Slapped partner he hit me back

[SySy7]

Last year myself and partner bought a house together and were staying at his mums for several months whilst we did it up. We also have 2 small boys and were all staying in one room - it wasn’t an ideal environment and quite stressful. One evening I went back to MILs (she was away for the week) after spending around 14 hrs at our new house sanding and painting. I was covered from head to toe and desperate for a shower. I got in and started washing hair when the pressure dropped to nothing because he decided to start washing up (he knew this happens) so I called down for him to turn it off as was covered in soap. He ignored me and it went on for so long that I ended up going down in my towel. I was pretty annoyed and angrily said turn it off I’m showering and he refused and told me to sit on the sofa until he was finished and then I could get back in. I was shocked by how unreasonable he was being and also triggered a few things in me from childhood. I went over to turn the tap off myself and he kept blocking me and my reaction was to slap him. I am not justifying this action. He then went on to slap me back and push me so hard that I fell backwards into the wall and really hurt my back whilst also being completely naked and humiliated. I was devastated and although he apologised said I should have never of hit him. I asked him for couples therapy which he refused and said he wanted to work it out ourselves. This was over a year ago now and although I’ve tried to move on from it it’s unresolved and we can’t even bring it up without disagreeing. We had a minor disagreement recently and out of the blue he called me a fat ugly slag - it was completely uncalled for and in front of our children. It’s again been enough to trigger me that I can’t move on from it. I’ve decided to go back to therapy - I used to go before I met him. We’ve been together 7 years and they’re both isolated incidents. Am I just as much to blame for what’s happened or am I potentially with a bully? I moved to his town to be with him so don’t have any real friends or family here and both boys in school.

My mum's only done it a few times to be fair. For women it doesn't seem to matter and it's airily written off, whereas for men do it once and you're branded for life, hmm? I think if your instinct is to slap someone like OP (and you do it), either that's a familiar action to you, or will become a familiar action to you if you get away with it on the basis of your gender.

No idea if you watched that documentary about the (tiny) gf who would constantly abuse her (huge) bf – when he just stood still and blocked her and took her abuse like a stone, he still got pretty injured. IMO a slap in return and a push away (to distance the slapper from you) is pretty par for the course I feel – if he were to just "block" and stand there he would get injured too.

Generally, I stand by the fact that if you hit someone, prepare to be hit back regardless of their size – it's human instinct to self defend when attacked physically. No idea what you're saying about abuser immunity, sounds pretty gaslight-y to me. So you want to hit someone bigger than you and then call them an abuser when they hit you back? Sounds quite deliberate to me, even if subconsciously (even during your rage you probably know you'd get away with the slap because you're just a wee innocent woman pushed to the brink by a big man bully).

You shouldn't have slapped him OP. But I can see that his behaviour was extremely provocative, almost as though he wanted a reaction from you. Goodness knows what is going on in your relationship, but if he won't go for couples counselling with you I don't see much hope. Sorry.

My exH used to shout at me and corner me in a way that meant I had no escape. He would physically block me from leaving a room and continue to shout abuse at me. It was honestly terrifying. The only way to break out was to shout harder and louder and worse. Like I would literally, after about 2 hours of listening to him shout the most horrible things at me, while I was crouched down in a corner, burst into the most horrific shouting you have ever heard. He would then use that in later arguments against me, tell people I am crazy etc.

Abusers do this a lot. Someone uptrend mentioned reactive abuse.

Just leave. He is unreasonable, making you act horribly, it's an extremely toxic environment for your children.

I do sympathise but you need to pick yourself up, gather some strength and do right by your children. Your own needs, wants, insecurities, emotional trauma do not matter as much as their right to live in a calm home.

Why are you reviewing this now if it happened last year?

While you shouldnt have slapped him, he had ruined your shower and he knew it would before he started, and was blocking you from turning the water off and i think many people would have been feeling very stressed by his behaviour.
He was tormenting you, and i can understand your reaction to this far more than his counter reaction of slapping you and then pushing you into the wall.

Most people in that situation would have turned the tap off and let you have your shower and apoogised. Hes treated you like crap there, and i think its not ok.
Hes refused to try and help process it.
I think he is being cruel to you tbh. You dont need couples therapy, you need to dump him.

At my house when you run the tap the shower pressure drops and starts trickling, it's still coming out but with barely any power. I assume this is the same thing? It's annoying. But I wouldn't expect my partner to come storming out the shower demanding I stop using water elsewhere in order for his shower to come back more powerfully. I'd expect him to do what we always do - either ride it out with poor pressure or just wait for it to come back, use the time to have an extra scrub and carry on showering after whoever else stops using a tap/toilet. This is an absolute non event in my house we just get on with it.

If he came storming downstairs and demanded I stop washing up I would have been extremely taken aback, and pissed off frankly. I might well have said no just wait I'm nearly done. I would not expect to be slapped for that.

He does sound stubborn - and quite antagonising, because I don't think the refusal and blocking the tap is normal behaviour either, to be clear. But I just want some people to stop and consider how it would feel to have someone come down shouting at them whilst they were doing a bit of housework, and then be hit for not complying. Because that is what OP did.

Then he met violence with more violence. This relationship is clearly toxic. He most certainly does not sound like a reasonable man, and not a very even tempered one either. Also sounds like he doesn't even like OP. But I can say exactly the same things about OP too.

You should break up; I think it's likely he's bringing out the worst in you and maybe vice versa.

You both sound quite bad, tbh.

No-one should be slapping or showing or hitting anyone, nor name calling.

What a dreadful example to set your children. And what a scary environment for them.

Surely you’re better off apart?

Ignoring the goading and violence that you've had plenty of advice on already, a man that calls you a fat ugly slag hates you deep down. I know you say these are isolated incidents but it's doomed.

You can't stand each other.

Those poor kids.

I agree with this. There’s a middle ground between putting up with a slap from a woman and striking her back. And let’s not forget he was using his strength to prevent her accessing the taps in the first place and ordering her around. So he was already throwing his weight around.

If he had removed himself from the situation. Told Op she had to leave the house or he would call the cops or actually just call the police that would’ve been much more the mark of a safe man.

I have never ever raised a hand to a man but I still think he was waiting for an excuse to hit her.

and yeah we can reasonably guess he’s stronger than OP he managed to block her from the sink and also most men are - let’s face it! Even teenage boys and 60 year old men are stronger than the average woman.
hence the issues some people have with trans people in women’s sports.

ETA: OPs behaviour was appalling too and she should definitely go back to therapy regardless.

But yeah two things can be true, this man is a bully.

Only read the first few responses but I completely disagree with them.

He is unreasonable and I would honestly leave him. An abusive arsehole.

I agree with this.

Neither of them were entirely blameless but his actions were far worse.

Both because he started the physicality by deliberately making her uncomfortable due to the shower water and blocking her. His actions in hitting her back wasn’t self defence - self defence is when you fear they will do it again. It was retaliation and he went way over the top - both because he is stronger and because he went on to knock her down after his first retaliation.

Uh—no. She can complain.

The totality of what is going in is that he us abusing, isolating, and utterly contemptuous of her and once she reacted physically and he then escalated.

OP get therapy and leave. You have offered to try to solve this as a communication/trauma problem snd he has refused. If there is no solution within the relationship then the relationship has to end.

Though I get what you're saying about expecting to be hit back, I know if I did something as out of character as slapping my DH, he would never in a million years slap me and shove me into a wall back. Especially after being a complete dick on purpose. OP I'd leave, once they've done it once it gets easier and easier to do it again

In the first post she said that she called down to him, he ignored, she waited ages and it continued and eventually got her towel and went down. He then refused to turn it off.

Why would him coming in from a tiring situation mean the washing up HAD to be done there and then? Why couldn't he have waited for the ten or so minutes it would have taken OP to finish?

It doesn't sound like there was water scarcity, just poor water pressure. I have the same in my house and my (nice, sane) husband and I frequently pause the washing up / garden watering etc. if the other is showering. The idea that I would make someone I love and respect sit dripping in soapy water on the sofa so that I could finish washing dishes first is completely impossible to imagine.

As bad as each other. Your kids have two violent parents. You need to sort it out.

I agree. OP was exhausted and dirty from a long day of heavy work. He decided to play a nasty trick on her by stopping the water, leaving her covered in soap. He then refused to restore the water — it’s physical abuse by this stage, as the soap must have been drying and itching horribly. I would have been desperate by that stage.

He is a sneaky abuser, who must think he’s clever being able to goad his wife into hitting him so he can then hit her back, much harder.

Not clever at all. Nor is verbal abuse in front of the children. I would not want to bring up children with a man like this.

Reminds me of the comments section under a video about men being killed by their partners. "They must have been abusive", "they must have started it".

I just don't think escalating a situation where washing up has caused poor water pressure into slapping someone is normal or justified - no matter how long she was left with a trickling shower - or even if it was entirely turned off. If my boyfriend hit me because I had been using water at the same time as he wanted some I would just never ever accept that it was justified to slap me because of it. Even if I took ages. Even if I said no I'm not turning it off yet. Even if I was being a stubborn dickhead like OPs partner.

I really doubt anyone would come on here and say I deserved it. I think they would say I was being unreasonable, or that I should have stopped washing up, and probably that we should break up regardless etc etc. But I don't think anyone would say I was asking for it - even using alternate phrases like 'invoking reactionary abuse' or 'goading' my partner. I think we would all agree that nothing involving an argument about water pressure would mean I deserved my boyfriend slapping me. End of.

She clearly said she called down and asked him to turn the kitchen taps off and waited a while for him to do so. He didn’t.

I've been married a long time and never slapped my dh.
But in your circumstances I actually think it would push me to the edge.
What a nasty, abusive prick you're he is.

You slapped. He slapped back. 🤷‍♀️

He was not justified in hitting you because you hit him.

Nothing justifies a man hitting a woman. They are bigger, stronger than us. They have denser bones, more powerful muscles. A man can easily a kill a woman if he hits hard.

There is no justification for him hitting you. He should have walked away, put himself out of harms way and waited until the situation de escalated. That’s what any decent man would do.

I’m not saying you were justified in slapping him. Or that it’s ok for women to slap men. But it’s very, very hard for a woman to accidentally kill a man by hitting too hard and they are not equivalent actions.

Walk away op. He has utter contempt for you. No decent person would expect their partner to sit shivering in a towel covered in soap, or call them a fat slag. There’s abuse right there.

Relationships don’t survive contempt. You need to leave

What’s you financial situation? Do you have a place to go? Real life support? Are you working?

Look up reactive abuse and apply it to the dishes/ slap situation.

The verbal.abuse might well have been another but failed attempt to get to to react in a way that meant he could justify putting hands on you. You need to leave