29/07/2025
They will be okay.
If you are asking, "how can I leave, and will they be okay"
- I can assure you, they will be okay.
Over the years, I’ve watched many friends stay in relationships that are violent, unsafe, emotionally draining, or just downright heavy. They put their emotional needs last, and try to imagine how the other adult might parent the kids without them - and that thought alone keeps them stuck. They convince themselves it’s better for the kids if they stay. Especially if they are financially dependent on their other half during the younger years, they normally have no financial backings, so tend to suggest "I'll just wait until I've saved enough to leave" for example.
But I want to ask you something.
If one day your kids are adults and they ask you, “Why did you stay?”
And you say, “To keep you safe. To make sure you were happy.”
What if they respond, “Hang on… how come our happiness was more important than yours?”
Would they carry the weight of your suffering and see themselves as the reason? Would they blame themselves that you couldn't breathe and be free?
You can suffer through it, try to detach emotionally, or stay stuck - but what is that teaching your children?
In most cases, when two people cannot work on themselves enough to support a relationship that is loving, kind, protective, and respectful, the children will ultimately learn to suppress their needs, to stay silent, and to accept that love has to hurt or they become hypervigilant, sensitive and observant to people's energy (hello dis-ease/sicknesses too).
So… are you really saving them?
Or are you showing them that love looks like self-sacrifice and silence?
I left when my kids were one and three.
I’ve been a single parent for eight years. And emotionally? I’d already left long before that.
When my son was born, I had two postnatal nurses sit on my couch and say - very carefully, very hesitantly - “You don’t have postnatal depression. What you have is a narcissistic husband and a mother-in-law who enables his behaviour.”
,
They told me they weren’t supposed to say that kind of thing - professionally, it crossed major boundaries - but both of them had felt so uncomfortable around him they needed to tell me. He was emotionally unavailable, and they could see what I was going through, without really saying anything.
It took me almost a year to make the move.
But it came down to one question:
If nothing changes, how long am I willing to put up with this as it currently stands?
And when I did leave, my family didn’t support my decision - in fact, they made me feel like I was making the biggest mistake of my life. To this day, those relationships remain broken for many reasons.
But I still left.
And if I can do it - alone, unsupported - you can too.
It’s not impossible.
It’s not selfish.
It’s actually one of the most loving things you can do for your children - to model safety, strength, and self-respect.
Because here’s the truth I’ve learned through healing:
Abuse wrapped in love is not love.
So ask yourself honestly:
Where are you accepting that?
And what are you teaching your children by accepting it?