What would you do...talk about being hung to dry..

csully397

This might look long dull and boring...but do read and leave an opinion.

Im engaged to be married to a great girl who is the sister of my now former closest friend's wife.. I grew up with this guy.

My friend since the day he met his wife over a decade ago till now that he is married with kids has never had a trusting or stable relationship with his partner...ie constant bickering belittling and war of words. They simply cannot speak to one another kindly at all.
In fact the reason they married was because his now wife didnt want her younger siblings to be married before her.
It has even gone as far as he has physically hit her a few times once by his own admission to me, he has cheated numerous times by his own admission to me also as recent as 8 weeks before his own wedding and 7 months after. 
I know he has more history than what i am mentioning.
Anyway from the day i met my partner he has constantly warned me of my partners  other sister who he told me is always the trouble insecure type  and no matter what she does on you you will always be wrong in the eyes of the inlaws if you react.
Anyway myself and that sister clashed...didn't  speak...got over it...keep our distance....move on...works fine for both of us.

Back to my supposed friend he is the type of person that would be in your ear stating all the dysfunctional traits of the inlaws and other people for that matter,what to watch for,whats going etc. Gossiping would be another trait of his.(snake in the grass comes to mind)
A hatred which stems from an issue between his family and his wife's as far back as when their 1st born arrived.(over 10 years ago)
All to do with him not being there, then his family wanting to visit the 1st grandchild and her family making a point she was too tired..tensions..fallout...bitterness etc.
(1st fact )
He has not seen any of his children born.
(Remember this fact for later on.)

Aswell as me having a public spat with the insecure sister my ex friend is always commenting about how he hates her and how she is constantly causing havoc for everyone. And in fairness she is but because i keep my  distance from her it doesn't affect my day to day life. If ive a problem with her id let it be known subtly and vice versa, whereas he texts me to say she is causing trouble again maybe expecting me to react for him i think.

The insecure sister was expecting her 1st child and while myself, my partner her mother and the pregnant sister were sitting at the table having a general conversation talking about giving birth etc  etc the topic was brought up about if the father of the child was going into the birth and it was firmly answered of course he was he is the father and should be there which further lead onto the insecure sister not maliciously at all mentioning the fact that my friend had not been in for the birth for any of his children. 

Anyhow as coincidence would have it my friend and his now wife had had one of their trademark bustups and i was receiving the now expected regular text telling how much of a useless *&#@ she is and a psycho the now usual insults that were just apparently normal to each other we spoke on the phone as he was so wound up he had punched a wall in their home etc etc.
I asked him to explain whats going on and he went off on a tangent about how his wife's  mother in law and sisters were all the same *&$#@! up in the head they are and all they do is bring up the past and throw it in your face. 
I tried to console him by agreeing with him and that not to let it bother him that thats how these people just operate and that rise above it just to make him feel better.He proceeded to explain to me that he wanted to leave her (again) flustered  telling me he is fed up, that all this aggro has been going on since the birth of the 1st child and keeps getting thrown in his face and again i tried dampening the issue and told him again thats what these people do bluttering out sure it was only said last week at the table. Thinking he would feel proven right and better than them forget the argument happened and that id diffused the issue instead he went wild is the only way i can describe it. It was only because it was the troubled sister that he took such a negative stance on what was said.
That conversation happened close to 2 and half years ago.

Now to date....
Nothing much changed they still fought with each other  but tried to portray an image of happiness and perfection on facebook but behind closed doors was a whole different story and all bad

Anyhow last week i recieve a text telling me that the sister was causing murder..and that if he found out she said about the whole being present for the birth thing all that time ago he would cause a war amongst some very other nasty obsenities that i cant type. But i can assure you they were cruel and unpleasant.
i replied asking whats up...
I said id call down next day to speak with him and not to cause any trouble. 
But it was too late he used it like ammunition what and threw it in his wife's face. I couldnt believe it i was gutted he'd done this.
His wife then called my partner roaring at her trying to find out if this was true bear in mind this is 30 months later we had all forgotten the conversation had ever happened so my partner was oblivious to what was going on.
i had to explain that i had told my friend this one day to make him feel like he was right about a hotheaded bustup with his wife but that id realised i made a mistake saying it after i seen him take it so personally. Not to say she went mad at me.i was feeling more gutted both i and he done this. 
Now things were starting to heat up we were told the initial cause of their argument was
apparently to do with his wife being paranoid about him talking to his sister about her insecure sister because of a previous incident that had involved them all.they went quiet when she walked into the room.This lead to the bustup between them which he also broke his hall door from striking it. 
His wife then called her insecure sister with whom she was initially backing up,to start at her over the table comment 30 months ago. Of course she had no recollection of this either. I was beginning to look more and more the bad guy fabricating stories to make the insecure sister look bad when to begin with my day was going great till i got the text from my friend over an argument that didnt involve me at all.
it was spiralling at this stage...calls and texts going everywhere. 
Eventually i spoke to my friends wife who was like an angry bull in a china shop calling me all the names under the sun accusing me of making this up. I assured her it was  said but not in the context which it was thrown at her by her husband.
She began explaining how the argument started  and how she felt she was being degraded and insulted and fearful because of my friends actions.
So i asked the obvious WHY ARE YOU STILL WITH HIM??? I got no reply 
i eventually spoke to the insecure sister via text messages  to explain to her how i came about talking to my friend and that it was never said to go against her. That i received a message that day out of nowhere from my friend going nuts about her...so to prove my point I forwarded  the obscene messages to her to show how i was brought into it. As i was fed up having the finger pointed at me.

The next day i was left a nasty voicemail from my friend stating i was a psycho troublemaker among other things  and how dare i ask his wife what is she doing with him..to the extent of being threatend that next time he sees me he wants to punch my face in...he has since cut all contact via phone or social media.
i was very  hurt mentally by this as all along ive tried back him up, ive kept his dirty secrets to myself all his badmouthing about everyone, physical abuse ive never told anyone. And this one thing i tell him he takes it up wrong uses it against his wife and i believe now that he knew he could manipulate it to get at his wife but it would come back on me...and that it did.

It has all turned on me as if i said the birth thing or started the argument. 


i now look and feel like ive hurt everyone when I never intended for any of this to happen.

i apologise for the length of the story 
but I would appreciate any help and helpful opinions about where and how i should go about things. ..

R.D. aka MR.D

I think you now realize that your biggest mistake was getting involved at all.

There is no point looking back now and all you can do is focus on making things better in the future.

Making things better for you and your wife, not your friend. You should leave well enough alone.

Remove yourself from any further involvement. Just say, 'I've made the mistake in the past of getting involved in things that aren't my business but now I just want a quiet life'. End of conversation.
If someone comes to you complaining about something/someone, say 'I'm sorry but I don't think that's any of my business.'


On this exact situation if anyone approaches you on it, tell you you realize that you made a big mistake by getting involved and you won't get any further involved so it's not up for discussion.

You might rub some people up the wrong way but you won't get any deeper into the situation that you are already in.


Keep yourself to yourself and be civil.


As an aside and I honestly don't know what the best advice here is but I'm sure more experienced posters here will have a better opinion. Your sister-in-law is in an abusive relationship. It seems like nobody cares about that. She has to make the decision to leave but maybe your wife's family could work to support her in making that decision.

Lalealynn

He sounds like a controlling nutjob. But don't them drain you. You can't really get in with negative people or people who want to abuse you all you can do is be the adult or try to be without allowing their negativity and jibes into your life or head. All you can do is be positive. Trust me.

Learn from them how NOT to be. That's not what love should look like. Drama is repetitive and boring.

Trouble is when you get involved in a family spat they ALL unite and turn against you it's just the way things are. Family circles make up after spats as do those in abusive relationships (for a while anyway) you will be the one damaged.

You deserve better than that. You deserve better friends.

anndub

I'm completely flabbergasted that your main concern is for how look as opposed to the fact that your sister in law is being beaten by her husband and has admitted she is afraid. And there are children in the household witnessing this every day.

You can't believe he would turn on you when you have been so kind hearted as to not tell anyone about the punches he throws at his wife. Do you really think that you deserve a pat on the back for enabling an abuser?

This story had made me very angry. I think you need to take along hard look at yourself, your post has come across as very self absorbed. If you understand the difference between right and wrong you still start taking steps to support your sister in law to get out of her marriage and stop worrying about yourself.

OP I don't think you were dropped in it. You interfered once, maybe meaning well, but when that blew up you kept interfering and passing on messages and causing trouble. Aside from the abuse, family squabbles are just that. Stop buddying up with everyone and then passing on what they're saying about each other. Of course the finger was pointed at you.

These people are dysfunctional and unhappy by the sounds of it and yet all you care about is how you look and getting into more drama and stoking the fire.

If you want to go around telling people stuff - do it one last time and tell the wife's family that the man is hitting her, that she is afraid, and that you are done with it. Give her some information about resources that will help her.
Then walk away and consider your involvement in the situation. As well as standing by while a friend of yours hits their spouse

sadie06

csully397 wrote: »

..he has since cut all contact via phone or social media.
.

What a great result for you! You should be delighted. Why would you want to be friends with an aggressive, wife beating, cheating, s*** stirring gossip?

Put your efforts into encouraging his wife to get away from him! It is decidedly odd that at no point during your unbelievably long post was any concern expressed for the safety of their children or their mental health having to witness all of this. It seems that the extended family (including you at this stage) view it all as one big stage managed drama. Perhaps it is to a certain degree, which would explain why they haven't separated, but that's not the way it must feel to the children who have to live with it day in day out. She needs to get away from him.

You seem to have become sucked in to this drama and have lost perspective. His family is dysfunctional and he is a violent cheating scumbag. You should have withdrawn your friendship a long time ago. Take a step back from the family dynamics that have become your norm, and really look at this.

Mr. Incognito

If any of my friends told me they hit their wife I would tell him that I do not want to know him and would urge her to tell her family, call the cops and get a barring order.

This is not normal. This is dsyfunctional.

jopax

Yes you do look like the bad guy and trouble maker with regards to your wife's family, there is no doubt about that.
You did wrong to get involved at all, especially forwarding on texts, it sounds very petty.
Anyhow that time is gone now, the best thing you can do is learn from this. They all sound nuts to be honest.
The fact that you got embroiled in all this shows that you have lost all sense of prespective.
I can understand you feeling like you don't deserve any of this and it doesn't seem fair.
Am sorry to say but I don't think there is much you can do at this stage to resolve your reputation.
I would advise just keeping away from it all and just spend quality time with your wife.
Make sure you keep all that toxic crap away from your own relationship and just be grateful you don't have a marriage like theirs.

ABajaninCork

What would I do? I'd be passing these people like an exam! They're not all the ticket.

Just stay away from them. Oh - and keep your mouth shut!

Yarf Yarf

You're as much of a trouble maker as any of them. You're adding fuel to the fire and then wondering why you're being embroiled in all the madness. You should be more concerned about the fact that you've covered up for and enabled a man who beats his wife. Take a look at yourself.

LegacyUser

Wow someone admits to you that he beats his wife and you do nothing.
He is an abusive husband, who clearly has some serious anger issues, who is violent to his wife.
And to be honest you're just as bad as him. By doing nothing (keeping his "secrets" ) you have allowed the abuse against his wife to be perpetuated. You have allowed him to keep beating her. You're essentially said 'it's fine to hit your wife".

Why do you think this violent cheating lying scumbag kept texting you and informing you about the relationship? He did so because the vast majority of men (and women) would have told him they wanted nothing to do with him the second he told them he hit his wife, they would have told him he wasn't scumbag and they'd report him, get help for his wife and kids. You did nothing. You supported him. You supported his actions. Of course he was going to fill you in on his disfunctional relationship because you essentially endorsed it and endorsed domestic abuse.

To make matters even worse his wife is your fiances sister! You new her own sister was being beaten, and you did nothing, you actually acted as a confident for her abuser! Whatever you may think of your fiances sister as a person, how do you think your fiance will feel knowing her husband to be stood by and let her sister be abused (not to mention cheated on etc)? If I were her I'd dump you on the spot tbh.

The very first thing you should do is report this violent scumbag for abuse, and then tell your fiancé and her family that is being beaten by her husband. Something you should have done the second he told you he'd hit her.

Your post made me so angry OP, I'll refrain from saying what I think of you and your behaviour, but at least do the right thing now and help this woman and her children escape the obviously incredibly violent and dangerous home environment your "friend" has created. Stop allowing the abuse to continue, nobody, no matter how you dislike them deserves to be abused, and her children don't deserve to see their mother beaten, verbally abused, and treated like dirt by their own father.

LegacyUser

The next day i was left a nasty voicemail from my friend stating i was a psycho troublemaker among other things and how dare i ask his wife what is she doing with him..to the extent of being threatend that next time he sees me he wants to punch my face in...he has since cut all contact via phone or social media.
i was very hurt mentally by this

Just to add, the above happened because you simply questioned his wife on why she didn't leave him.
He threatened to beat you up just for that. And you "were hurt mentally"

Stop thinking about yourself for a second. Now imagine the abuse his wife would get (probably has gotten) if she actually tried to leave. Do you think he'd just let her walk away without punishment, he threatened to beat the crap out of you for merely suggesting she do so, imagine how he'd threaten and abuse her if she actually tried.

Oh and the way you felt hurt mentally, imagine feeling like that every second of every day.

That's why she's still with him. That and the fact that she has no support. The one person who knows what kind of abusive scumbag her husband is, (you), has washed their hands of the situation. Has done nothing to support or help her or her kids.

csully397

Ive got to say first of all thanks for the replies

Im not sure how to reply individually so here is a general reply.

The word "BEATEN" is being mentioned an awful lot which makes it sound like its happening everyday, personally I cant imagine that this is the case. The events I mentioned are all I know of.

The reason I forwarded on the texts was to prove that I was minding my own business that day because everyone was lead to believe by him that the events that day unfolded because of my interference.


As regards doing nothing about his actions that is the complicated issue...Say nothing everyone is at peace.....say something and if she doesn't believe it I look the fool again...Its up to her to act not me.

So I am now looking at the avenue whereby I just leave them to it...its not up to me to influence anyone's decision and hope that the street angel house devil gets caught out and when he does just nod and smile knowing I was right....

But to be honest the nice person in me would want to be there for them all if it did....

Rubberchikken

My advice, for what it's worth is, make sure you and your partner are there for this woman when she finally gets the courage to walk away from this abusive relationship.
Stop texting/phoning/gossiping about others and what they're doing or not doing.

And ignore this guy. He's no friend. Tbh he's barely human.

Yarf Yarf

csully397 wrote: »

The word "BEATEN" is being mentioned an awful lot which makes it sound like its happening everyday, personally I cant imagine that this is the case. The events I mentioned are all I know of

Laying a hand in violence on your partner even once is unacceptable. It doesn't matter if it happened once or many times, it's not something to be trivialized. This man seems to have violent tendencies anyway. He admits he hit his wife, he threatened to beat you up and broke a door in a rage. She said she was afraid. You're very naive or just wilfully ignorant or too self absorbed if you think he doesn't hit her often.

LegacyUser

This ex friend is a complete coward, and always has been. The reason he "hates" the particular sisters and his wife is that they stand up to him and he assigns blame to everyone except himself for his own failures, faults and short comings in life. He has always been this way and has always been a coward. But your ex friend is a familiar type to me, the sort who would shag anything with a hole because he could and wouldn't care for someone's feelings, the sort of coward who know he can manipulate and trample over loved ones, especially women and children, with put downs and trampling all over their self esteem and knowing he will have done it so long they won't ever leave but will take it, and most definitely the sort of scum who will go to great lengths to bring you down to his level, and to bait you into behaving like him, in forcing you to fight with him and start fights with him so that he can always have a fight when it suits, and it will always be someone else's fault.

You have become as much as a snake in the grass as you describe him. You have stirred the pot and have got involved and are in it up to your neck as thick and as deep as your ex friend. It's no surprise that the minute you turned your back on him even halfway that he would be onto you with threats, he will be onto everyone with ears to tell all he knows about you or save it for "revenge" when you least expect it.

To me it sounds like your friendship was founded out of fear, as this guy and his actions and behaviours were always there even if you were friends since childhood. It screams to me you are afraid to stand up to this guy and always have been and have preferred to err on his "good side" in being his confident on his exploits from cheating to violence and everything in between.

My gut instinct would be that if I actually knew him, his wife, you and everyone else, I would be on the phone calling social services and having the children removed from your ex friend and his wife. Why? Because I suspect that the wife could be at this stage, less of a person than she used to be and equally as toxic as your ex friend and prone to retaliation of an equal footing that your ex friend is capable of. But I would be reporting him for his violent behaviour, it might be just his wife he has hit once or twice, but maybe he hasn't told you how often he has done it that would repulse you enough that would have you abandon him - his "friendship" with you is a means to gain validation for how he has always behaved, and someone to gleefully tell all his exploits to, so losing you is a major blow to his ego and confidence - or indeed how much furniture has been damaged, or even if his kids have been hit. And it wouldn't be beneath him to hit his kids.

You would be doing a favour by telling the family what you know, especially the cheating - how many stds has your ex friend been spreading around - so that at least the wife can get medically checked out and help them end a bitter marriage that is never going to ever be a happy one.

If you want to know what the right thing to do is, then you go to the Gardai and report this scum based on the threats he has made to you and also inform the Gardai of the domestic violence going on between them that he has told you. They probably won't act on what you tell them that was told to you, but at least it might give a foundation for the wife's complaints should she ever make them against her husband. If anything I feel for the poor children caught up and at least someone should know that there is domestic violence in their home and for someone to act upon it.

I think the time of staying silent to please everyone is now over and the time of telling all to authorities has come.