Big Mama,
I know how hard that first step can be but when you feel you are ready to take it and do you will feel so much better. If you take your children to a family members or friends house in the same town but make sure it is somewhere he has no clue where that person lives then you have done nothing wrong. Trust me my mom did it once with my little sister and I. She had called the cops the night she did it and even the cops said as long it was in the same town and she didn't leave the state with us she would be doing nothing wrong.