My husband just slammed a door on me repeatedly

[WhatTheChuffJustHappened]

Trapping my wrist, bruising and cutting it.
In front of the kids no less.

H and I have been together for 21 years, he's never raised a hand to me or even come close.

We moved out of our house into a tiny gritty nasty flat while we buy a house. No one wanted to, we all hate it but a long boring back story means we have no choice.

DH is a miserable arsehole every Sunday. I don't know why but he is, he speaks to us all like shit until the afternoon when nice DH comes out.
We're all sick of it. Knowing we were going to be in a tiny flat this weekend I offered for him to stay at hotel, I would pay, we all get a break.
He said he would stay at a friends tonight.

Instead he has extended his Sunday arseholeness to Saturdays.

We had a minor dispute about some medicine while he was holding the baby.

He then flipped out and slammed the kitchen door in my face - literally. I tried coming out and he kept slamming it shut, catching my wrist and slamming it again still.

I got out and I try getting the baby off him but he's pushing me, hard. I start to panic as he's holding the baby and I hit his arm. He then puts the baby in the sofa but towers over him so I can't pick him up.

I'm panicking and shouting at him to give me the baby and get out.
I pick up the remote control and hit him on the back repeatedly until he gets away from
The baby.

I pick the baby up and tell him to get out. My voice is shaking and he mocks it.

He eventually agrees to go after a torrent of lies.
He said he slammed the kitchen door because I started hitting him. That all this was because I kicked his clothes this morning (I did neither, there were no clothes and I was putting meds back in the fridge when he slammed the door, fridge and door directly next door to each other) he shouts that it's all my fault that he is the way he is.

I say fine, it's all my fault, I tried to fix that by giving him us a break in a hotel. But now he's still like this.

He took my door key so I couldn't lock him out.
To said I would take the kids to a hotel and he chucked the key back

I've now locked him out.

Fuck sake.

In bold:

Report to police. This will trigger access to women's aid, legal aid. You then have a free solicitor. You can go into a refuge with your children and be out of the flat.
It'll also help prevent him having unsupervised access to your children.
You'll have access to multitudes of help if you report and be on your own if you don't.

I would call the police as he has a) hurt you and b) hes doing a lot of gaslighting and lieing. like another poster said if he turns spiteful, youll regret not having this as evidence.

I've no idea why he's such a nasty bastard on sundays.

OP, if you're still around, I think he is playing a long game. A very, very long game. You say that although you've been a couple for 21 years things have got more serious and committed in recent years. It's now he's got you where he wants you that his nasty side is coming out. The reality is that it's always been there, he's just been hiding it. He is just a nasty bastard, what you're currently seeing on Sundays is the really him coming out of hiding.

I agree that he's playing a long game. I don't think it's a coincidence that he's got you trapped in a horrible flat with children and a baby and and no job no prospect of a way out. Barefoot and pregnant is a real thing, and how men have controlled women down the centuries. He's been working his way towards this. The reason he's nasty on Sunday mornings is because that's the time he's allowed himself to let his true feelings about you show. He's been training you to get used to that and now he's upping the ante. He also knows that you won't call the police to protect yourself and your children, he's trained you in that way too.

You think he has "issues" that he can somehow deal with and everything will be OK. He wants you to believe that so you'll have hope and keep the relationship going. In fact the truth is that this is him, it's who he is and you can't change it. Everything will never be OK with him.

You hit him because he was threatening your baby. Surely you can see that. Of course you tried to protect your baby. The people trying to say you were wrong doing that are disgusting. A big violent man who has just attacked his/her mother threatening a baby - let that sink in.

He could have done an incredible amount of damage slamming the door on your wrist. It is huge escalation to use a weapon to hurt someone like that. It is very, very violent. He could easily have disabled you and he knew that whilst he was doing it. You must have been terrified. I am so sorry.

I would suggest the Freedom Programme as a source of support. I'm sure you'll see him there -

freedomprogramme.co.uk/

I hope you haven't gone away, because I will add this. I also thought reading the thread that he could kill you next time. Two women a week die at the hands of their male partners, men like this. What he's doing to you is pure hatred, the fact that he's been controlling himself and you for so long shows a level of calculation and spite that is hard to fathom. He sounds extremely dangerous and I think you need to allow that realisation to come to the fore and then act accordingly. The police, Women's Aid and the Freedom Programme are your lines of defense from him. Engaging with him in any way will put you and your children in danger.

Hope you are okay OP

I agree with karabair

I lived with my abusive ex for over a decade. The abuse gradually escalated over that time. It got so bad that I HAD TO get the police to remove my ex from our home. I got to a point where I thought I could be killed. It was shocking and scary and a few years on I am STILL trying to recover. But I am lucky and know I done the right thing.

OP, I hope you will see this, what you've said, that this is the first time he's done this? That scares me way more than my own relationship with my ex. It is very unpredictable. So you really have no idea what he could do next. That is very very worrying.

Taking the 10k is so he can control you. That's financial abuse. IT does sound like he had some of this planned. I think the fact he's moody on Sundays is really strange and suspicious too.

I hope that you will contact the police, women's aid, the freedom programme and your GP so that they ALL can record what he's done to you and help you.

One time is one time too many, it is.
But he wasn't about to kill me.
Ridic comment.

One of the most chilling things I ever read on Mumsnet, which changed my attitude to DV completely, was a post by someone whose best friend had been killed by her husband.

He didn't mean to do it. He'd never raised his hand to his wife before. He pushed her, they were at the top of the landing stairs, he didn't know she'd fall down the stairs and hit her head at the wrong angle and be instantly killed.

It was the first time he'd ever hit her. And he didn't even hit her, just pushed her out of his way because he was angry. Didn't even push her very hard.

That's the problem with permitting yourself physical force as a means of responding to a situation you're not happy with. And that's the problem of being with someone who doesn't keep his hands to himself when he's annoyed. You just never know where it might end.

21 years or 21 days
Once they start they won't stop!!!!!!
Please ring the police and report it. He shouldn't get away with that and most certainly not infront Of your baby's x

Your children saw what happened, they can bear witness to the fact that he attacked you first. CALL THE POLICE PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD so that you and your children can file witness statements.

I need to play the long game.

1. If he kills you first, you won't get the chance.

2. He's playing a long game himself, has been doing for 21 years, and he has way more practice at playing long games than you. He could break your wrist next time, could you go back to your studies if he did? If he was very careful, he could, through carefully timed assaults, keep you just injured enough not to be able to attend college/uni for a couple of years, so that you lose your chance to have a qualification and have a job that allows you to be free of him. Yup, only an utter bastard would do that: only an utter bastard would slam his wife's wrist in a cupboard door repeatedly in front of their kids. Your "D"H has shown himself to be the utter bastard.

he didn't know she'd fall down the stairs

I don't believe that. If you push someone at the top of stairs you know they're going to fall. Maybe he didn't know she'd die but he would certainly know she'd fall down the stairs. He must have pushed her pretty hard if she didn't have the chance to put her hands out or up to protect her head.

These men do know what they're doing, like the OP's husband would know he could permanently disable her by smashing her wrist by banging a door onto it. They just tell a different story afterwards. They're lying.

Karabair, I tend to agree with you but there's an outside possibility that it was true (obviously it was the story this particular guy told and the victim's friend posted this and I can't remember whether she said she believed him or not).

If there were something that caused her to trip, he didn't know he'd pushed her as hard etc., then it could happen.

The point is, it doesn't matter whether it's the first time or the twentieth - the possibility of death or permanent injury is present as soon as physical force is used.

Chewing
If you mean the OP I don’t think hitting someone who is endangering you child is equivalent to repeatedly slamming a door on your wrist.

Karabair, excellent posts

He was holding the child, How was the child endagered?

june
“He then puts the baby in the sofa but towers over him so I can't pick him up. ”

That is point she hits him with the remote.

How was the child endagered?

If your DH was suddenly capable of bashing your wrist repeatedly with a door- an entirely unpredictable action that he'd never come close to before, having never previously been violent at all- how confident would you be that he wouldn't harm the baby he was holding?

Also his behaviour has to be looked at in the light of what he did next. Clearing out their joint account of 10k is financial abuse.

My friend lost everything. The day the house was sold, the removal men had been and put everything in storage, he told her that it was over. She thought he had rented a flat for them to live in until they found somewhere they both liked. He walked out the door and left her in an empty house that was no longer theirs. She drove to a friends for a bed to sleep in. He had planned it all.

That's horrific Justasking111 😧
did he get his comeuppance in the end?

No he did not. He was a very clever man and used the legal system to see her off.

I remember a very similar scenario from my childhood.

My mum and dad got into an argument as usual and my dad tried to leave the scene and my mum was chasing him shouting. He tried to slam a door behind him but she kept shoving her arm in the gap.

I just remember me and one of my little brothers (the other was in his high chair) crying and begging both of our parents to stop.

I remember being frightened about what might happen next. I was frightened by the fact both my parents were being violent and I didn’t have any concept that one of them might be more to blame than the other.
They both made me scared and unsafe.

My siblings and I still deal with the repercussions of living with domestic violence on our lives every day.

Don’t let that be your children’s story. Take action now.

OP said she was hiding this thread and it doesn't look like she's returned since. The problem with 'tough love' is that it can scare people off and prevent them asking for support again. I think some of the responders on this thread should bear that in mind in the future.

breakthesilencedv.org/stop-judging-me/

When someone tells you why they can’t leave or why they keep going back, it isn’t appropriate to respond by saying their reason is just an excuse. Unless you’re trapped or have been in the situation, you won’t know how precarious it is, how impossible it can get and how real those traps are – including the mental perception of being trapped.

Victims know what those who haven’t been abused don’t: leaving the abusive relationship is the most dangerous time period. According to the Domestic Violence Intervention Program in Iowa, during the first two weeks after a victim leaves, their abuser is 70 times more likely to murder them. In fact, 75 percent of domestic violence victims who lost their lives to abuse died while they were leaving or shortly after.

At no point is it ever the victim’s fault when they are abused, regardless of whether or not the abuse they endure ever takes physical form. The act of abuse is deliberate and calculated, and the damage it leaves behind can be monumental. The only appropriate reaction is to show compassion and be supportive.

Be a part of the person’s healing instead of inflicting more harm.

@RolytheRhino Great post.