My life wasn't supposed to be like this.

[tresfatigue]

When I was 18 I got pregnant and had my son. When I was 19 my boyfriend started being violent. When I was 20, I thought he was going to strangle me to death in front of our child. When I was 21 he left me when my dad beat him up for raising his hand to me. He broke my heart. I cried over him every day for months. When I was 22 I took him back. He was caught trying to cheat on me a few weeks later. My grandmother had just died, so I was vulnerable, still loved him, and didn't have the strength to throw him out. It was easier to try to forgive him. Now I'm 23. Our relationship hasn't changed much. He still takes his anger out on me. He's still violent. I rang the police on him on one occasion and had him removed from the house, but couldn't bring myself to press charges against him. Our sex life isn't great. Once a month or so. I don't know if he has cheated on me or not. I can't trust him. Him and my father can't be in the same room together. He tried to kill himself last week by overdosing on pills, because he stole and spent £7000 of his grandfathers money. I had to go in the ambulance with him and book him in. Stayed in the hospital for nearly 7 hours so he wouldn't wake up alone. I had to help him access counselling and get a sick line from the doctor. I'm trying to support this man through his depression and desperation because I love him.

I'm 23, and my life wasn't supposed to be like this.

I doubt that

The posters who are getting a little strong on this thread, who IMO are usually kind and empathetic, are I think over- rather than under-empathising. These are people who have been in the child's position, and their own inner child (to borrow a slightly cheesy phrase) is screaming "get out! get out!" in a kind of panic due to their own memories. It's completely understandable but sadly likely to be counter-productive.

The mother in this case is pretty young herself and has only just woken up to the fact that the relationship she is in is extremely unhealthy, is still very likely hanging onto hope that it could get better if she throws enough love at it. This is of course misguided. But you can't change someone's whole viewpoint, and the things they've been doing for a third of their whole lives, in five minutes. Why do you think therapy takes so long? You can't just slam a set of bullet points down in front of a client and go "see that, that, and that, do them, your life will be sorted, that'll be £50 please". We wouldn't be very impressed with service like that! Yet here you are getting frantic because someone who has only just posted here for the first time hasn't taken on board in the course of one day what a collection of complete strangers are saying. She's hardly had time to think about it. She needs that time.

People need to work through their own issues - obviously the sooner the better in a situation like this where both mother and child are at risk of harm. But yelling at her will just make her freeze up. After all she's used to abuse; piling on a bit more isn't going to make a lot of difference.

Oh for a like button

I have not been in the position op's child is. These are not my memories.

For the record.