I have been a MN poster for a good few years but have only been lurking recently as I just don't have the time to post.
I really need some support at the moment to help me stay stong and focused on what is right. I have four children, DS1 is 14 and does not see his biological father due to DV issues, I cut contact with his dad whilst I was pregnant and there has been no real contact past the first couple of month of his life. When he was 4 I met my DH, I was self sufficient, had bought my own house, re trained as a health professional and coped well, with lots of support from my parents with childcare due to the eratic shift pattern of my job not fitting "normal" childcare providers.
DH was in the armed forces, he lived about a 3 hour drive away from us and when he came home at the weekend or on leave he stayed at my house. I think because of this things moved quite quickly, we were married within a year of being together and he left the army a few years later. During this time I still lived in my house and he was living a barracks miles away, still coming home at weekends.
We moved to a bigger house when he left the army and he been renovating it slowly over the past 7 years. In that time I also gave birth to DD, aged 5, DS2, aged 3 and then found myself pregnant again. It wasn't planned and my periods had not returned as I was still breastfeeding. I was absolutly gutted, I was exhausted and really did not think I could cope with caring for another child, however DH would not listen to my fears and told me that if I had a termination our marriage would be over.
DS3 was 1 yeaterday and although I love him to bits I am totally exhausted, he gets very little of my time, DS1 has aspergers syndrome and a lot of my time is taken with helping him cope with day to day issues, DS2 is showing many signs of an ASD and I am awaiting a paediatric appointment to have him reviewed, however I am really struggling to cope with his distructive and aggressive behaviour and obviously with all this going on DD, who has no ASD issues as far I am concerned, is "playing up" to get attention.
On top of all this we had some building work done whilst I was pregnant with DD and about 2 years ago became suspicious that there was a problem with the work. We had a structural engineer come to appraise the work and found it had not been built to plan by the builder and the roof on our housr has failed as a result of this. It is going to cost in the region of £30,000 to repair and have had to get solicitors involved as the builder had no insurance, despite telling us he had at the time. This has added anothe £8,000 worth of solicitors fees and legal reports in the last 18 months with the builder frequently disappearing of the face of the earth. Consequently we are both stressed. I cannot go back to work as we cannot afford the childcare or fit the care pattern around DH's work. We have no relatives to help, my parents are both in ill health and his mum works and his dad just doesn't do childcare , not that I am expecting them to look after my family whilst I work, it's just these are exeptional circumstances.
Anyway, he has always had avery short fuse and will get very angry easily. Over the past six months this has resulted in a lot of shouting at the children and making their behaviour worse. I also feel as if I am constantly treading on eggshells and trying to smooth things over before they occur. His has had very angry explosions which I have felt have been disturbing for the children and asked him to get some anger management, however he has refused saying he "isn't ready yet".
On Christmas Eve he lost his temper with DS2 (DS2 in the bath with DD and grabbed her by the hair and pulled her across the bath) and slapped him across his back so hard he left a hand print. If it had been any other day DH would have been out of the house with my proverbial foot up his backside quicker that he could have taken a breath. However it was Christmas Eve and I felt like I had to hold the family together for the kids, stupidly I never really sorted things out, despite telling DH what would happen if he ever laid a finger on one of the kids again.
Since then his anger has been verbal and against inanimate objects. This morning there was an arguememnt between him and DS1 about creal (FFS!) basicaly we ask the kids to make sure they have a different cereal every day as DS1 has a habit of eating the same one until there is none left and the others may not have had any of it. DH isnisted DS1 had not had a certain cereal, DS1 insisted he had it yesterday, I agreed with DS1 as I saw him eat it and DH flew of the handle, screamin and shouting, hitting the back door, I asked him why he always had to be correct and why he could accept that he may have made a mistake. I was ver calm and did not raise my voice, DH then hit my laptop screen with his shoe until it broke. DD and DS2 were crying in another room and I told DH to leave and not come back until he had undergone some counseling. His reply was that it just wasn't going to happen. He's gone to work now, I have been expecting some sort of grovelling text but that hasn't happened (not that I would have accepted it).
I am just so overwhelmed about how I am going to keep things "normal" for the children, getting them all to their activities and am dreading the fall out at bed time when there is no one else around. Please give me a boost and a bit of moral support.