Rages/smashing things but not physically hurting you

[Friedbanana]

Hello, just wanting some advice/ pointers to where i can read about this as i’m not sure where to search to find info. Basically DP gets very frustrated/angry very easily, at basically the slightest disagreement, and i try to give him space and leave to go to another room and then he cools off, but if for some reason he follows me or i follow him, or i just continue the discussion calmly because i dont realise he’s bubbling, then he will suddenly, without warning, throw something really violently- in the past he’s smashed a kettle into the wall (right next to me) and broken a kitchen tile (and the kettle), he’s thrown chairs at bins amd broken both, he’ll kick things (breaking his sandles) and slam doors very forcefully. It used to sometimes send me into a panic attack as sometimes it would be really close to me and really scare me. The worst rage was when i was sat at the top of the stairs and he ran along the corridor as if he was going to push me doenstairs but he didnt, but i genuinely thought he was going to. He said later he would absolutely never hurt me, and if i thought he had the capability of hurting me i should leave. i don’t think he would either, but it really does hurt me mentally. Anyway today i confronted him and said he needs to sort it out as it makes me v anxious, and he needs to sort it out before we try for children, as I can’t bring them up with that around them, particuarly as the triggers will be a million times worse when there’s a baby. He says he tried his best to control it, and for the first time in 8 years or our relationship he told me thats how his father was around him- terrible rages and smashing things when he or his sister did anything the tiniest bit wrong. he never physically abused them. He doesnt feel loved by either of his parents even though we do see them each fortnight id say (before lockdown) and it’s very sad. So anyway just wanting some advice really on how to support him. I love him very very much and wouldnt leave him, i think he’d make a fantastic dad apart from this issue. He also suffers with depression and social anxiety but sadly refuses any professional help. Thanks so much for reading!!

Just imagine your back at the top of those stairs again, he’s running for you, gunning for you. Last time he stopped within a hairs width of you tumbling down the stairs. Let’s say this time he doesn’t stop, or in the future your 4 year old runs out to protect you, and ends up getting hurt. He’s excuse will he that he didn’t mean to kill you/hurt your child. He was going to stop, and you should KNOW he was going to stop, because he’s always stopped before.

It’s doesn’t matter that he always stopped before, it absolutely doesn’t mean he always will. Just because the violence is inflicted on object and not you, doesn’t mean that your or any child/children won’t still get hurt. What he if he goes to slam a door in a rage, your fingers, or a childs fingers are in that door. Yeah sure he wasn’t trying to trap your fingers when he slammed the door, but that’s what happened in the end anyway. It’s so easy to happen by accident, there should be no risk of injury to you or any child, but during these rages that won’t be the case. So whilst launching say instance the TV remote or a glass across the room in a rage, are you sure that it won’t ever smash into your child’s face? Kids run around that literally what’s they do, and when you have kids you soon find out that they often end up in the way of things they are not supposed to. Accidental or not, do you think you’ll be so forgiving when your sat in A&E having to get stitches for your child???

I’m sorry to paint such a bleak picture of the man you clearly love, but love doesn’t stop this from being reality. You can love him all the work over, but you can’t save him, and him being a good person most of the time doesn’t make him a good Dad.

If you are still in any doubt think of it this way....it is absolutely and utterly his intention to hurt you during these rages. Currently (not always) there is something that stops him crossing that line, what do you suppose that is? Let me tell you, the ONLY thing stopping him from crossing that line is the consequences to HIM, not to to you!!! He doesn’t stop because he loves and cares about you, he stops because he cares about himself. There is absolutely no guarantee to you, that he will always care about himself, or care if he puts you in hospital or worse, care if he gets arrested or jailed.

I know it’s hard, I know you love him, but honestly you have the power to save yourself and any future children by leaving him. I know all this seems unimaginable, but trust me when I say, that if you stay 10 years from now you will desperately wish you had left.

I understand and I agree. This is not my thread and I don’t want to derail the op. I know I need to leave.

What makes it so difficult, what makes it so hard to leave, is that he isn’t a monster, he’s got so many wonderful qualities in many other ways and I would never have believed this about him had I not lived through it. It sounds mad, but he respects women much more than a few other men I know. This is genuinely breaking his heart because he thought he was a better man than this.

All of the above sound like cliches, because it’s true, you can have the most wonderful man in the world in every other respect and he can also treat you this way. That’s what makes domestic abuse so hard, what makes it so difficult to leave, so utterly sad.

I’m so sorry to the op and everyone on this thread who has experienced similar.

OP, stay loved up with this violent man if you like. Fill your boots, keep forgiving him and wait till the day he hurts you and then forgive him and let him do it again if you like. You’re an adult and you can make your own decisions, even stupid naive ones, but for fuck’s sake don’t inflict this on a child, because that would take you from being a fool to being a terrible selfish mother.

Oh yeah, and if you are stupid enough to breed with this man, If SS are ever triggered, which is quite possible for many reasons and in many ways, you’ll be forced to choose, and being as though you’re so besotted with this violent man you’ll condemn your child to a life of being in care.
Be a fool as much as you like, but don’t be a selfish fool.

This is terrifying to read, please, please leave op

I'm really sorry that you're in this position OP, but I have to agree with all of the previous posters. It's not easy to hear that people think you should leave your partner, but you really should consider it.

I had an alcoholic father who would shout, throw things, behave threateningly to bring us into line. He was occasionally physical but absolutely terrifying even without that. When you've had childhood experiences like that, it skews your perception of what abusive is. I had a couple of relationships with men who behaved as you describe your partner does and, because they were less abusive than my father, I didn't recognise how serious the situation still was.

My last relationship before DH was like yours and he was charming and delightful a lot of the time. It went on for years with just the odd occasion of hitting a wall next to me, throwing things, kicking furniture etc. It upset me but I explained it away as him expressing his anger, he didn't hit me so it wasn't abuse in my eyes. We then hit a really stressful patch with various things going on in our lives and it escalated quite quickly. He never did attack me but I have zero doubt that it would have ended up like that if I hadn't left. Having a baby is incredibly stressful, and you won't know if that will trigger an escalation like I experienced until you're in the situation. I really wouldn't risk it in your shoes.

You don't need to support him through this. I'm sorry to hear about his difficult childhood but this is absolutely a choice he is making. He has chosen to intimidate you instead of getting help to sort out his issues. Somebody who can make those choices is not a suitable partner and certainly not a suitable father.

If you've stopped feeling afraid, a lot of damage has already been done. Shutting down makes it easier to survive but more difficult to escape.

I have struggled to read this as it takes me back to first DH over 30 years ago.
He told me of abuse he suffered and how it made him feel, yet did the very same to me. He flew into rages and punched doors, broke things around me. Hit a hot cup of coffee out of my hand. It terrified me.
Some times he would tell me how sorry he was and swear he would change, obviously it never happened.
When he felt like it he was amazing and thoughtful, however as time went on, the ugly side was the more predominant side. No one knew what was happening behind closed doors. There is so much more!
I had grown up in a loving family and never experienced behaviour like this. How I would have loved the experience of Mumsnet at that time. There is amazing advice here from experienced posters. You should listen to them, I’m sure deep down you know they are right. Don’t go down the road of thinking it can be changed, it can’t. His next relationship was exactly the same. I was grateful everyday after that I had never had children with him.
Please leave.

The only advice I can give you is to leave him. It's not even as though he wants to address his issues or try to get any professional help. It's only a matter of time before he hits you or your child if you're stupid enough to have one with him

He is terrorising you and it's abusive.
Leave.
Do not even think about having children with this person. Imagine growing up with this. It doesn't bear thinking about.

@Friedbanana - on behalf of your future children, may I just add this.

I was the child of a father with an ungovernable temper. To everyone else, he appeared charming and very caring of his family. Behind closed doors, his rages often escalated into physical violence, and he wouldn't talk to us for weeks. The term 'domestic terrorist' suited him perfectly. We lived in fear of his outbursts, but couldn't tell anyone else what was happening, due to the shame as well as his perfect public persona.

I live daily with the anxiety that must have become hardwired into my developing brain because of his reign of terror. I have worked hard to manage it, but it is always there at a low level. Added to that, I am still wary that any man I meet could be hiding a dark side to their nature.

I beg you to consider that it's because of our personal experience that we feel this need to reach out and support you. We are complete strangers to you, but out of the care one human being can have for another, we sincerely want to help you to see your situation more clearly.

One day it won’t be an object in the home. One day it will be you.
One day it will be your child.

Please leave. He won’t change. This is only ever going to escalate.

Oh I had one of these at 27. Started with rages at inanimate objects escalated to verbal abuse to me when he was drunk. But I loved him etc 🙄🙄 thing that made me end it was the cold hard voice in my head saying I could never have children with this man. So I ended it and met the perfect man now have two girls. Thank the goddess everyday that I dodged that particular bullet.

It's like swimming in a swimming pool with just the one bucket of raw sewage in it. It's only a small percent of the whole pool right?

He needs professional help op

Do you want to have a daughter grow up thinking this is how she deserves to be treated? Do you want a son who grows up and repeats his behaviour? Do you care at all about your future offspring and how much damage a father like him would cause them?

Stay with him if you like. Just don't have kids with him or you'll be just as culpable for the damage done to your children.

OP are you able to answer previous posters questions about how old he is and also what sort of person his mother is, as presumably she is a reflection of how you will end up if you decide to continue down this road.

OK, so you don't want to leave him now.
Do you realise that he will still do this when you have a baby?
Do you realise that someone - a neighbour, a health visitor, a friend - will most likely report you both to Social Services?
And do you realise that once Social Services are involved they will pretty much give you the choice of leaving him or having your baby taken into care?

Do you realise that your partner is abusing you, and will in the same way abuse any child you have?
Do you?

One more question: Does he throw things in a violent rage at work, at a friend's house, or at the supermarket or does he manage to control himself with other people?
You and I both know the answer to that, don't we?

I have a husband who was a rage smasher. He only sought help after I left him. He has been in therapy for years attempting to heal physical and mental abuse from his father.

I’m sure all of these replies are hard to read especially as you seem to still have your rose tinted glasses on. Might it help to look at it from another angle?
You spent time and energy writing your post, your op is quite long and you’ve tried to add as many details as you can think of to explain your situation, I bet that took quite a bit of time. If you’ve spent longer than 5 minutes on mn you’ll know that we collectively call a spade a spade which is not so for other forums you could have posted on.
My question to you, and for you to ask yourself, is why? Personally I think it’s because no matter how much you love him, how he’s such a wonderful guy 95% of the time, you KNOW with absolute certainty something is not right, you KNOW that your gut, your instincts, your subconscious is probably screaming at you in the back of your mind that this isn’t normal, his behaviour isn’t normal, that he isn’t a brilliant man who has a little bit of a temper sometimes. If a man was throwing things at/around me whilst in a rage I’d be frightened! Why weren’t you?
Please OP try and listen to what everyone is saying to you no matter how difficult it is too hear and get out before the next object of his rage is you instead of the bin

Would you stay with him if he wasn’t financially well off?
Do his friends know he has violent tendencies? Or is he too scared of an actual man...

You say you think he can change as he did when you had a panic attack. The problem with that is he knows deep down you can leave. As things stand he can only push it so far before he reaches that line he won’t cross because you can end it.

The problem with this is once you are in a more vulnerable position, pregnant or with young children, he can redraw that line further and further into unacceptable behaviour, but by then you are trapped, or at least will find leaving so much harder.

This is the huge risk you are taking with this behaviour. My ex has ‘intermittent explosive disorder’ and would accept no therapy at all. www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/intermittent-explosive-disorder/symptoms-causes/syc-20373921

OP, Some posters have been a bit harsh here. You are not stupid and you have shown real insight in realising that your partner would not be a suitable father given his behaviour. I want to commend you for this. It shows you will be a great mother, as you are already thinking about what your children will need. You have also expressed yourself thoughtfully and articulately. It is understandable that you boundaries around acceptable behaviour are less than other people's due to your own upbringing. I really hope you use this thread helps you to continue your reflections and understanding.

Hi everyone, thank you for all your posts and I'm so sorry to hear some of your experiences. I’m really grateful for these insights and i’ve downloaded the books mentioned! I’ve no idea why people have the impression he's much older and well off- he’s a couple years older than me and we earn about the same, and i put the vast majority of the house deposit down when we bought it two years ago as i worked really hard to save. I also have a good amount of savings currently (self employed so i’m saving with the view that i’ll need 2-3 years salary saved for when i have a child). It’s always been really important to me to be financially dependent as my mother never was and she really struggled to bring us up. So i’m in the very fortunate position that i’m not tied down financially, for which i’m really grateful. I now know his behaviour is totally not ok. One detail that i forgot to mention was that he would always excuse his outbursts as ways to make the argument stop. We had a really good discussion earlier where he agreed his behaviour is totally not acceptable and he wasn’t actually dismissive of professional help. He said he’s going to research more about his problems and then possibly seek out help. He also said I need to make sure I never escalate it by raising my voice, but thanks to this thread I asserted myself and said even if i do raise my voice, his inability to process his stress is the real issue, and future children will push his buttons etc. and he will need to be able to learn how to deal with his own emotions then. He completely agreed and he clearly doesn’t want to be like his father. I will leave him if he cant sort himself out, and I won’t have children with him. He knows that now so I’m positive things can change.
The comments about me being a future terrible and selfish mother were a bit harsh but as i know that’s not true it’s fine! I work with children, some from really difficult backgrounds, and I assure you I wouldn’t let my child stay in an environment where they could come to any mental or physical harm! That would 100% be my main priority.

OP, this is really scary to read. The way you dimish this behaviour is honestly really upsetting to read, and I don’t even know you! Please don’t have children with him. Please put yourself first and get out of this.

He also said I need to make sure I never escalate it by raising my voice, but thanks to this thread I asserted myself and said even if i do raise my voice, his inability to process his stress is the real issue

I wonder if he has PTSD. I briefly had a relationship with a man who was completely unable to cope with women expressing anger (or annoyance). Hearing a raised female voice triggered him right back to his trauma. I felt sorry for him but essentially he was really fucked up and I would not recommend a relationship with someone with those issues.