I am currently living under the same roof as my dc's father. We are splitting, the dc's know, but we have to sell the house which is taking time.
(d)p is emotionally abusive. He has been physical in the past but not for a long time.
I know what he is and I fully intend to get out with the kids.
He will pick on me in front of the children/put me in a position where he is being very unpleasant but I don't want to retaliate because it would compromise the poor dc's even more than his behaviour does already.
E.g if he is insulting like this evening in front of the kids telling me I didn't do any work today ( I looked after all 6 dc on my own whilst he skulked upstairs "working" and that the gardening and tidying up I did all day wasn't work it was a hobby and looking after the kids could never be classed as work and if I saw it as work there was something wrong with me etc etc.
You get the picture.
The younger kids had asked him to take them out to the zoo but he said he was too tired. He does this all the time, never takes them anywhere or spends time with them. He's always too ill or tired. He never puts the little ones to bed, reads them a story, brushes teeth, do bath times, he has never once in 13 years bathed one of his children. Never taken them swimming, played football, cricket played hide and seek, done drawing, nothing. His idea of playing is to sit there and let the kids run around. If he occasionally comes with me to the zoo it is me pushing swings and playing, he sits there on his ipod because he's too 'ill'
So I know that he will go for me when he knows I will not fight back because the children are around.
He says things when they are there like" When these kids are older they will see you for what you are, how mad you are, how you have spoilt their lives" He does this infront of the kids and calls me names infront of them.
I try my hardest not to fight with him in front of them, not to retaliate, sometimes I do but most of the time I seemingly just take it and they hear all sort of shit being spouted against me. I also do not want to sit them down and tell them that daddy's horrible etc because he's their father and they are caught in the middle. I don't want them to take sides. It has to be their choice what they want. I give them all the love and reassurance I can. He uses them as a power thing. he will take them out for a walk in the evening when he knows I don't want it, but of course if I say it's too late then he makes me out to be the bad person spoiling their fun. If I challenge him about it in front of them then they feel really awkward and upset and I want to avoid that, it's so difficult.
I am hoping that when they are older they will understand what sort of man he is.
They generally do not want to spend any time with him, the younger 2 in particular don't like him at all.
Please can you give me some advice? How can I deal with things to help my children when their father is on the attack and wielding his power stick? Sometimes this can be very subtle of course.
Those of you in relationships like this, how have you helped your children through this?
Those of you who have managed to get out how do your children see what happened when you were with the father? Has their perspective changed over the years?
BTW their father does precious little with them. He is self employed and works from home, which makes things even worse for me. It is me who does all the normal stuff. The only out of school stuff he does is picking up from play dates and supporting the 2 older boys with their sport stuff. He has never been to parents' evenings or anything like that, never supported any hobbies other than sports.
I do not need convincing that he is a grade A shit and that I must get out. It's the poor kids my heart breaks for
Am I making any sense?
Sorry this has turned into a ramble, a bit of a splurge of thinking. There are so many years, so many, so much to say and I don't really know where to start.
Thanks for reading, any advice appreciated