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‘My partner has become abusive since we had our baby’

Ask Roe: ‘I feel I can’t do anything right for him, he takes offence at everything I say’

Real love should feel like safety, not danger. Photograph: iStock

Roe McDermott's face
Roe McDermott
Sun Apr 7 2024 - 05:00

Dear Roe,

I need some advice about my marriage and I don’t feel I can speak with others. My husband and I have been together for over ten years. We now have a young baby. We have always been a couple that bickers, my husband has also gone through counselling for anger problems. I have stuck with him as I always felt that I’m not perfect either and 90 per cent of the time, we get on. However, the last few months I just feel like I can’t do anything right for him. He takes offence at everything I say, if I ask him to do any small thing he says I’m nagging or that it’s my job as I’m at home all day doing nothing on maternity leave. I try to explain my day and he tells me he doesn’t want to hear it and gets mad. He has started insulting my family and if I stand up for them he jeers at me. If I stand up for myself he tells me to go, don’t come back, and that I won’t find anyone else who will put up with me. He has screamed and called me a bitch in front of our baby. He got into my face the other day in an argument as I was walking into the livingroom. When I address all this, he tells me I’m playing the victim and says things he has said and done never happened.

We talked this all through and said we would work on it on behalf of the baby. We even had a romantic evening, had really good sex and worked hard on being there for each other. However, he went out the other night for a pint in his hometown. He stayed at his parents, which made me nervous because I’m only a learner driver so need someone who can drive in case there’s any emergency with the baby.

When he came home, I said that I might go out with a couple of friends in my hometown in a few weeks’ time. He asked me to come home that night and not stay at my parents’ place as he needs support with the baby. I said I need a night away as I’ve been with our baby solid for months (after a quite traumatic birth but that’s a different story). He then gets snappy and tells me to “stay away and not come back then”. I asked him if he felt that’s fair, considering he has been out quite a bit since the baby was born. I asked him to look at it from my point of view and he said to “go into the dirt”. I am now writing this in desperation as I think I need to leave him. But am I overreacting? Considering there is a baby now? I just need some advice.

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You are not overreacting.

Your husband is mocking you, insulting you, jeering you, refusing to contribute to basic domestic and care work, staying out all night while you take care of a baby, refusing to let you rest and socialise, physically intimidating you, gaslighting you and responding to any small boundary or request for help with threats of ending the relationship. He’s doing all of this at a time when you are physically, emotionally and financially vulnerable, and when you are looking after a young baby. This is not “bickering”, and this is not a question of someone being less than perfect. This is abusive behaviour that is escalating and is not magically going to get better. You cannot change him, and he is expressing no desire to change how he is treating you. You are with a man who has already attended counselling for anger issues, and so he is aware that he has issues with regulating his emotions and lashing out, and yet is not taking any action to address his behaviour.

This is a man who knew you were going to have a child but apparently didn’t plan to support you in any way. This is a man who is using the baby as an excuse to laden you with endless work in the home and control your ability to leave the house and socialise. And this is a man who is insulting and belittling you at any opportunity, making you believe that you have no other options but to stay with him. What’s also alarming is that you don’t feel you can speak about your situation with anyone. This is how abuse operates – it cultivates silence and secrecy around it, so it can grow.

You do have options. You can leave him and stay with your family or friends. You can leave him and raise a child who doesn’t grow up believing that romantic relationships include emotional abuse, disrespect and threats. You can leave him and stay single, focusing on raising your child and building up your support system of people who love you and want the best for you. You can leave him and somewhere down the road, when you have healed a bit and worked on your self-belief, you can enter into a relationship with someone who is kind, caring, respectful and who wants to share the work of a life with you.

I need you to understand that leaving someone who has anger issues and has displayed abusive behaviour can be dangerous. You need to proceed with caution. You should consult specialist services who will be available to advise you generally and on an ongoing basis in case the situation escalates. Women’s Aid provides both online information and a helpline, while SafeIreland.ie has information on all kinds of abuse including domestic violence and coercive control, as well as a comprehensive list of helplines across the country. Aoibhneas, a women and children’s refuge, also has a 24-hour helpline and online information. Any of these support groups will be able to advise you on making a safe exit plan, which might include telling some trusted friends and family that you’re planning to leave; leaving some emergency items with them in case you suddenly need to stay with them; setting up some code words with people you trust that you can use in text or over the phone in case there’s an emergency; and ensuring you have other people present when you leave your husband so that you’re not left alone with him. You should also consult a solicitor and book yourself a counsellor to give the emotional support you need.

I know that you have likely been justifying his behaviour for a long time and that it’s hard to think of leaving someone that you have been with for so long, but remember that you’ve just started a lifelong relationship with your child. You have a responsibility not only to keep them safe, but to model for them the type of relationships you want them to have as they get older. Show them that they never have to tolerate abuse and that real love feels like safety, not danger.

Take care of yourself. You can do this.

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