Hello, my story is too long to leave here. The brief synopsis is this: I married my HS boyfriend and we will be married for 23 years this year. We have two children. One is 19 and the other is almost 7.

Two years ago we seperated and came very close to divorce. We began the reconcilliation process this summer. I have been reading the MB articles and taking the advice to heart. I have been encouraging him to do the same to no avail. He finally moved home, and we began talking. It has been a very trying time. But I felt we were making some progress.

Two months ago we discoverd that our youngest child has been the victim of a sexual predator....a relative...who is now in prison and hopefully we can keep him there!

This has all been a very devestating to our resolve. I have come to terms with things by knowing that GOD is in control...and whatever His plans are for my little girl must be more wonderful and amazing than I can comprehend. I have had to let go of a lot of rage because it was eating me up inside and taking my energy. Energy that my little girl needs from me.

The revelation of this abuse has caused my husband to go into a downward spiral that scares me. He has always been a very angry individual. And frankly, scary at times when he gets very angry. However, mainly it is just really sad to see. He sufferd extremely traumatic abuse as a young child and comes from a home infested with abuse and child neglect while void of love and affection. It is understanding this and reading MB articles that I have come to fully understand why my own marriage was lacking in the fundementals. He is really truly ignorant of what it means to be loving and affectionate to your spouse.

I listen..but I dont' know how to help him. He's pulled away from God, blames himself and really looks at me with hate filled eyes now. He trusts no one. And I can hardly blame him. BUT how do I help him?? He is very depressed, sleeps a lot. But whenever I try to speak to him about it he gets very angry. And ANY reaction I have, if I cry or get frustrated or upset at something he does - he gets extremely angry. So angry at times, I know I have been very close to being hurt.

Counseling is a touchy subject and one that always causes a fight.

Im just kind of lost. I don't know what to do. I try to do all the things that I am supposed to do....but nothing seems to work.

And it is hard to help your 6 year old deal with the horrific things she went through and at the same time try to salvage a marriage. I am scared to death that this will be the end of my marriage....and I dont' want that. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />

I wish I had the right answers for you. You and your family are going through such a difficult time right now.

You may want to try the General Questions II board. It gets a lot of traffic.

I'll be thinking of you. Wish there was more I could say.

nana, your daughter is seeing a therapist, right? Please make sure she is; on this very board are people who suffered, or whose spouse suffered even less abuse than what your daughter suffered, and they have been horribly messed up, even 30 years later! Even if she sees someone only a few times now, make sure you take her back occasionally through her childhood, because as she ages, she employs new-found wisdom and knowledge to the situation - she will still need help dissecting those new viewpoints of what she endured. What a 6 year old understands is vastly different from what a 10 year old thinks, and from what a 14 year old thinks.

As for you and your H, the first thing I would do is get yourself to a counselor. Not cos there's something wrong, but because the C can help you work out strategies for minimizing - maybe even helping eliminate - your H's pain and anger. That's what they're good at!

If I were you, I'd also be reading up on adult survivors of abuse. Learn how the adults incorporate their survival skills into adulthood, and how to reprogram that dysfunction into something healthy. You don't have to read it to him, and I know HE won't read it, but you can learn, and then look for instances where you can incorporate some of that knowledge into making things better.

Finally, if you're afraid of violence, please leave, at least temporarily. Especially for your daughter's sake. You do NOT want her to grow up seeing violence, because she will seek out a partner who does violence to her; it's what she knows, after all (if you were to stay, that is). You can set that one boundary for now - 'You have just pushed me against a wall. That is violence. I know you don't want to be like that, and that is why I'm leaving for a couple of days, so you can work out what's causing you to lash out. When we come back, we can talk about it.'

That's giving him a consequence for the action - not pulling your love, because you're saying you're coming back. It might be enough of an incentive for him to want to control it.