'Am I wrong for checking out of my marriage after my husband refused to parent OUR children?'
"Am I wrong for checking out of my marriage after my husband refused to parent OUR children?"
wow_wt
I (f42) have been married to my husband Mark (m43) for 20 years. We have 3 kids, John (m16), Mary (f14) and Peter (m12). For some background, Mark grew up with a narcissistic mom with whom he has very little contact right now, and a dad who is clearly emotionally abused. Name calling and silent treatments are very acceptable and normal to him.
Anyway, he is the best dad to our daughter. He’s sweet and loving, yet the very few times she needs to be disciplined he is firm and fair - she’s a rule follower and rarely gets in trouble.
With our boys however, especially the 12 year old, not so much. He is just now starting to connect a little more with John, our 16 year old, who is “finally into sports” (he’s used to be really into art before, so he had a hard time connecting with him), and their relationship is not bad.
Peter, our 12 year old is quirky and I admit, a little more difficult to connect with. He’s adhd, and has some crazy mood swings (we’re working with a therapist), which makes my husband extremely frustrated with him.
The other day, the kids were supposed to be working on their chores, but for one reason or another they were not. Mark comes in and starts yelling “you’re all so pathetic! You can’t even do your chores!”
The 2 oldest scurry on to do their chores, while the youngest was taking his sweet dear time to get started (not good, I know!). Well, Mark started yelling “how stupid are you that you can’t even get the damn trash out! I’ve had to remind you every day this week to do your f*kng job, but you’re too stupid…” And that’s where I stopped him and said “ that’s enough! You DO NOT speak to MY CHILDREN this way!”
He tried justifying why he “has to” but I continued that he can discipline without name calling. Mark then walked off saying “I will never discipline YOUR children again”.
Later that night I apologized for saying all that in front of the kids, I know that was wrong, but he said he doesn’t know if he can forgive me. It has been over a week now and he has kept his word. He just hangs out and does fun things with the 2 oldest and tolerates the youngest, while ignoring anything that has to do with discipline.
Aside from that though, he is a great husband, and a great provider and will do anything for our family, and he truly believes he isn’t doing anything wrong by calling the kids names.
I just don’t know if I can continue a relationship with someone who won’t share the parenting load with me, and who thinks its ok to call their kids names. So, am I wrong?
Here were the top rated comments from readers in response to the OP's post:
Fairmount1955
"Aside from being verbally abusive to our kids and emotionally abusive to me, he's a great husband and provider." Fixed it. I mean, it's probably better for the kids to have less of him around, the behavior you teo are modeling for them will ensure this cycle will continue because you've normalized it. You're wrong for centering him thinking he's not in the wrong. He's a parade of red flags.
StrugglinSurvivor
Read this recently, and it is something that I feel should make a difference in how your children my turn out in life. When we criticize our children because we are angry or tired, they don't stop loving us. They stop loving themselves. And that SUCKS.
So no matter how tired we are, no matter how stressed we are, we should always take a breath and think before we speak to our kids. Because it is a lot easier to build strong children than it is to fix broken adults.
Rich_Dig_5855
Yeah, forget that guy. Nobody wants to be bullied at home, much less by their DAD. Your kids are going to grow up thinking that "love" and making mistakes/falling behind on responsibilities is a good excuse for someone to bully them if something doesn't change.
If you continue to allow this strained, weird relationship they're going to resent you too. I STILL have a hard time talking to my mom because for the sake of us having a father figure she allowed verbal and physical abuse. Again, forget that guy. He can get right or get left. NTA.
childofcrow
He needs therapy and to understand that what he did is abuse. Name calling like that is verbal and emotional abuse. And just because his dad did it doesn't mean it's okay for him to do - especially not to a disabled 12 year old. Christ.
Interesting-Fish6065
What on Earth? He’s supposed to fully participate in parenting them because they are, in fact, HIS children. What comes out of YOUR mouth has zero capacity to change that. Also, no one “has to” hurl insults at his own child.
Calling your own child “stupid” over and over again is likely to cause harm and is not an appropriate or effective form of discipline. How is this dispute primarily about what you said rather than about what he said, which was a lot worse?