more from H. So, it's Youngest's birthday in a couple of weeks and he wanted to discuss the party. What usually happens is that we have a small party with his school friends in the garden, and when they leave all our family comes around for a barbecue. He wanted to know if I'd discussed it with Youngest and what the plans were - which is fair enough. And I have, and Youngest wants to have things as usual this year.
I suggested we split it over two days - that the friends party and the family party one after the other had always been quite stressful and busy and a lot of work, and that I wasn't really up to it, and given that things were so fraught and fragile, perhaps making it a bit easier on ourselves would be a good idea. He wasn't happy about that. A rant about how it was about Youngest's needs and not mine, and as I'd not been able to put Youngest first for our whole lives together, I might as well start doing it now, and I clearly just didn't want to see his family because I was embarrassed and ashamed that they knew our problems.
I said it's nothing to do with that, and I told you what it was to do with, and this is my home and I am telling you what I need and what I can do.
It is so exhausting. We can't even have a brief conversation about practical matters to do with Youngest without him bringing the past into it. I have been living like this for a long time. I asked him to cut me some slack, and he said I was in his emotional debt. I said relationships don't work like that and he could either leave the past in the past and concentrate on the present, or sit in the past and his blame on his own, but there was no way I could 'work off' what he saw as my 'debt' by absorbing his poor behaviour any more and I didn't plan to.
It went on like that for a while, then he went. I wish I'd never got into it with him. It was a really really rubbish attempt at going dark. He seems to be able to bring the attacking into any conversation - even the ones that we really have to have, about the kids. It's not unreasonable he wants to know what the plans are for Youngest's birthday and to be involved in them, but the conversation ended up not being about that at all. We weren't raising our voices but it was upsetting and stressful and brought us no nearer to deciding what to do for Youngest. I don't want a packed day where we're both having to fake some friendliness or I'm having to ignore his behaviour so that Youngest doesn't pick up on it. I would like to be able to give Youngest what he wants, but I am not sure either me or his father are in that place yet.
Either way, there will be the children's party and I will decide on the day and send the invitations today. I won't do anything about a family party because I don't want one (I'm not close to my family, so it would just be my in-laws, none of which have made any contact with me since the separation, despite us being reasonably close before) and H can handle that if that is what he wants. I guess I could just leave and let H have that party on his own with his family and the kids, but it's my house and H said I couldn't avoid his family forever, and I suppose he's right. It's not really about that though - I'm perfectly able to be civil for a few hours for the sake of Youngest. It's just I don't trust him not to use it as an opportunity to make me suffer, knowing that I'll just paint on a smile and tolerate it for the sake of Youngest.
Please don’t get into it with him anymore. The second he gets disrespectful, it needs to be over.
Really take my going dark suggestion seriously. Don’t have these conversations verbally. I would be communicating only in email to him . Then you can choose when you are looking at it. So when he goes off in his rants. You don’t have to look at it.
He is very emotionally abuse. And what is this you are in “emotional debt?” What it gods name is that?
You need to avoid the crazy like the plague. Email only and for the kids. And I would tell him exactly why. You need to take a very hard stance now. He is out of control. You probably would have suggested exactly what he wanted and he still would have attacked you. You aren’t going to win with him until he gets his own stuff worked out, so only bare minimum with him. And not in person. If you want I use the phone, fine, because the second he becomes abusive you can say “ I am hanging up, I’m not tolerating this”
I work in a hospital and we recently had some verbal abuse workplace violence issues. We work with patients and their families and families often can cross the line into abuse. We had an in service and learned those lines and what we are are not to tolerate and we should be walking away from. Your ex’s behavior is considered abuse, and it’s something we are never expected to tolerate. We tolerate ALOT at work, but that we are not to.
Yeah, I need to go darker. I don't know if it was abuse - he wasn't calling me names or shouting at me this time. He does like to tell me why I do things, and it's always the worst possible motivation a person might have - and that's because he doesn't trust me. And, frankly, because he clearly doesn't even like me that much.
He's getting the results on his project today. He told me last night if he didn't do as well as he'd hoped, he'd know it was because he had to move out in January. So I have more to look forward to if his performance doesn't satisfy him.
I am going out to spend the money I am saving on council tax this month at the makeup counter. Lipstick will not cure a marriage but I plan to spend that little amount at the makeup counter every single month in honour of his relationship advice and insight (!!!) and in care of myself.
Emotional debt - well, I think he means the years that he was a SAHD while I worked, and absorbed an absolute ton of stress, anxiety and emotional hostage taking from me. I really was awful. I had very severe PND that went untreated (which is not an excuse, but I mention it because I want to be clear that the problem at that time was with me and my health and not with him or the marriage) and a whole heap of childhood trauma problems (I won't get into it, but I had the worst possible time growing up and was in total denial about it until I came into a safe place as an adult - my therapist says that's very common. He was my safe place so he bore the brunt, which was wrong). I have a lot of remorse for what I put him through, but I also know there was no malice in it from me, and that I've taken the steps to do what I need to do to move away from that dynamic. Where we're left is that he wants to forgive me for it but can't, and, I think, he rather likes having a compliant and guilty wife who absorbs his abuse because she thinks he deserves it. Whenever I've asked for affection, attention, support, or just a halt to his poor behaviour or a change in the way he communicates to me, he brings up this 'debt' of mine one way or another.
Well there are always things on both sides of any long term R where one person misbehaves. But you can't move forward with one person not being willing to let go of the past and forgive and look to the future. That's regardless of any abuse. This 'debt' is basically him hanging onto this resentment. You can't make him let go of that, but you won't have a decent M without him letting go of it. His resentment may be valid, but my H also behaved pretty intolerably at times during our M, and I've realised that the only way to R is for me to forgive him for that, understand that (as you said) it wasn't done out of malice and let the past stay in the past.
You can only control your side of this, which right now means protecting yourself from his unacceptable behaviour. Please don't let him blame you for anything work related from him moving out! And maybe it's time to talk to youngest and decide on a different sort of party? If he wants youngest to see his family let him arrange to go to them, you can keep out of it. I agree that for the time being you should keep communication via text or email, it sounds like talking in person or on the phone is just getting him upset and attacking you, not very productive.
Yeah, I agree. I think things have flared up between us because a) he's waiting for these results and knows it is poop or get off the pot time in terms of our relationship - if he has been making excuses, it's all being exposed now and b) he's really angry about the ultimatum I gave him (which is fair enough - it wasn't clever of me). I can agree that his behaviour amounts to low-level verbal and emotional abuse, but I don't think he's a narcissist or anything else incurable. I also don't think I can cure him.
What I need to work on is the part of me that doesn't feel okay unless I have his approval. I know for sure that my wish to do the parties slightly differently is yes - more about my needs than Youngest - but doesn't come from any particular shame around his family or selfishness to the extent that Youngest wouldn't have a nice time and see his family. The fact that H consistently believes the worst about me should be something I can shrug off as just his opinion. I find him thinking badly of me very frightening and threatening and it's why I get into it with him - trying to convince him that he's wrong - which is of course invalidating but also a total and utter waste of time.
He doesn't really reply to texts or emails. I send information sometimes about school trips and we have a shared calendar, but he often spaces on things like that. Then gets annoyed with me about it for not telling him. Again - I need to just shrug off his annoyance rather than seeing it as my problem to solve, and I am not there yet.
I don't know how to work on that. But I am seeing IC today and will bring it up there for discussion. Learning not to care what he thinks of me seems a strange way to repair a marriage. When I am on my own or with friends I feel like I am a flawed but basically okay person who has a lot of kindness and insight and is doing her best most days. When I am with him, quite often I feel like the worst person in the world. I suspect he has a similar experience and a lot of our skirmishes are about getting the other person to think and feel the way we want them to think and feel so that we ourselves feel okay. I wish I could talk about this with him as friends - not in a hectoring way, but just in a 'huh, look at this thing we keep doing, isn't it crazy?' and I miss that part of our connection, which did exist. Ah well.
Makeup counter lady was very persuasive. I am now happily skint for rest of month.
He wasn't happy about that. A rant about how it was about Youngest's needs and not mine, and as I'd not been able to put Youngest first for our whole lives together, I might as well start doing it now, and I clearly just didn't want to see his family because I was embarrassed and ashamed that they knew our problems.
It just never ends, does it? Really sorry you have to deal with this Alison, seems like you can't have the simplest conversation with him without him shaming you, or blaming, or belittling, or in general doing anything he can to bring you down.
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I said it's nothing to do with that, and I told you what it was to do with, and this is my home and I am telling you what I need and what I can do.
Great response!
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I wish I'd never got into it with him.
You really can't win with him. He's an energy vampire, and they don't care whether it's positive or negative energy as long as they get something from you. Here's a blurb from a website about dealing with narcissists:
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There is nothing to be gained from negotiating, collaborating, or even corresponding at all, with an irrational, abusive person, and the sooner a person can embrace this fact, the better equipped she will be to live a happy, drama-free life.
Think about it.
Wouldn’t you rather put that energy into something beautiful, positive, and productive, like spending time with people who see you, listen to you, and respect your boundaries?
So with that in mind, I understand this party is for your S but you should seriously consider not inviting your H. I am dead serious about this, it's time to cut his abusive, pathetic, narcissistic ass our of your life. He wants to have a party with S then that's fine and dandy, he can set up his own separate from yours. Tell him you do not want to hear from him at all unless it's strictly business regarding kid visitation.
Okay. I don't want it to come to that, but if it does, I think it's his choice and a consequence of his behaviour. He won't see it that way, but that's none of my concern.
I am going to leave it where it stands for a few days - I've send the invitations out for the children's party which I am happy to organise and fund and sort out. Youngest is happy. If H wants to invite his family to a home he no longer lives in, he can't really do it without my co-operation and he doesn't have it. I've said what I needed to say and I don't think I need to say it again.
I don't need to be in touch with him again. I am away with work tomorrow and he's taking care of both kids overnight at the house - it's too late to rearrange anything at this short notice, and I can't cancel because it's a really big meeting I'm getting paid a lot of money for. But I can leave the kids alone together for an hour (Eldest is more than old enough to hold the fort and takes care of Youngest for an hour or two regularly and responsibly) and be gone before he arrives to care for them, and I will be arriving home during school hours the day after so there's no need for him to be there and I'll be home when the kids get back from school. No contact from me to him needed about that. He will no doubt have something to say about my leaving Eldest in charge for an hour, but I can delete those text messages unread.
Alison: a relatively responsible 14 year old is perfectly capable of babysitting a small child, even a baby. I left my kids routinely by themselves at that age. If he has a go at you about that then he is just plain spoiling for a fight.
And Eldest is extremely responsible and routinely takes care of Youngest for an hour between tea and bed while I take the dog out. I can cast iron guarantee H will have something to say about it, which is hilarious because we left them together for an hour a week with H's approval and at his suggestion while we went to therapy last summer...
All quiet this evening. Have had a pleasant evening with both kids. Dog made a little error of judgement on one of the sofa cushions and it was such a relief to just sort it out without the huffing and puffing and sulking and blaming and looking to punish and then all the pacifying and cajoling I'd have had to do if H was here. I don't want to demonise the guy, but I still have my heart in my mouth at moments like that, then breathe a sigh of relief when I realise I can handle these little domestic mishaps myself, in good humour, and they really don't matter all that much.
Honestly? You sound scared of him or scared of his anger. I don't know whether you have reason to be, I recognise similar stuff from my H in the past (he went through a phase after he first left of babying the kids and acting like they needed babysitting even way past the age where they were happy to be left alone), but my H no longer acts like that. He wouldn't dare, and I wouldn't tolerate it. Time to put that fear behind you, lovely. I know you're more than capable of being very assertive, you just need to convince yourself of that.
