my dp has told me he hates me for getting pregnant and having our dd

[veryunhappychappy]

I am devastated.

Everything is crumbling around me and I do not know what to do. dd is 5 months old today and since she was 4 weeks old he has been viciously nasty to me, very critical, scathing comments every time i speak/ do anything. he is unwelcoming to my friends and family and pretty controlling at times. i feel totally paralysed by him and it's at the point where i do nothing but try and stay out of his way when he is at home.

i found out about a month ago he has a codeine addiction, on top of a problem with cannabis -which i knew about, but have always been supportive of his efforts to stop, and have always remained hopeful that he would. all my hope is going. not just for that but for absolutely everything. he spends hundreds of ££'s a month on his addictions (this has become very obvious since i went on maternity leave and am unable to plug financial gaps).

i feel i am treading a very fine line at the moment and am not sure if all this is making me depressed.

i am so sad for dd. she is a lovely, bright baby and he is so detached from everything that he shows very little interest in her - not because he isn't interested, but because he is absolutely full of self loathing and anger.

He has stopped eating and has lost lots of weight. he won't eat anything i make because my food is 'shite'. he had developed control issues to the point of neurosis which means he wants to do everything himself, meaning he spends even less time with dd. at a rough estimate i would say he takes sole responsibility of her for less than 30 mins each day.

He ignored my 30th birthday in favour of buying and smoking cannabis -and completely ignored valentines day too. since then i have not kept quiet to keep the peace but have been responding to his criticisms and actually wrote him a long letter outlining my fears (that his behaving this way is making me depressed and is putting everything at serious risk). He broke down and confessed to the codeine addiction and is now getting drug counselling.

i don't want to sound like a complete wet rag, but he is not a wicked person. i know this behaviour stems from him being deeply unhappy and confused about his parents messy separation when he was a child (he has a deep mistrust of women and i have put myself right in his firing line for becoming a 'mother' i think). i am finding it harder and harder to see him. i miss him so much. it is like he is just slipping away right in front of my eyes and there is nothing i can do. he won't let me help.

Today he told me he hates me for getting pregnant and trapping him. i have devastated his life by doing it. dd was not planned and he says he has no trust for me as a result. He is lived that we didn't discuss an abortion (at the time I said it was something i could not do).

Please help, I do not know what to do.

Sorry, long. (am a namechanger btw)

thanks colditz, i am having a read of that now.

You're not necessarily splitting you all up for good. But he has to recognise

1. that he has a problem (which he does, so that's good). 2)That it is impacting on you (which he doesn't, he blames you).
2. That he must take steps to become well, and if that means him giving you a break until he's feeling less hostile towards you, he should comply.

Deep down, you are afraid of losing him. That's understandable. But hand-wringing, wet liberalism never made a man love anybody. It just makes them walk all over you. (Don't mean to be unkind, I've been a hand-wringing wet liberal. Nowadays, I'd kick their teeth in before I allowed a man to talk to me the way your partner is talking to you).

and here

This must be devastating for you, VUC. I've been with somebody going through a similar situation, and I felt as if to leave him would be to throw him to the wolves. But we didn't have children together (though he wanted them), thank God. And eventually I realised that no good would come of staying with him - I wasn't helping him; to use a popular parlance, I was 'enabling' him.

Since having daughters, I have a rule - if it isn't something I'd want for them, it isn't something I'd want for me.

This really, badly sounds like something I wouldn't want for my daughters. Or my friends. He has to stop blaming you or get out, I think.

I'm so sorry you're going through this, and hope it works out in the best way for everyone.

OK, forget you & forget your dd for a minute. Let's say your priority is getting your man well.

It's NOT going to happen whilst you stay with him. Because when he is doing the 'I'm going to get counselling, I'm going to get off drugs' stuff, what he is really saying is 'You are still here, so things can't be that bad. However, you're nagging so I need to shut you up by making appropriate noises'

I don't mean he's thinking that consciously. His addiction is drowning out his need to behave decently towards the mother of his child. Anything you say is white noise at this point.

You have to accept that he's deaf to your words. Only actions will get through. You have to get away from him & work this through separately.

thanks colditz, this was interesting...

Ambiguity
Avoiding responsibility by claiming forgetfulness
Blaming others
Chronic lateness and forgetfulness
Complaining
Does not express hostility or anger openly
Fear of competition
Fear of dependency
Fear of intimacy
Fears authority
Fosters chaos
Intentional inefficiency
Making excuses and lying
Obstructionism
Procrastination
Resentment
Resists suggestions from others
Sarcasm
Sullenness

VeryUnhappy. You Love you dp and dd obviously and don't want to leave but as others on here have said staying is maybe not allowing him to change. He has no reason to. He can wallow in his misery knowing that you are there to take it out on and to pick up the pieces. Maybe what you should do is tell him that you need to sort out things separately. It doesn't need to be final but maybe it will give him the push he needs once your not there.
As much as you love him your priority is your dd. Do you want her to see the effects of his drug habit and what his behaviour has on your relationship.
Even If he loves her can you ensure that he wont start talking to her the way he talks to you?

You deserve better and so does your dd.

and here

did you get rid of that guy colditz?

here we go again

ah..the silent treatment. i get that a lot.

it is very isolating.

Sure did.

And you know what else?

We get on better now than ever before. He visits the children every single day. they adore him, he adores them, and I don't have to take his shit any more.

We can both be the parents we want to be. I don't have to nag him about anything any more. I can live my life as I like it, and not as an enabler. he can get himself as far in debt as he wants and spend all his leftover cash on crisps and sweets as far as I care, because his maintenance ha been dealt with by the CSA and comes directly out of his wages.

the letters and phonecalls in his name from debt collecting agencies don't bother me one bit, because they are offically Not My Problem Any More.

We split in February last year. He said it was the worst year of his life, and it made him grow up because he had to look after himself for the first time in his life ... this from a 34 year old.

And I have stopped crying myself to sleep, my 14 month bout of diarrhoea vanished within a week of him leaving, and I don't have to keep a £130 escape fund in the battery compartment of an unused sex toy any more.

nice hiding place!

i have to try and get some sleep. thank you everybody for writing back to me and i will check back in tomorrow if i can.

colditz - thank you for your threads, i can see all the parallels. i am just finding this very very difficult.

Excellent hiding place ... they have to be unused, you say?

My point was.... look at the dates.

Look at the way it escalated.

It only stopped when he was made to leave.

There are MORE£, you know. More of my threads, just like that. Look how I am defending his behavior!

In January 2006, I hated him so much I sometimes wished he would die.

In February 2006, I think I had a complete nervous breakdown. The mental health crisis team were involved, they came to see me and asked if I was under any stress. I said no.

I'd been under so much pressure for so long, I didn't even feel it any more. But my head felt it, when I woke in the mornings wanting to be dead so I didn't have to face a day that might bring surprises with it. My stomach felt it when I couldn't go into town because I had such racing diarrhoea.

But I answered honestly. I didn't believe myself to be under stress.

And when I posted these threads, and everyone was telling me to leave him, I was disbelieving that they would tell me to split up my family over such trivial matters.

Rereading them (as I sometimes do, to remind myself of what I am worth) is like watching lemmings throwing themselves over a cliff. Reading tHIS thread is like watching lemmings throw themselves off a cliff. Both are an exercise in painful futility.

I could not change my frog into a prince. I am not Wonderwoman, and neither are you.

here's a classic

Watch as I defend his behavior "He's a decent man!"

He really wasn't.

Colditz, had no idea you'd been through all this!

Thanks for taking the time and energy to share with OP.

Veryunhappy hope that helps you put things into perspective.

nite nite

Ah well, y'know ..

Neither had I.

A bad relationship is like a bad smell ... you don't notice it when you are in it every day.

Based on some personal and professional experience of living and working with people with drug addictions, my advice is that you need to leave him. Possibly forever, but certainly until you are satisfied that he has dealt with his addictions (and abusive behaviour, hard to tell how much they are linked).

Whilst you stay with him you protect him from , and delay, the inevitable consequences of his behaviour. So it's the horrible choice of seeing him do that alone, or allowing your DD and yourself to be brought down with him.

It's the toughest kind of tough love.

Sorry to be so stark, I feel awful for you, but you really will be doing the best and most loving thing for your daughter, yourself, and ultimately for him.

All the best to you, keep us posted.

Veryunhappychappy,

Re your comments:-
"I have tried to force a change. he is not himself. he will be hating himself for this.

i know i sound like some sort of idiot but i don't want to leave him. he is not in a good place. he has been to the doctors and has got counselling - he managed to jump a long waiting list by phoning and phoning so i know he wants to get better".

The above is so fatuous it breaks my heart honestly.

It is NOT YOUR FAULT that he is like this, he made a long series of bad choices for which you are not responsible. Some people are too badly damaged to be fixed and you as his partner are in no position to be able to try and "fix" this because you will fall flat on your face.

You cannot force a change, people only change when they want to. At present this man clearly does not and his behaviours are affecting both you and your daughter badly. You will likely only see how badly he has treated you and daughter when you get out.

You can choose to stay to watch all this go on around you but your daughter has no such choice. She has no say at all.

By staying with this man you are condoning all this and enabling his behaviour to continue. You are his enabler. You by staying are stopping him facing the consequences of his actions; everyone has bailed him out somehow to date. Enabling someone does not work. Nor does rescuing and or trying to save them.

he said he didn't hate me this morning -he said he loved me and is just finding everything incredibly hard.

i don't want to give up on him. he doesn't treat dd badly at all - only me. he doesn't spend enough time with her ime, but that is because he is so ashamed of himself i think.

i know what you are all saying is true really.

i haven't got the strength for this any more

You haven't got the strength for what, VUC? For this post or for the struggle you are going through at the moment?

I know in my heart that you won't break up with him. I have been with two very selfish men and defended them to the bitter end because I was so afraid of rejection and abandonment. When you've had enough, you will leave him, but you probably have to reach your rock bottom too - because enablers are as sick as their partners, just in different ways. It will only be then that you realise the validity of what these ladies are saying to you now. I'm really very, very sad that you are in this position and don't have the confidence to demand some respect. But if you don't, you don't. We can't make you change, any more than you can change him.

Keep your chin up.

veryunhappychappy,

If you know what we are all saying is true then all of these people who have taken the time to reply to you cannot be all wrong.

So you still want to rescue him?. If you really love this man you would walk away with your daughter whilst you still can. Enabling him like you have done will neither help him or you. Making excuses for him (you think he is ashamed of himself) serves no purpose either.

And he calls what he is doing to you and by turn your daughter love?!.

Many people find things incredibly hard but that is no excuse for him acting in such a manner.

The fact that he treats you badly is enough for your daughter to both see and reflect on over time. You are her Mum and she will learn from you both; we learn about relationships first and foremost from our parents. As her parents, what are you both teaching her now?. That it is okay for Mummy to be used as a verbal punchbag when he's had a bad day?. You really do not want her growing up in such an atmosphere because she will one day see you as weak for not getting out earlier.

He does not care to spend enough time with her because the drugs are more important to him. They override everything else.

You still have strength, you are still posting for a start. Put those energies you still have into positive action for you and your daughter. Call Women's Aid and seek their help too. You frankly, owe your daughter that much. If you give up now you give up on not just yourself. So you cannot give up now.