Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here - he won’t let me go to therapy with him. He is mad about something that has to go with his job “wronging him”, it has nothing at all to do with me so there really isn’t much I could have done. I’m a calm person, it is very rare for me to lose my temper even with the many teens we are raising. I do understand why someone could ask what I’m doing, though, because I do think sometimes spouses can provoke husbands, but I also think I’m pretty self-aware.
I do think he has undiagnosed depression/anxiety/ADHD. I just feel at a loss - it is really taking its toll on me and I know it affects my kids.
He does drink and he drinks it’s a lot worse. Especially the last year he will get really mad if he drinks, and had snuck alcohol and lied about it. I don’t think it’s the best decision for our family for me to leave but staying is hard. I have moments where he is so good and normal and then he will snap.

Why not?

OP here…. Because he is mostly good and kind. Because I love him and my kids love him. Because no one is perfect… and because staying is easier, I don’t want to be alone, give up financial freedom/move, etc.

Staying is easier for YOU. what about for your kids?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a husband who went to therapy for years for anger management. Part of the deal was the therapist asked me to come in alone a few times a year or the therapist would call me to get a read on his current behavior.
I wonder why his therapist doesn’t want to meet with you alone.
Seems there is something else you don’t realize: he is lying to therapist, telling therapist you are the problem, he is having an affair and that’s why he is having a temper tantrum and then leaving…..
If your husband disagreed with you calmly, you would start asking questions about why he is leaving and where he is going…….

I don’t think it’s an affair - I have checked into that thoroughly, but I do think he is lying to the therapist. I think it’s a lot of childhood trauma/horrible upbringing, but I am sure he’s telling his therapist that he is fine. He doesn’t seem to want to do the work.

Leaving is easier said than done. My kids love him. I love him. We would have to move and uproot their lives and 90% of the time he’s great.

How can you say that when your kids are in therapy because of his behavior? Having an abusive upbringing will affect them for LIFE.

Yeah, this.

The 10% of the time that my ‘father’ was an abusive prick resulted in four adult children who struggle with substance use disorder, mental health issues, broken marriages and/or avoidance of marriage and parenthood altogether.

Your husband is probably really messing up your kids, and I’m fairly sure the day with come where your kids will be angry at you for making them grow up with him because money and convenience and fear of breaking out of the toxic norm you’ve grown used to. At least that’s what happened in my family.

OP, please read up on the abusive cycle and "coercive control". Men who are abusive - whether emotionally or physically - generally are not abuse all or even most of the time. The problem is, as that many have explained the 10% bad behavior trains the spouse and kids to walk on eggshells and proactively defer to and behave in ways desired by your DH. This is extremely unhealthy and carries forward to your kid's future relationships. You're kidding yourself if you think that 90/10 isn't deeply affecting them in a negative way. You are going to get down the road into HS, college or adult hood and your kids are going to be PISSED that you didn't protect them. And they are going to be PUZZLED why they can't form healthy long term partnerships with non-abusive partners.

I'm almost 60, and my mom's verbal abuse primed me to be involved in 2 abusive serious relationships for a total together of about 15 years. The second relationship resulted in kids, and although I love my kids, I will forever regret raising them with their Dad, even though I had the courage to leave when they were about 18 months and 5 years old. The fact that I left and managed to maintain full custody (with significant visitation to Dad) and got them a therapist to help them deal in the MS and HS years, is the only reason that they are relatively healthy happy children. That said, one fell into a seriously emotionally manipulative relationship in HS, which he eventually ended on his own. The other struggled to have emotional attachments because she grew up a people pleaser for her dad. Early relationships were also somewhat unhealthy and abusive, although she also, with support, was able to draw boundaries and identify healthier, kinder people.

You will be lucky if your kids are still speaking to you by the time they are in adulthood.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a husband who went to therapy for years for anger management. Part of the deal was the therapist asked me to come in alone a few times a year or the therapist would call me to get a read on his current behavior.
I wonder why his therapist doesn’t want to meet with you alone.
Seems there is something else you don’t realize: he is lying to therapist, telling therapist you are the problem, he is having an affair and that’s why he is having a temper tantrum and then leaving…..
If your husband disagreed with you calmly, you would start asking questions about why he is leaving and where he is going…….

I don’t think it’s an affair - I have checked into that thoroughly, but I do think he is lying to the therapist. I think it’s a lot of childhood trauma/horrible upbringing, but I am sure he’s telling his therapist that he is fine. He doesn’t seem to want to do the work.

Leaving is easier said than done. My kids love him. I love him. We would have to move and uproot their lives and 90% of the time he’s great.

How can you say that when your kids are in therapy because of his behavior? Having an abusive upbringing will affect them for LIFE.

Yeah, this.

The 10% of the time that my ‘father’ was an abusive prick resulted in four adult children who struggle with substance use disorder, mental health issues, broken marriages and/or avoidance of marriage and parenthood altogether.

Your husband is probably really messing up your kids, and I’m fairly sure the day with come where your kids will be angry at you for making them grow up with him because money and convenience and fear of breaking out of the toxic norm you’ve grown used to. At least that’s what happened in my family.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a husband who went to therapy for years for anger management. Part of the deal was the therapist asked me to come in alone a few times a year or the therapist would call me to get a read on his current behavior.
I wonder why his therapist doesn’t want to meet with you alone.
Seems there is something else you don’t realize: he is lying to therapist, telling therapist you are the problem, he is having an affair and that’s why he is having a temper tantrum and then leaving…..
If your husband disagreed with you calmly, you would start asking questions about why he is leaving and where he is going…….

I don’t think it’s an affair - I have checked into that thoroughly, but I do think he is lying to the therapist. I think it’s a lot of childhood trauma/horrible upbringing, but I am sure he’s telling his therapist that he is fine. He doesn’t seem to want to do the work.

Leaving is easier said than done. My kids love him. I love him. We would have to move and uproot their lives and 90% of the time he’s great.

How can you say that when your kids are in therapy because of his behavior? Having an abusive upbringing will affect them for LIFE.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a husband who went to therapy for years for anger management. Part of the deal was the therapist asked me to come in alone a few times a year or the therapist would call me to get a read on his current behavior.
I wonder why his therapist doesn’t want to meet with you alone.
Seems there is something else you don’t realize: he is lying to therapist, telling therapist you are the problem, he is having an affair and that’s why he is having a temper tantrum and then leaving…..
If your husband disagreed with you calmly, you would start asking questions about why he is leaving and where he is going…….

I don’t think it’s an affair - I have checked into that thoroughly, but I do think he is lying to the therapist. I think it’s a lot of childhood trauma/horrible upbringing, but I am sure he’s telling his therapist that he is fine. He doesn’t seem to want to do the work.

Leaving is easier said than done. My kids love him. I love him. We would have to move and uproot their lives and 90% of the time he’s great.

NP. Please take a step back and think about what you have shared. You say your husband is "great" 90 percent of the time, yet the 10 percent is so bad that your children are in therapy due to the severe effects of that 10 percent.

That is not normal and is not good.

THIS! so the kids have learned they have to walk on eggshells in case he goes ballistic. that's outrageous. this is not a healthy way to live.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a husband who went to therapy for years for anger management. Part of the deal was the therapist asked me to come in alone a few times a year or the therapist would call me to get a read on his current behavior.
I wonder why his therapist doesn’t want to meet with you alone.
Seems there is something else you don’t realize: he is lying to therapist, telling therapist you are the problem, he is having an affair and that’s why he is having a temper tantrum and then leaving…..
If your husband disagreed with you calmly, you would start asking questions about why he is leaving and where he is going…….

I don’t think it’s an affair - I have checked into that thoroughly, but I do think he is lying to the therapist. I think it’s a lot of childhood trauma/horrible upbringing, but I am sure he’s telling his therapist that he is fine. He doesn’t seem to want to do the work.

Leaving is easier said than done. My kids love him. I love him. We would have to move and uproot their lives and 90% of the time he’s great.

NP. Please take a step back and think about what you have shared. You say your husband is "great" 90 percent of the time, yet the 10 percent is so bad that your children are in therapy due to the severe effects of that 10 percent.

That is not normal and is not good.

Anonymous wrote:I have a husband who went to therapy for years for anger management. Part of the deal was the therapist asked me to come in alone a few times a year or the therapist would call me to get a read on his current behavior.
I wonder why his therapist doesn’t want to meet with you alone.
Seems there is something else you don’t realize: he is lying to therapist, telling therapist you are the problem, he is having an affair and that’s why he is having a temper tantrum and then leaving…..
If your husband disagreed with you calmly, you would start asking questions about why he is leaving and where he is going…….

I don’t think it’s an affair - I have checked into that thoroughly, but I do think he is lying to the therapist. I think it’s a lot of childhood trauma/horrible upbringing, but I am sure he’s telling his therapist that he is fine. He doesn’t seem to want to do the work.

Leaving is easier said than done. My kids love him. I love him. We would have to move and uproot their lives and 90% of the time he’s great.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:He is some kind of special. It gets worse over time, not better.
Mine thought he is all that and bag of chips. I left and he fell apart completely. He is all gone now. Can't say I did anything other than not sticking around. For him, everyone else was bad and weird.

OP here - I don’t want that for him. I think the anger comes from insecurity and childhood/abandonment issues, I don’t want him to fall apart, I want to help him grow and become a better person. I want to help him but don’t know how. He has so much potential but his anger is destroying him.

You aren't responsible and you can't fix this. You've wanted to help him all along but has it changed anything? Your kids deserve better than this. This is truly f'd up.

I have a husband who went to therapy for years for anger management. Part of the deal was the therapist asked me to come in alone a few times a year or the therapist would call me to get a read on his current behavior.
I wonder why his therapist doesn’t want to meet with you alone.
Seems there is something else you don’t realize: he is lying to therapist, telling therapist you are the problem, he is having an affair and that’s why he is having a temper tantrum and then leaving…..
If your husband disagreed with you calmly, you would start asking questions about why he is leaving and where he is going…….

Anonymous wrote:OP here - so what do I do? He has been in therapy for a few months, so I am hoping that helps, but it doesn't feel like it is enough to leave him over. I love him and most of the time he is kind and good natured. When he goes unhinged it does scare me though, not because he would do something, just because it is really scary. I don't know what boundaries to set with this.

If you have kids you suck as a mother
This is not normal

My husband doesn't throw things or name call or yell much (he raises his voice) but he's black and white in his thinking and I get the eggshells thing. I really really get it.

It's incredibly odd and hard to explain because he's a great guy, a very fair and justice-minded person, yet at home he can not admit when he is wrong (even small things, which just screams childhood stuff to me) and he operates in a way where he is entirely above criticism. It's incredibly frustrating, but also kind of sad?

Over the years (20+ marriage) I have learned that staying emotionally neutral and calmly explaining why he is being unreasonable, and leaving it at that (repeating if necessary), is the best way to get through it. Earlier in our marriage I would get more emotional and that is NOT the way to go with a person like this. I also understand him better now, and find that his outbursts don't really phase me (like I can walk away and go do what I was doing...if I even stopped doing it...with no physical or emotional effects). It's just his quirk.

What I am most concerned about is that our son doesn't grow to be like this and so far all signs point to him being the opposite which is such a relief, to see him emotionally healthy. I think this is also good for my husband to see...not much is more humbling than a teenage boy coolly telling you why you are being unreasonable and how you can be kinder and more level-headed.

Anonymous wrote:NP and I have the same DH as so many here, down to taking himself off Lexapro even though it was helping, in his case because “he thinks medication isn’t real”. This morning he was feeling some kind of emotions (guilt? Embarrassment? Sadness? We’ll never know) because he overslept and missed taking the kids to something special he’d promised them. But instead of owning his feelings and allowing theirs, he just stormed around getting angry at everyone and then dismissing their disappointment as “not rational” since he couldn’t go back in time and fix it. Like, that’s not what rational means and people can still have feelings even if the situation that caused them can’t be changed.

Anyway, this is all happening on a family vacation and I’m honestly surprised it happened now instead of 2 days earlier. I’ve been holding my breath waiting for one of his tantrums. Sorry you can’t be on your own schedule and play on your phone all day, DH.

Boys should not be allowed to graduate HS without proving that they can feel emotion without expressing it as anger.

I'm a previous PP; I could have written this many times over the last 12 years. Usually more at home than on vacation, though.

Anonymous wrote:NP and I have the same DH as so many here, down to taking himself off Lexapro even though it was helping, in his case because “he thinks medication isn’t real”. This morning he was feeling some kind of emotions (guilt? Embarrassment? Sadness? We’ll never know) because he overslept and missed taking the kids to something special he’d promised them. But instead of owning his feelings and allowing theirs, he just stormed around getting angry at everyone and then dismissing their disappointment as “not rational” since he couldn’t go back in time and fix it. Like, that’s not what rational means and people can still have feelings even if the situation that caused them can’t be changed.

Anyway, this is all happening on a family vacation and I’m honestly surprised it happened now instead of 2 days earlier. I’ve been holding my breath waiting for one of his tantrums. Sorry you can’t be on your own schedule and play on your phone all day, DH.

Boys should not be allowed to graduate HS without proving that they can feel emotion without expressing it as anger.

So how long will you remain in that miserable marriage?

NP and I have the same DH as so many here, down to taking himself off Lexapro even though it was helping, in his case because “he thinks medication isn’t real”. This morning he was feeling some kind of emotions (guilt? Embarrassment? Sadness? We’ll never know) because he overslept and missed taking the kids to something special he’d promised them. But instead of owning his feelings and allowing theirs, he just stormed around getting angry at everyone and then dismissing their disappointment as “not rational” since he couldn’t go back in time and fix it. Like, that’s not what rational means and people can still have feelings even if the situation that caused them can’t be changed.

Anyway, this is all happening on a family vacation and I’m honestly surprised it happened now instead of 2 days earlier. I’ve been holding my breath waiting for one of his tantrums. Sorry you can’t be on your own schedule and play on your phone all day, DH.

Boys should not be allowed to graduate HS without proving that they can feel emotion without expressing it as anger.

Sounds like you’re staying w your mean man bc of the $$

Suffer in silence then .. as he def has zero reason to change.