Shocked at Dh's past, he needs to distance himself

[pumpkinsweetie]

I have been with my dh for 8yrs, we have 3 dc together & my dd1, whom he has bought up.
Since we have been together, every few weeks he goes into a deep depressive mood that can last days or even up to a week!
Lately he always seems to be like it, most days and it has started to affect our relationship so i have questioned him on why he gets like it, and he has told me his dad beat him as a boy.
His parents have always caused issues for us, basic backstory :mil has insulted my dd1 continually about how she is not her blood!, pil for a year had dh doing their house up every weekend, pil are always askinh for grand gestures of money towards expensive birthday gifts, the last one being an allotment digger thingy that we put £80 towards after being continually harrassed for it, they now want a dh to pay a fith towards a solid gold watch for mil 60th-the watch will cost around £1700 split 5 ways!!, the next is pil constantly buying sil's dcs expensive uniform & clarks shoes when she doesn't spend a penny on my dcs, there are a lot of other things but don't wanna make it too long.
Anyway upon my recent discovery of my dhs past, i now look back on this past year and realise they have been phoning him at work and asking for this money and bragging about what they buy their other gks, not to mention putting him down calling him jellybelly and telling him to lie to me about them phoning me.
We had a long talk last night, and i know he was hit with a belt, thumped, and shouted at when he was a child by his father and we have made a joint decision to cut them out of our lifes as they bring nothing happy to his life.
The thing is he is very scared of his father and his mother does nothing but stick up for fil.
How do we break free from this awful family without causing a show-down iyswim-how do you slowly distance yourself ?
Has anyone managed to break free from an abusive controlling family without too much trouble?
The last thing i want is fil at my door as he scares me also

'phoning him' not me

There is always trouble of some kind when you start laying boundaries with abusive controlling people: their game is control, and they hate losing it, so they will use any and all means at their disposal to regain it.

The thing to remember is that you have a right to lay down whatever boundaries you choose, and as capable adults you can cope with whatever they decide to throw at you. Really, you can.

Have either of you had counseling?

There are very useful links you could use at the start of the Stately Homes thread, by the way. I would notably recommend 2 books by Susan Forward: "Toxic In-Laws" for you, and "Toxic Parents" for him. They discuss confrontation, among other things. Mostly they should be good tools for you getting to the point where you feel emotionally detached enough to break free.

No neither of us have had counscelling, i have said to dh, that maybe seeing one might be good for him as i think it would help him come to terms with his past.
I will have a look at them books, maybe they could help-thanku.
He said to me last night that he deserved the abuse as he had been 'naughty', i of course said no child deserves that treatment naughty or otherwise.
I feel ashamed of myself for taking so long to realise all of this, all this while i have put up with their toxic behaviour and allowed them to manipulate him further

Has anyone broke away from their toxic families sucessfully and if so, how did you do it?

Can't think of any other way except moving as far as possible and making the relationships grossly inconvenient and practically difficult.

I moved countries. Worked wonders.

Your role in this is probably bigger than you realise.

I moved countries too!

Become very boring. Don't respond, tell them you will get back to them, become unavailable.

If FIL ever appears at the door, film him (discreetly).

And give your H a lot of love. I am so glad he trusted you enough to tell you.

Moving away isn't really a possibility at the moment, dh has been working for the same firm for over ten years, children are settled in their schools and we have friends that are very dear to us here.
If it were an option it would be nice to get away but unfortunetly not for now.
If he & i make our excuses hopefully they will get used to seeing us less and less until one day it becomes nothing iyswim-could that work?
I can't believe someone can just forget what they did to their own flesh & blood and carry on the way he does, i also know mil has her part to play, as she could have stopped it but she sat back and did nothing, sil also has her part to play because when mil can't get in touch she uses sil as a 'go between' by getting her to harass him over the phone, whereas other sil gets involved very rarely as she lives other side of country.
Its hard because i know he loves them but they treat him so different to his sisters, its almost as if they never wanted him except to make his life a misery.
First thing is first, im going to look into changing our phone numbers and deleting his sil from Fb.
Its hard because we love our nieces, but whilst sil keeps medalling i don't know what else to do

they will get used to seeing us less and less until one day it becomes nothing iyswim-could that work?

I think it could. But easier said than done. It'd be great to be able to just ignore them - but in practice ignoring is hard, hard work. You'll need to be strong, persistent, and keep some effective strategies on how to distract yourselves when going gets tough.

I was young when I was close to my parents. I wasn't able to distance myself the way you are describing. But perhaps with your life experience and wisdom (that I didn't have) you will.

Best of luck.

What does DH think about potential moving? Your thoughts about his stable job, children settled etc, - is this how he feels too?

If you don't know for sure, you could gently explore this in a fantasizing sort of way...... "How I wish we could move to the other side of the world from all this unnecessary stress"

Thankyou Glenshee, it is going to be very hard as my dh will suffer either way.
If i let things carry on they will carry on with their version of 'happy' families whilst my dh relives his past everytime he sees them, or he is going to have a tough time cutting ties with all he knows.

No-one has once apologised for his treatment as a child, they just carry on like they have this 'perfect' family when indeed they don't.
I cannot carry on with this charade any longer and ive told dh im not willing to stand by whilst they ruin his self esteem.
We have his mothers 60th bbq to attend to in August, i don't think i can go to it even though he is adamnt he should go, i just think it will be another excuse for him to be ridiculed & for my dc to feel left out

He doesn't want to move, he doesn't see why we should.

I left home at 19 and just refused all contact from that point. It was easier for me as my mum had passed so I was only leaving my dad. The way I look at it is that violence is like a poison that drips down through the generations. The only way to deal with it is to cut it out completely. No contact at all, just refuse to engage. No calls, return any cards etc unopened. Good luck and your DH is lucky to have your support.

Oh and don't bother trying to explain it to his parents they won't accept it and you'll end up frustrated and upset. Just break contact

Big hugs to you and your dh.

I would really urge counselling, if you think they are nasty now.....wait until they become manipulative and unpleasant about what you are doing. Especially as you will be cutting off a major source of income for them, and people will question them as to why their own son broke contact.

Stay strong, keep declining their requests for anything. If you want finality then it should be from your dh alone. Whether it be a phone call of a letter. If it were me I'd want my dh to make it clear that their behaviour is not acceptable and that they aren't welcome in his family.

TBH I broke all contact immediately with my parents, then I was so far away from the lies, manipulation and toxicity it didn't matter. They can say what they like, I know the truth and the people close to me do too. Infact I was surprised at the family members who came out in support of me against the odds.

You say you have some dear friends? Tell them what is going on and ask for their support.

Good luck, and look after your dh, his confidence must be rock bottom. He should see a doctor for his depression at least.

It doesn't sound like your husband is ready to cut contact.

Growing up with parents like that does a lot of strange things to a person, including long-lasting feelings of attachment (through fear, obligation and guilt, aka FOG) to people who treated you poorly, and sometimes a lifelong campaign to get them to treat you right, for once (even though they never will).

Your husband will need to come to the realisation that his parents are toxic, and that they will never change or treat him decently, at his own pace.

You, however, do not need to do anything that you personally do not feel happy doing. So if you don't want to go to his mother's 60th, don't go. Whether he goes or not is his own affair. How it affects your relationship while he is still in the grip of the FOG is something you will need to handle, though, as he has a vested interested in keeping up the charade of a happy family so long as he wants something from his parents (their approval of him, which they will never give).

And don't pay a penny towards that effing watch!

Use the cash and hole up in a nice hotel together for the weekend,if you have it to spare x

^my dh will suffer either way.
If i let things carry on they will carry on...^

Yes I agree. I didn't mean carrying on / doing nothing as an option. Only that ignoring is very difficult and you have to be prepared for that.

Don't worry i don't intend putting any money toward this watch, we don't have that sort of money-i can't believe the cheek of fil to ask for that sort of money!

I intend to completely cut-off communications, and im hoping dh follows but like you say he is still clouded by the FOG, deep down i think he wants to be 'accepted' by them but i think he also knows it is never going to happen.

I know that pil, once they realise whats happening they will pull at his heartstrings as much as they can so they can be puppet master once again-they have done it before but this time im going full throttle with change of phonenumbers etc, no facebook, no letters.
I have my dds 2nd birthday party at the weekend and one of my nieces is coming, i don't want to hurt the dc, so im going to allow for this one occasion-sil is dropping her off then going.
Do i still allow for contact between my dcs and their cousins?

To me it would depend on their relationship, and yours with SIL.

I have some cousins I still talk to, and some who turned out just as toxic as my dad and his siblings.

When they get older there is going to be an awkward atmosphere between them as the ties that bind will be the gp's. Your dc's will want to know why they aren't going for Christmas, getting presents etc. Although by the sounds of it, that happens anyway.

If your SIL is on the inlaws side won't she cut off contact eventually also?

She is pretty much on the side of pil, to my knowledge, dh was the only one abused as a child.
Sil see's fil as her knight in shining armour and does everything he asks of her, she is round mil house so much my bil has started to get pissed off.
If pil cannot get in touch with us she will contact us, to say mum this, dad that and to brag about things mil has bought for her dc.
I used to think she was nice, but lately im not so sure- i have gave her a lot of baby things as she didn't have much money when her new baby arrived early, i was happy to be of help but now she EXPECTS baby things from me!, because my dd is turning two she had been heavily hinting at wanting my stair gates and playpen for mil house so her dc can sleep there! because i said no she has been rather kurt.
However much i wanted her to be nice it turns out she is in league with pil

I suggest that DH writes them a letter saying that he is having counselling and the counsellor has told him to have no contact whilst he comes to terms with things that happened in his childhood.

This may put the wind up them and ensure they co operate.

He could also put that as they also 'want the best for him', he expects them to agree to nc.

If they make contac,t repeat that you are sticking to 'what the counsellor advised'. Phone the police if DF becomes abusive.

DH can postpone the decision about DM's party until he has 'had enough counselling to decide'

Although I have contact with my parents now, I didn't for ages. I changed my phone number, changed my email address, moved house and just ignored. It was easy as they had no idea where I was - obviously if you can't move, it's not as easy.

But honestly, it really was quite simple for me to just ignore them.

*I suggest that DH writes them a letter saying that he is having counselling and the counsellor has told him to have no contact whilst he comes to terms with things that happened in his childhood.

This may put the wind up them and ensure they co operate.

He could also put that as they also 'want the best for him', he expects them to agree to nc.

If they make contac,t repeat that you are sticking to 'what the counsellor advised'. Phone the police if DF becomes abusive.

DH can postpone the decision about DM's party until he has 'had enough counselling to decide'*

Excellent advice from Finally. You are doing the right thing OP. It will be hard but these are obviously very toxic people and your DH can only heal when they are out of his life. Stay firm and consistent.

Damn- why doesn't bold ever work for me?

The trouble is, my dh is very relunctant not to see the doctor, so for now we are going to keep our distance from ILs as much as possible.
When me & dh went on holiday a while back, he was like a completely different person- because he wasn't communicating with them.
They are so toxic, just seeing them for one day can affect him
The first hurdle is to make sure they do not phone him with 'sob storys'- waiting for our landline to be fixed so i change our mobile numbers.
Im hoping he won't back down, as it does him no good.
Going to report back to this thread atleast once a week to document everything