Hello everyone. Some of you may recall me from late last year and early this year. It appears my thread is gone so it's time for me to start all over and I'll start from the beginning.
I'm 43 my W is 42 our sons are 22yrs and 14yrs. We have been together for over 25yrs and Oct3 will be our 20th wedding anniversary.
Our relationship has been a classic love/hate one. We either were in love with each other or hated each other. Before we were married and once after we married I did physically abuse her. She says she forgave me for that and I have not touched her like that in close to 20 years.
About three years into our marriage we separated due to how I mistreated her. I wasn't attentive to her and I was very selfish and I basically talked to her like crap and did whatever I pleased. During our separation she started seeing an old boyfriend of hers and it went on for a few months until I finally had enough of it and told her she had to chose between me or him. Obviously she chose me and she moved back in a month or two after that decision.
Things were ok for us for a while and eventually after a few years I slipped back into not treating her like she should have been treated. I know I was emotionally abusive towards her and again acted very selfish and did as I pleased with no regard for her. So around 2002 we were becoming very distant and I don't recall if I tried to speak to her about but she did tell me that she considered us separated. Once I was told that I did the classic beg, plead, chase etc. even going so far as to get her her first cell phone. I even went out of my way to go pick it up at a FEDEX location, little did I know.
I asked my mother for advice during this time and she advised me to give my wife space and time which I had a hard time doing. My wife started to go out with friends from work to happy hours more and more. My memory says it was at least once a week and my gut was starting to tell me something. At my mothers insistence I took my sons to my parents house and me and my boys spent a Fri or a Sat night with my parents. Come bedtime for my boys I called my wife so they could say goodnight to her and then we talked and when I asked where she was she told me she was at her girlfriends house. My gut told me otherwise and the next day I started checking her phone records and lo and behold she wasn't where she told me she was because the cellphone bill at that time would show where she was when a call came in or when she made one.
Naturally she denied cheating after telling where she really was at but I knew better. This went on for several months until I finally had enough of the lies and I went and told her parents about her affair and I even called her boss. Naturally she was extremely pissed off at me but it wasn't long after I told her boss about the affair that the company fired this guy(she was seeing a co-worker).
A few months passed with no progress on our marriage when one day I decided I couldn't live like we were living and I moved out of our house and in with my parents. My wife was ok with that until she found out that I started seeing another woman. The day she found out she called my cell phone at least 20 times. When I finally talked to her she was livid and upset she even missed some time at work because she couldn't function. This lasted about a month when my wife had me make a decision between her or the other woman and I broke it off with the other woman.
Eventually we worked on things and in the spring of 2004 I moved back home. Things were good for some time but some of my old habits came back such as not being there for her not being loving and not going places with her. I would say I became the typical guy who gets lazy and she did her thing and I did mine we weren't spending time together.
This latest separation(according to her) started at about this time last year. I could really feel us drifting and I decided to talk with her about it when we were out to dinner alone. I told her I could feel us drifting apart and that I don't want us to be one of these old couples who live separate lives and that I would like to do things together. She proceeded to tell me that she was so used to doing thigs on her own and that she liked it and that she was tired of everything and that there was a specific incident that caused this. She also told me that she didn't want to be married anymore.
In July of 2011 my wife and I were at a bar for a reunion of old friends and one of our friends asked how we made it so long and I said I don't know we sleep in a king size bed she doesn't touch me (I was complaining about our lack of sex). My wife heard that and wasn't pleased so she is talking with one old friend who used to have a crush on her over 25 yrs ago and I was mad that she was paying attention to him and not me so I gave her an attitude when she asked me a question in front of him. Well when we got home that night she let me have it saying she was never more embarrassed in her life. She even told me that before all that happened she had wanted to have sex that night with me but since that happened she said no way. So this is the point where the drifting really started.
Needless to say but after that dinner that night in Oct I was devastated. I believe I started begging chasing and pleading to no avail. I became depressed and cried and lost a lot of weight. Sometime in Nov was the last time we had sex and after it happened she said she let her guard down. Things were meh between us and one night at our youngest son's soccer game she tells me she wants a divorce and that she wants the house and wants me to help pay for it. I said that's not reasonable I need a place to live and I'll pay for our youngest son. Well that was the end of that conversation for many weeks.
Dec rolls around and her birthday is Dec 23 so she is out with her sister and their friends while I was at a benefit beef n beer for a friend of ours. Everyone was asking where my wife was so I called her and told her everyone was asking for her. She eventually shows up at the beef n beer with a major attitude towards me. We end up going home and the very next morning at the kitchen table she told me that I ruined her birthday. All she wanted to do was hang out with her sister and her friends she said. Well I told her that I was sorry that I wanted to spend time with her on her birthday. She starts crying and says she can't do this anymore and then I start crying too and hugging her. I was so upset that I had to leave the house and go to buddies to settle down for a few hours.
Sometime in Dec I was at a Christmas Party at my buddies house without my wife and one of my friends girlfriend starts talking to me when we were outside smoking and tells me that if I ever need someone to talk to that I can talk to her because she know what it is like to go through the pain of a divorce. So eventually I start texting her for advice and support and we texted a lot everyday. Nothing ever sexual just her being a friend and yes I kept this hidden from my wife.
So the holidays roll by and my wife and I spend our usual time together except for New Years Eve. New Years Eve we are supposed to go to my cousins house together but she tells me that she doesn't want me going and again I'm crushed and I start crying so I decide to go to my buddies and spend New years Eve with him and his girlfriend. On the way up to his house my wife calls to see if I'm ok and to say that she isn't staying at my cousins for very long. I spent the night at my buddies and my wife came home to an empty house since our boys stayed at their friends houses.
Now my timeline is a little off here but it was decided that we couldn't live the way we were and I told her that since she wanted to end the marriage that I was not going to move out so she tells me that by the end of Feb she will leave. Sometime in Jan I started seeing an IC for my depression and I started taking Venlafaxine because I had a lot of trouble focusing and I was always depressed and crying. I started to feel better after a few weeks on the anti-depressants.
Sometime in late Jan at one of our youngest son's indoor soccer games my wife saw me texting someone and she asked who it was and I lied to her because I was texting my buddies girlfriend and I didn't know at the time that my wife saw the name of who I was texting. So a few days later on a Sat night she comes home and goes on my cell phone account and sees who I was texting and how much and see went ballistic. She accused me of having a physical affair which I did not. So that was the end of the texting but the accusations from my wife kept coming telling me how vulnerable I am since we haven't had sex since Nov.
At that time my wife had access to all my email accounts and my FB account so I decided that I didn't want her having access since she had been telling me that she was moving out at the end of Feb. Well that didn't go over well. This was in the beginning of Feb and I had also been talking to my sister almost everyday about what was going on and my wife did not like that since her and my sister do not like each other.
So my sister invites me to a private page she has on FB and most of her female friends friended me. I made the mistake of telling them what was going on in my marriage and one of women started flirting on FB and I flirted right back. I have still to this day never physically met my sisters friends. On a Monday in Feb after my wife came home from a weekend up the mountains with her sister and her friends she asks me if I have been talking to anyone and of course I lie and say no.
Well the crap hit the fan because my wife logged into my email account that was linked to FB and saw everything I wrote about her on the private page and saw the flirting I was doing with one of my sisters friends. She accuses me of sleeping with her and my wife goes on FB and posts in the private page "how about Leo being nice to his wife for once". Well that bought an end to being on the private page and my sisters friend deleted me as a friend which made my wife really believe that we slept together. So I decided to suspend my FB for quite some time and all that drama eventually died down.
The end of Feb comes and goes and my wife doesn't move out and I don't push the issue. My sister calls my house one night and my wife answers and the two of them got into a nasty heated exchange in which my wife told her to stay out of her marriage and my sister pretty much told my wife to have a nice wife. I had to leave the house when that went down so things would calm down. My wife called while I was out driving around and she was hysterically crying and saying how she was leaving ASAP and that she told our sons she was leaving. Well again, she never left and I never bought it up.
March rolls around and things are status quo with us. Our ten year old lab became really sick and on March 20 we had to put him down. It was very hard for us and we actually hugged and she kissed me for the first time in a while not passionately.
April rolls around and as far as my wife and I go things are the same not going anywhere. I was laid off in the beginning of April which didn't make us happy naturally.
May pretty uneventful nothing happening between us.
June was a good month since our youngest son graduated grade school and my wife and I volunteered to help decorate the school hall for the dance so we did get to spend some time together. By the end of June I'm feeling depressed again (I had stopped taking my medication)mostly because I haven't been working.
July I was fortunate to go back to work for 5 weeks which took me until the middle of August. Things between the wife and I are the same not going anywhere.
August is pretty much the same between us so-so.
This past month things have been so-so I was called back to work last week from Wed to Sat and it felt good. I should make it a point to say that my wife does spend a lot of time out of the house. She does have various activities that she participates in such as playing volleyball and also coach a girls grade school volleyball team. She also likes to go walking with one of her friends and sometimes my cousin. Sometimes they go to the gym. It's not uncommon for her to be out of the house from anywhere between 7-11. She also does part time work with my cousin on the weekends selling funnel cakes and such at various shows. It's not every weekend.
So last Wed night she is out and I text her "late game" @ 10PM and that is all the message said. She comes home @ 10 minutes later and rips into me so I calmly tell her that when she talks to me like that I will not speak to her the conversation is over and that we aren't going to speak to each other like that anymore. Well she went into the living an sat and watched tv.
We get up the next morning and as I'm leaving for work I ask my wife if she will be home later that night after I'm done softball she says yes why? I told her that we needed to talk and she looked taken aback by what I said and she said ok.
So I'm driving to my softball game when she calls me after work and she starts chit chatting and then asks what I want to talk about. I told her that I wasn't going to tolerate her speaking to me like that and that if she did the conversation is over and then she tells me that that was how I treated her for years. So I told her that I was sorry for the past that I can't change it and it does no good bringing it up and that if she does our conversations will end. She told me that she doesn't trust me because of the past and then she changed the subject. That conversation ended pleasantly.
This past Sat both my wife and I had to work and I was home before she came home. I had made plans during the day to go out with one of my single friends to a bar. As I was getting ready my wife came home and asked where I was going and I told her and she says to me in a nice tone "don't I get invited"? I had given up inviting her out with me since she always says no. So I ask if she wants to go and she says yes and that she is hungry for dinner. I said ok well I haven't heard back from my friend and that we will still go out to eat. We drove to the bar separately at her suggestion because she wasn't staying out all night due to getting up early for work.
My wife and I get to the bar about a half hour before my buddy and we have a few drinks and we are talking and I decide to flirt a little with her. She was displaying a lot of cleavage so I asked her to pull her top up because I keep staring at her. She says well stop looking. I say I can't help myself do you know how long it's been? She replies "well you don't show any interest". I did not pick on that at first it took about a minute after to realize what she said. I said wait hold on did you just say that I'm not interested? Tha's not true. I may have to wake you up later to which she said please don't I really do have to get up early tomorrow. I said well maybe I'll come home early to which she didn't reply so I started talking about other things.
So my buddy shows up and we ate dinner had some drinks and my buddy and I decide we are going to a dance club since he is looking for a woman. Well my wife says she wants to go but just for one drink then go home. I said ok. So off we all go to the club. Her one drink turned into her almost staying until closing because she ran into people that she knew. Of course she was out dancing and she tells me that some guy tried to pick her up he asked if she was there with a man and she told him yes. I'm usually the type who doesn't dance but I actually did go out on the floor and dance with her for a few songs. She left before I did and when I got home she was sound asleep so I let her be.
I have noticed that since Monday I've been down in the dumps quite a bit and I'm not sure if it's the situation with my wife or if it's because I'm not working steady and worrying about the bills. I can feel a little tension in the air but I think it's because my wife is stressed out right now. It's the end of the fiscal year at work and she is extremely busy and not to forget that including her working next weekend as well as this one upcoming she will have worked 25 straight days. I will let those who read this and myself take a breather lol. I will post about what I have been doing and what I haven't been doing to try to salvage our marriage. Any replies in the meantime I do appreciate. Thanks
M 44 W 43 S 23 S 15 INILWY 9/11 Divorce Mediation started 3/13 June 30 the day W is moving out
You and your W are both going through this push and pull dynamic with each one jockeying for the dominant position. Maybe try initiating intimacy with your W to see what happens. Sounded like she was asking for it.
M-43 W-40 2D - 9 and 5
Emotion, yet peace. Ignorance, yet knowledge. Passion, yet serenity. Chaos, yet harmony. Death, yet a new life.
You are right Leo, there are some similarities between our situations.
I do agree with Bond here... at least you will know where you stand. Intimacy may be exactly what the two of you need to ignite that spark. If you can get there, maybe you can have a serious discussion about putting the past behind you and starting over.
If she rejects you... well, then I'd say it is time to really begin to DB.
M 43 X 38 T 13 W moves out of home 11/2010 Roller coaster from hell 2/2011-5/2012 I request divorce 5/2012 W moves home 6/2012 Good time 7/2012 - 1/2015 I leave 3/2016 process of divorce
First, sorry you're in pain and going through this, but based on your post it sounds very salvageable.
Quote:
By the end of June I'm feeling depressed again (I had stopped taking my medication)mostly because I haven't been working.
Did you consult your PCP before stopping or did you do it on your own? Have you started on them again since you're working now? A common problem among depressed men is that we don't want to be on medication, so we just stop taking it when we think we're "well" again. We like to think we can fix ourselves. But often we can't, and in the case of depression we're not just hurting ourselves, we're hurting everyone around us too. Go back to your PCP and get evaluated for depression. Get back on the med's if they recommend it. This could be a huge factor in what you're going through.
Also, have you read DB (or DR) lately or did you last pick it up when you were having trouble last year? If it's been a while then read it again. Pay close attention to the chapter on "more of the same" behavior because reading your detailed post I'm seeing a lot of that from both you and your wife. There's a long history of ya'll reaching out to each other, then pushing each others' buttons, then retreating to lick wounds and seek others for support. That's extremely unhealthy behavior in a marriage.
Also have you read the 5 Love Languages? It's time to start filling your W's love tank, it sounds like it's been empty for quite some time. Yours probably is as well, but first you have to fill hers, then she'll want to start filling yours.
I agree entirely with your feedback, but I need hep reconciling how filling the love tank is not considered pursuing activity. Any thoughts?
Leo's sitch is a bit different than most of us because they're still together and while they have problems, he's in a good position to work on restoring love to the R. It's not as easy for many of us for the reason you mentioned, most of the techniques in 5LL for filling the love tank can also come off as pursuit and that conflicts with the concept of detachment. All I can tell you is what I did in my approach, after reading 5LL my W was still at home and I was not attempting to detach but rather to show her 180's, so I concentrated on her primary language (WoA) but also showed love through the other languages. I knew it wouldn't change her mind about leaving (wasn't enough time), but I wanted to show her this 180 before she was gone so that she would know what is in store if and when she returns. Basically while she was still there I showed her that I am now the loving, caring husband that she said she was missing. But as expected she did still end up leaving and I have detached since then as well as going dim both for my benefit and to give her space. So I am only communicating with her regarding the kids for now.
