I am sorta new here. So I will apologize in advance if I post or write some I shouldn't.
I have been married for 20 yrs. And we have definitely had our share of problems.
But in short, here is my question. What would you do if divorce is being used a manipulation technique? To intimidate?
My husband had an affair and refuses to accept responsibility. I know I will get responses that say, well, "what was your part in his having an affair". And I will tell you right now zero! Zip! Nada! I will acknowledge there were problems in the marriage that we BOTH OWN. But this is 100% on him. I wasn't happy in my marriage either, but I didn't choose to have an affair. Shifting the blame to the faithful partner absolves the cheating spouse to accept no responsibility for their actions. "I wasn't getting xyz at home, so I found it else where". So if the unfaithful partner can convince you it was your fault and that you just need to try harder ... That just isn't gonna fly in my book. Sorry, but it's not. Multiple things could have been done if there was an unhappy partner in the marriage. Reading books, Counseling, Prayer, communication....etc.
So he got frustrated that I wouldn't own HIS actions and just rug sweep his affair. So he filed for divorce. He is the breadwinner and I was in college at the time and couldn't afford to stop going and I would have to quit and find work. So I folded. He later revealed that him filing for divorce was meant to frighten me. While he was moving out, he would come every Thursday and would pack more things and leave. He would make sure I was in class at the time so that he wouldn't have to see me. Every Thurday when I came home and saw that more stuff was gone, I would be more and more heartbroken. Then one day I just snapped. I took the rest of his things and boxed them up and left them in the garage. I totally rearranged the closet to fit all my things now that everything he owned was packed up. He later told me how much that hurt him and he sat in the garage and cried.
He is making claims that he is going to file for divorce again. He behaves as though I hold no value to him. He has also made then comment that, "With as much money as he makes, it will be quite easy to have have me replaced, and no one on this earth is ever gonna want me".
I know many of you would say, "why would I even want to be with him?" And I wonder that myself sometimes. He is currently in therapy, but I am at the end of my rope with him. I don't really feel like he wants the divorce, in my opinion, he is wanting control. I am literally on the fence if he does it again this time. I may just agree to it. It's not what I want. What I want is to be treated with love and respect, and I feel like if I fold again, I will be letting him know that it's okay to totally disrespect me. I guess I am one Tired Blugirl.
So my question is, if your situation is like mine, how did you handle things? Did you just do the 180 and GAL?
