My crappy childhood has just exploded

[DearTeddyRobinson]

I'm on hols with DH, 2 DCs, and my parents. 6yo DS is being a pain in the arse. DH and I are dealing with it as best we can but it's hard. He's clearly driving my parents mad and they are not hiding it. Lots of snide little comments to him etc. Anyway today there was some kind of contretemps at the pool - I wasn't there.
Next thing I know, DS is running into the house sobbing hysterically, with my mother hot on his heels, my father close behind. They were shouting the odds about him being a spoiled brat, I started to get angry with them and told them to stop bullying him. Yelling escalates, father tells me to leave and go home. While I'm yelling back at my father, I hear a loud slap and a scream. I run back in to where DS is and my mother is pinching his face and leaning down right into his face, hissing something at him. I shout at her to leave him alone, she doesn't and continues to berate him.
I slap her in the face. All hell breaks loose.

So while I was growing up my parents were violent disciplinarians. They would shout at and slap and beat me whenever I transgressed. They used to team up so one could hold me down while the other hit me.
On one occasion I was dragged naked from the shower (I was a teen at this point) and beaten on the bathroom floor.
I never wanted my kids to think this was ok and by and large DH and I agree. But I have serious anger issues and somehow still think that hitting someone is the ultimate resolution (not the kids though).
I think today all of this fucked up mess came boiling over. DH is disgusted with me for hitting a 72 year old woman - understandably. (But not with her for hitting a 6 year old who had a red hand print on his bum).
We are leaving tomorrow, 3 days early.
DH is barely speaking to me. The kids are confused. I am sick with god knows what - rage, guilt, whatever.
Where the fuck do we go from here?

chickenyhead

Yeah right, this would never be acceptable if roles were reversed...i.e. woman got hit by a husband.

This sort of thinking is the reason many people don't recognise abuse. There is always a somewhat understandable explanation that is difficult to argue with. Zero tolerance there should be.

The way the husband is behaving, i.e. being passive about the mother hitting the child, is probably consistent with how he behaved when OP hit him. He should have left you then and there. But he did not. You cannot have the best of both worlds.

Dearteddy you showed your son you will protect him. Yes, explain to him that you shouldn’t hit, but you stepped in and put a boundary in place that was never there for you as a child. You need to tell him that whilst you should never hit, you will also never allow him to be hurt

I totally agree with this. Your DS knows you have his back and will do anything to protect him.

No.The DS has learned that it's okay to hit people, because his Mummy does it.

@Bookworm4. The Op has admitted to hitting her husband on a number of occasions. He now sees his wife hitting an older woman.Presumably, it was his wife's idea to go on holiday with her parents, his in laws. Yet, the end result is his son hit by his MIL and then he sees his wife slapping her mother in front of his son. It must be so shocking for him and he must fear that his wife will always choose a violent response to a crisis.
If this was reported to the police, the OP could lose custody of her child.
The hitting as a default response has to stop and the OP has to agree not to try and integrate her abusive parents into her child's life.

I cannot imagine any MN wife being prepared to go on holidays with PILs who hit their son as a child.
Yet there is an expectation that a man will accept his in laws otherwise he is controlling.
The OP was wrong to put her son and her husband into a holiday situation with her parents, knowing that they used violence as a way of imposing their methods of discipline.
Lots of posters are minimising the OP's actions.
A priority must be cutting contact with her abusive parents and not insisting that her husband and son are forced to go on holiday with them.

I feel for you OP. I believe we are all products of our childhoods to some degree. Yes as adults we need to take full responsibility for our actions. But our early years shape the people we become. So what I am trying to say it's your mums fault you hit her. Not only was she wrong lifting her hands to your son and pinching him she was wrong for the abuse u suffered as a child......causing your anger issues. I dont think you owe her an apology. I think it was a long time coming and full deserved. You are his parents you discipline your son. She over stepped her place by a long shot. Dont feel guilty. She doesn't deserve u in her life and you deserve better than her. I would go NC without further explanation to her. Agree show your husband this thread. He should have your back. Hope you are ok.

You've changed the course of family history OP and that's never easy. But you've DONE IT!

Your son may remember it with sadness but also with love....she's an old cow. 72 or not I'd have slapped her too.

Bookworm4
Ask your DH how he would feel if 2 people chased after him shouting, then slapped him? Would he take it? Would he deserve it? I think it’ll be a no.

Given that the OP has slapped her DH twice and thrown a glass at him, yet didn't respond in a violent manner proves that you are incorrect.

People excusing the violence of the OP are part of the problem.
The OP needs to own this and all of her actions.

As you've hit your DH before, he may have been angry because he sees you as an out of control person who will resort to violence.

If you were a friend of mine I would hope that you go no contact with your parents, and seek counselling - long term counselling - to work through your childhood trauma and your anger issues which are definitely linked.

I’m glad you hit her, I’d have knocked her out.

Do not apologise.

Leave, protect your kids from them, and tell your dh to fuck the fuck off.

You’ve done nothing wrong.

@mrsmuddlepies

A priority must be cutting contact with her abusive parents and not insisting that her husband and son are forced to go on holiday with them.

100% agree

Hello OP
I think low contact/civil communication is the way to go and therapy for you to deal with those issues in childhood. My husband is placid but he would have had my back - it would not have escalated as it did in your case because he would have dealt with the fracas by the pool - if he was unable to because he was dealing with second child then as soon as he saw my parents chasing our first that would have been a red flag/bad moon arising and he would have stepped forward (with second child on shoulders if need be) to intervene.
I am sorry that did not happen in your case. I am sorry your DH does not realise how fucked up your childhood was. Anyone saying 'but it was years ago' gets no slack from me as they do not understand how these things can reoccur/be triggered/be passed down from generation to generation.
Your husband should have been stepping up with his kids and not leaving in-laws to discipline them - having seen that that discipline was going to be physically/emotionally abusive he should have prevented that from happening. If it was beyond his control/escalated quickly then he should have at least been there to help shoulder the fallout - would your father have told him to pack his bags?
As for your Mum being 72 - the vulnerable OAP trope won't wash if she was capable at 35 of hitting a toddler and at 72 of hitting a six year old. Violence begets violence and all our actions have consequences eventually whereby we have to face all the things that we have done.

Tweetingmagpie

Leave, protect your kids from them,

no problems with that

and tell your dh to fuck the fuck off.

Lets not encourage the OP to be aggressive as well as violent.

Ask your DH how he would feel if 2 people chased after him shouting, then slapped him?

This. Imagine if two adults had chased after another adult shouting insults at him, and had then hit and pinched him. They'd be done for assault. So why in hell would it possibly be OK for two adults to do this to a child???

OP, whilst I don't in any way condone hitting - if it had been my child in that position, I would've gone batshit crazy on their arse. I'd go proper momma bear mad. Violent childhood or no - no mother worth her salt would just calmly watch that happen.

@tweetingmagpie, So you think it was right for the OP to force her son and husband to go on holiday with her physically abusive parents? She knew what they were like, yet the OP put her son in a vulnerable position and you defend her right to do this?
Would you also support victims of sexual abuse going on holiday with their abusers?

You sound like you need to go for a spa day.....

and before everyone steps up saying I am absolving the OP, she is included in the reckoning. We all are. I don't mean in a religious sense, I mean that the people we are, the people we become, the things we do to others and our loved ones, any negatives bite us in the bum eventually and how you come out of that depends on how self-aware you are and how penitent of the shit stuff you have done - whether you truly make amends for it or not. Dysfunction can be cyclical.

DH knew but today tells me he thinks I am exaggerating. That hurts more than anything. He says it was long ago and I should be over it by now, and like you, asked why do I speak to them now if it was really so bad.

First do what Dreichuplands said.

Then ask him why he is angry with you. Tell him you are ready to listen and that you will respond when you have digested what he has to say. This might take a while (days, weeks).

Ask your H to do some reading on the topic of effects of childhood abuse.

Are you ready to consider the idea of going no contact with your parents?

Your H needs to join Alcoholics Anonymous and get sober.
Are you willing to consider the possibility of separating from your H?

Normally I would say that it is wrong to hit someone BUT there is a major difference when you are acting in defence of a child. A woman with a known history of violence against children had been chasing your child, had hit him, was pinching him, was hissing into his face, and was highly likely to hit him again. In those circumstances, slapping her face was a reasonable response to shock her out of her course of conduct and defend your child.

I really cannot understand why your DH is effectively condoning what your mother did. It wasn't just a matter of a smack on the bum, it was the whole series of events starting with whatever caused him to run away crying in the first place.

Sure, you need help to deal with your awful childhood. And the first element of that is cut right back on contact with your parents. Please resolve to do that now.

RageAgainstTheVendingMachine

That is a whole load of hyperbole to blame the DH and not the OP, from what she has written we don't know what the DH was doing (at least I can't find it if she has).

I'm so sorry if you OP, this sounds unbelievably traumatic
I'm especially horrified at your husband's failure to have your back, I think he knows he ought to have stepped up and in order to cover his embarrassment he's doing a DARVO manoeuvre.... spinning it and blame it on you

Why on god's earth do you go on holidays with them ? Stop doing that !

If any adult, male or female, old or young hit my child I’d kick their fucking head in and if my DW was angry with me for it we would have a serious problem.

I say that as someone who has never hit anyone in my life.

Sounds like she deserved a slap. How DARE she do that to a child