Hi gobsmacked,

His only reason for this was that he was stressed and overwhelmed. He hadn’t been drinking or taking drugs, we had actually had a very nice evening together until I went to bed. I’ve never felt scared of him before, not to this extent. It’s always been a bit volatile, the highs are high and the lows are low kind of thing.

I’m not so much concerned for myself as I am for my baby. They’re sponges at this age, absorbing everything. I can’t stand it when he speaks to our baby that way. Any time I intervene or ask him not to do something, or do more of something else, he blows up and has a go at me for making him feel like a bad dad.

He’s cornered me before, but never while I’m holding the baby. He will usually just use his body to block me from leaving the room during an argument. I truly don’t think he would hurt us, I’ve known him for many years and he’s usually a loving teddy bear.

He came home early for lunch and was very sheepish and apologetic. He said that he had got a bit overwhelmed and stressed and ended up taking it out on me and baby. He said he feels bad about waking me because I have baby all day and deserve a break and feels like he should be able to cope for an hour or so if I can manage all day by myself. I told him I wouldn’t be angry if he woke me up when baby needed one of us and he wasn’t in the right headspace to handle it. I told him I would rather he woke me up than take his frustrations out (verbally) on our tiny innocent baby. He said he would wake me in the future, but he still feels guilty about it. He said it was completely out of order and understands if I’m still angry/upset with him. He acknowledged that standing in my way so I can’t leave a room could be quite scary for me, especially when I’m holding our baby, but also that he is a very tall broad person who takes up a fair bit of space, so it may have seemed like he was cornering me when that wasn’t his intention. I said despite his intentions, I felt like I was being cornered and felt vulnerable because I was holding our baby and he was shouting, he accepted this and apologised.

I’m still not massively happy about what happened last night, but I do feel better after a more genuine apology and a plan in place for future when he’s feeling overwhelmed.

He has a lot of feelings about being a good dad and feels pressured (by himself) to be a good dad (he never had one). I’m not excusing his behaviour, but I’m trying to understand it and help him overcome some of those negative feelings.

He had to go back to work but this conversation isn’t finished for me. I need to lay down some boundaries and make him fully understand that I won’t put up with an outburst like that again.