AIBU to still feel unsafe and want to tell someone?

[Puffinsandcoffee]

My husband has done some things to me /around me in recent years that weren't great. Nothing really terrible - not hitting or SA - but stuff that has made me definitely a bit scared of him.

It's been well over a year since he's done anything like that.

I just have two questions I thought maybe someone on here would have experience of this stuff and could answer.

One is, when did you find that you felt safe and comfortable around your husband again? Is it normal that I don't? Every time he swears or slams a door or something I get scared, and then scared he'll notice I'm scared, because he would get annoyed by that because he just wants us to move on from the stuff that happened. The world cup is stressing me out because he keeps jolting out of his chair and shouting and swearing at the TV!

The other question is, is it really vindictive that I want to tell someone in real life? I obviously won't. He'd be so hurt and really angry, because it's such an injustice to who he is in general. But there was total secrecy in my family about my dad's additions and abuses and I think because of that, having to not tell anyone about the stuff my husband has done is making me feel worse, like as if it's all happening again even though it's not.

Just to pre-empt some stuff that might come up

• I have posted about this stuff before. I spoke to Women's Aid because of replies. I don't mind my other posts being referred to but please don't "catch me out" with stuff from them. Mumsnet is the only place I can have these "conversations" and I'm not trying to be defensive or in denial or anything like that.
• I am getting therapy for cPTSD which I have from other stuff mostly childhood stuff.
• I haven't gone into detail about what he did because I don't think it's relevant but I will if it is.
• I won't be leaving him. I can't even if I wanted to but I don't want to.

I didn't put a poll as it's not really an either/ or but just - is this all normal and will pass, or am I damaging my relationship by not moving on from it?

What a horrible little man he is.
And he’s convinced you that you can’t be without him.
This is very sad to read.

Please do listen lovely you deserve so so much more than this and so do your children.

I am so sorry to hear of this. that is such a devastating and disturbing thing to read.

It really doesn't compare though. There has been no escalation, in nearly 20 years. Just very occasional, low level outbursts. Never any financial abuse or not letting me see my family or anything. Just, occasionally, he loses his temper.

I think it's me, tbh. Mental illness that can be very stressful and frightening. Of course he loves getting home from work, but that's what makes it more stressful sometimes to be here.

I've never kicked a door at work, but we work in very different fields!

I have just read what he did/does and gosh, that is scary! You are minimising a lot which I think is a usuall reaction in many cases. Its very difficult to see what it really is as its become your normal. Its not normal. I am sure you got lots of good advice on here.

There may not been any escalation but there has been cumulative harm for the ‘low level outbursts’

It's a terrible aftermath of that that some - a small minority of them - go on to inflict harm on their own families.
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My sense is that there are many communities here who could describe their experience in these terms.

You are excusing male violence. It’s chilling. Domestic violence is unacceptable whatever one’s ethnicity. (And I suspect that the story you have been told of violence against your group is somewhat one-sided). But clearly you feel differently and believe domestic violence to be excusable so I’ll leave you to it.

OP, I personally think a lot of your logic is deeply flawed but you are a product of your upbringing, as we all are, so I’m not going to be able to convince you otherwise.

I completely understand why you can’t leave him. You would be left with nothing and no one in this world.

I would be amazed if anyone on this thread can help you but I do wonder if there are any organisations connected to your community that you can reach out to? Your situation is clearly not uncommon in your community and so there must be outreach organisations that can offer support, even if it’s just an understanding ear from someone who can empathise so you don’t feel so alone with this? Have you looked into that at all?

Low level abuse is still abuse, OP. You being afraid all the time will be something the children subconsciously aim to recreate in their adult relationships. This is why you are with a man that makes you feel like that, because your dad made you feel like that.

I think the truth is, a lot of women don’t understand that abusive men are actually usually nice men. Most of the time they’re funny they’re charming, then they apologise when they do something wrong and they promise it wont happen again.

You seem to think abusive men are somehow different, but they’re not. This is their exact pattern, and you’re refusing to see it because most of the time your DH is nice. That is what makes him the same.

I'm not or at least not meaning to excuse domestic violence at all. I don't think it's excusable. I think it's explainable.

The "story I've been told" is backed up by what I've witnessed my own father subjected to, among much else. I've never suggested that we didn't also commit violence too.

But anyway, my husband is white British so it's not these experiences that explain his behaviour, I recognise that.

You say you’re not reacting to it and ignoring it but I sense you aren’t prepared to confront him over this behaviour and have a conversation where you challenge the way he’s acted.

This is not healthy and I think you know it

I have done. We have talked about it & I told him I still feel scared because of it. It is over a year since when he punched a wall and called me a horrible name, and after that I told him I felt really sad to think I'd become a woman who accepted that sort of behaviour, and was scared of him. He has said he's sorry. He's aware I'm scared of him and is trying to take that into account in how he behaves day to day. Since then really he hasn't done anything that I think would be considered abuse..

These threads are full of women who grew up in homes like this. Where mum would say dad was a ‘good man’ and would tell herself the children knew nothing.
I grew up with a friend in a home like this. She would tell me what she would hear late at night from her room. But she would get up in the morning and be cheerful and playful to create some peace in the home. She hoped that by being a good, happy girl it would glue her parents together.
She went home from school at 8 to find her dad hanging from the stairs.
Her life was one of meeting abusers and trying to not be scared.
Fear created in children, which is hidden, leads to lifelong health problems. Mental health, addiction, auto immune disorders. You are all burying fear and it will tell over time.
Your children present as happy, but so do you. But children are hyper-aware of emotions and they sense fear or anger because it threatens their survival.
His anger is something he thinks is okay to express in private and he knows it is wrong. He doesn’t walk into Tesco and call the checkout lady a c*nt or try and kick a door in there because he’d get arrested.
Just because your children appear to have a better childhood than you did, it doesn’t make it right.

He is exactly like that. You need to leave.

"I would be amazed if anyone on this thread can help you but I do wonder if there are any organisations connected to your community that you can reach out to? Your situation is clearly not uncommon in your community and so there must be outreach organisations that can offer support, even if it’s just an understanding ear from someone who can empathise so you don’t feel so alone with this? Have you looked into that at all?"

This is what I have repeatedly said earlier in the thread.

I know OP does not want to explicitly state her ethnicity and I respect that, so will not post links to any groups here....but OP a quick search will give you telephone numbers that you can call and speak to someone. Like @Franpie says, just a listening ear who has some insight into your situation.

I have to start work now but not disengaging here: I am listening and taking this all on board and I really am grateful. I hope that comes across - I can see it's prob really frustrating to read some of what I've written but it means so much to me to just be able to air all my thought processes with the truth about what's happening and hear what people think, with no risks to me from just saying this stuff somewhere, so I'm so grateful.

OP you are NOT the cause or reason for his anger he chooses this behaviour ..remember that .

Hi there.

Thank you for your kind concern for the OP and each other. Your support really makes a difference.

We'd like to share our web guide, which we hope may be helpful. If you'd like to, please feel free to take a look at our Domestic Violence page.

Very best wishes from all at MNHQ 💐

The cognitive dissonance on display here is strong. You know it's not right and it makes you scared but you put up with it and are willing to explain it away. I don't think many will be able to join you on that particular bandwagon, OP. I hope you are able to find peace away from him at some point in the future.

The man i've been married to for over 20 years has never expressed 'angry' behaviour! On the rare occasions we've argued, he takes the dog a walk to give us both space.

You've said you won't leave him, and as a grown adult that's a choice that you're entirely entitled to make.

You're also asking if the fear he prompts in you will ease, and the answer to that is no. The likelihood is that your fear will intensify with every angry outburst. It could make you very unwell, mentally.

Is there someone at work who you could speak to?

In my previous company we had a young lady with South Asian heritage who found the courage to speak to us as she was being flown across the world into a forced arranged marriage to a much older man at the end of the week. We were able to contact various organisations that helped her. HR teams are very clued up on this sort of thing these days, they may be able to put you in touch with organisations that can support.

So your mental health issues are so bad that he finds home life so stressful that it results in shouting and hitting things?

And you still claim that your children have a safe, happy home life?

If you are saying that you are the problem, then why have you not left your DH and DC so that they can have a happier home life?

As someone who has c-ptsd due to my childhood experiences of DA and MH issues of my parents, my only goal in life is making sure my DC feel safe emotionally and psychically in their own home.

I would feel a failure as a parent if my children felt distressed or unsafe in their own home.

The things you've described would make someone who is not already "susceptible to being a nervous wreck" a nervous wreck. None of those things are acceptable. And I think you probably already know that. Why is not leaving him an option for you?

@Puffinsandcoffee I won’t repeat what others have said so please just take my support and sympathy - but I do want to make one point: you say you’re from a community where violence among men is commonplace but the values are such that violence directly towards women is not nearly as acceptable, even though it occasionally spills over to a man’s partner. Would that be right?

Because here’s the thing: he’s NOT from your community. His violent behaviour towards YOU does not have its source in growing up among the violence and chaos that you grew up in - and the “rules” that govern it are not the rules you are using to evaluate the possible danger you’re in.

That he needs you to keep quiet about it tells me that he knows that his behaviour would not be seen as OK in your family. But he’s convinced you that his violence is somehow less than it really is. I suspect he’s using his origins to make you feel inferior - whatever he does is “better” than your dad and so you don’t deserve more because (he reckons) you’ve already won by him not being your dad. But that’s not true and is itself abusive. He is abusing you - and he doesn’t have the childhood trauma that you had to explain that. He’s choosing to have you terrified.

I think you need to listen to the white British women here who have personal experience of male violence from partners because that is their culture and they know how that sort of violence works.

And when they tell you that it can escalate to worse violence towards you, please listen. He’s not playing by the rules that you know.

All my love and support. Please find someone IRL to reach out to. I hope you’ and your children are ok.