Has anyone separated from their partner with a young child but then regretted it later?

[Beyondconfused]

It's as simple as that really. I have posted on here recently about separating from my partner, we have an 18month old DD. I know we are imcompatible (separate lives, no sexual life since DD was conceived over 2 years ago, separate beds, can't communicate in a respectful way etc and he can say abusive things and be very selfish, spend no time together at all, he works all of the time).

But, over the last few days we have been getting on much better, like flatmates. Makes me wonder if I should just try harder and shut up and make the best of it for DD and see if things get better (although I doubt they will).

Has anyone left a relationship when they have a young child and then later thought that perhaps they gave up too quickly?

Why are you looking for someone to give you permission to be saddled with someone abusive? He gets better for a few days and suddenly everything's OK? All the time you think you should just 'try harder' he is controlling your life. Making the best of it actually means accepting the worst of it. If you go this route your DD will grow up thinking a woman's place is to put up with bullying and shut up about it ... is that honestly the message you want to pass on?

You may regret leaving or you may not. But you will sure as hell regret staying.

Oh Cogito, I don't know. I'm just bloody worried I'm doing the wrong thing. Maybe I've read too much Mumsnet recently ( I was rather sheltered from all these arsehole men stories before reading Mumsnet!!!). I just read some of the stuff on here and think that my situation is easy compared to what some poor women have to put up with with their lying, cheating, seriously abusive partners.

I don't feel any differently about him as such, as in, a really decent guy who is prone to being selfish and abusive with is words on occasion, partly due to him and probably partly due to my attitude maybe (incompatible)....but we have a daughter and when he is not working he's a good Dad and he does have his good points.

I'm not scared of leaving him, sad yes, as I remember the good bits...but I'm just bloody scared I'm going to mess everyones lives up and if I'm honest maybe I could've done more (ie, invite him back into the bedroom once DD had got over her colic for those first 6 months after being born). Then again, I have just remembered that he told me recently that he didn't think sex was very important in a relationship.

I'm talking myself out of it one day as I seem to have the ability to forget the bits that are wrong after a few days of things seeming to be ok. Argggh.

I'm just wondering if anyone had done what I'm in the process of doing and then a year down the line things turned out worse than they thought. In my head I think things might be ok, but then I think maybe I'm being naive that's all.
I've led a normal happy life until this!!

If you're not sure then you have to go in stages... more to convince yourself than anything else.

1. Talk honestly as a couple. Via counselling if necessary. That means everyone owns up to mistakes, expresses their feelings & concerns and agrees to take responsibility and make changes. If he's not prepared to stop being selfish and abusive, rejects counselling, doesn't take you seriously, promises changes but does nothing, or expects you to make all the running... bad signs. If you discover you are simply incompatible, that's worth finding out. If changes can be made and you stay together, problem solved
2. Trial separation. A staging post that will enable you to see if life without him is better or worse. Then you can judge if it's right to take the next step.
3. Permanent separation.]

Almost everyone describes their selfish abusive partner as a 'good dad'. They can carry on being just as good a dad from a different address.

Your posts are always great, very wise.
He won't go to counselling at all and thinks we should be able to work it out on our own. Each time we have talked about our problems he takes absolutely no responsibility for his part at all and blames me for everything. What he said the other week (the abusive comment I wrote about in my previous thread) he still hasn't acknowledged. He just said to me that night that from now on "we should never talk about our relationship again".
So then of course, my mouth has been shut, even if I wanted to talk about things, yet he can drop in things like how ill the whole situation is making him and how it's not fair on him that I'm still in the flat rubbing his nose in it with DD around and that I should go and stay with my Mum and Dad.

One day he's all upset/moody. The next he's jolly as anything. It's totally and utterly confusing.

I wanted to go to counselling to discover a) if we can sort things through with some outside help or b) come to know for sure that we can't things through but know we've done everything we can. Alas he won't go to counselling under any circumstances.

And so I have to leave and will be the bad guy won't I. :(

Trial separation sounds good to me but hard with a DD, not fair to mess everyone around like that.

I'm just so bored with thinking/talking/writing about the situation. I want change one way or another and to move on whether it's with or without him. It feels so stagnant.

Left one abusive relationship when I was pregnant with DD1 and the next when DD2 was 2 (I know, I know!). I can honestly say,I never regretted leaving for one second but I will always regret not leaving both relationships much earlier.

I kicked exP out when DD was 18 months old, following his 2nd affair since she was born. Its bloody hard sometimes and in my wobbly moments I do miss the good things about him. But it doesn't detract from the fact he lied to me and had such little respect for me and my children that he was unfaithful for months at a time. I dont need that crap in my life. Painful as hell, but no going back from that. Good luck x

"And so I have to leave and will be the bad guy won't I."

If you are treated badly and you walk away you are not the bad guy you are the 'smart guy'. The 'bad guy' is the one dishing out the ill treatment. He won't go to counselling and risk a mediator pointing out he's in the wrong or suggesting he should adjust his behaviour. Far easier to have a go at the wife until she shuts up.... which she always does. The person that refuses counselling has no intention of changing.

If you can go and stay with Mum and Dad, why not do it? Living with someone so emotionally erratic 24/7 affects your judgement and, if you've tolerated it for a long time, you'll think of it as 'normal'. Time spent with yourself and other people is often the best way to see how abnormal things actually are.

Thing is, he's not full of "ill treatment". It's just when things don't go his way and we argue that he says awful things (although he can be very selfish). Other than that he can be really nice. But alas now, I have just totally switched off.
He has just come in and asked me (respectively) again if I am going to go to my Mum and Dads for a bit so he can have a break from it. I have explained that they live an hour away which makes viewing flats difficult here, but that I understand what he says. He still says "it's your decision" regarding me leaving, which it is. But there is not a single ounce of fight from him and still not a single mention of what he said the other week.:(

Anyway, I shall drone on about it no more! Thanks for your replies.

marymoo - I would find it much easier to live with my decision if he was like your ex, cheating, lying and a totaly bastard etc but he's not. He's just selfish, can be belittling and say awful things and thinks that sex isn't very important in a relationship.

BUT, my resentment is such that I no longer love him. I guess I was wondering if there was anyone who had split up from someone feeling as I do but then later regretted it. I can understand not splitting up from a man who had affairs/alcoholic/lying etc.....but what about when they are perfectly reasonable sometimes and a total cock at others?!

No one can know if you will regret leaving.

Will you regret staying?

I will be living a lie if I stay.
It's just hard as when he's being nice with DD and being pleasant to me (although I still feel like he's just a flatmate) I feel I should feel something as he's a decent guy (but not that decent to me at times)...however, I still feel this feeling inside me where a part of me almost can't stand to be near him. Is that just total resentment? I sometimes feel that if we didn't have our beautiful DD and I never saw him again my life wouldn't be any different AT ALL. That's how little there is now. Not a good sign is it?

" It's just when things don't go his way and we argue that he says awful things"

A good relationship is an equal partnership of two people that like, love & respect each other to behave decently, even when they disagree. People who say 'awful things' in order to get their own way are bullies. They don't have to be bullies 24/7... they just have to knock you back every so often so you know your place. They can afford to be nice the rest of the time because that's a little incentive for you to stay obedient. When the cards are on the table and you stand up to them, however, it all gets turned around that you're the bad guy. See how it works? That's not the behaviour of a 'reasonable man'.... it's psychological bullying.

You will probably regret leaving initially because, in spite of everything, you're still secretly hoping things will magically come right. But one day, a few months down the track and from the vantage point of a lovely life where you are not being ignored or belittled, you will smack yourself hard on the forehead, make this face , and wonder why the hell you put up with the crap for so long.

It's just when things don't go his way and we argue that he says awful things

Normal people realise that sometimes (often) things don't go their way and don't say awful things because of it.

I disagree Lueji. I think everyone says awful things sometimes don't they? Normal people have arguments sometimes. Normal people say things they regret sometimes.

No I don't think normal people say abusive things every time something doesn't go their way. Perhaps occasionally and being "normal" they would hopefully apologise once they have calmed down. Abusive people don't tend to apologise or if they do it is a conditional apology i.e. I am sorry but... In other words not sorry at all.

Do you want your DD growing up thinking what her parents have is all she can look forward to? Do you want her to think that being treated the way her mum is, is fine?

Everyone deserves to be with someone they love and who treats them properly.

I agree that we can say shitty things in an argument sometimes, things we may not mean.
However, the things DP has said to me have always had an underlying theme...of not being good enough, belittling comments, controlling selfish attitude, not listening or understanding. Those things aren't one off regretted comments. They are obviously things he thinks.

BUt, for him to say to me the other week "if you were a bloke I'd shove your teeth down your throat" purely because we were disagreeing about why I want to separate, purely because I was firmly telling him that he wasn't taking responsibility for his own actions and that we both have played a part in our relationship falling apart ....well that's just totally unacceptable isn't it.

Just because two people don't agree on something it doesn't give them license to say such abusive things....of if they do say them, they then have the decency to realise they were wrong, take responsibilty for what they said and apologise.

Beyondconfused - I remember reading the shoving teeth post and didn't realise that was you. Nasty, and yes of course it's totally unacceptable, especially if he didn't apologise.
What is making you doubt your decision to separate? You talk about making the best of it for DD... but it sounds like it wouldn't make things better for her if it the relationship was so bad. And what about you? What about what you want. Shutting up and making the best of it doesn't sound like a recipe for happiness.

Abusive people don't tend to apologise or if they do it is a conditional apology

Yes, that's a familiar one to me.I've just found a lot of old emails between me and DP where we've communicated after an argument (weirdly, as we always did, not in person, just text or email)....and I can see my emails are quite firm in saying "what you said was unacceptable and I won't be spoken to like that"...and his response being that I made him so frustrated that he said those things, a case of sorry but it was your attitude who made me say those things, ie, blame on me instead of taking responsibility.

abatinbunk No, I don't want DD growing up thinking that this is what a happy relationship is, two parents who no longer want to spend any time together. My DP would say that I treat him badly at times and I think the same of him, so it's both of us. I'm started to realise now after have DD that actually we have just been two people who did love eachother but are just incompatible and that no amount of counselling or communicating can rectify that now.

I think the lack of sex ( read intamacy , closeness ) is a fairly big factor. In that it's a positive in being close and general harmony.

When my XP was pregnant I totally went off sex. There were hundreds of articles in her magazines about 'how to have great sex when pregnant'. Not one about guys who's switch turned off. And as such we drifted apart.

And without the intamacy of sharing a bed it was down hill from there. There was a comunication breakdown. A rift grew. Resentment flourished. Understanding and forgiveness wained.

I think you'll probably find a lot of single mums miss having someone to share life with. It ain't easy bringing a child up solo.

They may not miss their dickhead ex or regret the split, just not having decent bloke around .

If you are able to get on with this guy, well value that. You may not be suited for a relationship but he's your dd's dad, and hopefully will be a part of your dd's life, and hence yours for another 18 years.

I don't know what he said to you, but I respect you admitting you are both not angels.

Me personally. I regret that I and my xp haven't been able to give dd a family that's together, dd suffers the consiquence of going between homes , but we weren't suited ultimately. we do manage to get on. I even asked xp to holiday with dd and me this year, she let's me use her flat at times etc etc.

Obviously you shouldn't have to put up with abuse. Again I don't know what he said. If you don't love him there is no point in holding out. But if he's fundimentally decent then put your energy into being friends for dc's sake.

Thanks for your post Mr Gin. It's good to have a man's perspective.
And what you describe re sex(lack of intimacy and closeness) is a huge factor in creating general harmony. But we've not had sex since DD was conceived over 2 years ago and when I mentioned to him 3 months post birth about when we might have sex again he said "when we have another baby" and that was that. End of conversation. I thought that was pretty odd. Sexually things have never been great, I think he has low sex drive. He recently told me that he didn't think sex was very important.

And without the intamacy of sharing a bed it was down hill from there. There was a comunication breakdown. A rift grew. Resentment flourished. Understanding and forgiveness wained.
I totally get this yes. He has this firm idea that I "kicked him out of the bedroom" 3 weeks after DD was born (I was breastfeeding and she would only sleep on the bed, she had terrible colic, I just wanted a small chance of some sleep and it seemed pointless in his being tired too when he couldn't do anything). I have told him that I did not kick him out at all. He will not shift on this.

I would hope that we could be friends as he is a decent guy, although his attitude to me is not decent at all at times.

This evening he has been very petty. Wouldn't let me use the lounge to watch tv or compromise when I said I would happily watch it in the other room if he would let me unplug the dvd so I could take it in the other room. He then told me that from June 1st he will no longer be providing money for the food. He will buy his own food and give me some money for Edie's food but not for me and he will do his own washing/cooking etc. Under the circumstances he doesn't feel he should pay for my food. I am a SAHM so I have no income. I have been looking for flats for a month, he has on many days been reasonable, saying I should find the right one etc, not just take anything. I have continued to cook, clean, look after DD 7 days a week, do the food shopping, do all the washing. Everything the same, he goes to work but does nothing else. He stopped giving me any money just for me when I told him I wanted to separate. This I understand and dont' expect him to give me money for me to have coffees or haircut or whatever. It is his house, he pays the bills etc, so I figure that my payment for staying until I leave is to contiue to do all childcare and all chores/washing etc etc.

Tonight he also told me that the house is a shithole 90% of the time (trust me when I say it is not AT ALL. It's very tidy), told me I never do any cleaning (again, totally untrue) or foodshopping etc.

I have kept firm in telling him he is being belittling to me. He then tells me I'm being arrogant and preachy. He doesn't think that him saying "if you were a bloke I'd shove your teeth down your throat" was wrong as it was " just a saying, out of frustration".

Alas he is taking the victim role as usual. He has done nothing wrong at all.

I think you'll probably find a lot of single mums miss having someone to share life with. It ain't easy bringing a child up solo

I'm sure it isn't Mr Gin, but to be honest, I've pretty much 99% of it on my own (as he's been working all of the time) since she was born so I'm not sure it will be that differnt workload wise. I can honestly say I've felt pretty much like a single parent since about a few months after she was born.