Feeling Torn
My partner has struggled with mental health for a while now. We had a child recently and he was out of work so I went back when the child was 2 weeks. I work almost everyday, and he stayed home with the kid. He ended up hurting her bad enough to put her in the hospital. He was removed and is under house arrest with family until court plays out. I know he didn’t mean to hurt our child, but I am struggling so hard. Not with the single parenting part— that’s fine. I have childcare and I have everything I need for that and I’ve got a routine down now. What I’m torn about is after all of this is sorted. I know he wants to work through this as a family unit. But how do I do that? I’m struggling with it because at first I thought maybe but now I cannot see myself able to let him back in. I can’t trust him, and not being able to trust my child with him? My pets? And also myself? It hurts because yes I love him, and yes I know he wants his family, but what happens if he stops trying to get help? What happens when he gets too upset, or stressed, or overwhelmed? I hope he gets better for himself and for our child in the future, but after everything is sorted legally I don’t know what I’m going to do.
@Lawoftheland01
Many times, with legal things we cannot really plan for what is next until that is settled.
I think you really want to have a family unit like you planned for. Mental health is not something we can see is actually healing and setbacks are always a possibility. I cannot imagine the stress and confusion you must feel and the terror of how a person you love could hurt your baby. Your future has put you in a situation where you will always need to be on watch of anything.
I do feel as though I need to be on watch of anything and it’s a struggle because I shouldn’t have to panic when my child is gone for too long or not in my sight. I do want a family unit and I wish it were more traditional but honestly? Nothing in my life is traditional so I don’t know why I expected this to be traditional.
And yes mental health is hard to see and healing comes with setbacks, but when you try to create an environment and put in place safeguards and tools to actively aid in support and prevention of drastic measures, it hurts when those setbacks happen to inflict pain and even hospitalization to yourself or others. I offered every tool and every safeguard and every alternative— people on call to relieve him, babysitters I could drop her off with, being on call, taking on all the nights so he wouldn’t have to, and even trying to find more professional help for him, even if that meant breaking the bank to afford it. He didn’t reach out because he didn’t want to “pawn his kid off” and it hurts. And it hurts more because of every support is offered and you refuse once, who’s to say it won’t happen again?
@Lawoftheland01
I am sorry he does not see he needs help and asking someone to take baby was not pawning her off but saving her from what happened.