Ok I need some emotional support, this is my first post and after reading some of the other posts on here I feel my situation isn't as bad as some. This is really long I know but I feel it's necessary for the full story.
My wife and I met when we were both 15 (now 34) my Mum and Dad divorced when I was 9 and I've come to realise in the last few months that I was really lonely growing up because my Mum suffers from depression, I didn't have a mother or a father in the emotional sense. 2 years after we met my wife moved into my Mums house with me and we've been together ever since. We didn't actually get officially married till 4 years ago but we've been like husband and wife since we moved in together. We have 3 children aged 3,6 and 9. A couple of years ago my wife had to go out to work as we are having money problems as before she was a stay at home mum, partly due to extreme clinical post natal depression when our oldest was born.
During the summer she started talking about 'nick' at work, I realise now I've been very insecure all my life due to my childhood and I started to get more and more jealous everytime she talked about nick, interestingly she also talked about mark at work sometimes as well but that didn't raise my jealousy as much.
During the summer she wanted to go and see Nick as they were 'just good friends'. I agreed despite my reservations as she doesn't have many friends and I felt my jealousy was my problem and was down to a problem with me. She used to see him almost every week and it was always out in the open and not hidden away, but as time went on I became more and more jealous and insecure. She used to say he was her best friend and they just talked. In November I moved out of home for a few weeks as my jealousy was massively causing problems between us, it was then while I was saying I was moving out for a few weeks that she told me she didn't have any feelings for me anymore. This really panicked me and I started reading up more and more on relationships.
Even though I had moved out I still saw her everyday and we were still texting each other everyday and during our talks she came up with a huge long list of why she had no feelings for me anymore which is a long list of things that had happened between us in the past, some accurate and some exaggerated to make worse then they were. After the 2 weeks and some realisation from another forum I came to the conclusion she was having a EA. So I moved back in without giving her a choice. The first night she slept on the sofa and then the following night she slept in our bed.
The next day I hacked her computer and looked at her iPhone back up files and saw all the text she and Nick had sent, there was a definite EA going on. Not quite I love you, but you make me so happy etc, your such a good listener, he asked her if she could be with him would she and she said yes. She talked about her favourite sex acts and there was one or two sex text such as him asking if she would give him a BJ for fun and she said yes. Also she said to him that she was suprised when I said I was moving out for a time as she wasn't expecting it and he replied with I hope you 2 can sort it out as I want you to be happy. Interestingly when I moved out the text between them stopped and she said this was because he was in her bad books. But after confronting her it was because she had come to realise it was wrong.
Anyway when she came home from work I confronted her and she went mental, trying to cut herself with a knife, trying to take loads of tablets and putting her fist through a window. I wasn't angry, I was in shock, betrayed and very heartbroken. She started sleeping on the sofa again and was really angry and upset and she said she only did it because she thought we were over because of the lack of attention and my affairs - I've never had an affair and when questioned about 'my affairs' she seems to have conjured up 2 parts of my life when I was reasonably happy, one 14 years ago and one late in 2010. I asked her to stop speaking to Nick and she agreed but after 1 1/2 weeks she still hadn't ended her friendship with him claiming she can't get in contact with him and was also I see now not trying that hard, probably because I asked her too and I got so angry that I gave her an ultimatum, either him or me and gave her 4 days to do it. The next day she said she'd done it. It was after the ultimatum that she took her wedding, engagement and eternity ring off which also broke my heart again. The next week or so were very tense and I constantly suspected she was still in contact with him but managed to hang on until after xmas before I had enough and moved out again as I was too angry and wasn't helping the situation.
During our talks while I was still at home, she said she didn't love me anymore, she doesn't know what she wants, shes confused and everytime I mentioned we should split up permenently she panicked and backtracked. In moments of truthfullness she said she was sorry for hurting me and once said she was sorry for getting too close to someone else. A couple of days after xmas I told her I was leaving permently and she had a panic attack and lay by me and was quite loving in her words, but didn't say anything like don't leave etc but said the break might do us good.
The next day I did a seperation agreement setting out some basic rules but included marriage counselling and us talking fortnightly but she wanted that changed to once per week and that the seperation was for a maximum of 3 months.
In the first 3 weeks I've struggled to leave her alone going round twice extra per week wanting to talk and making her really angry, the trouble is although she listens she is not 'trying' to fix things, she is going to marriage counselling with me but that isn't helping. She keeps saying she has no feelings for me all the time and is confused and doesn't know what she wants, last week I started to wonder if she is going through a MLC but dismissed it, but after marriage counselling a couple of weeks ago we were talking and and she said the most hateful thing of how happy she is without me and how they notice at work when we haven't talked, and asked me does that make sad? This really hurt almost as much as the other things she had said but later she started talking about her Dad who had died almost 3 years ago and how she had all these ambitions of climbing the career ladder at work, learning to drive, redecorating the house and how she only had 19.5 years left, I asked what she mean't and that most of her Dads side of the family had died of strokes and he had died when he was 55 so she hasn't got much time left. I said I wanted her to do all those things too but she says she can't be with me because when shes around me shes this subserviant controlled woman, I explained to her that shes responsible for feeling that way and shes in control of herself but she says she can't change.
I keep on trying, more for the kids and the fact that I believe in family but she keeps pushing me away ( apparently it's emotional blackmail when I say that too her?). The more time I spend apart the more I realise what I've been missing out on for the last 10 years or so, I haven't felt loved,wanted, appreciated etc and I kind of feel why should I bother? But later on I'm back reading relationship books.
I've managed to not contact her at all the last 2 weeks apart from our Sunday talk and Tuesdays marriage counselling. I am absolutely paranoid that she is still in contact with Nick but I know she can't see him because of childcare arrangements so the worst is they can text each other but I keep asking her if she is still in contact and she says no everytime but I never fully believe her. She said on Tuesday that when she spoke to him to kill her friendship that he had said that him and his ex - girlfriend had got back together and apparently his ex had banned him from speaking to her. I don't fully believe this story but I can see it is possible. I'm just trying to come to terms that she may still be talking to him but thats all that can happen and that theres nothing I can do about it.
I am so lonely and vulnerable at the moment and the whole thing has set off emotional timebombs of my past and how the only person who has ever loved me doesn't love me anymore.
The last 2 weeks I've been really working on myself, been climbing up local hills, started kickboxing again (loving that) tried to reconnect with friends and family. And when I told her about that she it was great, really great.
I keep getting mixed signals from her all the time like shes only going to marriage counselling for me but when I asked her last sunday what was the point of talking and marriage counselling if shes not really going to be trying for the relationship (which she said was also emotional blackmail) she said she wanted to see what could be done(had 3 sessions now)
Through reading the forums already I see at one point or another I've made many common mistakes already and have learnt from them. The big one was leave her alone and stop being needy! I know I need A LOT more patience and I'm really struggling. I've read just about every relationship book there is in the last month apart from DBing (it's been ordered!) and am working through my self esteem issues and self confidence issues. I can see that over the last 10 or so years I've turned into a right wimp and lost my way. I'm also reading Carlos Xumas Alpha male e-book which is amazing and I feel more 'manly' already. I've also learnt that at the moment when we talk, not to look at her directly as she finds it intimidating and she opens up more when I don't look directly at her.
Thats enough for the moment and hopefully will get you upto speed.
I'm ready for kind words, criticism and 2x4s
Thanks Andrew
PS shes not mentioned the big D word yet but just talks about splitting up and not seeing a future together and even expects me to move back in after the 3 months and her going back to sleeping on the sofa.
