DH flipped. Feel broken

[Mamato3boysand2dogs]

Hello I'm new here, i have had a terrible 24 hrs with DH and no one to talk to. I feel so ill and so upset i dont know what to do with my self.

DH does not get on with my brothers wife. To be fair it is her own fault, she has been an idiot in the past and i dont speak to her either.

Me and DH and 3 kids went to a party yesterday and planned to stay overnight in a hotel. My mum lives with us and asked if she could invite my brother and wife to the house for lunch, seeing as we were away. I wasn't over the moon but begrudgingly agreed to keep the peace, thinking as we weren't home, DH didn't have to see her, no harm done. DH has explicitly said he never wants her here but as we were not physically home i figured it would be ok and didnt mention to DH

Well, Ring Doorbell fucked me. He saw her. He was drunk so he exploded at me. Calling me a cunt etc, kids all there with us, threatened to punch me in the face. I told him to go ahead so he swung a bag of wet towels at my head. He missed. He then called my brother and screamed at him then stormed off leaving me and the kids. Remote location so no uber would come. We walked 1.5 miles to the nearest town, kids crying, me trying to play it down. I thought he went to the hotel but he had gone home.

I collected my car and started to drive home. He wouldn't answer any calls or messages. Trying to drive calmly while kids are getting more and more upset (10 and 13). My eldest got a cab separately.

My mum calls mid journey to say DH got home and they had a big row. He threatened to hit her, called her a cunt, put his hand through our glass kitchen door, threw a chair, generally went mad. Mum quietly cleaned it all up as he stormed upstairs to bed

I arrived home, mum was crying and shaken up, saying sorry for inviting DH wife over
Shes nearly 70 years old.

DH in bed. I tried to say sorry but he wouldn't let me in the bedroom. locked the door. We had a wedding today so i text him what are the plans? He said he was gonna go, but not me.

This morning we talked. He is still angry and called my mum a fat cunt when i told him she said he threatened to hit her. I asked him "did you?" He said yes, because she was getting "loud" at him.

Children this morning still upset. They missed out on the hotel stay too, which they had been very excited about.

When the time came to get ready for the wedding, DH said "are you coming or not?". I said no. He then basically begged me, 4 or 5 times, saying he wants me there and he will have to sit at dinner alone

I said no. My eyes are swollen from crying, no sleep, i look like shit. Kids are unsettled and i thought it unfair to swan off to a wedding and enjoy a hotel stay when they have been denied the same and made to cry into the bargain

DH is extremely annoyed and has gone, alone

Together 20 years. He is actually a lovely bloke and this is out of character but i cant see how to forgive and forget. I'm so upset, for the kids, for mum, for everyone involved. All my fault though apparently for inviting her to the house when i know how he feels about her. I just thought as we were not there, it would be ok. What did i do??

This is a dangerous, violent man.

Testing him is not a good idea and could have seriously terrible consequences for OP, her children and her mum.

He us an abuser.this isn't just flipping out.this isn't a one time event.its an escalation of how you've said he is.
Ok.what will be yoyr cut off.when yoyr mum is dead because she stands up to him.what if the kids want you to stay then.what if they get in the way?
Do you live this man.after all this?
Will the way he is day to day.nor just the flipping but Making you keep quiet and tread on eggshells stop?
Kids will replicate his behaviour.to you.to others.to future wives.
Or take it inwards.
There is never a once to this kind of event.
I no your scared.
I no this isn't easy.
I'm sorry op

but is apparently willing to attend anger management counselling.

Is his "inability to control his anger"

r" affecting other arenas of his life?

Workplace?
Driving?
Queuing?
Interacting with strangers?
Any situation where people have authority over him?

Or it is only within his home environment towards dependants who are no physical threat/equal to him??

I'd reiterate that this is not an anger problem, it is an intrinsic values problem.

Anger management is the go-to for abusers.

Do not listen to your kids. They are trauma bonded to him because they have lived their whole lives in an abusive environment. Of course they love and miss him, it's bloody Stockholm Syndrome. You don't ask if the air's good when there's nothing else to breathe.

You are the adult. YOU decide what's best for them. It clearly, clearly isn't living with this dangerous man, watching him intimidate, enslave and abuse their mother.

What does your mum say about it all? Your brother? Do they think you should stay with him? Are they willing to 'brush it under the carpet'?

I think the first thing you should do is a mental exercise: all those people who messaged you get well soon from the wedding,. all those people he told you were 'ill'. Imagine messaging them back reassuring them you weren't ill at all, just very upset and taking care of your very upset kids, and then telling them exactly what happened here.

Imagine what their reaction would be. Imagine how you would feel. Imagine what your husband would feel. Imagine how he would react. To the simple fact of sunlight being shone on his behaviour. Did a cold shiver run down your spine just imagining how he'd react if you told his peers how he'd behaved?

Imagine telling them 'but it's OK because he's apologised, and explained he only did it because he wasn't feeling respected.'

At the moment this event isn't 'reality' for you really, you're as you say numb. Because it's traumatic and you're dissociating. The only way it becomes 'real' is for someone outside of the fucked up dynamic to know, to take a view. Which you are 'kind of' getting here but it's an anon forum so it's consequence free.

OK so now imagine your child goes into school upset, and tells this story to a teacher. What do you think they would think? How would they react? What would they think of YOU and the steps you have taken to safeguard your little ones?

OK enough thought experiment. Try it out for real. Tell someone, in real life, someone whose home and/or livelihood is not dependent on your husband. Someone who knows him. A family friend. A teacher. Someone.

The only way you will prevent yourself from just falling back into your usual pattern of eggshell-walking and accommodating his utterly unreasonable abusive behaviour is to put it out there. You and your children are too trained to soak it up, excuse it, delete it. Make it real.

Be very wary of him saying he’ll go to anger management. He may weaponise this against you later.

Also he knows he’s pushed to far so he’s stating the above to reign you back in so be very very aware of this too.

Also you said no and he won’t like that either hence bending over backwards. It’s all to put you back in your box

you are in an abusive relationship and when he abused your mother she should of phoned the police not quietly cleaned up after him ffs.

it’s like the tiny tiny bit of shit in the sandwich analogy would you still eat it knowing it’s there.

take your time but if unsafe at all phone the police as he will escalate as he sees he’s losing his grip on you. You said No to him

He isn't angry though, he's just nuts. And in the sociopath way, not in the harmless quirky kind of way.

Even if he suddenly magically became a decent human being, so what? He's abused you for years! How does he expect you to live your life with him with that knowledge? Always walking on egg shells incase he does it again.

Always knowing that he never wanted to stop abusing you, he never cared, not until his own happiness was threatened. Fuck him. He's a horrible human bring, at best.

My ex attended anger management, but he was being a shit to <everyone> at work, his siblings, people on FB.. he turned into quite a nasty person all around.

It helped for a little bit, but the thing with anger management is its anger MANAGEMENT, its not anger cure. It doesn't change who they are and for it to work they have to CONSTANTLY abide by the things they're taught in how to handle stress and emotion.

The moment they stop actively managing it, they just go right back to being their old selves, back to the old excuses.

My ex attending anger management helped for maybe 2 or 3 years, then he slid right back to type, and by the time i plucked up the courage to walk away, i was a broken mess with a nasty, abusive, controlling angry man for a husband... who had alienated his whole family and all of his friends.. and continues to do so years later.

Use his want to attend counselling as some breathing space, plan your exit, get things in place.. i know it will upset your kids, but you and they, and your mom, deserve better... i know you won't leave right now, but set things up so when you do finally get to that point, you can just go.

For fucks sake that is awful advice.

OP's husband is violent and that will set him off again.