Can't take another unkind word...

[scouserabroad]

I thought about namechanging for this but seeing as I mostly lurk and only post once in a blue moon nobody will know me on here (or so I hope!)

Anyroad, DH & I have problems so complicated I could write a (very boring!) novel but basically we have religious & cultural differences which lead to arguments. DH gets very aggressive, calls me every name under the sun & threatens violence, although this is mostly just talk. We have been together for five years, married for four and he has only been like this for the past 18 months or so. What to do? My head tells me I should carry on trying to work things out for the sake of our dds, but my heart just doesn't want to.

So, once you've seen the worst side of a person, is it possible to love them again? Or even just to like them?

I don't have much experience but I would say you could if you could change the way they are and thus the 'worst side' of them. But you'd have to work at it together and build up trust again.

Hope someone with more knowledge comes along soon.

ime, no. Having cultural and religious differences is one thing, but someone who gets aggressive and abusive (which is calling a spade a spade) during an argument has a basic personality defect that is not conducive to a successful, happy relationship. Name calling and threatening violence are deal breakers. Why do you want to love him again? If you were the person doing the name calling and the threatening what would you be feeling towards the other person? Would that be a way to express love? Or complete disrespect for that person and also for the relationship? Love is built on respect, imo, and a relationship demands commitment to keeping it alive by treating the other person with respect at the very least.

The word 'mostly' shrieks out at me. As in 'mostly just talk' about the violence.

DP and I have religious and cultural differences, and i think that BECAUSE of the diferences it is even more important for DS to see us able to co-operate, live with mutual respect - and because he is part of both cultures (and in our case races), that he does not see himself as the fulcrum of a war.

So, I am not sure what current benefit your dds are deriving from a relationship in which you fight and are unhappy, and in which you are treated very badly, it seems.

If you don't want to try any more to make it work, then I don't think you should.

And if he is constantly verbally abusive and threatens you with violence then the chances of making HIM change, listen sympathetically, seem slim.

It may be that you would row, and he would have an aggressive overbearing demeanor if you wee the most culturally hegemenous couple in the land. it is his aggressiveness, and your feeling that you don't want to be with him that count.

er,'homogenous'.

Are you OK, Scouser?

the word mostly stood out to me too
is he violent (don't need to answer to us, just yourself)
If he is is that what your dcs need you to stay together for really?