experience of growing up in a house where your father verbally abused your mother

[CeCeBloomer]

I would be really grateful if people could share any experience with me and what lasting impact it has had. I am desperately trying to work out what's best for my children.

I appreciate you want to wait op and may have every intention of doing things after your dsd a level but in all honesty waiting is not for the best. It's just another reason, another excuse, another way to avoid...

They'll always be a reason and after your dsd a levels will just cone another excuse. Pleas don't be the couple I know in this toxic relationship who are still making the same tired excuses ten years in.

Its had a lasting effect on both me and my sister.

My mum took us and left him when we were 8 and 9 years old respectively. A lot of damage was done before that, though.

It doesn't matter if it's only 2%. It matters that it's anything other than 0%.

My dad was nice some of the time and okay some of the time. And then there were the times when he yelled and raged and sometimes broke things. When he called my mum horrible names. A lot of my memories are hazy and feel like they happened to someone else as I had to dissociate from my feelings. Never knowing what mood he would be in, or what would make him angry. Always walking on eggshells. To this day, the sound of a key in the front door makes me feel panicked and my stomach churn, even now when I'm happily married to someone nice.

When I started having counselling I told the counsellor that my dad wasn't violent. And my counsellor said: I think you need to widen your definition of violence.

He didn't hit my mum, although I think I saw him push her once. Hitting was rare, but as a kid you don't think: well, I'm probably not going to be hit. You think: this adult is raging and it's scary and I don't know what they're going to do.

The memories that really hurt are not the rare times that I was hit. No, the ones that feel the worst are things like the time he called my mum a bitch on the day of her dad's funeral.

I attempted suicide at 16. I spent seven years in an abusive relationship. I've had two breakdowns. I have anxiety and ocd. I don't know who I would've been instead, if I had grown up somewhere happy and safe, not constantly waiting for the next blow-up.

I used to wish he would beat us so there was something to show for the way I felt. As a teenager I went through a phase of telling friends he did, as I didn't know verbal abuse was also abuse and I didn't know how to explain why I was scared to go home.

My parents finally separated when I was in my 20s. As other posters have mentioned, as a kid I wished they would split up. I've always found it really hard to sympathise with people who are upset that their parents separated as I was upset that mine didn't. I'm glad they finally did but full of rage and sadness that it didn't happen sooner, so that my childhood could have been better.

I don't speak to my dad at all now. I've had a hard time forgiving my mum - not because she felt she couldn't leave but because of the stupid crap she told me, like "if you love someone you don't give up on them" which resulted in me staying with my abusive ex.

And learning to take abuse and not speak up led to other situations I can't even get into.

OP, if you know that you are being abused, you have a duty to your children to remove them from that situation. They are children and they do not have a choice. You are making a choice for them and you are making the right one. It's not a choice of whether to break up a family, because that happened when the abuse started and it's already broken. The choice is whether or not your children live in a house with abuse and bullying.

NC with my father. Have been for a good few years, though it took me far too long to get to that stage.
Feel it made me old before my time when I was a kid with all that was going on in the house and that's shaped who I am now. Still really struggle to stand up for and express myself when upset, though I have improved. Am very conscious of teaching my dc to be articulate and assertive when they're put under stress and hopefully giving them enough self-belief to never put up with that kind of situation.
My mum did leave in the end, far too late and I find that really sad. My father put his own twist on that too to all and sundry. Made me feel totally sick having grown up with it and seen what went on.

Oh my God. This thread is so upsetting and depressing. I grew up with a verbally and sometimes physically abusive father. He belittled my mother in front of us, but often belittled me. I resented my mother for not leaving and eventually despised her for it. It made me very determined never to get involved with a controlling man, and possibly I am a bit too controlling myself. Living with someone like this damaged my self esteem and made me feel deeply insecure and like a perpetual outsider. It's a terrible environment in which to bring up children and a very damaging way to live if you are the partner.

Depression and anxiety on and off all my life. Crap at relationships and jobs: letting down and alienating friends, bosses, partners, due to being an anxious people pleaser or not keeping up contact because I felt too shit. The verbal abuse went both ways tbh. Good luck OP if you are able to get your DC away from it you could be massively changing their lives for the better.

Sad, sad thread x

So many childhoods that should have been better than they were. Unless you have lived it, you have no idea.

I really identify with how we despise both our parents. The abusive one but also the appeasing one. I agree that it can make you go the other way in relationships. In my early adulthood I tolerated some aeful sotuations and got into some scrapes I am not proud of but thrse days my tolerance for dickheads is zero

It gets me a reputation as a man hating controller but I swear my strong boundaries are the only glue holding me together sometimes

I love my father, over recent years he made up for a lot. When I was younger he had a very stressful job (his own business) and as a way to unwind he drank, a lot. Now he would never admit he is an alcoholic, but he could easily sink 2-3 bottles of wine a night. We used to slope off to bed when we could see he was starting to turn, or my mum would tell us too, and she would be left with a barrage of abuse. When they had been dating 6 months he back handed her, and she said if he ever did it again she would leave. He never touched her physically again, but he did with his words. They are now only just separating, after 44 years of marriage. When he wasn't drinking he was a bit snappy and is very highly strung. He still drinks a lot, his outbursts aren't the same but I hate being around him when he is drunk. My sister is exactly the same, nicest person you could meet sober, a right bitch when she is drunk. Anyway, I felt I had a happy childhood but in the more recent months have been analysing a lot. My mum is a fabulous person, but she took a lot of shit she shouldn't have. My dad is very supportive towards me and the rest of the family, is very generous and is an absolutely brilliant granddad. But he still is horrid to my mum. I realise I have a fear of disappointing anyone, I hate confrontation and feel like everyone has more rights to have their needs met than I do. I am working on that.

I have recently left an EA 21 year relationship, he is much worse than my father in terms of not being able to control his anger, but many traits are the same. I turned into my mother. I had confided in her about my issues and we are very close and she said to me "darling, you are young, you have the means, you are in your prime, don't waste it and leave". it really resonated with me. She is 67 this year, looks amazing and is very fit, but she feels her prime years have gone.

I could see that my kids were seeing an unhealthy toxic relationship and if I wanted the cycle to stop I needed to leave. While all parents will tell you they want their parents to stay together, not many adults of children who witness this will say the same. They will tell you they lack respect for the person that didn't leave, that it gave them unhealthy ideas on love and realtionships etc.

If it cannot be fixed, then it has to be changed. Why should one person be treated badly and feel their needs come below the others? It makes no sense, we are all valued, we are all human, we all have a right to be treated fairly and with respect. Good luck OP.

I'm not sure even leaving/divorcing can protect your kids - I didn't realise my marriage was abusive until it ended - yes there were what I know now as red flags - but I thought this was pretty normal marriage stuff - nothing physical - just the upshot of own business, money tight at some stages and twin kids and me having depression.

I thought my parents had a good marriage despite my mum having mental health issues, money being tight etc, and a racial element added into the mix. I'm now not so sure - there was definitely financial control but this was the norm for their generation and my mum was often the butt of jokes - I didn't love her any less but know see this for what it is and it was undermining her. She never said a word about any of it. Since she died I have seen my DF in a different light and I idolised him.

I have tried to get my kids to see that the behaviour of their DF is abusive to me and by default to them. I have been shafted financially and the full impact of this is yet to hit them. I am struggling with the stress of it all and have bouts of low energy due to depression. My DS sees this as me staying in bed. Financially I wasted "their" money on solicitors when I should have just "agreed". Because their DF shows no anger my anger is referred to as "typical shit" and he is able to "buy" them financially.

The full impact will hit when they have to leave the family home and I am not able to buy anything anywhere near what they are used to. I fear at this point they may have to live with him.

I don't think there is anyway I can protect them even though they are only 16 - they both show signs of manipulative behaviour and maybe they were picking up on far more than I was aware of as the behaviour seems pretty ingrained. It is exhausting.

I saw my dad hit my mum to the ground just after she had been diagnosed with lung cancer. She died not long after. Before that he was always kicking off, shouty, angry, the odd slap. When she died, my sister and I lived with him. It was awful. She was his favourite and they used to gang up on me. I looked like my mum and he used to sneer at me that I was just like her.

One time I had a trivial argument with my sister and he joined in and went crazy. I went to bed in a room I shared with her. About 2 hours later my dad came in the bed room when I was in bed, not asleep - lying wide awake in despair and he put his hands around my throat and started to strangle me. He came to his senses, even my sister looked scared and he looked worried for days.

He had a disability which made him angry due to the way he was treated and my mother was pregnant with my sister when they got married. They should not have got wed but it was a different time. My mum resented my sister which my sister picked up on when she was small. My dad was also brought up in what sounds like a workhouse with a younger sibling and they had a bad time. He was then brought up by his elder brother whose wife was cruel to him - so his anger stemmed from being an orphan being brought up in bad places, and then in a loveless marriage. Not that I am excusing him.

It was a very tense upbringing filled with violence, the threat of violence, volatility, ill health and misery. My sister left home when she was 18, I was 15, she could not stand the atmosphere and went off the rails. I have seen her twice in 30 years. He used to regularly hit me, verbally abuse me but one day I knew he would never break me. Whatever he said I was, like fat or ugly, I knew I wasn't and just learned to laugh. He once said in an argument that Inwas not his daughter. He was lying but he did not get the reaction he wanted, I just laughed and said thank a god! I have gone the other way, it made me more confident and I knew when I was in a position to stand on my own two feet, I would never accept crap off of anybody or let them put me down. And I have stuck with that.

I did not get free of him until he died when I was 27. I was still living with him, purely because of his disability, how daft was that, I felt sorry for the old bastard. When he died I felt so many emotions, relief, excitement of a new start, and anger that my childhood had been so shit, and sadness that he had that anger and that my mum died young with no happiness before that.

So, my advice to OP, nobody should call you vile names, especially in front of children. Children pick up on atmosphere and your household sounds like it is on tenterhooks waiting for him to kick off. You and your children deserve better. Life is short.

rabbit just because the children are removed the abuse doesn't stop - and whilst the courts have the view that contact with both parents is essential for children's welfare they will continue to be "damaged". The abusive parent has unresolved anger issues and most do not see any fault in themselves so do not see that their behaviour is wrong in any way. Look at the co parenting with narc threads - this was my first question how can you co- parent with someone that refuses to engage with you because he sees my depression as being the problem whereas it is more than likely that his attitude to me contributed to depression.

This causes ongoing issues with the kids - i am still expected to "pick up" where his parenting ends and when I refuse to do so it impacts on the kids - how do you get round this without subjecting the kids to more abuse.

I don't know what age most of you are but even some of you seem to be giving your mothers a hard time for "appeasing"!

The judge in my case has given me 2 years to sort myself out before I can get a fulltime job to support myself despite that I will be 54, have not worked for 20 years and have ongoing depression recognised by PIP. This scares the hell out of me and is making my mental health worse as I left my previous job in difficult circumstances

there is no way I would have chosen to put my kids through this- there will be long term implications I'm sure - I just don't know to what level.
I do recall there being one instance when I wanted to leave but I do not know if that was as a result of my depression or his behaviour and I never told him this. I think my own mum died at the time and everything seemed ok afterwards.

All the way through this process I have been fighting for my kids - to try and make sure they came out with what had been promised to them i.e. Private school til 18 and living in a nice house from the settlement as my ability to do this on my own is questionable.

I have not achieved this due to his manipulation. School fees are unaffordable now so he says and he ran up debts to eat into equity. If I lose my kids emotionally and at the moment this is questionable too then everything will have been pointless. I would not have gone down this route otherwise. Everything I have done has been about them and to hear some of you say that your mothers were weak for staying saddens me.

Maybe your mothers thought they were doing the right thing and circumstances were completely different in their generation. I never got the chance to tell my mum I got it so wrong - I thought she was weak too but I know she had much more strength than the father I looked up to - she was trying to protect me in whatever way she could. I cannot judge or blame her for this - she was doing what she thought was best.

Even now there is support and education but nowhere near the level it needs to be to make sure our children are safe from abuse.

This is such a sad thread. Am in tears. So many stories I relate to. Like some PPs I wanted to go into care, I was desperate for my mum to leave my dad, I wanted him to die; I even had a boyfriend when I was 15 offer to kill him. It was lots of verbal abuse, loud shouting and aggression, towards my mum and then us. Scared as soon as he walked in the door. They were too busy with their dysfunctional relationship; him shouting, her being scared, to bother much about us.

I appear confident but I'm not, I had a fear of adults well into my own adulthood. I chose boyfriends well though, nice gentle guys, apart my DS dad, which is a shame.
My surviving brother has never been able to keep a relationship for long, and has many other issues. My other brother committed suicide when in his 20s; very damaged by his awful childhood.
I see my mum, but I don't have a close relationship with her. Stopped seeing my dad when I was 17.
Anyway; well done for asking him to leave OP.

greenberet: I don't hold any blame to my mum at all, except i wish she had more self love when we were younger. Maybe our lives might have turned out much different if she had left when we were young. Apart from being controlling and EA to my mum, he was a good dad. She loved him but she hasn't been in love with him for many years. She is such a wonderful person i hope now they are divorcing they can remain friends (because it wasn't always bad) and they both can be happy.

I must also say that my Ex had a very dysfunctional (father an alcoholic, multiple flings, occasional violence, cold hearted mother) and he wasn't nutured at all. In such he has grave bitterness and resentment from his childhood, but fails to see it as really that dysfunctional. A lot of his issues come from that, but he won't talk about it or have therapy so the cycle continued. I just hope at 9 and 5 my tow have a strong chance of not repeating history. Thats only because I managed to leave in the end, but I was lucky. I work, I am generally strong and will turn my hand to anything and I have wonderful family and friends.

My brother turned into a strapping young man, and I put that down to my mothers nuturing instincts. I have done quite well I think apart from letting myself be brow beaten every day and my sister is just about settling down at 42 years old. She has had a chaotic life at times.

Every circumstance is different I guess, and the effects varied, but there always are some in my experience.

Pudding I can see that - I also agree that most of the men will have had dysfunctional childhoods - my x did too although I'm not sure he sees it as this but there was def EA going on.

Thing is most men grew up not being able to express emotion - sissy if you cry and not allowed to get angry - but these feelings go somewhere, get repressed and come out eventually. We are also not taught how to articulate feelings or communicate how we really feel in a healthy way.

I think I am expressing 20 years of repressed anger - of being ignored, stonewalled and controlled. I shout when I'm angry which I realise is a copied behaviour to my parents - my X says nothing - which riles me even more - he somehow thinks he has the moral high ground because he is able to control his volume - but the anger is seething away underneath still and comes out in other ways which are not easily identifiable and normally directed at me through the kids although they don't see it. I never shouted when the kids were growing up but since the marriage broke down and this too has impacted on my kids.

We need to be taught how to really communicate with each other and really listen only then do we stand some chance of having healthy relationships

All through my childhood I never realised my father was verbally abusive. I thought it was normal family politics. It was in my 30s that i realised that it was abusice. He would scream and shout, throw China across the lounge. Storm out and disappear for days. I think my mum thought it was normal make behaviour too. She never left him. She died from cancer at 48. I will never know if that was caused by stress. My brother and I would sit at the top of the stairs listening to the rows and my mum crying. My parents thought we were in bed.

My first boyfriend I screamed and shouted at him. For 10 years. I thought that was normal. He shouted back at me.

I now know I was wrong. I still have problems negotiating and debating. I still have low expectations from men.

It isn't normal. Go and stay with another family and see how they relate. See how the dad talks to the children and to his wife. Respect. Equal.

Green beret. My mum stayed with my dad. But this was late 1960's, 1970s and 1980s. She worked part time. She couldn't leave - where would she have gone? There was no CM, spousal mtmce, or benefits then. I would never criticise her for staying. In that era there was no choice. Rape was still legal in a marriage. She never thought of leaving.

It is different now. Thankfully. There is support for single parents etc.

donners I have been thinking about this all night and the absurdity of it all.
The judges decision has reinforced my view that the legal system is a farce - I sat in court for 2.5 days and it was the biggest load of old bollocks I have heard and I am intelligent - the judge told me so! A previous hearing about the family home was nothing to do with family - it was all about money - sadly it all appears to be about this!

Common sense tells you a father who wants a relationship with his kids does not move 6 hours away - what legal training do you need for this? The two women magistrates - what the hell were they thinking - are they revenging some personal issues here?

I have said many a time I felt abused by my legal representation. Despite what they said they were not out for my best interests- it was all about fee income. And as for the judge no comprehension of mental health not to mention X's barrister being from her old chambers.

In the end I gave up the fight- I don't need some judge to tell me what I know is the truth of the situation. I have been financially shafted but somehow like you I will make it ok- even on benefits.

You are doing the right thing by your kids - you know this- but the fight is it worth it - seems like most people on here have ended up "damaged" whatever went on and these are people that have tried to take some responsibility for their feelings.

All we want at the end of the day is for our kids to be happy - how we achieve this I have no idea.
I believed the "law" would help me - I have always done the "right" thing? - what is this? Conditioned to respect people in authority? Bollocks! - they can be just as manipulative and ruthless -

At the end of the day the buck stops with you - you are your children's mother - you know what is right for them - we are the ones that have the natural instinct - not their fathers who are supposed to provide and support the mothers - not tear them apart out of their own immaturity and inability to face up to themselves.

Do what one of the posters said upthread let him take you to court - let him do all the fighting if he can be bothered - you just get on with your life and helping your kids. If he takes you to court find a lawyer then - otherwise all your energy is going in the wrong direction.

You will get there - we both will x

hello same here re family dynamics -this is what I'm saying - the circumstances were different - in their minds leaving may have been a worse option - they stayed thinking it was best for us - they took the abuse hopefully trying to shield it from us.

I am now in a relationship where we shout - thing is it doesn't phase either of us - we express our anger and when we calm down we talk & resolve issues - I too know this is not ideal but it is far better than the avoidance of dealing with issues that went on in my marriage - we are both working on ourselves who knows we maybe able to have a proper conversation when we have dealt with our own shit without the need to shout!
But then again I'm a "loud" person when I'm passionate about something- I like my music loud, I waer clothes that make me stand out - so maybe shouting to one person is passion to another!

Oops just realised got my threads mixed up