full image - Repost: Advice/vent. LONG story. I think I'm finally done (from Reddit.com, Advice/vent. LONG story. I think I'm finally done)
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So I (32f) have been with my husband (36m) since 2010, married since 2017, and we have 3 kids together under 10. The very beginning of our relationship was pretty rocky to say the least. He was determined to have kids, like right away, and yes, I was ready to settle down and start a family as going out with the friend group I had at the time (that I cut all ties with) was not my thing (beer pong every night, getting really wasted and doing stupid shit). So from the start I was determined to have a fresh beginning (more mature relationship with long term thoughts/goals) and start a foundation for a family as I was coming of age in adulthood to know its what I truly wanted, not parties and toxic friends. When I met my husband, I was in an apartment with a friend from that group, obviously I got screwed over and ended up asking my parents for help paying back rent and damages she and her friends caused to the tune of $3,500. Obviously I was having that falling out with her as well as cutting other ties of the like at that time. So this was the start. I was dating the cousin of a mutual friend my husband and I had. Mutual friend worked at a job with my now husband, offered me a job there, and we hit it off, hard. Like it was seriously undeniable what we had right away. I was already dragging out the breakup with the boyfriend I had at the time, and this was the catalyst, that I found someone that gives me a different feeling than I've ever known before, that I recognized as more than plain attraction. My husband and I got together about a month or so after, as we were still getting to know each other and hang out. First time we had sex, the connection was unlike anything else, I was elated, and sat myself down and realized I was definitely in love with this man. So with the falling out of friend I had apartment with, I move in with my now husband (and his brother) but, I soon discover weird situations I'm put in. A woman kept coming over, sometimes with her kid, to hang out. I didn't know of this person before or what the dynamic was. My husband told me she was his brothers friend, but anytime she came by, her focus was my now husband, and never his brother that would be home every time. We smoke weed. She does too. One of the times I was supposed to watch this woman's child so my now husband an her would go to a different room. Another time us 3 were smoking, they went downstairs soon after lighting, and the blind just entirely burned in my hand as I waited because nobody wanted the smoke to get out by her kid that nobody was watching downstairs, but what were THEY doing?? He dismissed it and said whatever bullshit. Some times she came by as the 3 of us were about to go to work at the same job. Another time I watched from the window as they had a snow fight in the front yard as me and his brother were inside. I got pregnant in the first 6 months. I was still dealing with this woman popping over unannounced to any of the 3 of us frequently. She liked to tell me how to take care of myself while pregnant. I was JUST quitting smoking cigarettes, and with all of the stress I started smoking cigars. Well he did eventually stop the popping over and letting it happen, not sure what he said/did, but it stopped. Then I had a miscarriage. In this time, remember we are only a few months into our relationship. We had a lot of arguments already with the woman coming over so much, how it was affecting me and losing trust for him, and losing faith in our relationship already as there were random blown up fights. Insults to me, toxic fights where he says to "just leave then". There was a time I was sobbing as I was gathering my things and packing into what I could find. He stopped me and calmly explained that he doesn't want to lose me. I decided to stay.So the miscarriage.. I took myself to the clinic, torn, in pain, and devastated. When I came back home, I explained what happened and that the doctor confirmed the miscarriage. This is where I want the emotional/mental aspect to be brought to light to the reader, though this was not the first instance, it's the first core memory of it that I can easily recall given the pivotal moment. We had our power shut off, weather getting colder. I'm in severe pain and on pain killers for it. Since we had no power he set up a big jigsaw puzzle on the kitchen table with candles for light. I couldn't focus on the puzzle, I was doubling over in pain constantly. This is where he belittled me, insulted me, claimed I was over acting, and saying I was pretty much the bad guy because he wants to do a nice puzzle with me. He accused me of not having working parts and that matters a lot to him because he really wants to have kids and maybe we won't work out. I healed, moved ahead, got pregnant and had another miscarriage.. more fights cycled throughout all this time as more women came to my attention with messages, and another woman who I found messages with after this incident: we went out to Walmart for some things and this woman spots my husband in line, talking to him right away, pauses, then does a, I'm not joking, does a HUGE side step to see past other people to check if I'm with him, then the conversation remained casual as she was with a friend of his. Yes, I found messages of them flirting, heavy flirting about their "unfinished business ;p" he claimed nothing to it, "we were talking about playing basketball together" uh-huh... So moving forward. I managed to get pregnant again, and this was our first child we had. Though when I was labor, he was more concerned about something else. So this is where his addiction will be brought to light. He had an addiction to pain pills and the like when we met. I had told him to stop that shit without actually saying it, but gentle, subtle hints, as I didn't want to overstep what my role was as a new girlfriend at the beginning, so it was my place, but wasn't, if you can understand. The entirety of my labor was him seeking pills, saying he has to leave, my parents clueless as to why he wants to leave as I'm about to have his child. So I have our daughter that night. It was a HUGE adjustment for me, as I have no younger siblings, and I was usually one of the youngest on both sides of the family, so not much of anything for experience with caring for children other than relying on instinct and researching on my own. Nothing wrong with that, I never had babysitting opportunities, and had no interest so young. So yes, a new child was life changing, and my now husband kept trying to leave when I needed him most. This is going to take a heavier turn as I bring something else to light. The physical abuse. I'm mentioning this now, but it had been happening in these first few years I had already covered. I mention it now because of this next part that only happened days after giving birth. Here we go.. Two days after giving birth to our daughter. I found messages, many messages, long, "pour your heart out to the one you love" messages. With 2 of his ex girlfriends. Other messages to another random girl that attends college in some other state. Let me tell you. The things he said in those messages, were all the things he should have been saying to the mother of his child he kept convincing to stick around to endure this. All the while he was saying all these loving things to them, he was beating me and insulting me, my appearance, telling me how worthless and ugly and lazy I am. So when a woman who is already broken from infidelity, suspected infidelity, proof of infidelity. In immense pain, sleepless, exhausted, an adjusting to taking care of something 24/7 you have no experience with, or get much help with because she's on the boob all the time, so he doesn't know what to do to help. He was sleeping when I found these messages. I unloaded. I cornered him and hit him for the first time. 3 years into our relationship where I was getting beat, that I finally snapped fron the pain and betrayal that I hit him. The fight got heated. He turned the fight into something else. I was back to breadt feeding our daughter. He was throwing things, "what to expect.." book was thrown at us. And at one point he had my in a chokehold as my daughter was still in my arms feeding, until his brother came in and told him off and to "be a man". I kept sticking around because I didn't give myself a support network. I brushed it under the rug and didn't know any better, and was afraid of being alone, raising a daughter on my own. I wasn't working at the time, I felt stuck, I stayed. Our daughter was still a toddler yet, maybe 18 months, if that when this happened. We were on the way to my parents house. We were having another argument as I was driving. As things got heated, he punched me in the face as I was driving...with our baby in the backseat. I told him that was it. The cheating, beating, lies, abuse. I was done. Broke it off with him. That night my mom was wanting to make arrangements for vacation and my brother and I could each bring someone. My brother chose a friend and I did not have my boyfriend anymore, and I cut ties with a lot if other people, so I brought nobody. My now husband was accusing me of cheating at him from the very beginning of our relationship (yes, all the while he was cheating/having heavy emotional affairs, multiple exes, projecting it ALL on ME, ALL the time). I didn't have interest in pursuing this friend, but he believed so. So we were broken up for months, went on vacation. Went up to my hometown for Thanksgiving by myself (this would not have been allowed if we were together, remember, I could be 'cheating' if I'm not around him). I started to think of how I wanted him to understand how I feel. So while we were broken up, I made flirty messages with that friend that he accused me of cheating with somehow ( I'm accused of cheating with everyone/anyone, not exaggerating). So I thought fuck it, I'll make a conversation like his and see what he feels when he sees it. Well that backfired, went fishing and found it before I could present context for the purpose of it. Now I'm a cheating whore (though, we were broken up, but regardless..). I explained to the friend that what happened wasn't what I intended, and that I was sorry for pulling him into it in such a way. He was cool about it. But now this is my now husband's only ammunition on me, and it's been way played out in irrelevant situations (didn't do something as he expected? arguement, go fuck __ you whore). I never once cheated on him. Just seemed like it to him as I was trying to give him a taste of what I felt (stupid as fuck, I know that now). We had 2 more kids, tons more fights, but he stopped beating me after the break up, that much he learned. We married in 2017 and still had a lot of problems, though I hadn't found messages to other women in quite some time. We bought a house about a year or 2 after we married. So with a lot of the main components of issues out there, let's fast forward a bit to exactly a year ago.. I had a friend I made through my job that I bonded with really well, she's about 10 years older than me, has a fiance' that's my age. I've been endlessly accused (and still to this day) of having 'something' for my friends fiance',, but I very much don't at all, as with any of the accusations thrown at me. But like with other times I have found where he was being deceptive (projecting things on me that HES doing) and the combination of that and the next instance, clearly you'll know I was suspicious. My friend invited me to go to a wine walk, which I had never done before. Every time I get invited to go somewhere, it's a fight my husband starts, endless accusations, claims of what he says my thoughts and feelings are. But sometimes it's more than usual, like this time. The big fights he was causing over me going were ridiculous as usual, but something else was happening on the lead up to this event with my friends.. My husband had heard of a 'friend' he knew that was in the hospital, possibly on their death bed is what he would tell me. He kept bringing it up every random moment. Then he'd go on about it. How concerned he was about hisfriend's, on a daily basis, several times a day he would bring it up. He started obsessing, talking about it more and more. Saying he tried talking to hus friends brother to try to get more information on his 'friend', if they were doing OK, any updates etc.. yelling me how upset he was that his friends brother wasn't giving him information and how bad he felt. More obsessing, more of him bringing up his 'friend' and with how often this 'friend ' was being brought up, obviously I asked questions, like ok, who is this friend? What's the history? Is this someone you still talk to? What happened? Why won't the brother say anything? In a non accusing tone of course, because look how long it's been now since messaging other women was an active problem in our relationship, we're married now for several years and all. I didn't get much information other than him reluctantly admitting it was a girl he was 'friends with'.. I went out to the event with my friend, and I was distracted the WHOLE TIME. My husband was going on about how he's sick, I should feel bad I left, takes himself to the hospital, suddenly says they might put him on a ventilator, then he did NOT respond for hours. I was distressed and worried the whole time I was out with them, and spent most of the time of the event in a back hallway trying to call and get a hold of my husband. Friends coming looking for me to offer comfort. Went back to hotel to sleep in the girls room and my husband finally told me he was back home resting already, but basically has pneumonia, whatever. I get back home and he is STILL being weird, projecting accusations about my friends fiance', etc. I knew it in my gut that the lines would connect if I just looked for myself. Sure enough, I did a basic check of his search history, and the amount of times I saw his exes name over the span of over a month of constant daily searches. It all fucking made sense. He was OBSESSING, to ME, about his EX, that he REPEATEDLY, CHEATED on me with for YEARS, on at LEAST an EMOTIONAL level. Every day, multiple times a day, over a month and a half he's searching for her, and venting to me that he can't. Needless to say I was like I'm fucking DONE. He claimed it wasn't a big deal, he was just looking to see if she died is all...is it though? Is that all? Obsessing and constantly searching and reaching out to people he knowingly shouldn't associate with as a married man FOR his EX?? I made it clear I have dealt enough with all these women all these years, especially THIS woman, who was a frequent name in arguments about cheating, who actually cheats, and who gets accused of cheating when they haven't. He accidentally admitted he was having this relationship (at least emotional to my knowledge) for the first 4 years of our relationship. Think back, I had our first child 3 years in to the relationship. Ouch. That's just ONE of the women I had multiple concerns over. We keep having fights, over and over. He's manipulative. In the past few months, he'll see I'm anxious/having a bad day/having a hard time/start a fight with me. Then after he starts a fight, insults me to no end, name calls, he waits until I can't stand it anymore and I react...then he pulls out his phone all calm and collected "I'm recording you! Everyone will see how much of a psycho bitch you are. The kids already know you're crazy!". It hurt when a few weeks ago I had to tell our son to stop doing something hurtful/destructive, he promptly grabbed my husband's phone, held it up and said angrily "I'm recording you!" Today we had a fight, he left the house with the kids for about an hour, when they came back, the first thing my son said as he walked right up to me when he found me in the bedroom "so did you learn your lesson yet?" My son just turned 6, this is not in his usual conversations with me. I'm sitting in the car in a parking lot, like many other fights/times I can't take it anymore/need space/time to cool down. I have a consult with mediation counselor on Thursday, and requested online for personal therapy. I have no outlets other than running and hiding. I hid in the bathroom for hours yesterday because he slammed the bedroom door open with his phone camera recording me as I'm crying on the phone to my mom that I don't know what to do, I can't take it anymore. So I ran and hid in the bathroom. I don't like to be photographed or videotaped much in general, but without my consent or willingness, I'm going to run and hide. I wanted to change out of my work clothes, but he could come in the bedroom recording me. He stated he was documenting my craziness (my reaction to him) to show everyone I'm crazy. But he never records him shouting, insulting me in front of the kids, screaming in my face and bringing up other irrelevant things to hurt me until I break down, THEN he instantly calms down and hits record, sits back and laughs when I pour my heart out and lay out my frustrations and what gets to me of what he does, he just laughs. I started declaring every time i see him record "I dont want to be recorded against my will in my own home!" Constantly screams divorce at ANY small confrontation, even about something I don't know about is somehow my fault, and that I need to feel his wrath for punishment. I'm at a total loss. It's not like nobody has ever told me to leave, you deserve better, you could do so good, you need someone who respects you, once a cheater.. Do what you will reddit. Yes I'm venting, but also I need some advice, validation of my feelings in this. I'm in serious need of help. All the events of the past decade have broken me, and yet he can't just, learn, or stop being mean, or stop searching for other women, no matter what the situation. Yes, the hitting stopped after several years, bit the damage has been done, and the scars run real deep in me. HelpTl;dr: I think I'm finally done with my abusive husband. Years of abuse and I can't take it anymore
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