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[quote=Anonymous]OP, I was married to someone like this. I see a lot of myself in your story - accepting unacceptable behavior and spending a lot of time in individual and marital therapy focusing on trying to get him to be reasonable in order to save the relationship. I understand why I did it - there is a lot of pressure in our culture about "working" on the marriage and how a two-parent family is best.

But, the reality is that your DH's behavior is abusive, and his choice to be abusive is one that he alone controls.  It is deliberate - google Duluth model and coercive control.  That abuse will slowly destroy you and your children.

When I made the choice about ending my relationship, I thought a lot about my kids - what would I advise them if they ever came to me with a story like my own and asked whether they should stay? I wanted to be able to tell them that they should never stay with someone abusive because they (and all humans) are worth more than that.

But, how could I tell them that, and how would they trust me if I couldn't show that I had done the same?

I ended my marriage. It didn't make my DH better, but it did give me and the kids a healthy, safe, calm home 50% of the time.  Unsurprisingly, DH decided he was more interested in finding another woman than custody, so I ended up with de facto full custody.

My advice to you - get a lawyer, get copies of all financial documents and start documenting his craziness (lawyer will advise), start planning your exit, start building/calling on your circle of support, file, and focus on building a positive life for whatever amount of time you have the kids.

When you are divorced, plan to parallel parent (not coparent), grey rock him to the extent possible, do nothing beyond the custody order for him, engage only in email via a parenting app, see if you can get supervised custody exchange or if not try to always do with someone else in a public place.  Try to limit any oral conversations to true emergencies.

You've got this!  It gets better! [/quote]

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