This is playing on my mind

[VictoriasSecret]

I have a good marriage. We have 3 children and I am a sahm. My husband is a good, kind man who works hard. We have always had a good relationship. We bicker sometimes but don't really argue and he has never been violent or aggressive to me in any way.

A couple of weeks ago something happened and it is playing on my mind to the extent that I feel a bit upset when I think about it.

I take sleeping tablets so sleep very deeply. I woke in the early hours to find that my dh had his fingers inside me and was taking intimate pictures of me on his phone.

He didn't immediately stop when I woke. I was so shocked that I just let him carry on which he did for a few minutes. He then stopped and made a bit of a joke about it. I said very little and we both went to sleep. We haven't discussed it since.

I don't know what to think of it. I feel confused about what happened.

You know, even if this was all a storm in a teacup, or an exceptionally vivid dream, or a one-off mistake by an otherwise good man (not that I believe it's any of these!) it's still a very good idea to start taking control of your life again. Suppose something dreadful happened, your H had an accident or illness or was kidnapped by aliens so he couldn't take care of you for a while, you'd be helpless. This is not a good situation even if you did trust him 100%. You went through a very bad patch and needed all the support you could get, but now you're a bit more capable you owe it to yourself and your DCs to climb back onto your feet and re-learn independence. If your H were a good man, about which the jury is currently out, you would also owe it to him to take back your share of the burden. It's quite an unhealthy dynamic, however understandable that it developed.

I bet you'll sleep a mite easier at night if you feel more in control too.

Hi, just caught up on your thread VictoriasSecret. How did you get on with CAB?

I think it's time to start setting up a bit more independence for yourself. This man has made you totally reliant upon him, and you are paying way too high a price for his 'help'. You will need your own bank account, and squirrel away whatever money you can.

Please tell me if this is out of line, but I suffer from chronic depression, and find if I'm having a rough time and DH is home, I don't HAVE to cope, I can just go off and hide for a bit. If I'm feeling terrible and am on my own, then I HAVE to carry on at least while the children are awake. I have to feed them, clothe them, take them to school etc. I feel like crap while I'm doing it, but I do what needs to be done. Perhaps on your own with your daughters you may find you're stronger than you think? (I know it will be different for me as I just have depression and not bipolar).

Just wanted you to know I've been thinking of you.

I truly hope you are alright VS. I really feel for you, you poor thing.

VS, have you asked him why he took photos of it? To me that is the aspect that is the most chilling. From your previous posts I can't see that he has offered you any explanation for that. I would say that it is highly likely that he has or would have downloaded them on to the internet and that he has done this many times before. In fact I would call his bluff and say that you know he has done it before and see if he confesses. I would also check his internet history to see what sort of sites he uses, if you have not done so already.

At the moment you only know half of the picture and it is a lot more difficult to make life changing decisions than it is to post messages on mumsnet telling other people to leave their spouses.

So sorry op , ive experienced similar , only in my case it became almost normal to be regularly assaulted , i suspect my ex was a narcissist .

I am very very concerned by what you have written , and how you describe the decline in your health and your capabilitys , its something im familiar with and something ive heard many times . Abusers and the disordered can acheive this quite easily in a non violent way , often they are caring and aparently supportive , in fact what they actually do is mess with your version of reality , then they inplant their own warped version . Eventually you do not know who you are and what is right.

I would urge you to contact womens aid , this is totally chilling .

I wouldn't be discussing this with him - I'd be planning my escape.

Please tell your CPN what happened, and I would urge you to contact your CMHT before stopping any meds.

This man sounds like a very nasty piece of work and you are very vulnerable at the moment.

omg, you lot are nuts!!

how can you jump from him 'abusing' his wife to abusing the kids?? sick in the head is what i think those of you who have done that are.

No evidence what so ever that it is even possible. How can you go round labelling a man as a virtual peadophile without a snippet of evidence? I hope you who have are disgusted with yourselves!

And i hope VS that you have some true friends in real life to talk to about this. Because in the OP you are saying you have a good marriage and he is a good man etc...this lot start and you are sleeping in the spare room and looking for advice to leave him.

Has your marriage truly gone from good to bad?? Or have you just listened to this lot too much?

You need to speak to someone in real life about this and get a bit of perspective on it.

I would be pissed off if my husband took pics of me whilst doing that, but he would get ALOT of grief over it and that would be it.

And while i'm ranting how on earth do any of you know he is pasting these pics all over the net? They are more than likely just for her husbands personal use.
He has been a prick and he knows it now. Certainly not bad enough to be labelling him a peadophile and a pervert sticking her pics all over.

I seriously think some people need to learn to think before they type

OP, i hope you get whatever help you need

so eloquently put moonbeam!! i totally agree! :)

Moonbeam, he hasn't just been a prick. In the eyes of the law he has actually committed a sexual assault. A sexual assault on a person whom he knows is very vulnerable.

It worries me that you think it's an overreaction to call it that.

I agree it doesn't necessarily follow that he would assault OP's children in the same way, but he's certainly proved that he has no respect for boundaries when it comes to other people's bodies. Would you want someone like that around your children?

madonnawhore
my husband has had wandering hands in the night. I most certainly don't see it as an assault on me. The law may say it is and fair enough because in some cases and in some relationships then yes rape is possible and i am glad there is a law to rpotect women who are genuinely a victim of it.

In a loving relationship where a man or woman finds their partner attractive then yes, there could be wandering hands. Sometimes i give him a slap and mumble to leave me alone...sometimes i enjoy it and am grateful he had those wandering hands. Totally depends which mood i'm in. I certainly wouldn't scream abuse.

The pics is a step too far i agree...my husband wouldn't do that because he knows better. But i hate my pics being taken anyway. IF he did do that to me i would probably have a whilly row with him...tell him what a dick he had been and make him delete any pics.

That would be it...he wouldn't do it again and the problem would be over.

I would never ever dream of stopping him being around my kids. EVER...without perfectly good reason.

I stand fully by what i said...people on here have ntohing better to do than try and up the drama and split people up. Before the end of page one on most threads i read the usual posters are screaming 'leave the bastard'

How can anyone know without living that persons life first?

Moonbeam but you have the option to consent to, or rebuff your H's advances. Presumably those times when you tell him to leave you alone, he leaves you alone?

My BF and I often wake up in the middle of the night all over each other, not really sure which one of us has started it, and it's great. But that is not what the OP is describing.

The OP was knocked out on sleeping medication and her H was banking on her not waking up. We know that because when OP did wake up, he was already half way through the assault. Any decent man would have stopped all sexual advances as soon as he realised his partner wouldn't, or was unable to give her consent. But without any regard for the OP's consent, he just went ahead and used her unconscious body to gratify himself.

If that weren't repugnant enough already, he took pictures of the whole thing.

Of course we don't know what it's like to live the OP's life, we can only respond to what she posts on here. And the details she's given in her posts are, to me, intensely worrying. She is describing a situation where she is entirely financially dependant on this man, and where he exercises an inordinate amount of control over other areas of her life and her environment.

All this while she is taking some pretty serious medication for mental health issues, means she is very vulnerable and despite knowing this, her H violated her sexually.

I wouldn't say that it's a situation she ought to stay in.

She does sound very vulnerable...but in her OP she also says

I have a good marriage. We have 3 children and I am a sahm. My husband is a good, kind man who works hard. We have always had a good relationship. We bicker sometimes but don't really argue and he has never been violent or aggressive to me in any way.

That to me does not scream abuse. Yes he was in the wrong...totally in the wrong. But in EVERY other area he sounds like a good man...described by the OP.

Then the MNers start and all of a sudden she is onto CAB and leaving him. Sleeping in the spare room etc...

Now if she is vulnerable and not in a fit state mentally then reading all the men haters on here isn't going to help is it. Because she goes from being happy to reading all the tripe on here and leaving him. That is the reason i say she needs to speak to someone in real life and get some perspective on this, rather than taking advice from a load of frustrated/jealous/highly strung bored women who are willing to accuse a stranger of child abuse amongst other things.

I seriously Hope the OP has someone to talk to who will help her see this more clearly rather than jumping because of what is said here.

I reckon 90% of the posters here just love the drama...and chalk it up each time they get the desired reaction. Usually splitting up a otherwise happy family

There is a bloody huge difference though between a sleepy night time tumble, and someone sticking their hand up you while you are out of it on sleeping tabs, and then taking pictures. The former is fine, the latter is sexual assault, and definitely not ok.

glastocat, does that make him a peadophile? make him plaster her pics all over the internet? and kill their marriage?

i don't think so

A very similar thing happened to me years ago, but there were no phones then, thank goodness. To cut a long story short, things escalated and this seemingly kind, loving husband/father/pillar of the community etc etc ended up inside jail after being found guilty of various sexual offences.It was the worst time ever, but i realised that what he did was without my compliance or assent and i did not allow it to happen. Think very carefully about this - whatever happens, how could you trust him again ? i would be very wary for a very long time...obviously, with what happened to me i would not allow it to happen again and i know you may feel differently cos as you say he has his good points. Well -they all do...

MB it might be an idea for you to educate yourself a bit more about how abused women act and react

they pretty much always start by saying their abuser is a good man, a good father, they have a good relationship etc

they have to do that, so they can stay, so they can rationalise, so they can hope he will become that nice person again who hooked them in initially

this isn't a "made up drama" in MN'ers heads

the Op has given enough information to make any sane person very worried for her

aren't you worried for her ?

do you think she shouldn't be asking herself some very difficult questions ?

should she accept this kind of sexual abuse to "keep the family together"

that is just as chilling to me, as the OP

it is people like you who guilt-trip women into staying in abusive relationships far longer than they really should

oh AF,

where do i say she should stay in an abusive relationship to keep the family together? No where...

I am asking how people can say he is abusing her children? I am asking how you can all jump on her and say that even though she says she is in a good relationship, you lot don't agree and she should leave.

I do not need to educate myself anymore on abusive relationships but thankyou for your concern. I know about them :)

I think, as i have already said, thats he needs to get some perpective on this. Just because you have it in your head she is in an abusive relationship..therefore making her OP statement rubbish doesn't make it so.

Maybe, just maybe, she was happy in her relationship and maybe he IS good dad...and he was being a major prick. Not unknown for people to act out of the ordinary. She says it hasn't happened before but yet everyone decides it has, she just doesn't know it yet

See what i mean, create a drama...tell her a load of crap so she doesn't know what to think.

I am leaving this thread now because i feel i am saying the same over and over. I have lurked alot and each time it is the same. You all jump and scream about the husband being a bastard and for them to split..call womens aid...blah blah blah.

What pissed me off was labelling a man a peadophile without not a bit of evidence. I seriously hope those who did are ashamed of themselves..you are the sick ones..no one else.

Good luck VS and i hope you find someone to talk to :)

she HAS been advised to talk to someone in RL......CAB,womens aid,her parents.......who would you suggest if not them moonbeam

oh and her CPN and team.....

ohhh ILT...from what i can see (and i do apologise if i'm wrong) but you are the first one to accuse the husband of abusing her children...

so i will say it to your face/screen you are sick in the head. What right do you have to accuse a man of something so appaling with no evidence?

I do not wish to answer any of your questions and IMO you have no argument here or anywhere. I suggest you get counselling. You cannot go round libelling anyone like that. Just because you are sat behind a screen wouldnt make it any less painful for her husband if this did get out. AND it has been known before for a thread to leak into real life.

Grow the fuck up before you post again

perhaps she should talk to her abusive husband ?

or to someone just like you ?

who would deny she has been sexually abused ?

thus making her more helpless than ever

she has been signposted to the appropriate RL organisations, and they will also be appalled at what has been done to her while under the influence of heavy medication, some of which was never prescribed for her

moonbeam....i can post as i like!

and yes,i would urge anyone in this situation to consider the bigger picture.....you might want to take chances moonbeam,but up to you.

i'm not sick in the head AT ALL.....i'll post again where and when.. who are you to tell me or anyone else here otherwise???

it might be an idea for you to educate yourself a bit more about how abused women act and react

very patronising statement that, but thats how you like to come across .. like you 'know all'

If you'd have asked my Mother about her abusive husband and she would certainly not have said 'he's a good man' ... stop reading twatish books and get real

"that's how I like to come across"

in a general kinda way, you mean ?

like, everything I post, ever ?

is that a disagreement with me on this particular scenario, or a cpmplete character evaluation ?

Can we not turn this thread into a slanging match?

The OP may still want help or advice, and shouldn't have to wade through all this.

State your opinions but there's no need to resort to personal attacks.