I've actually just adapted the following plan from one of my earliest posts which you've probably already read.
(1) Your wife currently has little respect and therefore attraction towards you as a man. Over the years you have been far too "nice" - as in weak and placating. That is something you are going to have to remedy as a priority. Find and read no more mr nice guy. You'll realize several things: you need to stop being "nice"; you need to become an "integrated male" i.e. more masculine. Also, if your wife is ultimately unwilling to work with you on a passionate and loving relationship, you may even have to end your marriage. However, there's no reason yet to suppose that she would not be motivated to change her own attitude and behaviours, if she sees that you have have made lasting changes yourself.
(2) When my own marriage was in dire straits, I found it actually very instructive to step back and contemplate how I would go about life if my marriage was already over. I realised that my life would go on. No matter how distraught and depressed I might be. If not for my sake, then for our child's. There would be living arrangements to sort out, property to be sold and bought, contact agreements to make regarding our child, and if this couldn't be agreed amicably, this would all have to be decided by a court. It would all be very stressful and expensive and time-consuming. Very. And then what? Perhaps after the 6 months or a year that this all took, I would at last have some breathing space - time for myself and to plan my future. I would inevitably start thinking about my career - which I'd neglected because I was so depressed about my marriage. I would want to do other things that I'd not been able to do before - sport, pastimes, travel. I would also start thinking about dating again, and of starting another relationship. But this time I'd want to get it right. I'd want to be the very best man I could be, in order to recognise and attract and keep a healthy attractive woman. This whole train of thinking put my marriage in a proper perspective.
(3) With that new sense of reality and perspective I then started working on myself and my future as if I were already divorced. In other words, I devoted myself to a 12-month plan of improving every significant aspect of my life. I suggest that you do the same:
(a) Focus on your career - stop thinking of it as something you are just doing to earn money for your wife and children. Start looking at it as an expression of your true self - something that allows you to come alive and show the world what you're really made of. Work hard, push ahead, and don't coast. If what you're currently doing is not what you want - change jobs. If you're not already, get on top of the family finances - be aware of what's coming in, what's going out, that you're getting the best deals on everything.
(b) Get yourself in top physical shape. Start going to the gym regularly, lose the excess weight, become physically stronger. It will really help your self-esteem and of course your work.
(c) In addition, start spending some time with male friends. Preferably, strong successful men with happy marriages. If you don't have such friends, start making them, either from work or the gym, or the fathers of your children's friends at school. Meet up once a week to play sport or have a drink. Don't spill your guts to them about how awful your marriage is - just learn to relax in their company and have a laugh about other things. You will over time absorb some of their male energy and confidence.
(d) Pick one more thing - an interest, pastime or hobby - to pursue. Something that's close to your heart or that you've dreamed about, that you would definitely want to try if you were no longer with your wife.
(e) Start doing all these things. Not for your wife (or even your children), but for you. Only you. Mentally sever yourself from the expectation that your wife is at some point going to turn around and thank you for any of this. Whatever happens in your life, whether you stay with your wife or not, its your destiny to be the very best version of yourself that you can be. Have a good long hard think about what that best version would look, think, sound and act like. Bringing out that best version - day in, day out, no matter what the outside world throws at you - should always be your life's quest, its spritual content. That's your sole responsibility but also your great freedom. It means doing these things for yourself, with no expectation of any thanks or appreciation or indeed any response at all, from your wife or anyone else for that matter.
(f) Here's where it will get interesting. If you stick to your programme, after some weeks you'll start noticing changes in yourself. You'll feel mentally sharper, stronger, more emotionally stable and much more at ease with yourself. You will start to feel and look and act like the man you were always supposed to be. People will definitely notice. Your wife will notice too. I'm telling you so that you are not surprised when people notice. They will. But do not do these things for that reason. And do not stop doing them if they don't.
(4) Your children. You love them a great deal and they are your responsibility to feed, clothe and bring up as strong and decent young men. Their greatest chance of all that is for you to be mentally and physically (and economically) the best that you can be. Again, you do these things for you, but that helps them as well. Given your own very difficult childhood, I think you'll realise how important this question is? What kind of father do you want them to see? I would suggest one who is strong, heroic, relentlessly optimistic and loving. So make efficient use of your time to ensure you are able to do for yourself the things I've suggested above. By fulfilling yourself you will enjoy the time you spend with them all the more.
(5) Sex. At long last I get to sex. Sex is fun and exciting and exhilarating. Except when it isn't. Sex can be intense and emotional and intimate. Except when it isn't. Sex can really make a man feel he's a man. Except when it doesn't. In other words, sex is like any other activity - it can be good or bad, depending on the situation. Don't get me wrong, I like sex as much as the next man (probably more) but you will never have a truly satisfying sex life unless you can get the whole thing into perspective. Sex is a celebration of your masculinity, not an ingredient. Sex is a desire, not a need. You do not need sex, from your wife or any other woman, in order to be a man. If you were marooned on a desert island with no female company for years, you would be no less of a man. Make that one of your new core beliefs. Believe it and act it.
(6) Finally, your wife. The sex issue can wait a while longer until you have started making the other changes to yourself. But your interactions with her are going to have to significantly change. Start having and expressing your own opinions without fear or favour. Do not do things for her unless (i) you objectively should (ii) you genuinely want to (i.e. not because you want to get in her good books). Start learning to say "No" to the rest of her requests. Start listening to her calmly and attentively, without frantically trying to "fix" whatever problem you think she has. Think of yourself as the rock against which the sea of her emotions needs to smash - you don't crumble!
(7) I appreciate that all the above seems like a helluva lot of hard work. So it is. But you've probably worked hard all your life. And if you completely ignore this advice, you will no doubt continue to work hard for the rest of your life. One way or another, life will always be hard work. The key difference is that you have the choice of working hard on and for yourself. As a former fearful/nice guy myself, and who has been doing all of these things for about 2 years now, I can absolutely assure you that there is nothing more satisfying. That does not however mean I've become a selfish and insensitive macho jerk. It means I have a sense of masculine strength and self-esteem that is completely independent of my wife, my marriage and sex. Because of that, I am able to love her in a far healthier way, I am better able to meet her emotional needs, and the dynamics of my marriage have considerably improved. And I'm still learning.
So that's the "man up" stuff from me. Make a start on it and stick with it.
You will soon get a lot more advice from the other posters on the marriage itself.
Good luck!
S&A
"A man can be destroyed but not defeated" - from The Old Man and the Sea, by Ernest Hemingway.
Which I take to mean that every man has within him a spirit of relentlessness and optimism. Its already there; he just has to cultivate it.
