my boyfreind behaved the same way. he was secretive, different around me etc. i thought he was the nicest man in the world, a real saint. he used to tell me “i love you” at;east 100 times a day. i never thought the following would happen:

turns out he dint want to be in the relationship but was afraid of hurting my feelings so never said it. he had already told everyone else we had broken up 8 months ago. i came to know much later. also came to know he was secretly having crush on 4 other girls. now we are finally breaking up.

Sherry,
what I see in your post is a man whos words and actions don’t match.
He is not a child who doesn’t know what he does. He knows and he still acts that way: drinks, doesn’t come home, picks fights if you ask him for explanation, makes no time for you, even hits you.
There are little options in this case, I’d say. The best thing to do would be doing something good FOR YOU.
Does that man make you happy? Doesn’t seem so, as you don’t know what measures to undertake in order to put things into place. Going back to whats good for you – is a life without a proper care and respect of your man good for you? Don’t think so.
I do believe you love him, but I don’t believe he loves you. And I suspect you have little love for yourself as well, or else you’d kick the man, who hits you, right to the curb.
Where is love, there is no abuse, neither physical nor mental.
I suggest that you make the effort to create a joyous life for you and your child, instead of wasting your energy for some man who obviously doesn’t care about you at all.
Please resist the temptation to “help him save himself” and to brush his horrible behaviour with you under the rug, and let that man go, he is no good.