Who can I talk to about this?- I need some help.

[MaryPoppinsAteMyHamster]

DH has a temper.

Who can I talk to in confidence about it?

I need someone who is going to give me inbiased advice about what do. I have spoken to HVs in the past about it and all they seem to do is tell me to thrown him out. I don't want to do that unless my Dcs are indanger. I love my DH and I love my DCs but I'm stuck in the middle not knowing what to do. I find his behaviour totally unacceptable and I worry for my DCs mental health seeing their dad like that. He has refused to get help saying he has always been like this and doesn't need to change. I worry a lot about whoever I chose to talk to about this getting the police or some other official body involved.

I really would prefer to speak to someone face to face but currently have no one I trust enough.

Hope this makes sense. Sorry if not, am typing quickly. Who can I talk to? I am getting really worried now.

TIA namechange reg

I think this is rather serious too. You have a newborn, however are you coping with all this stress and worry, I really feel for you.

I really do think what he is doing is eventually going to drive a massive wedge in your family. I don't like his dismissive attitude towards the situation - you just have to put up with it- No you don't. He has been fired from jobs due to his temper. Did he not feel awful about this? Picking up the children roughly is appalling, I assure you they will have been terrified. I am sure you know that anyway.

I do wish you all the best in this I again am so sorry you have this worry on top of caring for a newborn. Not a nice environment.

i don't understand why you are so set on minimising and excusing the op's dh's behaviour dsm. i really don't. she has painted a worrying picture of the tensions and problems in their family life. the children are currently exposed to his shouting / swearing / tantrums / and rough handling. to grow up having this as your day to day reality is damaging. the op seems quite ready to understand this. why are you not??

I never said anything of the sort.

I a trying to offer help and advice that is not of the 'get out of there' camp, as sometimes this is not the right advice, and TBH I am sick of seeing it on MN.

Too many bloody self-righteous people with their ideals of a perfect life, and god forbid someone should have to live with a character flaw.

The OP will decide what she wants/needs to do based on the different opinions she receives. Somewhere, she will read something and think 'that feels right'. None of us will actually make the decision for her, and there is no point criticising me for giving an alternative idea.

We were on the receiving end of a man very much like your DH.

Myself and my DS and DB were terrified of our father. He could shout and swear to the extent that you'd piss your pants rather than get out of bed and risk encountering him. He was a thrower, smasher, banger of doors etc.

In terms of actual physical harm, there was very little. The odd slap or getting in the way of one of his missiles but I can honestly say that we hated him. We feared for our lives at times and wished him dead for years.

We are all damaged by him to some degree. I can still have flashbacks if a door slams in the night. I once ordered DH to leave before I called the police after he accidentally slammed the living room door one night when I was in bed. I was hysterical with fear that I was about to experience one of my fathers rages and this was a couple of years after his death.

Do not underestimate the harm he is doing to your children.

Dirtysexymummy....do you live in fear?

Do you live your life trying to appease a man and anticipate his moods?

Do you spend your life trying to read his every tiny movement, facial expression, his very breathing to try and prevent some explosion of rage for some trivial thing that doesn't happen to suit him?

You should hang your head in shame at describing the women on here who are trying to help a desperate mother with small children make sense of what is happening to her as 'bloody self-righteous people'.

The pain of these women pierces the heart and is clear from their posts.

I still have my pain from my father who was like this and I am 50 years old. It has affected every single aspect of my life.

Reading your post made me feel sick.

I remember very clearly watching my father smash a stool over his knees in a fit of brattishness - he wasn't getting his own way over something or other.

I wasn't scared of him, I scorned him. he did used to hit me, he dragged me around by my hair once, but funnily, it never engendered any respect.

I respect him now - I respect him now that when we disagree he will hold up his hand and say he will discuss it another day - I did not respect him when I was 10.

Funnily, shortly after he broke the stool, my brother put his foot through a plate glass door, and both my brother and sister have a long history of violence and breaking things - as, if I have to own up to it, do I.

YOU need help, Mary. You are in a cycle, as you say your father was like this, too and your partner is completely unwilling to change.

PLEASE contact Women's Aid or your GP and try to get some counselling for you, so that you can hopefully figure out what is the best course of action for you to take with your children with regards to his behaviour, because he's flat out stated he's quite happy behaving like this.

I hardly ever post about my dhs past temper problems. I would never categorize him abusive, but with a lot of anger and frustration he had issues controlling. He would be like a bull. Luckily the smashing stopped before our oldest was 2. He found a way to deal with it.

Now when he recognises that he is angry and frustrated, he takes his bike out and go cycling. Or he goes to the gym for a good work out.

In a way, I see what it is like, it is a little like your insides is about to turn inside out, there is no outlet. Only, for my dh, now there is. It is awful to feel that way. Not a very happy place to be.

Is there anything your dh could do to vent it? Could he go for a run? Go to the gym? Have a punchball? Is there anything he could do to work up a good sweat?

I too can't understand why anyone would underplay such troubling behaviour. It has nothing to do with being self righteous and everything to do with concern for children to grow up having to live with this shit from a bully who is intimidating his own family.

I really wasn't being critical, Mary and I'd hate you to feel criticised. I know how hard it can be to get out of a situation like this, once you are in it.

Clients of mine have sung the praises of the Freedom programme very highly - I think it is an intensive course, and can be life changing. It has a website - freedomprogramme.co.uk, so it's easy to find. It is often run by Womens Aid. I have only known people undertake it after the end of their relationship. I don't know whether that is a prerequisite (though I suspect not).

Good luck - it is important that you change things, I think.

Thanks again for all the responses. I'm very touched you have all taken the time to help us with this.

Alfreda - I do feel I was damaged by my parents behaviour - it still has an effect all these years later - this is why I am so on the ball with ensuring my DCs don't suffer the same.

Assdoc - I could have written your post. I remember hiding from my dad under the bed on numerous occassions. There was one occassion when I knew I was in for a good shouting at as he ran up the stairs towards my bedroom when I was about 13. To this day if I hear someone running up the stairs in the same way as he did on that day I am terrified. My mother once scared me so much when I was 11 that I wet myself in front of all my friends - then she made me walk home like that becasue 'I wasn't going in her car in that disgusting state' (cheers mum). When I first saw DHs temper it was very unexpected for me and I instictively ran off and hid behind the sofa - there I was aged 26 hiding behind the sofa thinking wtf? It never leaves you - I know that.

Hello Expat - I am incredibly lucky in that I am able to arrange counselling and psychological help for myself very easily because I am a long-term sufferer of depression and anxiety. I took your advice and aranged to meet up with someone next week who can hopefully give me some advice too. In the past my psych has given me good tips on helping DH - I think it helped that my psych was a man and understood how men think about these sorts of things. He was a huge help at a time when things were far worse than they are now.

QS - sometimes he goes out cycling or does other activities which help him unwind. Thing is he doesn't get much free time - he gets about 45 mins with the DCs before bedtime and sundays with us. I suppose I could give him more of a free rein to do more passtimes (although he is working on his own project at work nearly every night before he comes home which helps him unwind). He took 2 weeks off when newborn arrived and tbh he spent about 1/2 the time in a huff and 1/2 the time having time for himself to unwind . I have no support other than him, no family support (funnily enough) or friends who can take the DCs while I unwind so if he goes off I end up doing everything myself with no sign of a break. Maybe I'm just going to have to accept that if it helps him with his temper but I would rather he dealt with it by learning how to react correctly to the DCs through spending more time with them- they are the trigger of his temper most of the time (if not all of the time now I think about it).

my DH throws strops.

Early in our marriage he could punch a wall, throw the remote, shoved me with his foot off the settee etc etc

when DC1 was a babe in arms we argued in the kitchen and he walked into the living room and kicked a table smashing it into pieces fortunately DC1 wasn't hurt.

a few months later we had both been drinking and were arguing he put his hands round my throat to tell me to shut up

I packed to leave that night, he promised he'd never be violent again, he's never raised his hand to me again

but he still gets stroppy, shouts (IMO) unreasonably at the DC's - and about 3 years ago he punched a picture in front of the DC's because he had a cob on

I called him a p*k (not very constructive I know) and told him to leave, I'd watched violence all my life growing up and swore I'd never be like my mother

he didn't leave, he told me he was ashamed of himself, and he hasn't done anything like that again

he does still shout, but he knows any inkling of violence and I'm gone

he can handle our DC's on his own, but says they play up when I'm around, so it's actually my fault that he gets wound up

So it is actually your poor children who are bearing the brunt of his temper??

Then it is totally unacceptable, and you should consider leaving. You cannot chose for them that they should have to endure this. In fact, you are siding with him by acceping it.

Insisting he spends time with them, when this causes him to fly into a rage is actually cruelty. And I really shocked to read that you prefer this to happen so YOU can have a break....

QS - No we all bear the brunt - this does not make any difference to me as the children are all I care about.

I'm not siding with him at all - I am on the side of my children as I surely have made quite clear. I am not willing to take them away from their father without good reason. I am trying to determine whether or not I have good reason to take them away from him.

I certainly do not insist he spends time with them - how can you possibly force someone to do that? I want us all to spend time together so that he can learn how to deal with them more calmly.

I am quite suprised that, from reading all my previous posts, you think I would put my children at any kind of risk for ANY reason let alone getting a 'break' It's not easy to discuss this sort of thing you know -getting a break from it all is hardly a priority right now.

BBM - thanks

Mary, you came and asked for advice on if you had good reason for leaving or not. I would say you have overwhelming reason to leave.

You know you have. You've been there yourself. You know what it feels like to be terrified of the people who are supposed to care for you.

That's not normal. It's not healthy and it is potentially very damaging, even dangerous, for all of you.

I think you need to calmly and rationally begin to plan your future without your husband.

You do know that when your children grow up they may well hate you too for making them live
with such a vile, pathetic excuse for a man don't you?

Sorry if I sound harsh Mary. I guess I'm just saying some of the things I wish I could have told my mum when I was little and thought my father was going to kill me.

Dont post much but saw this and can really see where you are coming from mary as am in same typr of boat here too, plus my dad and mum used to fight a lot too.
there are some great posts in response here too - lots to think about.
like you, i do not want to disrupt my kids lives and take them away from their father and their home if i can avoid it. however, i think my husband realises that i am 'stuck'as it were and so unleashes his temper knowing that i am not likely to leave him rashly. if not for the kids, i would have been gone like shot.

'I want us all to spend time together so that he can learn how to deal with them more calmly. '

Mary, wanting and getting are two different things.

I'm very sorry, but this will never happen unless he gets some serious anger management counselling.

It's not something he'll learn on his own. He needs to work with a professional and be committed to using some different strategies other than lashing out when he feels angry.

And he's not willing to do that.

So your choice is either to put up with it, in which case your kids have to as well and they will learn to think that this is okay behaviour when you're angry and this is what you're expected to put up with from a partner. Or you can get some counselling for yourself to get some self-esteem to determine how to cope best - which may mean leaving.

But he's not going to start playing happy family.