Dh says i’m an abusive narcissist, am I? 😔

[Soconfusedaboutitall]

He said this during an argument last week

Dh has a bad temper and I find it so hard to communicate with him these days even if I try to talk gently, he gets really defensive and I don’t want to argue in front of our young dc, so I often send text messages to him. This is generally just practical things about money and bills etc but can be about the way he is with dd (too cross with her in my opinion and I hate it)
He says that he sending all these messages to him i’m an abusive narcissist? Am I? I really want to know as feel confused as to if I am?
He said my messages trigger him and he feels 100% better when I don’t send them. I told him that I send them as literally cannot communicate with him at all and am not going to stand there and do nothing if I disagree with the way he ‘Disciplines’ Dd
He also gets annoyed as I try to section up the money and put some away, otherwise it just all gets spent and I don’t have enough for good, decent food. He said it’s being controlling, is it? If I didn’t do this and try to take charge somehow, we’d be screwed. I don’t want to be the one organising all the finances but he can’t and just spends without a thought.

I want to know if I am what he says I am. I’m willing for us to go to a counsellor to see what they say as I don’t believe I have narcissistic traits at all 🤷🏻‍♀️

It began with

This is generally just practical things about money and bills etc but can be about the way he is with dd (too cross with her in my opinion and I hate it)

and now he has become a very aggressive harsh, shouting and screaming and basically all about this rather than in the OP generally about money and bills.

Still bad temper some days, still snappy, ok other days

IS HE HER BIOLOGICAL FATHER????

Texting when someone can’t keep their temper in a conversation is abuse? How odd to think that

Do you both work? It is joint money? Maybe you need an account for weekly spends that he can get coffee and cigarettes from and a separate account for food.

Do you have money concerns is that is what is adding to the stress and anger?

I work, I haven’t said a budget as that would be even more controlling to him I imagine and I don’t want to have all the responsibility for what can be spent and on what and have to say it

Wanting to budget so you have enough money to feed your family is normal, it is not controlling.

Him shouting at your dd is not acceptable.

You have stopped messaging him, so now see how he still behaves. Although it sounds like the messaging was annoying, I can’t see how that makes you a narcissist, when you are simply trying to communicate your and your dd’s needs to him. If he is still being aggressive with you both, it is probably in your best interests you and dd live separately from him.

Because he’s always on high alert, waiting to have to defend himself from you. That’s how it feels - a siege mentality, constantly under attack.

It depends what "too harsh" looks like. If it's a raised voice / shouting when she's being naughty then I've had this exact conversation with DH. We'd agreed when DC was tiny that we'd try not to shout at her unless it was an emergency but it began to creep in when she was acting up until I started thinking it was getting too much and (most importantly) it wasn't working, it just escalated until both of them were shouting at each other.

I didn't say anything in the moment because while it's not ideal, and it's not how we agreed we'd parent, it's also not beyond the bounds of reasonable. And intervening when emotions are high is generally not going to de-escalate anything. So I bit my lip, waited until DD was in bed, and then we had a really long discussion about it once she was asleep. I accepted that I was sometimes inconsistent (which I was calling 'flexible') and DH accepted sometimes being harsh (or 'being the adult.') Over the course of a few evenings we came up with good strategies for how we would want to parent in an ideal world, when tempers are good and nobody has had a bad day or a frustrating evening, and then how we would signal to one another that the other was departing from that ideal and / or how we would signal that we wanted the other to step in to give us a breather.

Yes and now it turns out that due to his spending, the OP can't buy decent food for the week like fruit and veg.

She's buying pasta and sauce instead.

It's definitely getting worse as the thread progresses.

I’m trying to answer questions, he’s her biological father

She says something at the time when she doesn’t like what DH is doing, and then texts him afterwards to memorialise it in writing and hammer her point home.

Yes, it could be seen as abusive. He’s a grown man, not an idiot who doesn’t remember what she’s said.

I haven’t ignored trying to answer

So you intervene
whilst he’s cross
and then you start up the messaging
what’s in the messages?

and you haven’t been messaging for the last week
and it’s been better

So you have one child - how old?

Always the way when an OP doesn’t get the responses she wants from the original post….

IME usually when somebody has casually diagnosed somebody else with a personality disorder it is a reflection upon their own behaviour.

You can't effectively communicate with your husband as he has a temper, he can't be criticised or reflect upon any behaviour that may make him seem less than perfect. When you send him those messages they make him feel bad - not because you sent them but because they include truths he doesn't want to acknowledge. It appears he lacks self awareness and possibly has a fragile ego so just blames you.

You are not his conscience. Throw this one back and find someone who is more emotionally literate. It's not you, it's him.

The OP say's she's 7.

He will be hating the paper trail and accountability of texts …hence his attacking you (Darvo)

if someone texted me you are doing this and that…it wouldn’t bother me at all..certainly not abusive as the intent is trying to fix things

You can't possibly diagnose a stranger as being a `narcissist' on a Mumsnet thread.

You are ridiculous.

Always the way that someone gives context when questioned 🤦‍♀️ budgeting is in the original post

OP, contact Women's aid on behalf of your child and yourself.

You are being emotionally abused and manipulated, and likely financially abused too.

Have you family?
Can you stay with them?
Don't kid yourself that your child is immune to all this.

Stop engaging with him, he's not going to change.

Focus on getting you both out of this marriage.

Yeah, throw this one back 🙄

No need for OP to examine her own poor behaviour contributing to an unhealthy dynamic. Just get shot of the child’s father. That’ll make her life easier, don’t it? Not like that would cause a load of other problems, given they can’t even communicate effectively now.

IME usually when somebody has casually diagnosed somebody else with a personality disorder it is a reflection upon their own behaviour.

Blimey you're brave! 🤣

It seems like half of Mumsnet have casually diagnosed their DPs, ex partners and MILs at one time or another.

IME usually when somebody has casually diagnosed somebody else with a personality disorder it is a reflection upon their own behaviour.

Blimey you're brave! 🤣

It seems like half of Mumsnet have casually diagnosed their DPs, ex partners and MILs at one time or another.