I have been married for 13 years next month. We have five children together ranging in age 12 to 4. Although I would never say that things have always been great, I never thought they were 'bad'.
That is until just over 2 months ago when she told me she no longer wanted to be with me. It happened at a time when I was feeling down and was looking for reassurance from her. The day she told me I would not accept it. I convinced her there were things that could be done and she agreed to go to counseling.
For the first few weeks, after she told me, things were still going ok and I thought there was no need to panic. She was still sleeping in the same bed, she would still give me a kiss every morning before she left for work, we still talked a lot and it seemed ok, although I knew I had work to do.
About a month or so ago she moved out of the bedroom and began sleeping on the couch. Originally she wanted me to sleep elsewhere, but after two nights I went back to the bed and told her that I wasn't sleeping on the couch any more. She moved to the couch instead.
During this time she has displayed all the 'tell tale' signs of at least an emotional affair. She passcode locked her phone, she constantly was texting, any time I would walk by, she would put her phone down so I could not see the screen, then pick it back up as soon as I walked by. She began working out 4 to 6 times a week, bought new clothes, and was genuinely much more concerned about her appearance.
After doing some checking, I found one particular phone number that she had texted over 1200 times last month and was also her most frequent 'snap chat' contact. I was able to track it down to a guy that is 10 years younger than her.
For the last month she has gone to counseling, but basically only to say that she is done and she is not even willing to try. When I try to convince her to try, she gives excuses of why it isn't even worth trying...."I'm not physically attracted to you." "I love you, but I'm not IN love with you" "I haven't loved you for years" "I don't have warm fuzzy feelings in my heart for you", but then she always follows it up with "I'm not trying to hurt your feelings"
This past week was very rough. Again, went to counseling only for her to say she wasn't going to try any more and that I needed to decide how we were moving forward. I asked her for a favor that if it continued in that direction, we would at least try a separation before any legal action was taken. She said she would not agree with that because she felt it was just a stall tactic on my part and would just delay the inevitable. She did at one point during the conversation ask if we were separated if that meant she could date.
I asked her if there was someone else she wanted to date or wanted to be with and she said there was not. I never confrontd her about the text messages. After all of that took place, I took the kids (with her knowledge and permission) and we left on vacation.
While we have been gone, she has had family members come over for a type of 'intervention' as she called it. Trying to tell her what a mistake she is making and how badly she is going to regret this some day. I had talked to her family members and knew they were going to try to go to her and talk to her, but she is the one that had told them originally of her decision, so it wasn't as if I was telling them something she didn't already know.
Apparently it did not go well. She told them all the same things she has said to me. After a while she told them she was done talking about it, however was very emotional during this. She sent me a message after they left telling me they were there and that things did not go well and she felt all alone because now they are very upset with her. I tried to tell her that she is not alone and that they love her and they don't want to see her hurt or to make a mistake that affects so many people.
She texted today just to see how the vacation was going. I said the kids were having fun and she asked specifically how I was doing. I was honest and said not real well. I didn't sleep well at all. I asked how she was and she said she was ok, but tired from not sleeping also. Said she was just laying around the house all day today because she was tired and didn't want to see or talk to anyone.
A family member that had gone over to talk with her for the 'intervention' told me that I should start trying to come to grips with the fact that she isn't going to change her mind and that I need to start planning on my next step.
My wife has continually said that I deserve someone that is going to love me completely for who I am and always want to be with me and do things with and for me. I have continually said I don't want to be with anyone else.
It is like we are in a stale mate. She wants me to agree to split and I refuse.
