19 years in hell
I dunno if I've talked about some of the problems I've had with my husband but i'm gonna post this anyway.
[Spoiler (click to open) long and may be triggering as its talking about abuse]
We got married in 94, things were great till our oldest daughter was born in 96, then he started showing his true colors. Jealous that any time I spent taking care of the baby(or doing housework, or taking a bath, or anything that didn't directly involve him) was time he didn't have my full attention. He had to have control of almost everything I did. I was not allowed to talk to anyone other then his family(offline anyway).
If I did anything he didn't want me to or didn't do what he wanted when he wanted he threw a temper tantrum. Shortly before our second daughter was born in 99 it escalated to him threatening to kill me and our oldest(telling me he knew places he could get rid of a body so no one would ever find it, and that since his dad got away with murder so could he) to get his way when I didn't want to do what he wanted. that includes ANYTHING he wanted. There was some minor physical abuse, pulling my hair, shoving me into things so he could claim it was an accident and he didn't mean to hurt me. The hair pulling was to make me cut my hair any time it got longer then he wanted it to be.
I did get away from him for a few months I took my daughter and went to live with my folks, he couldn't follow because he was on probation for threatening to blow up the place he worked. As soon as he was off probation he came after us, told me he was taking HIS kids and I could either go with them or never see them again.
After all that I was too afraid to leave again. He did all the typical stuff bullied me, told me I was worthless and would never be able to survive without him. Told me if I tried to do anything about it he’d make sure I lost my kids, Anything he had to to keep me under his control and it worked, I stayed.
After our third daughter was born, he got us into a situation where we were living in unsuitable housing(I was told it was suitable it wasn't, it was a dump without even any heat) and refused to do anything about it till after we temporarily lost custody of our kids, and pushed to allow his cousin to adopt our youngest. I agreed because I really thought that was best for her, but it gave him another threat to use against me. He got rid of one of my kids he could get rid of the other two just as easily any time he wanted.
It got to the point that he was spending hours yelling at the kids, telling them they were worthless and would never be worth anything and that he hated them over stupid stuff like one of t them having to go to the bathroom before taking out the trash instead of doing it right when he said to. And when I intervened I'd get yelled at for not letting him discipline them. I also got yelled at sometimes for hours over stupid shit like him wanting a cigarette when we didn't have any.
A few yrs ago I ended up being friends with someone that lived at the same apartment complex mostly because she kept talking to me. I also became friends with one of her friends. Hubby didn't like it but he saw and advantage to it because my friends were useful to him. So he "made friends" with them and told them a huge bunch of shit placing all the blame for what he did on me, and anytime I tried to talk to them he either started talking loud enough that they couldn't hear what I said, or reminded me, by somehow making the comment that he knows where he can get rid of bodies and they'd never be found seem like casual conversation. I stopped talking to anyone and retreated back into my shell again because I didn't think I had a choice and no way out.
A couple years ago an old friend got back in touch with us, Hubby for some reason admitted to our friend on the phone that he acted like an asshole and abused me and the kids. When our friend came over to visit he wouldn't even let me say hello to him without talking over me, and when I tried to talk to him again later he made the usual comment about knowing where to get rid of bodies.... Again I gave up and kept my mouth shut.
Back to almost complete isolation, he wouldn't even really allow me to talk to my kids. We were also in a situation where I was only eating part of the month and then only eating once or twice a week the last two or three weeks of the month(according to him that was my choice yeah it was my kids eating was more important than me eating, I dunno how much food he thought I could buy with the 50 cents we had left at the end of the month but according to him it would have fed me for two or three weeks), and having to hide food from him just to feed my kids. What finally put an end to it was my oldest daughter talking to the school counsellor and telling her everything, because she was afraid he might kill me either lose his temper or just by starving me to death. Both of my kids have heard him threaten to kill us for as long as they can remember.
My oldest ended up in the hospital and could have died from low potassium because of him not leaving enough food for the kids, He's nice to people that are useful to him, either because they do things to make his life easier or they buy things for him. He yelled at me because I wouldn't make nice to them just to make HIS life easier and complain to me about how stupid they are and spent a year trying to convince me and the kids that one of them is a paedophile(not true the one he told us that about is a good person).
He goes back and forth between denying he did any of it, claiming the kids and I made it all up and admitting he did it but denying he did anything wrong that we deserved everything he did and that it wasn't abuse.
We're some place safe now and can get on with our lives without him.