Husband Filed for Divorce Today

[Jessica M.]

Thank you everyone for the wonderful advice. I see WAH almost every day because he comes over to see our daughter. Next week he will be staying at the house so he can be with our daughter while I'm at work. There will be little contact because we will be working opposite shifts and actually had to get a babysitter because our shifts overlap.

I may be sleeping on the couch next week. It just feels like it will push him away farther. We were having major problems with intimacy in our marriage, that was a major theme but I know he doesn't exactly value sex the way I do. So I think I will just need to be strong. I don't want him to think that we will be ex's with benefits (that's what him and his ex-wife were for awhile).

I am moving out of our home because I cannot afford it on the income I will have. For the size house we have, our rent is a very good deal but I can get a cheaper apartment and not have near the utilities. It is a big house to take care of too, all by myself.

I know getting mad isn't productive. I don't do it that much but it was just an emotion I was dealing with yesterday. I was very upset last night because I have been such a crappy mom to my daughter since these problems started surfacing last year. I was so blessed to be able to stay home with her for the first two and a half years of her life but the last year I haven't been very present, especially lately. I feel so bad for her and all the changes that are happening.

Me and WAH have a lot of issues. One was me staying home with our daughter. At first he wanted me too and seemed like he would do anything in his power to make it happen. Then it seemed like he resented it. He wanted me to get a full-time good paying job no matter how impossible or impractical it was. We are very different people. I am a homebody and he is not. We live far from our friends and it has been hard to make friends where we are now. We converted to Catholicism last year and he has had a change of heart and believes it is not right for him anymore even though he was the one that initiated it. We have a lot of sexual issues. I've changed a lot since becoming a Christian. I was not a Christian when we married and lived a very different lifestyle. I also changed a lot when I became a mother. He believes that he deserves to spend his money how he wants because he worked so hard for it. I have a hard time with anything dealing with deserving and entitlement. He thinks I'm not driven because I didn't want to get a job. I had a lot of issues with jobs before we had our daughter. I made a huge mistake right before we got married and quit a good paying job which ultimately led to us losing our house and filing bankruptcy. It was not the only reason, we both had bad spending habits and shouldn't have bought the house but it was a big reason. I nag a lot because I don't know how to get him to do things that need to be done. I know there is more.

Sorry that was very long winded. I should have replied separately to everyone's posts.