doormat

[HidingAnger]

i really need some help about how to deal with dh and his behaviour. i'm a sahm with 2 young dcs and I do everything.. cleaning,cooking,food shopping,gardening incl the grass, clothes washing etc etc etc

dh does nothing unless specifically nagged. i've tried asking but it doesn't happen so (and he accepts this is the case) i need to constantly remind him x,y,z still not done. depends on what it is but i give in some of the time and just do it myself

i support him 100% in all his crazy hair brained ideas, he's just recently started a new hobby. this will take lots of time and a fair bit of money but i know how much it means to him so i'm behind him for it. he has recently had to do some weekend work and so he didn't miss out on seeing dcs, i took them into the office to see him (not a easy trip,1.5hrs public transport, we only saw him for half an hour but imo and his, it was worth it)

but what about me? i have had a few appts (medical, hair etc) in the past and he's rarely there to help (even if i've checked with him first about when he can help) which means i have to rearrange for when he will be around or ask family (not ideal)

i feel like an absolute doormat. i am doing as much as i can to keep the house going for him but its not good enough

he smashed a plate last night (rare behaviour) and refused to clear it up. as did i. he kept complaining about how we live in a shit hole and that a broken plate (and food mess) on the floor doesn't make any difference. i just repeatedly said 'clear up the plate'. it was about 10pm and he was still refusing to do it, saying it would take hours because of all the other shit on the floor. There were 4 towels (from our swim yday) on the kitchen floor ready for me to put in the washing machine today, nothing else. so i got dressed again, told him i'd be back in 2 hours so he'd better make a start on clearing up the mess he'd made. i came back at midnight and he'd done an ok job so i went to bed. dc2 then woke up at 1am and didn't sleep again til 5. this is a rare occurence for it to be so long but i am disturbed by at least one of them every night. so yes, on top of everything else i'm sleep deprived.

on top of everything else, he has recently started insulting me. eg we took dcs to a playground yday and people kept leaving the gate open. so each time, i walked over and closed it (busy carpark the other side of the gate). He then pretended he was clutching a handbag under his chin and accused me of being hormonal because i mentioned loudly about people not being able to shut the gate. he has picked at my appearance too eg 'ooh aren't you going grey'. someone told me the other day that i was looking slim (big compliment after 2 dcs!) and when i told dh, he laughed it off.

shit, he's sounding a right arse and i'm sounding like a weak thing. i need help on how to deal with him

ps i'll be back in half hour or so, need to sort out dcs

his text just said 'i need to talk to you', he hasn't left any voicemails
i just replied back that i couldn't talk to him and still keep up a front for the dcs

re your first link.. yes, with some of them. i've never had a great relationship with my family but i'm more distant than ever from them at the moment.

humpty, thank you, i really do appreciate your help

off to have a look at your last link now

the thing about cutting you off from friends and family...

In my experience, it was very subtle. I would be invited out to a friends for tea and would mention it to H. He would be v supportive and say yes you should go.... Then closer to the time, if he was supposed to stay home with the kids, he would fake an illness/headache/migraine etc so that he neeeded to go to bed to rest in a darkened room so I couldn't go cos I had the kids.
or
If it was a situation where kids could come too, then he would invent some sort of problem meaning that I coudln't go. me and my H ran a cafe and he would invent some emergency there meaning that I didn't have time to go out for example, he would run out of change so I had to go to the bank, or he would be short staffed so I had to go to help him or it would be suddenly v busy so he needed help etc etc

TBH when you mentioned him working but you having to take the kids to visit him on public transport, that's what it made me think of. I mean, unless you aren't living together, surely he gets to see the kids most days even if it's only for a few minutes before they go to bed? I may be reading too much into it, but if that was my H, and he was working all day saturday, I would be thinking it would be great to go and meet firends etc without stepping on his toes, I mean, we could go out without leaving him at home on his own on his day off... But then my H would have suggested the coming to visit as a way of preventing me from doing my own thing. Does that make sense? I think a "normal" person would say "I'm sorry I can't spend much time with you this saturday, so why don't you take the kids out instead and have fun with them" and if you suggested the 1 1/2 hour public transport might have said "It would be lovely to see you, but it doesn't seem very fair on the kdis to sit on the bus/train whatever for that long, you spend the day with them and we'll have a family day when work's a bit queiter"

Does that make sense? In the same way, you said about his new hobby... If he is so busy at work that he has to work weekends, and he only gets to spend quality time with his kids on a break from work, and he thinks it's fine for kids to spend 1 1/2 hours on a bus to get there to see him... then how does he think he wil have time for a new hobby? I mean if his priority really was the kids and family time, then why is he going to start a new hobby instead of spending the time as a family?

What are you supposed to do while he is doing the hobby? do you go to watch him? For example, say the new hobby is sailing.... Do you have to go to the boat club with him and watch? or are you supposed to stay at home becuase the leisure money that you have as a family is being spent on that, meaning that you can't justify spending more money as a family on other leisure? While he's sailing, are you taking the kids to the cinema or something or staying at home?

I realise that this might sound a bit pathetic and overanalysing, but this is the kind of stuff my H did. He was very subtle.

Hope you're ok? feel free to pm me if you want to talk more privately.
xx

the other thing that really stands out for me about my relationship is that i felt that I was constantly walking on eggshells around him. When I did the DV course, that was a very common feeling amongst all of us.

For example: He would moan about the house being a mess but would never lift a finger to help. Again he was quite subtle... he wouldn't flat out refuse to do something, but it was often easier to do it myself and get things done and avoid the aggro.

It got to the stage where I was trying to second guess him just to avoid an argument. So if I knew he was coming home, then I would frantically try to tidy up. I would make sure that i changed the channel of the tv before I turned it off so that when he switched it on it wouldn't be on cbeebies because then he would accuse me of letting kids watch tv all day instead of me interacting with them. I would make sure that the kettle was boiled and the teabag was in the cup so I could have a cup of tea to give him straight away to keep him sweet. I tried to always buy things that he liked in the supermarket like his favourite biscuits and offer them to him with his tea. I always cooked his favourite dinners not what I wanted to avoid an argument. I would always defer to his judgement e.g. he would ask "let's get a takeaway, what do you fancy" I would reply "oh i'm not that hungry, you choose and I'll just have a little bit of yours" because otherwise if I said "i could murder a chinese" he would say "don't you think you've eaten enough shit this week, you're starting to get fat" etc etc etc

I would sit on the edge of my seat waiting for the next problem.. if the kids started arguing, I would rush straight in there are sort it out, before he started critiscising my parenting. If he said he needed the toilet, I would run in there first to make sure htere was enough toilet paper and the toilet was clean or that would be anotuerh problem.

It makes it sounds horrendous, but honestly it wasn't because he was such a brutal dictator, it was just easier to try to avert a problem.

The only trouble was, that he would see what I was doing and keep moving the goal posts. He would say that monster munch was his favourite crisps, so I would buy more. Then he would say that he didnt like them anymore and I was supposed to guess what he would want next.

Or I would say, "I'm just popping to the shop, do you want anything" and he would say "no". But when I got back, he would complain that I didn't bring him a mars bar, so next time I would bring him a mars bar although he said he did't want anythig, and he would say he wanted a snickers.

And so it went on...

lets say his hobby is 'sailing', i have been once to watch him. dc1 loves 'boats' so it was actually fun. but we haven't done it again since, it was quite hard to keep dcs safe and away from the 'water'
He has justified his new hobby because he's spending less time on his previous hobby, lets say its 'mountain climbing'. with 'mountain climbing' he'd be out of the house all day, one day of every other weekend. with 'sailing' he's only out for a morning every other weekend and mountain climbing once a month.

we went into the office because he hadn't seen them for days (leaves early and gets back after they've gone to bed). dc1 really enjoyed the journey which is why i did it

he does make me feel guilty about doing things with the dcs whilst he's at work eg dc1 likes painting and dh always comments on how he really wants to do some with him. but still he never has but yet every time i do when he's at work, i get the same 'oh i really want to do some painting with him'. He readily admits that he's jealous that i get to spend so much time with them

whilst he's out with his new hobby, we do usually stay in but that's something i can easily change and is a good point. right, action plan point number one.. plan an activity for when he's out!

sorry, this is all quite jumbled!

sorry, don;t know if my rambling are really helping you at all, just trying to explain the subtleties of this kind of treatment.

Basically it all adds up to a life of misery, just as much and many people say more than a bloke who gives you a black eye every now and then

The thing is that a black eye heals up and you never know it was there, but this kind of emotional game playing fucks you up really effectively and the effects last for a long time.

The good part tho, is that once you get away from "him" it all starts to fade v quickly and you start healing.

Just quickly, I totally get what you're saying above about the sailing and mountain climbing etc... But what would he say if you suggested skipping sailing/mountain climbing and spending a couple of hours doing painting with dc?

he sees it that he's got time for painting and sailing. i don't know why he still hasn't

he's great with dc1 or dc2 but both together on his own and he panics

your rambling is helping. its helping me see things clearer

is it wrong that i want him to hit me? that sounds weird but i'd prefer it to him saying stuff. it would be something tangible

ps you sound like a very strong lady!

no it's not wrong that you want something physical to happen, I used to feel like if he broke my arm, then at least it would be solid proof.

You start to feel like you're going mad... My H would tell me that I over reacted to everything and how I was lucky to have him after the way I treated him (wtf???). i actually thought I was going mad and went to see my health visitor to see if I had post natal depression.

She knew what was going on, due to another rough patch a few years ago and she basically "held my hand" thru that time, helping me to see that it was him who had the problem not me.

Even now, 8 months after leaving him, if I allow myself to get drawn into an argument about how things have turned out, he still blames it on me. He says that ultimately becaues I was the one who walked away, then I broke up our family and it's my fault. All I can do is keep correcting him and say that the only thing that I did wrong, was to put up wiht you and your pathetic carry on for so long! End of!!!

PS, you are a v strong lady too, for being brave enough to realise that something is wrong and wanting to do something about it. it shows that you have more respect for yourself than the allow yourself to become a doormat,

your ps has made me cry, i don't feel very strong at all. i feel completely broken

he wanted me to book an appt with my gp a few months ago because he reckoned i had pnd.

fuck fuck fuck i don't want it to be like this

if you've got a minute can you give me your opinion about this

last night (after plate was broken, i think, may have been slightly before) he sent me an email. i don't understand the point he's trying to make from it.

subject: watch this

But more importantly, look at this:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_hierarchy_of_needs

that wasn't v clear! his email was the youtube link, the next bit of text and then the wiki link

At work so can't watch the video but had a look at the wiki link. To be honest, I think he's just trying to mess with your head, so you'll spend a load of time looking at this and trying to work out what he's saying and what it all means.

Normal people don't communicate via the medium of links. Ignore, ignore, ignore. He's playing games with you.

Re: your earlier point - it might not hurt to see your GP, maybe see if you can get some outside support from somewhere? Though FWIW I think your problem is probably him and his behaviour rather than PND.

He sounds like hard work! I always moan to my MIL about DH because she knows what he's like and is very supportive of me but she will still love him unconditionally. I think it depends whether your MIL would be upset that you were knocking her DS or would be able to see the bigger picture

i am ignoring him, just wondered if anyone else could shed any light on it!

i think mil would be able to see bigger picture, she's at work now though

i just don't know what to do tonight, i haven't got the energy to deal with him. hardly had any sleep last night because of dc2

when i was walking round last night for 2 hours (to give him the opportunity to clear up mess because he wasn't doing it whilst i was there), it was like the dcs were stopping me walking too far. if it wasn't for them, i wouldn't be here. i may be a rubbish mum (in his opinion) but i'm the only mum they've got

I looked at the links. I have read about the hierarchy of needs before. I have no clue what point he is trying to make. Sorry

What are you getting out of this relationship now?.

You cannot hope to change his behaviour, you can only change how you react to it.

Your H likely learnt this type of behaviour from his Dad (we learn about relationships first and foremost from our parents) so I do not actually think that his wife i.e your MIL will be of any assistance whatsoever. She has stayed with her H for many reasons and she will likely side with her son.

The difference now is that you do not have to go down that self same path she trod with regards to your own children.

He has and continues to gaslight you and it is a very effective abuse tactic. You are likely to be a shadow now of the person you once were but you can heal but you will need to heal without his malign and self centered prescence in your day to day lives.

You have a choice re your DH; your children do not. You indicating that if it was not for them you would not be here is very telling indeed to me. They should not be or act as the glue that binds this together.

What are you both teaching them about relationships here?. You want them to potentially learn the same damaging lessons your own H did as a child?. They are picking up on all this, it will damage them just as you yourself are being emotionally harmed by your H.

I watched the video and read the wiki thing.... I guess that what he's trying to say is that here is the proof that if one is trying to live a fullfilling life and reach their full potential then they need all these things to be in place, money, housing, food, water, love, sexual intimacy etc etc etc, but unless you ahve all the foundations then you cannot live your life to the full...

It seems to me like he has kind of caught himself in his own net because I guess the point he is trying to make is that he is the victim here who is not having his needs met so his life is not as good as it should be....

but

If we assume that his behaviour is abusive, which I am certain it is, then it means that you can never acheive your full potential because you don't even have the basics in your life due to the negative impact of his abuse... so by his own standards you are having a shit life too!!!!!!!

But honestly WTF??????

What a knob. This is the sort of game playing that on the freedom programme would be referred to as "headworking" which is basically playing mind games to the extent that you feel that you are going mad.

Maybe that link isn't as helpful to people who haven't done the course, if you like I can expand on it?

Either way, it is utter bullshit. Don't even bother to consider that shit, it is just designed to make you question yourself and your sanity.

One incident that springs to mind with my H is that one day I needed to wash some dishes but there was no hot water... So I boiled the kettle and tipped the whole lot into the sink... (just like any normal person would do??). He totally flipped out saying that I shouldn't tip out the water like that - I opened the lid of the kettle ad turned it upside down- he said that the water would go inside the electrics of the kettle and then somebody would get an electric shock.
Basically this is my recollection of what happened, he spent the next 20 minutes shouting and swearing at me for beign so stupid and then told me to go away cos I was so stupid. I got in the car in tears and phoned my mum asking her what the hell was happeneing. I couldn't make sense of it. What was I missing here? I knew I must have done something v wrong to get such a bollocking but I couldn't for the life of me figure out what it was. I actually thought then that he was loosing it, mentally, because it was totally irrational and made no sense.

I don't know what his motivation was for behaving like that apart from to throw me off balance and make me question my own sanity.

This is maybe what your H is trying to do.

Am off to find my freedom programme book to give some more examples if you're interested.

And obviously, if you suspect abuse, you must get hold of a copy of the mumsnet bible

www.amazon.co.uk/Why-Does-He-That-Controlling/dp/0425191656/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1313597987&sr=8-1

The lundy bancroft book is absolutely fab, I had one, but just gave it away to a friend who also has an abusive partner, I cannot recommend highly enough this book to you. In fact I wish I still had mine and I would send it to you.

Apologies for more ramblings and sorry if it's not helping.

And just to repeat you are a fantastic mum to your kids, and by looking at your life like this and questioning what is going on, it just proves what a good mum you are because you realise that it's not right and you want to protect your kids from this crap

Ultimately it#s what attilla said that made me leave, to break the cycle for my kids, to give them the chance to see how a normal family can be, to experience living in a house where there is no tension, no abuse, no game playing, no fear.

You and your kids deserve to live a life which is full of love and affection, of respect and support for eachother. Where they are free to grow and feel nurtured.

I'm sorry, but I cannot see how they can experience this in your current situation.

i'm not staying here for the sake of the dcs, it was more that i want to run away to be on my own but the pull of the dcs is stronger. my parents stayed together for me and sibling so i know from personal experience how fucked up that gets!

humpty, the more you share about your past, the more i'm amazed!

attila, thank you, i appreciate you spending time writing to me

i'm watching my dcs now, having their dinner, and they haven't got a care in the world :(

hiding don't be amazed, I'm not any more amazing than anybody else, there are hundreds of ladies on mumsnet who have stories of abuse, which are all different but equally horrific.

You are amazing too. You said that your kids are sitting there calm and happy, that is down to you.

What can I do to help you?

how can you help? you can stop saying lovely things because i keep crying!

errrr, NO NO NO NO No

I will not stop saying nice things, because this is what you need to hear.

i'm going to disappear for a bit now, a couple of hours at least. this is dh's laptop so i'm deleting history etc so if he does snoop (which i think is unlikely) he won't find anything

i really appreciate all the help you've given me

and i keep forgetting to say pallymama, i read your threads...some very similar stuff happening over here

its awful, i'm not used to hearing nice things. and by writing that i know how wrong it is that i'm not

stay safe and stay strong and remember, this is your chance to think about what you want for yourself and your kids.

Once you figure that out, what you want, we can help you to acheive it

xxxxxxxxxxx