EPG's personal story
I was the main caregiver for 10 years to my daughter and son. My wife returned to full time work as soon as possible and I went part time so that i could be there for my children. During this time there were often outbursts from my wife when she did not get her own way. She would be home late away on weekends often yet when I wanted a day off it would result in verbal and emotional abuse.
It's hard to notice when you’re in the situation but in hindsight all the flags are much more obvious. Friends would comment about how I was taking financial advantage of her while other would try and talk me up, clearly this was a result of how she talked about me behind my back. She was always secretive about her phone and who she was taking to.
About 18 months before we separated she began putting me down for my work, my appearance, my intellect. On one occasion I had gone out to take flowers to her friends funeral and came home to find every picture of me and my children thrown in a corner along with every gift they had given me for fathers day. She then started telling my daughter that I was trying to kill her, simple things like a loose paver at the back door we're me attempting to kill her. She would regularly tell me that she wished I was dead and that I should kill myself. My daughter then started saying this to me as well.
One morning I was trying to make a cofffee when my daughter attacked me with a knife. my wife came in and screamed at me for bleeding on the floor. I threatened to call the police and left the house. When I came back later my wife and daughter had packed to leave. My son stayed for a couple of days before she came back for him. Two weeks later I was served with a domestic violence order, I wish I had taken one out myself many times before. Now I am the one who has to defend my reputation, spend thousands of dollars proving that I am the victim not the perpetrator. I have lost my daughter as she had sided with her mother who gives her everything she wants. She is gradually turning my son against me.
Yet I am still the bad guy in the eyes of the law because until I go to court to fight her claims the system judges' men guilty until they prove their innocence. If you read this and are experiencing anything similar, don't wait, don't think it will get better, don't give them the opportunity. Take action now - don't threaten to call the police, go and see them straight away before the tables are turned on you.