Me39, W38, D9, M10yrs, ILYBNILWY-1month ago, still living together, still in same bed, W is very distant and told me not to "expect too much" right now. apparently "waiting to see how we are after the holidays". But right now I am in more pain and hurt than I have ever experienced. Obviously. She might be too, but I have not been allowed to be a comforter as hoped for a long long time. W is withdrawn, angry, depressed, working out a lot now, trying to feel better about herself she says, wearing nicer clothes. She doesnt feel good about herself and hasnt for a long time she says. A long time ago I was so much more to her and in her eyes, Shes gone from a hundred pounds heavier and then lost it and then gained it again, and this has of course affected her, but has never, ever stopped me from expressing attention and affection towards her. but these days I feel like a chore, an additional load of laundry requiring the resentful washing. and resentful it has been. For what seems like years now, I have noticed the affectionate side of my wife drastically reduced. Although there were times when she would be 100%different, to my amazement by those times after so long of periods of lulls (making me depressed and angry, etc). Then, it would sink slowly back to little or nothing. I can count on one hand the number of times intimacy occurred over the last year, and the same for the prior 2-5 years. Disucssing it with her led to her justifying it with "thats just how i am", and "you have no right to expect more than I am wanting to give" (again, justified with her saying she just isnt the initiating type) We have a D9, and I got the ILYBNILWY talk, the (ur like a brother/friend) and how shes so confused, and unhappy. She even mentioned she thought she was having a MLC. When the W bought her notebook computer, thanks to myspace, Facebook, and games, she became addicted. Every night and every weekend spend hours sitting behind it. then she got the Iphone and alll its various apps and games. Along with AOL instant messenger. she was plugged in constantly. She has single girlfriends and married girlfriends who go out and sometimes act in ways that seem inappropriate and disrespectful of a marriage, if anything, just not very "married" like. Perhaps I am a lot more conservative or just plain jealous regarding actions and words, but they all have single male friends and sometimes when out around everybody, I see a lot of things that I myself probably would have difficulty thinking was at least, thoughtful. for a couple yrs now my wife has taken up going to a particular sporting event, and bought season tickets, the last 2yrs in a row. She goes with any one of her gf's and they take pictures and all so I know she is there with them. She enjoys it, and I was happy to go the first few times she went, was happy she had a thing to do outside of work. For several yrs I had a hobby that had me going out twice to three times a week and left her at home with the D. she spoke and acted supportive of it, but it was wearing her down. Ultimately this hobby wasnt fun for me either and ended up costing too much as we were having hard times financially. This financial issue was one that was always troublesome too. I begged for years to focus on getting out of debt, she makes more than I do, but I still contribute to the household almost as equally if she werent to proceed to spend further herself on things like additional groceries. We entered marriage with individual debt, but worked out a way to handle the household needs, and keep the individual debt to our own handling. Over the 10 yrs of marriage, we've had joint loans come and go, but whilst two people were out spending their own money frivolously, we both got further into debt. I finally broke down and decided to try to pay off mine completely, but its been very hard. Tires for the car, furnace breaking, new a/c, things just popped up that threw me back into the debt pit. With her, she is able to take loans from her retirement, so she ended up in a cycle where she would rack up several cards to near overlimit, take a loan out of her retirement, pay everything off, and then be right back where she was the next year. I almost bankrupted myself going to the dentist, and still need costly work done, but have no way to do it or pay for it. So a lot o fthis has been difficult and depressing for me too. (it appears I have gotten too long on this post, its acting funny so I shall continue below.
