Am I to blame/should I reach out?

[Ungresd]

I’ve posted before but having a low morning as due to go into counselling shortly and this has all come to the forefront of my mind. During pregnancy my ex questioned me on use of contraception despite using condoms, implication being that I had somehow tampered with it after sex. I got so upset about this that twice I asked him to stay with a friend and said if he didn’t I would call police (I felt physically stressed and so upset and just wanted to calm down alone). He became cold and distant in pregnancy and started drinking a lot. He came home drunk twice to the extent he couldn’t properly speak. Again on these occasions I told him I would call police and his work if he didn’t stop drinking as I had I idea if he had driven in that state. When he became colder towards me I think I once said I would tell his work everything because he’s treated a pregnant woman so badly yet goes into work treating patients as if he’s done nothing wrong. Few weeks later he’s been convicted for drink driving and is in a pit of despair, shuts me off saying I had been making demands of him at weekends that had made him stressed (wanting to see family and friends a lot which I did, probably was too much), and that it pushed him to drink with the stress I caused mentioning police and work etc. I apologised and he basically shut me off with a final message saying his dad said I was bad news and he shouldn’t speak to me. He’s not a kid, he’s 42.

After apologies by text that went unanswered, I left him to it. I’ve never heard anything from him and DC is now six months old. I know he managed to keep his job as he pays a lot in maintenance which I had to do via CM as he ignored me when I mentioned coming to an agreement.

I still feel guilty for things I said and look back knowing I felt so mentally distraught at what he was saying and doing that I leapt to these resorts to try and get him to stop. I feel maybe it’s on me to reach out snd try and initiate a relationship between him snd dc but then friends say he was awful to me I have form for harbouring guilt as I’ve done it my whole life. Would you approach him or sod it? For what it’s worth he never once apologised to me for things he was doing/saying.

No, leave it. He knows where you are and if he wants to be a parent he knows where to find his child.

You can’t force someone to be a parent.

Absolutely do not approach him. There is only one person to blame for the drink driving - and that's him. He knows where you and your child are if he wants to have a relationship, and he obviously doesn't.

The ball is very firmly in his court - leave it there. The reaction of his father is frankly unforgivable and you sound better off without this kind of toxicity in your life. Your child definitely doesn't need it.

@ClocksGoingBackwards guess I just feel I’m to blame. He didn’t speak since month 6 of pregnancy. It’s hard not to think that was my fault. Personally I would have moved past someone saying the things I said if they had apologised but I am not a good person to judge it as ultimately I am a bit of a pushover and just want things to be nice/happy. I found what he was doing extremely hard and was probably too sensitive to it.

@RatherBeRiding i agree the drink driving wasn’t on me … counsellor has finally managed to drill that into me. I guess I feel like maybe he was right to cut me off like that given what I said? It’s hard because he knew me and whilst I know it was wrong and I apologised, there was so much support from me to him which he knows. He never even acknowledged his own behaviour not once. It’s left me feeling like I was the worst person in the world and the cause of his nastiness and subsequent silence in DC’s life.

He is responsible for his own actions OP, not you.
The threatening to call the police and his work was probably really annoying, and a bad idea, but his actions are up to him.

As pp said, you can't force him to parent his child. He knows where you both are, I'd leave it.

You've been around for a while with similar posts haven't you?

He's made it clear he wants nothing to do with you or the baby. Whilst difficult to accept you cannot force any relationship. You cannot change the past and what has happened. If he was interested he'd have been in touch. He hadn't and you now need to move on with the rest of your life and raising your child the best you can

Really don’t contact him again. He doesn’t want to hear from you, the relationship is over. Carrying on working to accept that and to look forward. Focus on yourself and your baby.

How is your fault that he has prioritised his own feelings over yours, and more importantly, your child's?
You've apologised, and he has responded with some bullshit about what his Dad thinks. Who cares what his Dad thinks? He is an adult and a father himself, and has made his own choices. You mentioned about his patients - is he a doctor? So fairly educated and able to adult when he wants to, he'll be aware of the issues involved. He should know that condoms are not 100% effective, and that drunk driving is dangerous and causes fatalities, and that pregnant women should be supported not vilified. He is clearly someone who does not accept their own failings.
If you were to reach out to him again, you would risk being embroiled with this toxic alcoholic and his toxic family. If you do choose to do this, at least wait till after you have finished the counselling, now is not the time to be making decisions that will impact far into the future.

@badgerstink yes I’ve posted before. Im
having a low day.

I know I can’t force the relationship, I think for me it’s more feeling I am to blame for it being this way. If he had gone and had an affair and left then mentally I would cope better but I often look back and think wow he must really have thought he had a firm reason to never speak to me or see dc ever again? It’s the extremity of it that makes me feel it’s all my fault.

@DelphiniumBlue yes at the time that is what upset me, the fact he was grilling me about condoms when I hadn’t even bought them! And as an educated man he surely knew I hadn’t done anything … I never got to the bottom of what he thought had happened. It came out of nowhere some days. I just feel shit that I even referenced police when he said these things as it was so dramatic and not right. Similarly with the drinking I could have handled it better and just talked to him rather than threatening him. At the time I didn’t feel like me, I was so stressed and worried that he had become so irresponsible and unkind in the space of a few months. But he must have felt it was significant as he’s never once acknowledged my apology and when I stopped reaching out 8 months ago, he’s never been in touch. For a man to do that he must believe I am terrible. And it makes me think I’ve no clue how awful my actions truly were or something.

OP,
You are well rid of this nasty, manipulative, irresponsible drunk.

Stop worrying about what he or his toxic family think.

Stick with your counselling and learn from this experience.

Don't contact him again - he knows where you are.

@Thesefeetaremadeforwalking thank you for the support. I know his behaviour wasn’t great but I obsess over what I did. I hate myself for it. On the one hand I absolutely don’t want him in my life because I have accepted he was not responsible or kind to me but on the other hand I am blindingly aware that he must think I am utterly dreadful to have point blank ignored me in my pregnancy and to date, with his dc here. And it’s that part that I can’t bear… whatever he did wrong doesn’t make what I did ok does it? And then I come full circle and think I need to reach out for DC’s sake because this is on me, I’m the cause of him cutting me (and dc) off by what I said and the revolting threats I made.

But he must have felt it was significant as he’s never once acknowledged my apology and when I stopped reaching out 8 months ago, he’s never been in touch. For a man to do that he must believe I am terrible. And it makes me think I’ve no clue how awful my actions truly were or something.

No. You're thinking about it all wrong. Nothing you did or said made him cut off contact with you. NOTHING. Other than maybe the fact that you wouldn't put up with shit behaviour any more.

Really, he cut off contact because he is a shitty, shitty, shit person. You are NOT! Now stop worrying about what he must've/or is still thinking. It really doesn't matter. Nothing you did warrants his reaction.

Start believing that you dodged a bullet and possibly your child has dodged a bullet too. Do you really want someone like that to be a father to your child?

Keep up with therapy and start believing in yourself and your self worth.

Why is blame so important to you?

Can you not see that, regardless of blame, this was an unhealthy dynamic and your priority is to avoid being in it?

Totally agree with this. Please work on not taking the blame.

@TurtleCavalryIsSeriousShit i know he has made the decision himself as regards his child and I’ve finally accepted that’s not directly my fault after a LOT of therapy.

i know though that making threats to him wasn’t ok. When I felt he was accusing me, or drinking or just not being very nice it was absolutely vile of me to jump to making threats. If I hadn’t done that I would be more confident now that he was the dysfunctional one. I think on one occasion I even said his work should know how terrible a partner he was… because he’d got home four hours later than expected and missed dinner. I mean these moments of what I said were not often, maybe 8 times in total but still, it wasn’t right. I feel like it makes me quite toxic too. It’s so so hard as all I wanted was a nice relationship and I couldn’t understand why he was suddenly treating me so horribly.

@Watchkeys i think because if I was the monster he/his family seem to think I am, given they’ve never ever seen their child/granchimd, then am I not under a duty to do right by dc and fix my wrongdoing?

I've read a few of your threads. It clearly wasn't a good relationship. You did and said things you shouldn't. He was the same.

But ultimately, blame isn't really important. What's important is that the relationship is over and you and your DC need to move on.It's good that he's paying maintenance so that's at least one less thing to worry about.

Let it go. Put it in the "this was a bad relationship and it's great that it's over" box.

I don't think his behaviours was in any way acceptable. Notwithstanding that, your threats to him were cruel, manipulative and abusive. I've been on the receiving end of threats to contact my work/my family/friends and disclose information and the impact it had on me was horrendous. This was from someone who supposedly should have cared for me and instead left me frightened, stressed and feeling forced to remain in a relationship. I don't say this to hurt you. The fact that you regret what you've done is a good sign and I would recommend you working on yourself to make sure you don't repeat the behaviour.

Personally I wouldn't want to ever hear from my ex-partner as it would awaken all those memories and feelings.

@WaferThinIce thanks. Yeah I apologised a lot and obviously never did anything. I felt really shocked by his change in attitude towards me and didn’t manage it well at all. I hate myself for it. In this situation would you have blanked me during pregnancy and beyond? And now blank the child? I just feel I’ve caused it. I was terrible and I know that but I hoped he knew me well enough that I was more than that, even apart we could have been civil. Xx