Whatever hypothetical legal charge you’d apply is irrelevant. Please don’t minimize what he did. It wasn’t “stupid”. It was deadly. Kind, loving, rational men do not do this to their families.
Be your own best friend- what would you say to your best friend if she told you such a story? Would you make excuses for her husband’s behavior or agree with her if she did? Be as good a friend to yourself as you would to someone else.
That’s scary crazy.
Regardless of what his initial intent might be, if he does things like this he’s going to end up hurting somebody: you, your kids, or himself. And after somebody’s been seriously injured or killed, saying “I didn’t mean to do that” isn’t going to change things.
He needs to learn how to handle his anger without lashing out, for his sake as well as everyone else’s. Now that the legal system has gotten involved, there will probably be recommendations for counseling. He needs to work with the counseling and not resist it.
Sounds like your husband has a mental illness, and a dangerous and severe one. It’s not a “bad attitude,” or a simply a moral weakness, but a mental disorder that prevents him from functioning just like a physical disability would in its way. You both need to acknowledge this and respect it. Fix it as much as it can be fixed, and feed it as little as possible with excuses and allowances.
Real world your marriage is pretty much over it’s just sputtering on the last fumes.
He may make nice and apologize in the short term just to get back in the house and take stock, he may even make noises about going to therapy, but do not be deceived, he is ragingly furious with you for calling the police and getting him locked up. Top of his mind right now is how to divorce you in the cleanest manner possible and still maintain some visitation with the kids. He will be seeing an attorney in the next few weeks as to how to accomplish this. I can practically guarantee you this. I suggest you get an attorney as well.
If you think he has achieved some epiphany at the hands to the police you are wildly mistaken, whatever problems you two had are now magnified by a power of 10.
Right now you need to be focusing on your post divorce life as a single mother with 4 kids and how you are going to work out the logistics of making this transition.
How do you figure that he has a mental illness?
I’m glad he’s in jail with the personality you’re describing. While he’s there find family or friends you can stay with and get out. A man who can’t control his temper and lashes out with childlike temper tantrums is no man who deserves the responsibility of a wife and kids.
I admit to being sensitive to this topic. An acquaintance of mine recently killed his wife letting his daughter find her mom’s dead body. This happened in McKinney Tx and was in the news but I won’t say any more on that. As things have come to light after the murder we realize that he had a history of abuse that she was hiding from everybody she knew. Some girls in my group knew a little more that she let on and they were trying to get her to divorce but she’d always say “no, that’s just not my faith, I believe marriage is forever”. Then the day came when he let his temper go too far.
Do what you have to do to get on your own 2 feet and get him out of your life. I don’t care what kind of fears you feel right now, when he’s firmly in your rearview mirror and you surround yourself with people who love you and respect you and treat you right then you’ll see that walking was the single best decision you ever made in your entire life. Seriously, get out.
I’m sorry you’re going through this. I’m afraid the next few days are going to be really hard, for you and your children.
I wish I didn’t know this from experience.
My immediate concern is what’s going to happen when he’s released.
Or to put it more bluntly, who’s he going to blame?
You think abusers remove themselves from a situation that makes them mad? Well, some do of course, but not usually. They like being mad.
I’m sorry this happened to you Palo Verde. When my husband used to drink he would be violent towards me. I had always told myself I would never stay in an abusive relationship, but I stayed. I know it’s a lot easier said than done. You probably won’t leave, and neither will he, but at least try to go to some counseling. If he won’t go for himself, at least go for you and your kids. It can help make you a stronger person (it did for me) and more courageous to do whatever you need to for you and your kids.
The part you’re missing is that she did not tolerate his acting up physically and immediately called the police.
From his perspective whatever the dynamic is that causes them to go at it (the OP did not go into it) he cannot indulge his rage or he will get taken to prison. If whatever (again from his perspective) the OP is doing that causes him to lose his shit when they argue is not rectified he will be in constant danger of going to jail.
Assuming he is not completely insane, and both he and the OP are not willing to make a sea change in the way they interact with each other his only option is to leave the house if he wishes to avoid arguments and stay out of jail. Alternatively he could live onsite but withdraw emotionally and interactionally to avoid arguments with the OP while he figures out his options. This is likely to piss the OP off royally and will probably create another confrontation.
Whatever is happening it’s likely there’s a lot more to the story than just a crazed, violent man going off on his innocent wife. Unless both parties are willing to acknowledge their part in that argument dynamic and change their behavior substantially nothing will change. The only way this is going to change is if both the OP and her husband are sincerely committed to changing the way they interact. There’s something serious at issue here between them that is going unsaid by the OP.
Getting picked up by the police may cause him to re-asses his life, but the chances of this happening are very small.
The only thing that will give him pause in this is if he does the math and (assuming he’s not wealthy per the OP’s concern about being unemployed) he will realize he will be living like a pauper after CS for 4 kids is extracted from his paycheck.
How do you figure? In all my years of driving, never once have I or anyone else shut off my car while it was in motion. I might be able to guess what would happen, but it’s certainly not something I know from experience.
(That said, I’m certainly not defending him or what he did.)
I’ve driven cars that have lost power through other means and it’s pretty scary, especially at high speeds. Steering and brakes revert to manual and it can be tough to control the vehicle.
Personal experience.
Frustrated people can try to shout each other down. Immature people initiate small scale violence that easily escalates. Mentally ill people do deadly impulsive acts to “make a point.”
I got a guy arrested (well, he got his own dumb ass arrested but I did file a police report) and he was furious at me. He still wanted to keep seeing me though (I declined).
If he’s “only” been physically abusive twice in their whole long marriage, he’s probably not planning to do it again anytime soon (he likely WILL, but he probably doesn’t think so). I’m sure he’s emotionally abusive much more regularly but that’s not going to get him arrested.
It wasn’t an argument, it was a physical assault and she is not complicit in being assaulted. And yes, plenty of abusers do go off out of completely nowhere. If someone has an abusive mentality, there is literally nothing you can do to stop them from finding reasons to do it. You can probably prevent some instances, but there will always be some.
I do agree that probably nothing will change if she does stay with him.
I don’t think it points to insanity as much as it indicates the fact that he’s either not very smart or has no familiarity with what happens to maneuverability when you shut a car’s engine off, possibly both. Modern cars are reliable enough many adults have never been in a car that lost power while traveling.
“Argument” vs “assault” is a distinction without a difference if one is going to lead to the other. If he’s really just a sociopath then you have point, but most scenarios like this are not some crazy person looking for a violent fight, but an argument dynamic between frustrated people that escalates to shouting and potentially physical violence. You need to change the argument dynamic or nothing else will change.
Add my voice to the voices saying, please make that phone call. You don’t need to commit to anything right now, but you need someone who knows the legal and social ropes that surround domestic violence and who can be your advocate.
No one who gives a shit about their family, no matter how sophisticated or rudimentary their knowledge of cars is, would turn off the engine as they and their family are speeding down a road.
I don’t think you really understand much about abusive men. They do intentionally, calculatingly pick fights for fun and sport and they don’t have to be sociopaths to do it.
The solution to a man who thinks he has the right to assault his wife because they’re arguing is not to make sure they don’t argue. First and foremost he needs to realize he doesn’t have that right, then other relationship issues can be addressed. You can’t work on them in an environment of abuse.
One thing it explains in the book I linked to earlier is that anger doesn’t cause abuse; an abusive/entitled mentality causes anger. An example he gave was a women whose child from a previous relationship was missing for a couple days and the woman was frantic of course. The husband felt his needs were being neglected during that time, so he blew up at his wife.
That man didn’t need to find better ways to cope with his anger, he needed to realize he shouldn’t have been angry in the first place. Even if he had been just silently seething and didn’t let on to his wife, he’s still a selfish asshole with a very fucked up outlook.