Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

Flip

1 2

Original poster

Advising People To Leave Relationships

42 replies

TheShellBeach · 12/12/2022 01:12

It isn't that easy just to bin someone and move on with your life.

The advice to LTB is honestly meant, but quite difficult to take.
You would have to find somewhere else to live (or they would) and if there are children, they would have to be handled sensitively.

OP posts:

JennyForeigner · 12/12/2022 08:01

RottingAutumnApples · 12/12/2022 06:30

Yes, that’s the issue. LTB is fine, and not overused here. The problem is that LTB is UNDERused in RL. In all the years I talked to my friends about the many instances of abnormal and painful behaviour from my H no-one ever said, ‘You do realise that’s not normal? You shouldn’t stay with him’. Instead it was, ‘Men! What are they like?!’ In RL appalling behaviour from men is normalized. Many Mnetters have the experience to recognize awful behaviour from the off.

But yea OP, the problem is that if the OP does not quickly agree she should leave, there are posters who will turn against her, start attacking her as a terrible mother. I despise those posters. A woman, experiencing abuse, is subject to abuse as she tries to talk about it. Those posters drive her from the thread, drive her from support.

Even worse are posters who, if the woman does come back later and start a new thread, say, ‘you’ve posted all this before and had advice’. These posters are bullies.

Show quote history

This is very astute on normalisation in RL and you are quite right on shaming posters. That's terrible behaviour.

In defence of the MN community, many of us are the reverse though. We work with refuges or VAWG services and appreciate how hard it is. LTB in those circumstances is to appreciate just how dangerous abusive relationships are, and how the pattern escalates.

OldWivesTale · 12/12/2022 08:03

ResearchMakesMeCry · 12/12/2022 07:42

The assumption is also that there are better partners out there. Perhaps, but likely not in sufficient numbers.
I'm used to being chronically single and have resigned myself to it. But a lot of people aren't like that.

But surely it's better to have no partner at all than to stay with a crap or abusive one? And from the children's perspective even more so. I think decent men are few and far between but then I'd rather be single than stay with an arsehole.

felulageller · 12/12/2022 09:13

Leaving, both emotionally and practically, is a process not an event.

Saying LTB is a useful part of that process.

When you have DCs sometimes you can never really leave as abuse can continue after separation when contact etc is used as a tool of abuse. Also women are at most risk of being murdered at the point of ending abusive relationships. It's not a safe time and has to be handled delicately.

But it's still valuable to have the affirmation that LTB is the advice of other impartial people.

Wheredoallthepensgo · 12/12/2022 09:17

HowVeryBizarre · 12/12/2022 05:01

Having worked with many women in abusive relationships over the years one of the things that has always struck me is how many don't actually realise that the relationship IS abusive. I think it is very powerful for many women here to have it validated that the behaviour of their partners is not acceptable, that they are worth more and that they have choices. It certainly is not easy to leave an abusive relationship but not telling people that they should is not the answer.

Yes yes yes

WhatNoRaisins · 12/12/2022 10:36

Maybe it's time for a new acronym to say that this is not ok.

yellowsmileyface · 12/12/2022 13:21

I know what you mean OP. It's usually the best advice, but some posters deliver it in quite an insensitive way. Replies to posts detailing actual abuse that simply state "get rid" always feel a bit flippant.

Women in abusive relationships are usually dealing with a great deal of shame for having ended up in such a situation, and when posters make out like it's easy or simple to leave, it adds to that feeling of shame.

I think it's more helpful to facilitate a discussion so the OP can draw their own conclusions about what to do, plus recommending other resources such as getting in touch with Woman's Aid who are more qualified to advise in abusive situations.

lightand · 12/12/2022 13:33

Nobody reads "ltb" and heads off with nowhere to go and no money when you get there.

How do you know?

ChrisTrepidation · 12/12/2022 13:40

The fact is that many people are in shit relationships that they would be better off out of.

Hence why LTB is used so liberally on here.

Dittosaw · 12/12/2022 13:47

Despite the fact I’ve just told two people to Lyn, aside from abuse I agree.

People have forgotten how to pacify, neutralise and discuss things. They feel like backing down or doing more is a loss.

When I speak, I smile a lot (naturally). I say things in positive phrasing and avoid criticism or blaming if possible. No am not Pollyanna and I do understand that when you’ve asked politely for years and they are still lazy it gets to be a lot, but I can ask assertively with a smile on my face.

Women with small kids are vulnerable, financially, emotionally and this is also a time of disrupted sleep and maximum stress. They need more support than usual.

We are all idiots sometimes . I’ve found that apologising and being the bigger person sometimes leads to the other person doing the same as well. There are times when one partner will do more than the other. So to me, LTB is the last resort.

However, any woman if they can, should try to be financially free so that they have the opportunity to go.

GreenManalishi · 12/12/2022 14:00

I don't think anyone advising a woman to leave her relationship with a LTB expects her to shut the laptop and start packing immediately with kids and hamsters in tow, and nowhere to go?

Surely it's more of a, you deserve so much better than this, and no this is not reasonable, set the wheels in motion in order to free yourself? Not a literal, RIGHT NOW and if you don't I will be angry?!

Original poster

TheShellBeach · 12/12/2022 14:05

Joannagorilla · 12/12/2022 06:45

@Tuilpmouse I would argue it's actually impossible for a lot of women. Especially those who have children with disabilities and are unable to work. I would bet it would be near impossible to leave an unhappy relationship.

I actually left my violent ex-husband after ten years of being his punching bag.

It was very, very difficult. I was lucky in that I went to my sister's but me and the two DC had to sleep and live together in one room, and I missed my house and having a place for everything. That sounds mad but I had a lot of trouble coping in surroundings where I could not put everything where I wanted it. I am autistic and routine and order were/are important to me.

Eventually a judge awarded me the house (it was rented from a Housing Association) and my ex didn't move out till the day I moved back in, and then he bombarded me with phone calls about how he had to sleep in his car. I felt guilty, although he had been very violent for years, and had made no effort to find himself somewhere else to live.

There is so much guilt associated with being abused, and with leaving, and with ending what had been (to start with) a happy relationship. In retrospect I should not have married him but it's easy to say that afterwards.

OP posts:

Original poster

TheShellBeach · 12/12/2022 14:08

Not a literal, RIGHT NOW and if you don't I will be angry?!

Well, no - but as PP said, sometimes there are posters who get annoyed with someone who wavers, or who says things like "I need to get the pets sorted out" or "DC is in the school play next week so I can't just go".

There can be a pile-on in circumstances like this. I've seen it. I've also seen threads where people say "you've already posted this and got advice so why are you still with him?" type of thing.

OP posts:

RottingAutumnApples · 12/12/2022 14:35

GreenManalishi · 12/12/2022 14:00

I don't think anyone advising a woman to leave her relationship with a LTB expects her to shut the laptop and start packing immediately with kids and hamsters in tow, and nowhere to go?

But if by page 3 the woman has not agreed to leave posters there are posters who DO get angry.

GreenManalishi · 12/12/2022 16:35

There are a lot of angry people on the internet and some of them are here. It doesn't mean they're right.

Talon01 · 12/12/2022 22:53

There seems to be a lack of balance that's for sure.

Genuine abuse cases of course but a lot of the stuff on here is one sided and then aided by projection.

Rarely do you get two sides of a story.

PrincessConstance · 13/12/2022 12:27

The LTB on Mumsnet is grossly overused.
By the time people get to the end of their natural lives, they'd have moved house 600 times and had 600 relationships. Then there are the double standards.
Man wants sex-LTB
Woman wants sex-he's useless-life's too short-LTB.

Original poster

TheShellBeach · 13/12/2022 13:31

LTB is overused on here, probably, but if a woman is in a bad situation and enough people say it to her, it may spark something in here which leads her eventually to split up.
Even though that may be/certainly is very difficult to achieve.

OP posts:

Flip

1 2

Swipe left for the next trending thread