
You have to leave, he is a monster. He is definitely feeling confident that he has you where he wants you and his abuse is escalating. He is already grinding you down.
If you had known this was him before you started the relationship would you have taken up with him? No, of course not.

Sadly like many many many women you’ve found yourself in an abusive relationship. The image should help you unpick exactly how you’re being abused. It’s also helpful to know that abuse often starts or gets worse during a women’s pregnancy.
In terms of next steps I would try and find a local domestic abuse charity that can offer you one to one support. You can also go to your local children’s centre and see if they are running the freedom or you and me mum course, or do the freedom programme online. Another great step would be to try and talk to your friends and family about what’s been happening in your relationship, as you’ve likely not done so out of loyalty, a desire to protect him and fear that people will persuade you to leave, but this will have denied you support.

You need to break the cycle now before your children starts to see what is going on in your home. This is plain and simple psychological abuse. You do not want them growing up thinking this is in any way normal the way that you did growing up, and then accepting and expecting this from thei relationships. You have already sacrificed a good job for this piece of shit man, you will just lose more and more if you stay.

You know what's going on, you know it's deeply unhealthy and if you can't leave for your own sake, leave for theirs.

You are clearly intelligent and have insight into this. I think you will find the strength to leave and then blossom. Good luck.

When he makes these accusations what do you think is behind it?

Does he want a row?
Does he want to push you into doing more?
Is it resentment that you don’t work?

Are you happy?

At this point you’re so vulnerable (pregnant. Small child, low earning job). In his mind he knows he can demand these things and there isn’t much you can do.

OP, he has shown his true colours. Who he really is as a person and it’s ugly.

Remember this:
-you deserve to be treated with respect and kindness
-what you do is valuable and don’t take nonsense from anyone!!

please get your ducks in order and plan your exit, you deserve happiness

I imagine seeing these replies has come as a bit of a shock and it will be a lot to process. On reading the first part of your post, my feeling was that a lot of husbands who go out to work all day have absolutely no idea the amount of work that is involved in being a mum to young kids and looking after a house. This part is very common. They think mums are sitting around all day drinking coffee and can resent that. He has no idea. I guarantee you that if he was left at home to do everything you do for even a couple of days he would very quickly choose to be back out at work!...I think a lot of good partners would admit to this. BUT when your post goes on to mention the way he speaks to you etc, that is unacceptable. It is easy to become passive and be a pleaser to keep the peace. Sounds like you are rushing around on a Friday doing all these tasks because you are worried about his reaction if they are not done. You should not be feeling this way. This thread must be a lot for you, but keep slowly processing his behaviour and find your strength and focus on what you need going forward. Don't just accept this as normality. Unfortunately things will likely feel worse when another baby comes along. Having 2 little ones is different to having 1, and a lot of support from a partner is needed believe me. Being a single mum must be daunting and difficult at times, but with a man like this it might feel so much easier on your own, doing things in your own way in your own time with no obligation or pressure.

I would leave if I was you, but if you want to give him a chance you need to speak calmly and clearly to him and assert yourself.

Mine would have got ‘talk to me like that one more time and we’re done. I expect to receive the same level of respect that I show you.’

It probably won’t make a difference -and if you feel at any risk of harm, don’t do this. Just leave.

How can you consider your relationship 'generally great'?! What's great about it? What's even good about it? This man is abusive.

You are being abused OP. My ex husband was exactly the same with the character assassination and verbal abuse. He didn’t care that I had just given birth to our baby.

An abuser isn’t abusive all the time and they always believe you are at fault for the abuse.

I had some fantastic support from my local domestic abuse charity (not women’s aid) and I’m free and now live a life without abuse.

The most important thing you need to know is that he won’t change. This is how he is in an intimate relationship.

A really good book to read is - Why does he do that by Lundy Bancroft.

I really don't think this would work in this case. This is just who he is. He can pretend not to be abusive for a while if he really thinks you are going to walk, but it won't be genuine. He is choosing to abuse you, he has decided that this is what you deserve. There is a reason why mediation doesn't work when one party is abusive, it's not something you just snap out of.

@PinkUser I imagine this has all been a bit of a shock and will feel overwhelming for you.

It's ok that you haven't recognised before the abusive situation you're in and you're not alone in that so don't punish yourself.

You obviously need to get your head around this and think about what you want/need to happen now. You wouldn't have started the thread if you were happy about the way things are.

Do you have someone you can talk to? Good friend, family member. It doesn't need to be a best friend and ideally not someone who is close to both of you. This is someone for you and you alone and not for him. Ideally he'll never know you share anything with them.

Ideally you want someone who will support you but not try to bulldoze you into things you're not ready for. The last thing you need is someone else ordering you around.

People might suggest relationship counselling but this is not recommended if there is abuse present in the relationship. This is not a problem in your relationship to solve, he is the problem and he is an abuser.

It sounds like physically you and your child are safe at the moment because this abuse appears to be financial and emotional but please be aware that could change and often does.

Pregnancy and post birth is a very risky time in abusive relationships and your risk is heightened.

Do you have a place of safety to go if things escalate? Can you leave a bag of stuff somewhere for you and your child just in case you need to make a dash.

Think about access to documents like passports and important paperwork. Can these be stored out of the house without him noticing?

I know this all sounds scary and so unlikely in your situation and I hope it is but it's better to prepare than not.

Please keep talking.

You will be better off on UC, renting a house and getting your life back.

Leave.

Nothing about this is great. He's emotionally and financially abusing you. What will come next? You must leave. Be careful

my sisters husband was the same, so in the end she didn’t do anything in the house for a couple of days, he didn’t have any clothes for work and kicked off, she was like that’s all the proof you need that yes I do do things in the house!
She did kick him out not long after!
Her biggest regret was that she didn’t do it sooner