Partners who chose to stay for the long haul

Ohhhhh hugs my @SJT63

Thank you for your message xx

Hello @Former-Member @Silverfox , @Carlachris , @Faith-and-Hope

@Shaz51 @Former-Member @Silverfox @Carlachris @Faith-and-Hope @WinstonOBoogie @HoneyOne

et al

Mr S turns 60 this coming Saturday and for the first time since Christmas we will be able to cross the border to visit his family. He often becomes very restless around the time of his birthday, but I hate mine as well and don't put that down to MI.

Things at mine are "normal"... we all know that our version of normal is slightly different to those who's partners don't need the extra help that ours do.

Leading up to Christmas he usually deteriorates a bit while he mourns his separation (14 years ago) and is upset because it's not a proper family Christmas as we have the boys either Christmas Day or Boxing Day but not both. They aren't small children, one of them is driving.

The festive season can be very stressful for a lot of people for a myriad of reasons... for Mr S it brings back truck loads of regret.

Does anyone else see seasonal changes?

How do you keep your own spirits up if they are unintentionally stealing all the joy?

Looking forward to a much better 2021 already.

Love,

S

we went down for his birthday and it was horrible

he was so abusive towards me that his sister has said we can't stay with her at Christmas - he doesn't know that yet, God help me

the last three days have been so bad I took a sickie today with exhaustion but he's got worse and I've been fighting back, which only excalates things ever more.

But what came out today was that he has mistrusted and resented me for nearly two years over something he feels I didn't support him over. I put his children's interests first and facilitiated them going home to their mum after Christmas two days early because I needed time away from him and I couldn't leave them there alone (12 and 15 at the time). He was completely out of control then and they too needed a break from his constant raging.

I know I did the right thing and would do it again. I thought he had accepted it, but it now seems that the incident is at the root of all the abuse I've been getting for the last several months. He has said he won't leave my house, and perhaps I should.

I know he will calm down, but all this was said not 2 hours after he'd told me he loved me unconditionally - about an hour after a previous dressing down for something I didn't know I'd done wrong.

I'm so very tired......

Sending gentle hugs @SJT63 ..... I think I was living with a different brand of the same thing.

Hey @SJT63 that sounds pretty intense. I'm gonna flick you a quick email to check in.

I wish I could offer some hope but things are good for me here either, so I'm coming up blank.

Sending you a big hug @SJT63

Hi @SJT63

Birthdays, Christmas and holidays are all stressful for Mr D although he doesn't get abusive.

I am tired at present, a combination of Mr Darcy continuing to cry often late into the night, sometimes through to midnight and then having to take our whippets out between 2-4 pm for a pit stop. Rose (4 years old) was crate trained, Henry, now 10 months old also sleeps in the crate but cannot hold his bladder overnight. I need to keep them in the crate at night as in under a year it is likely Mr Darcy's condition will deteriorate and become end stage. While he loves the dogs dearly, he did find a puppy jumping about a bit much after he had his major abdominal surgery.

I hope you got some assistance in relation to your recent problems.

me again....

@Former-Member @HoneyOne @Jynx @Faith-and-Hope @Shaz51 @WinstonOBoogie

I HAVE HAD ENOUGH!!!!! Yes I'm shouting, I never shout, but today I'm shouting. I'm shouting here because you guys will hear me. I'm shouting here because I'm at my work desk and can't shout. I'm shouting here because shouting at him might be dangerous.

I have spent the last two days in bed with him coming in and out to shout at me despite the fact that I was so empty and exhausted that I couldn't go to work.

On one hand, I guess, I could take it as a compliment that he is now so comfortable with me that he has begun holding things against me that I did when I barely knew him. During a major, violent episode in December 2018 (when I'd only known him 4 months) I facilitated the boys going home to mum with their cousin (I didn't have my car with me) after we'd been down at his mums for a week. He had been merciless in is language against us all (unless he was passed out asleep) I desperately need to go home to my own place for some rest but I couldn't leave his children (then 12 and 15) alone with him. Not physical danger, but mental danger and, of course, they would need feeding. This was all a year before he moved into mine. I cought a taxi, train, train, taxi back to my house and didn't make contact with him for nearly a week. I often wonder why I didn't just cut my losses then. I think mainly because his octogenarian now have their hopes pinned on me being there for him once they've gone.

He often brings up how is ex-niece "stole" his children that day (even 2 years on). I sometimes quietly assert that it was, perhaps, for the best as I had been worried about the boys. Yesterday for the first time I was included in the whole global conspiracy theory as he says he had known from that moment that I didn't have his back, he couldn't trust me, he will always resent me.

Now that he's gone there once, I know he will go there again, regardless of whether he actually means it or not, I am going to have to continue to justify my position on that for the rest of my life.

I maintain that the welfare of his children trumps everything. Always.

It came up yesterday because he is already worried they will do it again this year as it's our turn to have them on Christmas again. Two years later, the older one is driving, it's irrelvant, they come and go as they please now without needing me or mum to drive them around. I haven't yet broken it to him that after his performances on his birthday weekend we are not being invited down for Christmas anyway.

The dynamic between us has/will change with this revelation. Now that I am in the same box as his ex-wife, everyone related to his ex-wife, his ex-bosses, the bloke at the flying club who doesn't like him, the bloke at the sailing club who wouldn't help him, EVERYONE who lives in the complex where he has his own townhouse (that he hasn't been back to since March), Energex, TPG, six different medical centres..... it's a long list of people and institutions that unless they present him with a public, written apology for their appalling behaviour will never be allowed in his presence.... well his sister and I were put in the box yesterday.

Unless she "comes on bended knee in the next week" we will not be staying with her again.

She has already told me she doesn't want us but I'm not getting involved between the siblings, they need to sort that, not me. I have never been and stayed with his family and not been humiliated and embarrassed by the way I let him treat me. They have only ever seen me at my absolute worst. I really hate that.

So back to that changed dynamic. We have spent two days actually fighting. I never fight, I give in I cajole I placate I door-mat myself to avoid fighting. In the last two days I've fought back three times and he really, really hates it.

When he is calm I try to explain things but he doesn't want to talk about it "can't we just draw a line and move on" he asks... which is a total insult now that I am being chastised for a moral stance I took 2 years ago.

"We can move on" I said this morning "after I've said a couple of things".

1. The well being of anybody's children, ever, is always going to take precedence over your sensibilities. Whatever mood you are in, however you are behaving, however it will affect you I will NEVER put you ahead of a child.

2. I am no longer going to exhaust myself trying to protect you from the consequences of your own actions.

3. Sometimes it is your fault. You and your sister are BOTH to blame for what is going on between you at the moment.(he was furious yesterday when I dared to be honest and say it wasn't all her fault)

4. As much as you loathe it when I just walk away, if you are shouting at me about something over which I have no control, if you are shouting at me about someone else and going over the same story for the 54th time, if you are being irrational and can't talk to me calmly, if you call me names I AM GOING TO WALK AWAY and you have to suck it up.

I haven't actually said them yet. I might email. I tend to get a better response when I email.

Unless I can put those simple boundaries in place I am not going to survive this.

Hi @SJT63 ,

It sounds like a horrible experience being at the receiving end of shouting and namecalling. It is good that you are putting boundaries in place, regardless of the communication channel you choose. No one deserves to be spoken to that way and you have the right to implement boundaries and be treated with respect.

Thank you for sharing your experience with us. Keep reaching out x

SRae

❤️ @SJT63 ..... hearing you .....