I can’t argue or have different opinions to my husband without it turning nasty.

[Vinery]

I can’t argue with my husband, I can’t voice a different opinion without him taking it very personally and getting defensive and then getting aggressive.

If he’s annoyed me or if I’m just having a bad day and perhaps I’m nagging or just being snappy etc he becomes really horrible to me. He takes everything so personally when perhaps it’s just me feeling annoyed or tired or had a bad day. He often will bring in arguments from months or years back. I feel like I can’t say anything anymore just in case I upset him. I can’t help sometimes but be annoyed at things. For example his mum was being rude to me and I told him that I wasn’t happy about a comment and he blew up at me for talking about his mum. If I ask him to please cut the grass he’ll bring up something I said 3 years ago he didn’t like so that’s why he won’t cut the grass to help.

Whats going on? I can’t be happy all the time about everything as I have feeling and emotions. Sometimes he or others upset me and I voice it or feel it.

I was sick one Christmas with a terrible fever, even hallucinating. He did nothing and he was pissed off. I also caught the norovirus and he just walked past me whilst I was being sick. In return he expects loads of attention.

Ive been feeling really fatigued since catching covid last year, he has no sympathy and couldn’t care less, I think it annoys him. I’ve got to hear about his bad back daily and he takes it out on me that I don’t care enough about it.

Financially at a push I would be ok. My family don’t really like him. He has made comments towards me in front of them. He makes it awkward when they visit as he doesn’t really like them.

Life is too short to put up with this crap. You need to get out before he grinds you into the ground. You deserve much better than him

Please think about you and your childrens future
I spent 21 years with a man who told me I would never find better. I had to agree with everything he said, do all the housework, childcare etc, but praise him to the hilt.when he cooked a meal.
I started feeling that unless I was satisfying ALL his needs, he would.find fault with me.
In the end I really couldnt be bothered anymore. I just said I agreed with his opinion, even if I didnt
I left and ..........
I have never been happier. I met a man who values, loves and supports me.
Honestly, its scary, but you can find better. You may even find you are happier on your own.
My daughter thinks I was a total doormat with my exh and I should have left years before. I truly was not a good example to her, but maybe she wont make those mistakes
Good luck. OP x

Op, it's really difficult to believe and accept that you're a victim of domestic abuse but you are.
He's abusing you. Nothing you do will ever be good enough for him.
Make plans to leave and see those plans through.
Have a look at the Freedom Programme and also at a woman called Melanie Tonia Evans, she's an expert in narcissistic abuse. I bet what she has to say resonates with you.
Good luck.

Blimey. My exP started talking like this and I left him asap.

OP, take a step back, look from the outside point if view, you're better off without him.

From an article by Lauren Laverne from several years back which I think will speak to you. Link is at the bottom.

"Thirty percent of women have experienced this kind of relationship. I’m one of them. What I remember most about emotional abuse is that it’s like being put in a box. How you end up in there is the biggest trick – I never managed to work that one out. Maybe you think it’s a treasure box at first: you’re in there because you’re special. Soon the box starts to shrink. Every time you touch the edges there is an “argument”. So you try to make yourself fit. You curl up, become smaller, quieter, remove the excessive, offensive parts of your personality – you begin to notice lots of these. You eliminate people and interests, change your behaviour. But still the box gets smaller. You think it’s your fault. The terrible, unforgivable too-muchness of you is to blame. You don’t realise that the box is shrinking, or who is making it smaller. You don’t yet understand that you will never, ever be tiny enough to fit, or silent enough to avoid a row – because they aren’t rows. If you’re lucky – like my friend and me – you get to leave the situation. I’m not sure whether you ever completely escape the experience. Obviously coercive control is not just present in partnerships. It permeates and perpetuates all kinds of toxic domestic relationships."

www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/sep/07/time-to-make-emotional-abuse-a-crime

I have a very similar husband and understand your predicament. Do you look at the 5 languages of love?
I’ve realised from my husband I have to show him more love and affection. It seems to be working so far. I need tasks doing like you and there’s no stopping you standing up for yourself but also understand how he is feeling. It sounds like I treat my husband like a child, and I kind of do, but it gets the chores done and keeps us both happy!

OP, we have 3 pages already and the general consensus is obvious. Your husband is narcissistic twat who is abusing you and it’s highly unlikely that he will change so divorce is your only answer.
If you want just to moan it’s fine but your situation won’t change and only will get worse.

@Vinery Financially at a push I would be ok. My family don’t really like him. He has made comments towards me in front of them. He makes it awkward when they visit as he doesn’t really like them

His next step will be probably to isolate you from your family. Please take the children and yourself to your parents and then phone him to say you want to divorce. Or get your dad to come round to your house so you have a witness for when you tell your husband to leave.

How old are the children and has he always been controlling? Please don't allow your children to grow up in this abusive household.

This man is a total waste of space, and you will be much happier with him out of your life. Start planning that divorce.

I think you are all right. He’s got me going rounds and round in circles doing things and saying things I don’t really want to do. I don’t really like him anymore, there isn’t anything nice about him apart from the fact he works.

Jesus Christ he's a total prick isn't he.
I'd be off as soon as practically possible.

Don't put up with this shit. Why should you be miserable and bullied for the rest of your life. You deserve so much better

What's going on is you are trying to have a relationship with him; a collaborative partnership that is a two-way street. He is a kind of man who does not want that; He sounds like coercive controller who wants to dominate you and sees you as an extension of him, rather than an autonomous individual.

He will be angry with you having thoughts or opinions that are not what he wants you to have. Patricia Evans explains it well in her book The Verbally Abusive Relationship. Also this video series may help you understand your situation better...

No there is no relationship built on mutual respect. He sends his mum large amounts of money. I’ve stopped getting involved as the first few times when I said why don’t you speak to me about it. Not that I’d say no or anything but it would be nice to be part of it. All I get is it’s none of your business, I’ll do what I want with my money. Fair enough but we a family we should be able to talk together and not just point blank say no. He constantly wants to know what I spend “his money on”, it’s never anything other than household stuff.

All the holidays have to be revolved around what he wants to do. He gets angry if I’ve not booked the right things. It’s always about him.

@Vinery if you split up then not only will you have escaped a loveless marriage, he will have to give you more money (child support) and spend more time with the children if you share custody. That will be probably more time than he spends with them at the moment! You'll be better off without him.

How are you doing @Vinery ?

This is my exact marriage!! he constantly says all he wants is a family and his kids..... but his actions and behavior always say differently… He always says he wants one thing but quickly sabotages himself. He deflect his feelings about himself onto me… A small example is I left the trash outside on the chair because I do everything in this house I get up at 7 AM I start work I get two kids to school and he sleep 16 hours a night... so he made the comment you seriously can't walk the trash 15 feet to the trashcan? Are you that lazy?! That isn't about me that's about him.... or he will say you expect me to do all of the stuff in the house and not ever spend quality time with my kids.... well you know what I've been doing that for seven years. I'm the only one who has ever done anything. He bought a restaurant about a year ago and he is God's gift to earth there but when he gets to his house to his family he supposedly loves he treats us like trash. God forbid someone sit wrong at the dinner table-it will throw him into a full blown frenzy temper tantrum. I think he has severe undiagnosed ADHD. He is extremely compulsive and his mind racist 24 seven. His rap sheet is 10 pages long throughout his life… No matter how bad he wants to do better and be better for some reason he can't. I have never met someone who consistently says they won't to do one thing but always does the opposite. He wrecked his motorcycle a few years ago and then his mom got cancer and passed. I have been in fight or flight mode for so long I do not know how to function like a normal person. I keep telling him he should talk to his Doctor Who has known him his entire life and breakdown everything that goes through his mind and how he functions on a day-to-day basis because something is just not clicking somewhere....

Omgggggggggg I don't know how many times I have to tell my husband this… I get paid for 40 hours a week working for Home but I work 16 hours a day doing everything in this house and he told me a few years ago that I need to know my place... bitch please!!!! then get your ass out there and mow that grass!!!!

the projecting is real in my house!!! I am so glad I found this thread because I feel so validated right now I could scream at the top of the mountains!!!

He says I’m not like the wives of his friends who gym for their men and make their packed lunch etc. I don’t want to do those things because he treats me so poorly

I'm sorry OP, but it sounds like he wants a 1950s, adoring & fawning housewife. No wonder you don't want to do that.

He takes everything so personally when perhaps it’s just me feeling annoyed or tired or had a bad day.

Ar the same time, whilst I don't condone his behaviour, it's not ok to take your moods out on other people, like being snappy with them, and expect them to be happy to be an emotional punchbag every time you've had a bad day.

Zombie thread

Sweetie, you deserve so much better. He’s a horrible person without an ounce of empathy or kindness. Why on earth should you do anything for anyone who treats you so badly?

Could you leave? sounds like your parents would be supportive.

Hi and speak to a solicitor. Have you got your own money? Start putting money aside.
Get a divorce.