My husband of 7 years is stressed, angry and unpredictable a lot of the time. He can rant and spew vitriol at me for hours on end when he is animated. He name calls (cunt,pig,sow,twisted bich,fat arse) shouts and roars at me, tells me I’m a useless woman & blames me for causing his outbursts. He says I’m a gaslighter, that I'm making his life a misery & I’m impossible to live with.
We moved to his hometown in a rural area a few years ago as he got a decent job. Before this I was the main breadwinner & owned my own house. We sold this & moved. i would always have been open to moving to the countryside. He has a steady state job & I'm making work for myself when opportunity arises. I’ve taken a big pay cut but I’m making it work. His family live nearby but at any one time they are fighting with each other. His parents separated when he was younger & he carries a lot of hurt from this. His mum has alluded to his temper but brushes it off. I can see how she avoids him or appeases him when he gets tricky. I have no close friends here, no family. I have nowhere to go when he kicks off. I grew up with lovely home with no drama or anger.
He will admit himself that he has ADHD, diagnosed as a teen but unmedicated. He refuses to go to anger management or seek help. He sleeps poorly and overacts to small stressors. I never know what will set him off. It could be anything from a pot boiling over on the hob, to him forgetting his keys or missing a turnoff in the car. On occasion in the past he has thrown things such as a glass at a wall, pulled my clothes out of the wardrobe or broken stuff in a rage such as a clothes horse or ironing board. He has never been physical but at the height of his episodes he had leered over me or pulled the bedclothes off me. I haven’t had any incidents like this in the last while but verbally he’s still nasty. The tirades can go on for hours. He gets so worked up he sweats, say he has chest pain and sometimes froths when he is angry. I usually try and leave the room (or house). I’ve tried getting angry back, not reacting at all, but usually I get upset and cry. We attended marriage counselling (organised by me) and it did help for a while. He often says I tried to tell lies about him during marriage counselling and that ‘he won’ in marriage counselling.
We have no kids & battled infertility with the loss of a baby, IVF and multiple miscarriages. It has been tough over the last few years & for a long time I was just surviving. These experiences have definitely changed me but I sought counselling and help to deal with the losses. I would have thought myself generally a friendly, cheery and empathetic individual but I’m questioning everything. Maybe I am difficult, moody and bitter now. Maybe I'm
a ball of misery to live with. I could never bring a child into this house now. That makes me sad too.
I know anyone reading this will tell me to leave. It’s not that simple. And I know that sounds pathetic.
When he’s in good form he’s great fun & very charming. But I find everyday he’s angrier and more stressed. He says l’m
a bad communicator. It’s so hard to communicate though when I’m afraid that anything I say will cause an outburst.
Financially I’m stuck. We’ve just built a house & my savings are gone. We have pets and I would never leave them behind. I’m unable to afford to go anywhere else right now.
My head knows that this will not get any better but my heart wants to hang in there.
I just don’t know what to do anymore.