Husband verbally abuses me, feel so alone

[Shelby123]

I recently had our first baby. My husband works in emergency services and his mental health has been deteriorating in the past 2 years. I feel like I’m his emotional punchbag, he holds it together at work and bends over backwards to help other people, however when he comes home he let’s rip at me over the tiniest thing. His rants are becoming more and more intense and the things he says are unforgivable. He will start at me over something insignificant, but will end in him saying he detests me, hates me and that he is leaving me. He did this regularly during my pregnancy and told me numerous times that he is only staying because I was pregnant and that he hates me and everything about me. He will never apologise ever for anything he does or says. I feel so sad all the time and worthless. I want more than anything to leave but I don’t want our child to be from a broken home. I thought having a baby would heal him somewhat but it has escalated. If I ask him for help with something to do with the baby when it doesn’t suit him he loses it. He will tell me I’m a bad mom. He will repeat things to our baby like ‘your moms an idiot’ or ‘your mom couldn’t be bothered picking you up’ if I ask him to help me with her when I’m breast pumping milk for her and can’t immediately go to baby. No matter what I do it’s the wrong thing. If he is holding the baby and it cries, if I don’t immediately rush to help him he accuses me of not caring about the baby and leaving everything to him. If I do rush to help he tells me to stay the f* away from him, that I’m the reason the baby won’t settle for him & that he doesn’t need my help. Everything ends in him having a meltdown and blaming me. I feel like I’m on eggshells and i feel so alone. He isn’t close with his family and we live overseas, he doesn’t have any one else but me and the baby. I feel like either he will make my life hell if I leave, or he will hurt himself. I don’t know what to do, I feel like I can’t live like this, and I don’t want our child to grow up thinking how he talks to me is normal. Everytime I try to talk to him about it he has a meltdown and ends up screaming at me that I don’t understand. He won’t see a doctor as he is worried that he won’t b able to stay in his role if he is diagnosed with depression. I sweep all his behaviour under the carpet and just put on a facade for everyone else. Everyone we know thinks we are in a happy marriage. I came from a loving home and I just want the same for our baby.

[Guest_7403]

He could be suffering PTSD maybe raise the idea of seeing a specialist to him

[Maui757]

Hi Shelby,

Your post caught my attention because I recently came to the realisation that I am verbally abusing my partner of almost 7 years, and have been doing so basically the entire relationship. I know this might sound weird that I'm replying to you, but I feel for you so much.

It really does sound like he has a lot of issues, and is feeling completely out of control. I can understand all his trigger points - His job, your baby, poor mental health, probably not a lot of sleep with a newborn, and then fighting with you constantly and then pretending everything is fine for the rest of the world. But none of those are excuses to treat you the way he is. He needs to take responsibility for his actions.

You must be so exhausted both emotionally and physically. I've seen first hand the effects my abuse has on my partner, and it destroys me. He went from being this outgoing, friendly, caring and loving guy to a shadow of himself, shy and scared, lacking confidence in himself and has a very low self esteem. I'm fairly sure most of that is because of how I've been treating him.

It sounds like you need to do what's best for you. Your husband needs to get help, but you can't force him to do so. He needs to realise how his actions are affecting you, and realise that he's abusing you, and then he needs to take the steps to get the help he needs. You can definitely try to talk with him about it, perhaps try a different avenue, but in the end you need to do what is best for YOU.

For me, it took my partner breaking up with me and 2am after a massive fight to get it through to me. Even then, this has happened before and we've worked through and came up with plans to get better. But this latest time was different - I think seeing my partner break down in tears because even though he loved me, he was ending our relationship, kicked me into gear.

I realised that I had gone too far, and there was no going back. We both calmed down and spoke well into the early hours of the morning, and eventually agreed to keep trying. But I knew something was different - This was my last chance. I kept thinking over it, and 2 days later when I was trying to go to sleep I realised I was abusing him. Like literally, verbally abusing him. Since then I made an emergency appointment with my psych and I'm hoping I can start the road to a better life.

But I also know, if I don't get better, he will leave me because it's what's best for him. And I don't blame him for it.

Hope this helps 🙂