Not sure how to go on! Feel like a horrible person.

[Henrythehoover]

This is a bit of a difficult subject and I'm really struggling to know what to do.

I feel really unhappy but not sure how to sort this. I've been with my dp over a decade and we have children together. He's always been a big guy (obese) he used to care about how he looked ect when we met but over the last few years he's just stopped caring to the point he has a shower about once a month when I moan about it he never brushes his teeth (they are rotting) and it's just horrible. He's also very clingy and makes me feel bad for just being me when his anxiety gets bad. It's like I'm responsible for how he feels as in his words "if your not happy I'm not"

We do have good times together but this underlying stuff is really getting to me. The kids are picking up on things too and it's not good. Like they think over eating is normal and don't want to help round the house. I feel so mean feeling sick of it all and I don't know what to do. I'm a horrible person for not standing by him when he needs me aren't I?

I've tried talking about it and get told things will change but they never do. It's so difficult to cope with and to make it worse I have no one to talk to a out it. If anyone has any suggestions for making it better as I just don't know what to do.

Oh, and regression = controlling, because the child needs to be at the centre of attention, and will do whatever it takes to ensure that his needs are met.

Thanks everyone. I currently work so that I can be at drop off (breakfast club) and pick up at the end of the day. It's just the holidays that are the problem.

I just don't get why I feel like i ow him something. Probably because he was there for me and my oldest when my ex left. Or he's just made me feel responsible for his happiness.

You're doing no one any favours by supporting this. Not him, not your children, not yourself.

Reading this as someone unrelated I know I would be thinking why the he'll would you stay. But the reality of it is so different. Alot of the time life just plods along and I feel I'm making a fuss about nothing. Even though the niggling voice in my head says it's not right

I know lots of people with depression, not sure that's his excuse.

Showering once a month at your instigation, rank and you should not have to have sex with any human being this dirty.

He's lazy, dirty and uses the kids against you; you are not responsible for him, he's a big boy, if he was remotely interested in your feelings and saving this relationship he'd at least wash and brush his fucken teeth, that is just vile what he is doing; sorry but I'd not be taking the blame for someone else's choices, not when they were affecting my mental health, he'd have to go, I could not live like this.

Regardless of him and what you feel for him, he's damaging your children. They shouldn't be brought up in this environment - honestly, it's emotionally abusive, the way he uses them to blackmail you into compliance.

They deserve better. And you definitely can give them a much better life.

She's tried to separate from him and he's used the kids to manipulate her into saying. I've not at any point said they shouldn't see their Dad. I've said that she should not give him and his mother the opportunity to pull that shit twice.

Read the OPs posts properly.

As he seems to require mothering perhaps his mother can get him to wash etc.

I've tried a few times to split and it's always the same and other times I never get the nerve to do it or things seem better for a while and as you know there are always things in the way like we have a family holiday booked for next month so I think I'll do it after that then something else comes up. Plus I sometimes feel like i can't cope alone but maybe it's him who's made me feel like that as whenever I day the kids have played up while he's at work I get "how am I suppose to work when you clearly can't cope with the kids" but when I go out he calls constantly saying the kids are playing up and that he can't cope or he's ill. I went out with the oldest and a friend the other day we where staying out for the evening and about 2pm I got a call saying can I come home as he's not well and can't cope" I said no and mentioned it to my friend with that my oldest went "he always says that to try and make you go home"

Sorry for going on but putting it all down is really helping.

Don't apologise, it's your thread and you use it however you want.
I don't like the fact he calls you back all the time when you go out.
What a cock.
Is he also moody for a day or 2 after you've been out?
Stonewalling etc....?

Sometimes usually it's just I missed you so much or the kids saying he was nasty and him denying it.

You said that your kids say that he's lazy and that they feel he's not interested in them. That just sounds so incredibly sad, that your children have noticed such a thing.

So he's only obsessively interested in spending time with you? Not even his own children?

There has to be something incredibly wrong with a situation like this.

He does take them out when he's off in the holidays and I'm not and says he enjoys it but not sure if that's just to make me happy. God it's bad I even question that isn't it?

You shouldn't stay with him because of the kids, or his mother, or even because he wants you to. You stay because you love him, want to spend time with him, and because he contributes positively to your family life.

Do you feel he genuinely is interested in your children? It surely must be very sad for children to feel unwanted by a parent?

Not really he loves them but doesn't really take much interest. If they are telling him something he says look at this and shows them something on his phone. I don't know maybe I'm just being mean.

I think I'll give woman's aid a call tomorrow and see if I can get my head straight

Christ sounds a bit like my sTBXH. Doesn't shower often. Wouldn't brush his teeth for days, teeth rotting. Wearing same clothes for days on end. Needy. Doesn't like to spend time with the kids. Always calling me when he's looking after them because he's 'ill' or DS is playing up. Has a combatative relationship with DS.

It is SOUL destroying. I feel like I'm a husk of myself. We're still in the same house but I'm pushing on through.

Strength to you op you can do it. Your kids will know and understand. Truly they will.

Omg sounds like your describing my life. I hope you get things sorted. It's so hard isn't it x

Grey and Henry. Massive hugs to both of you.
Your right, it's not easy to leave, not at all, especially when you are being controlled or manipulated ontop of all the usual worries of separating.
The women who I've worked with in the past said it felt like they were going mad debating things in their mind going around and alright or blowing it all out of proportion, trying to rationalise it - 'there are worse men' etc etc.
Sometimes it's only when ur out of it, can you see the woods for the trees.
If you want, PM me, I can send you both a copy of the Freedom Programme which is a programme about the various tactics involved in DV.

You're

Thank you will on you

Pm

Hi I thought I'd update! As usual I have lost my nerve I was all set to end it then he started crying and I backed down. My fear of surviving alone holds me back. I did have it out with him and said if things don't change it's over and he has had a shower well he did two days in a row but that seems to have stopped. I wish I wasn't so weak and could just say how I feel but he has a way of making me feel guilty and I'm not sure why. Sorry I don't have better news it's just so hard to know how to deal with this.

You're well on the road to getting there, just keep telling yourself this is not what you want! See if he will change, most likely he won't, and get yourself in the position to truly leave for good

I think it's the guilt I feel for the kids and not feeling like I can survive on my own that holds me back. Also the stupid old fashioned notion I have about sticking with someone forever. This is my second relationship and I've never been in this position before (ex left when I had our dd and we haven't seen him since)