What am i doing here?

[Silly1235]

I dont really know where to start. I have been with my partner 11 years give or take, married for 8, kids 6 & 3.
I love my partner, but i feel he is lazy, selfish and angry. He twists things around on me and i dont know how i feel anymore.
i dont feel happy. i feel he says he loves me, but im not sure if he is capable of the love i need. He does love me that i dont doubt, but his family are so inherently selfish and he has totally learned his behaviour off them, he is often in a mood from his work and always takes it out on me.
Im nearly 40 i dont want to start again, i dont want my children to have a broken home and i feel very lost. I feel like a failure.
Financially i am pretty independant, i earn more than my partner, i run a business which gives me some flexibiity around the children ie to do a school pick up if needed but also to the point i cannot switch off and have had probably 10 days off in 10 years. My job is pretty stressful and does contribute to sometimes feeling stress and lack of help or input from my partner.

You are late 30s. You're not that old and it is never too late to start again. You would only be a failure to your own self if you actually stayed within what is really a dead in the water relationship here. Its primarily that too because of his emotional abuse aka moods towards you.

What do you want to teach your children about relationships and what are they learning here from you both?. Their home is certainly not their sanctuary and they are certainly picking up on your H's antipathy and moods towards you and in turn them.

You're unhappy in this relationship for very good reason so why would you want to stay with such a man at all?. For the children, no that is not a good enough reason to stay. It also teaches your children that your relationship with their dad was based on a lie which is a terribly heavy burden to place upon them. And they won't say thanks mum to you either for doing that to them.

If you've also had 10 days off in 10 years then that is far too little time for your own self to recharge properly. Why can't you switch off?. Do you think the likes of Peter Jones and Debra Meaden take such little time off from running their varied businesses, no they do not. Can you employ others, how is it you've allowed yourself such a punishing workload?. You need to rethink your business model because you are not helping it as well as you could be, you need more time away from it.

So your husband comes from a selfish family? No excuse for his behaviour now he's an independent adult. How can you love this man who treats you so badly? If he loved you, as you say, why does he treat you like this?

Your children already ARE in a broken home - with a very unhappy mother. Surely you'd be better off without him dragging you down?

i feel he is lazy, selfish and angry so what is the point of him as a husband and parent?

Is this how you want to spend the next 40 years of your life? It's a common time in life to have a rethink, and for good reason. You only get one go, so really, do you want this to continue as is, grinding on, or are you going to make some changes?

OP, you have two problems - an excessive workload and a terrible marriage. I wonder if they may even be interrelated- do you spend more time at work to avoid spending it with DH? Have your DC been deprived of holidays for ten years because you never take time off? When do they actually get to be with their mum?
Your DH says he loves you. Words are cheap. Does he SHOW he loves you? It’s actions, not words, that reveal a person’s true nature. And you say you love him. Really? Why? He is a selfish bad tempered shit who takes his moods out on you.
Don’t you think you deserve better than that?
And as Attila wisely (as always) says, what are you modelling to your DC as a “normal” relationship? Do you want your DD to marry a man like this? Do you want your DS to treat his future wife like this?
Please, OP, have a reality check about this “love” of yours. Don’t suffer another 40 years of this.
Get a better work life balance, take some holidays, learn to delegate.
And LTB!

thanks for your replies, in some parts he is a great dad, he certainly loves our kids. and he does love me. i know he does. in part he is going through adifficult time at work, and that would be easier for me if he tried to pull his weight more around the kids, but he doesnt and if i give him a task he gets angry or frustrated and huffs and puffs with me. I tell him off a lot for shouting at the kids as i dont think there should be an excuse for it, or also for shouting at me infront of the kids, as he will apolgise but justifiy it because 'mummy was xy or z' so then if i ever shout at the kids (im human!) he will try turn it like i shouted at the kids, sometimes i do think its ok, in context for being naughty. i dont shout at them to get in the car quickly or any mmundane shit.
i dont want to spend the next 40 years unhappy, but i love him. i know it would break my kids hearsts not to see their dad everyday so i feel like i have to work at it. but i dont know where to start.
my work is an issue, i employ people but i do the bulk of the owrk, im not peter jones and im not earning peter jones money either! i dont do bad thou! i worry if i step away what ive worked so hard to build to fall down i guess

i should add, that i try my best to see my kids, i drop dd at nursery at 7.30 (morning is my busiest time at work) im in work by 7.40 but my work phone starts at 6.30am YUK!
i have had holidays but i am always working on holiday, which mostly means doing the morning rush 6.30-10am and then mostly fielding ad hoc calls (as i dont have uk based office staff)
i pick up my son twice a week from school and sit and engage with him do homework etc and then just do more work when they have gone to bed, So im pretty much always mentally working but try my hardest to take the flexibility that i can do the pick ups sometimes.

And what is your husband doing whilst you are running yourself and in turn your business basically into the ground also because you are overworking yourself?. Your whole working life too needs a complete overhaul. Your boundaries re work need serious reworking, for a start you could not answer the phone until at least 7:40.

Abusive people as well usually state that other people drove them to their actions. In this case you are being blamed by him and he is also bringing your children into this as well by telling them that you were doing x y or z. He is truly a nasty individual and is indeed someone who is adept to blame others namely you for his own faults and failings.

Is this really a model of a relationship you want to be emulating to your children? Would you want them to have a relationship like this as adults ?

Women in poor relationships too often write the good dad comment when they themselves can think of nothing else positive to write about their man. As again is the case here.

Do you honestly think it's good for your dc to see you berated and told you deserve it?

It's not.

Is it the kind of relationship you want to model to them, the kind of treatment you want them to replicate or expect?

I don't have a great deal to say, but please don't stay together "for the kids". My parents did that, it wasn't great, then they split up as soon as (4 days later) my younger brother left for uni - leaving me at home alone to pick up the pieces. It pulled my family apart and I still feel distanced from them five years later.

The kids will cope. If you're not supposed to be together, that's that.

Also, the fact that they stayed together gave me a really warped idea of what relationships should be like, and I ended up staying with a really unsuitable (and abusive - NOT that my dad was) partner for almost 8 years. It affects kids in different ways that you think no matter what you do, but what WILL be better is having a happy mum, and that's not you now, is it?

thank you - my DH parents did what your parents did @sunshineangel and broke up a week before him and his sisters final uni exams. for sure it gave him a fuct up view of relationships and his father is an angry aggressive sorry excuse of a father (who thinks he is the best father in all the land).
i have spoken to DH and told him he needs to speak to someone about what happened when he was younger and how would he feel if our DD (only 3years old) when she is older if he husband speaks to her how he speaks to me.
im pretty sure when i say we are the best things in his life, its his own frustrations with his own life that spills onto ours.
and then i feel like a total mug, im the earner, the childcarer, the house cleaner.
only this morning my husband asked me why DS was going to school in shorts again, i asked if it was an issue why he hadnt bought them. the expectation is that i do everything for the kids, and im fine with that to an extent, i had my kids to mother them not palm them off.
i dont think he realises even half the things i do.

my work is obv a big source of stress too, i am the main earner currently and i earn high, but my work does mean i need to be on the phone from early due to the nature of what i do. so im often juggling kids, work, myself getting dressed when DH just sits on his phone. should he pull his weight more in the mornings - absolutely. is it divorce material - probably drastic.

OP, you admit in your update that you are the main wage earner, and the main child carer, that you run yourself ragged in the morning while “D”H just sits on his phone.
This has to stop! You are martyring yourself while he gets a free ride.
Why on earth do you allow this situation? You need to sit down with your husband and a list of all the chores required in the mornings - and then DIVIDE them between you. Tell him to pick one, then you pick one. Continue until all the chores are clearly allocated. Keep a written list in the kitchen.
Tell him he is solely responsible for all his, then STOP doing those ones! Any failures- let him face the consequences. If the DC are late for school, missing PE kit etc - HE gets to apologise/explain/go back to the school with the missing items. Not you. You have to learn to delegate, both at home and in your business.
And I think you need to stop claiming that DH is a good father. From where I sit, he’s a lazy fucker who is content for you to exhaust yourself doing everything while he can’t be bothered. If you genuinely love your kids, you don’t treat their mother like that.

Drastic - well, maybe you can bear it for now, and you can let your dc grow up seeing you spoken to like dirt, and wonder why they start talking to you like it too.