sons and their wives

@Lolo81 He was abused by my ex. He may have some PTSD but he ha never been willing to engage with any of the psychiatrists and therapists I have taken him to. He is very dismissive of counsellors as well. I am a bit clueless as to know what to suggest.

@annodomini thats really nice I was like that with DS's ex fiance. He does pick nice girls, I'll say that for him! His wife seems nice! I hope we can move forwards for his sake and also because of my GC.

In contrast, My eldest DS always picked awful girls who were mean to my other kids and rude and dissmissive of me. His wife, my DIL who I mentioned last year behaved appallingly. Unfortunately eldest DS is close to his abusive Dad and takes after him a lot. He had spent all his formative years with this man, to my regret.

My profound sympathy. As their father was abusive this rather sounds that they have inherited his trait and I am rather concerned about the Mental Health issues, as the aggressive behavior is escalating, do you think it might get violent?.

Can you shed any light how the MH issues presented themselves in their teenage years, was drink or drug use involved to your knowledge.

It has got violent in the past and my DH is wary of him. He felt he was escalating the other day and said he walked away as he felt at risk.

MH issues: drink and drugs, self harm: particularly self harm when he claimed that he had been attacked but medical professionals and police who attended the scene felt that he had done it to himself.

A few times he had been rushed into hospital after collapsing- it has been suggested that he OD-ed for attention/drama rather than there being a medical cause.

Whenever he has been under extreme pressure, he stops eating and also once ignored me for two whole weeks while living in the same house. Before he was sectioned he was not washing, eating or leaving his room and had been injecting something and barricaded himself in. We were worried about OD as it had been suggested before.

Obviously after the section he was very displeased and now many years on seems to hold a grudge.

Lavazza1st, Reading about the background of your family I think you have tried very hard to be supportive to your sons. I genuinely beleive our children inherit traits from both parents and as your sons have got older, these traits - good and - manifest. I feel you have done all you can to be supportive but dealing with mental illness and also abuse can be overwhelming. You cannot change these inbred traits in your sons but take a step back to limit your exposure to more heartache. No doubt you have sought counselling for yourself to try to understand the situation. This is not your fault.

“Traits - good and bad”

OP I think you hit the nail on the head with nature/nurture. Without going into detail I have experience of this and it is often genetic and also in studies, it’s been found that children are very much influenced up to 2 yrs of age. So if your ex was abusive when these boys were tiny it’s been absorbed i to their psyche.

Also I didn’t see anything in your OP that was placing blame on your DIL.

Thanks Tickingbird. I hoped very much by marrying a non dramatic man that my sons would be influenced by him...we hoped by nurture that we could overcome the past. But we were wrong and have suffered for it.