In Lalalaletmeexplain’s hit column, readers ask for her expert advice on their own love, sex and relationship problems.
With over 200k Instagram followers, Lala is the anonymous voice helping womankind through every bump in the road. An established sex, dating and relationship educator, she’s had her fair share of relationship drama and shares her wisdom on social media to a loyal army of followers. Every week thousands turn to her to answer their questions (no matter how embarrassing), and her funny, frank approach to love and relationships has made her the ultimate feel-good guru.
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Lalalaletmeexplain is back with this week’s column and is here to help answer your sex, relationship and dating dilemmas
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Trigger warning: This article contains mentions of pet abuse
Dear Lala,
My husband and I always talked about having kids, but once we got married he said that he no longer wanted a child as he felt it would ruin our perfect life together.
I wanted to be a mum and he agreed we could have one child but that it was my fault if it didn’t work out. Our son’s now two. Since he’s been born my husband has been hugely unsupportive. In the early weeks, he’d say: ‘That’s your job’, ‘He’s your project/hobby’, ‘You wanted a baby’ or ‘I’m bored of looking after you’ and generally belittling and name-calling me. In response, I told him that this kind of talk needed to stop because our son would soon understand what he was saying. Since then, he’s managed to reign a lot of this back but he’s still highly irritable and blames that on his mental health. At home I also do 95% of the childcare and housework while also working part-time.
To make matters worse, a few months ago he got angry with the cat and threw him across the room. He said he hadn’t meant to do it with such force and that he’d just intended to scare the cat. Since then, he regularly shouts at the cat for doing nothing more than typical cat behaviour. He also swears at him and says he’d like to strangle him. This happens in front of our toddler. When I confront him, he says I’m over-reacting and acting like his mother. He says he knows it’s wrong and doesn’t need me to tell him. It’s so odd because this is a cat my husband used to love but since our son came along, he now hates him.
I’m concerned about the impact on my son. My husband doesn’t swear at or name call my son, but he does speak to him in the same way he speaks to me. He’s never been physical with me but I’m worried that his behaviour with the cat could be a precursor to that and he often belittles me, insults me and calls me names. Our son adores him, and he can be very loving when it suits him, but his patience is thin. And when we have a rare date night, we get on fantastically. I’m trying to weigh up which is the greater good – for me to stay so my son has a loving dad in his life daily who is sometimes grumpy and takes that out on us or to leave and not have a father figure present but to feel less like we are walking on eggshells?
One reader is worried about whether their husband’s behaviour is a precursor for future behaviour
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Lala says…
Without a doubt the best thing you could do for yourself, your son, and your cat, is to leave. This will of course be an extremely difficult decision to come to and you’re faced with a lot of barriers but overcoming them and making your way out soon will undoubtedly be less difficult than what you’re going to be living with in a few years-time if this escalates, which it probably will.
If your husband were to go to a therapist, I’m sure they’d want to explore his relationship with his mother, his comments to you about sounding like her and his deep reluctance to become a parent may be indicators that he experienced toxic or abusive parenting himself. He felt forced into parenthood and he’s become increasingly angry and resentful towards the situation he feels you burdened him with. He’s taking his rage towards you and your son out on the cat, he’s using the cat and his attitude towards you to control the household. It feels like he’s punishing you for forcing him into this. But understanding why he might be doing what he does doesn’t change the fact that he’s doing it. It would take years of him being committed to therapy to ever change it, and even then, it’s unlikely. It may well be caused by his mental health but that doesn’t excuse it. And if it were then you’d expect him to be like that with everyone. Is he having problems at work with mistreating colleagues?
Lala says that “the best” thing the reader could do in this situation would be to leave
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This is domestic abuse, and your son is experiencing emotional abuse by witnessing it. The best thing you could do as his mother is remove him from a household where he’s being spoken to like he’s an irritant and where he’s watching his mother being verbally abused while his cat is being threatened. It’s a volatile environment that is unhealthy for a child to be in every day. Your husband is choosing to continue to behave like this rather than address his mental health/behaviour or leave.
The pet abuse concerns me greatly. Please have a look at my ‘Pets and Domestic Abuse’ highlights on Instagram. I think that you should have the cat rehomed at the earliest opportunity. Paws Protect provide a foster care service for people in abusive households. But what concerns me more is the link between pet abuse and serious domestic violence and an increased risk of domestic homicide. Police ask about pet abuse in the risk assessments they do with abuse victims because it’s an indicator for how serious the violence might be. So, you’re absolutely right to worry that it’s a precursor to him becoming violent with both you and your son.
Lalalaletmeexplain says that leaving would be a “difficult decision” for the reader
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Would he be receptive to a suggestion that you live separately? You have options even if he wouldn’t be. You can contact the Refuge National Domestic Abuse helpline on 08082000247 twenty-four hours a day to speak to a professional and begin thinking about a safety plan and an exit plan for when you feel ready to go. You don’t have to leave immediately, you need to do things in your own time, whilst also prioritising your son’s safety. Leaving can be a time of heightened risk for escalation, so it is important to get that professional support.
It’s understandable that you cling on to the good parts, but they aren’t enough. Walking on eggshells is no way to live. Your son is far better off with no father in a calm home than a present father in an abusive household. Leaving will be hard but so worth it.
For more help and support, visit Refuge on refuge.org.uk
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