What was the moment that you realised you had to leave the father of your child/ren

[StressLevel100]

And how long from that moment did it take for you to actually leave ?

I'm in the process now, it's only after he announced he wanted to split I realised how dependent on him I was so ignored all the bad bits, my dd told me I should have left years ago. Only upside is he has a high income now so can afford to be generous with spousal support

Still haven't managed to separate properly yet but getting there. The moment for me was at the end of January when he got blind drunk and punched a hole in our kitchen door while me and the kids were asleep upstairs. The noise and him shouting woke our 5 year old and I just thought enough.

He managed to talk me into giving him another chance and we've been doing marriage counselling but over the past few months I've come to the clear realisation that I do not love him anymore.

Feel like I'm living in a war zone at the moment but we will be able to move on soon hopefully as the mortgage is almost out of the early repayment penalty stage.

This has been the worst year of my life and hopefully we are getting to the end of it all.

What stopping you OP?

Are you ready to go?

@BrigidSt sounds like our exes were similar. Mine also raged a couple of days after my C section.

My lightbulb moment was NYE when again he raged drunkenly at me and I realised I didn't want my kids to think this was ok. Took 3 months for him to go and I had to actually find him a place plus I moved out for a while (from my own home) to get him to go. I can't say it's been easy though life is so much more peaceful without that stress. That said, I do feel incredibly lonely at times because I'm scared to trust anyone and have almost become a hermit, which isn't great either. However I know I did the right thing for my family, regardless of all that. I saved us all.

When I thought I was pregnant he told me to go to the doctors and get it sorted. (I wasn’t just a very late period) we already had children and married. I asked him to get the snip he said no what if I meet someone else. Unfortunately it took me another 5 years to leave. He met someone else whilst we were “married” and she got pregnant very quickly he now complains he stucks and can’t do anything anymore.

When DH got angry when I told him that having sex with me while I was asleep was rape. Two years later with a lot of planning and I think my escape plan is almost ready to roll.
Reading some of these posts is heartbreaking

I didn’t have kids with him (thank fuck) but it was when he kidnapped me at gun point when I couldn’t take any more of his shit and went to stay at a friends house. I am so bloody thankful I’m alive as I know how close I came to dying that day. Now have a wonderful partner and daughter. I didn’t leave straight away but that’s when his spell over me broke. My family have no idea what happened. Even I don’t believe it sometimes. It’s like a dream. Well..nightmare.

When I couldn't bear his shouting at me for one minute longer.

I didn’t leave. I made him leave.
He was a stubborn arsehole who’s main joy in life was being resistant to everyone.
The straw that broke the camels back was when he swapped numbers with a cam girl, basically he’d been paying for live porn online while I was upstairs with the baby/trying not to kill myself with PND, DS was 6mo.
Cam girl then tried to blackmail him and got into contact with me, she found me via his Facebook profile.
I kicked him the fuck out of my house.
He is an arsehole of a cunt of a man. He doesn’t deserve the love of DS.

After he'd kicked me hard while we were lying in bed, refused to contribute financially to his own baby, and threatened to put me '6 feet under.' When DS was 5 months old.

After he'd beat me when I was 6 months pregnant.
MY daughter is now 21 years of age and an amazing, confident, kind, smart individual.
He's never been in touch or supported her.

Heaven knows how different she/I, our life would have turned out had I not left when I did.

Sad stories on here. I hope those who need to find the strength to leave do so.

There wasn't one moment.

We owned a business together. He was extremely controlling. I knew I couldnt take it much longer. So spun him a line about taking pressure off the business, giving him more control by me going back to work. He jumped at the chance to be in control of it. I did also hope us not being together, all the time would help.

It did for a while and I hoped that we would come through it. Then he decided I must be shagging someone else, because I likes my job. Then he realised I wouldnt let him control me so he went to a counsellor and promised to change.

He came home and would tell me what he told her, I would point out that wasnt true. During one of these converstations he said he had figures money issues were part of the problem. But he didnt understand why a few years previous, money had been an issue as he was on 40k. At the time I believed he was on about 16k. I was paying 90% of household bills and he lied and was on far more money than me. When I basically said 'you were on how much?....why the fuck was I paying all the bills' he couldnt answer, nor tell me where the money went.

I suspect his paranoia was caused by his lies. He was either shagging someone else or had a gambling/drug addiction. And I didnt care. Not one bit. I was exhausted with it. With six months (and his abuse getting worse) I left. 4 years later, I am very happy and so glad I left.

I knew from very early on after my daughter was born but it took me almost 5 years to get to a point I get ready to leave. I was scared and didn't know any different so tried to make it work. He was abusive; psychologically, verbally and financially. I knew I couldn't allow my daughter to grow up in that environment. The more I realised I did everything and could actually cope on our own, the closer I got to saying the words to him. I'd sit on the sofa with the words stuck in my throat desperately trying to get them to come out. Until one day I finally did it. The enormous sense of relief was unbelievable. Suddenly all my fears were gone and I get strong for the first time in years.

There wasn't one single thing that made me realise, it was just the straw that broke the camels back. It was another Friday evening after I'd come home from work, collected my daughter from after school club and gone home to the empty untidy house while he was at the pub spending our bills money that finally made me see what I wasn't going to miss.

@Babdoc

thanks for an amazing balancing post.
There are some twats out there but that isn't always the reason we have to move on.
Congratulations on moving on whilst still recognising the place your partner had in your life

Aw, thanks for the flowers, Hecateh!
I just wanted to reassure any mum who thinks she can’t manage on her own, that there is always a way. I had no advance notice, no chance to plan, get advice, or put aside savings etc- I was happily married one day and a 36 year old widow with two babies the next.
We are all stronger than we think, and countless mums throughout history have managed as lone parents and made a damn good job of it. Believe in yourselves. God bless.

It took me 3 years of should-I-shouldn't-I. Is this the right thing for DS, what if I can't do it, what if he meets someone and it's all a huge mistake.

It's still very new, but I haven't regretted it yet for one second. DS is just cracking on with things, he's amazing.

I realised my marriage was dead in the water on the second incident of DV - when my ExH pushed me onto the sofa, pinned me down using his full body weight, put his hands round my neck and started to squeeze. This was in front of our two (very young) children in the living room. His mother was there and yelled at him to get off me which he then did. I said that I would call the police. She immediately tried to minimise his behaviour by saying "that was nothing". She then threatened me if I reported the incident. ExH and his mother lied to the police and cafcass about what had happened. I had to endure several family court hearings within a space of 18 months regarding exH's contact with our children (he was doing cocaine). He lied to the court about his substance misuse, however drug testing proved to the judge (who was desperate to believe he was the victim for some reason), what he had been doing. I don't think I will ever fully trust anyone else again in my life after enduring exh's lies, constant manipulation, vindictive and spiteful behaviour during our relationship. I never want my daughters to go through such crap.

First marriage, we were very young, and he went away for three months with work. I realised how much I hated life with him, and coincidentally started to emerge from the fog of PND. He came back and it was about 2 weeks later. I stood up to him for the first time ever, he went mad, and I ran for it. The police rescued me from him, in the street, and the following day I moved into a refuge and they helped me "snatch" my baby from my mil's house. We never looked back.
Second time, xh hit my son. He was out the door, on his arse five seconds later. I kicked the living shit out of him, and he never set foot in my house again.
I swore after the first time, I would never put myself or my child(ren) in that situation again, and I didn't.

I tried really hard to salvage our marriage for a good three years I’d say. He was all I had known from a very young age and we had three children together so I really didn’t want to ‘throw it all away’. I didn’t love him as anything more than a friend for 3/4 years I think.

My main gripes were: he didn’t earn much and had absolutely no desire to better himself. Just no ambition whatsoever whereas I went to uni for four years and my starting salary was almost double anything he had ever earned. I tried my damnedest to push him into further education but he had no interest.
He also didn’t drive, he’d never attempted to learn so I was our taxi. I’d also tried to push him towards doing a theory test and trying some lessons but he had no desire to.
He was/is possibly the most passive and complacent person I have ever met. It always seemed as though he just agreed with anything I said. I bought all of DC’s presents for birthdays and Christmas, I planned trips out with them, I planned extra curricular activities and groups etc and he just went along with it. I even went vegan at one point and he blindly followed. He voted for whoever I voted for...

I left him after struggling on with bubbling resentment for approx three years. It’s been over five years now, he still doesn’t drive and still has zero ambition. I made the right decision.

A couple of other people mentioning a lack of understanding, support and compassion after a c section. That was a massive part of my problem also. From a man who fainted TWICE having a blood sample taken

I can just about laugh looking back. But really i'll always be quite angry that he stole some of the joy of those precious early days with my baby

When he stood there and said he hoped someone killed me at work .
We were together 16 years married 7 and had 4 children. It was the final straw after years of his drinking , drug use thrown in and violence and verbal abuse