In a marriage with no intimacy and connection ? And you can’t look outside because then you are labeled a cheater and have too much to lose – kids, financial security, reputation. How do you cope?
How many of you feel stuck?
r/AskMen
In a marriage with no intimacy and connection ? And you can’t look outside because then you are labeled a cheater and have too much to lose – kids, financial security, reputation. How do you cope?
Comments
Divorce
You fix it. You don’t always have to cope and feel miserable. There is always an out. How “fixing it” looks, that’s up to you.
I was in the same situation. It went on for a long time. We tried counseling, but my ex wife was mentally checked out and there wasn’t anything I could do. Ultimately ended up im separation and divorce. Not fair to you or your kids to stay in a marriage where youre not happy and the kids will see and feel it too. Hope everything works out for ya.
Either couples therapy or divorce that’s the only way out.
How did you get to this point?
You do not have to cheat. You just have to get another woman to be interested in you, but not vice versa.
Women are attracted to men that other women find attractive.
So…. work out etc until other women start hitting on you. Just don’t reciprocate.
You move on
Join the deab bedrooms reddit and join the many who are also in your shoes.
If you feel stuck that’s your problem. Ill gladly give up half my shit for a happier life and a healthier mental state. Hell id give her all my shit so she could fuck right off, why? Because i know for a fact ill eventually gain it all back.
Work on your marriage, talk to your partner , get counseling. It’s easy for people to tell you to get a divorce, but look in the mirror, have you exhausted all your options?
I know I haven’t . That caused my wife to have an emotional affair. I didn’t invest in my marriage the way I invested in my job , buying rental properties etc .
None of us are perfect , I’m not giving up that easy .
Many of my male friends are “miserably married”. They’re only staying for the kids, basically held hostage by their overbearing and bitter wives.
Me right here. Been in this struggle for a decade now. I’ve tried countless times to resolve the issues with her but she just says she doesn’t want to talk about it (buries her head in the sand hoping it’ll go away). She refuses to do marriage counseling as well.
Here’s the kicker. She’s an amazing mother to our children but not a good spouse. We both love our children very much and I don’t want to put them through a divorce. I finally had to do some soul searching recently because I’m on the brink of wanting to just end my life (not acting on it but I have the thought come across my mind daily now). I finally sat down and wrote her a long letter detailing all of the issues that I’ve tried to bring up with her to resolve but she refuses to talk about them. I’ve basically said that if we don’t resolve them, we’re going to have to get a divorce because my mental health cannot take it anymore. As much as I don’t want to get a divorce, something needs to change.
You have to weigh what you believe you’re loosing against your mental/emotional/spiritual health. You can still co-parent and live the life you want. Realize the greatest loss is that your kids are taking cues about how they should be in the world, and you and your wife are the greatest influences to the model they’re creating for themselves. Your example will be the footsteps your children follow. What do you want your children to know about you when its all said and done? These are the guiding questions.
I’m a big believer in Mens’ work. Finding men to share with, who listen and offer their experience is invaluable…and far more effective that these posts. Best of luck to you brother!
I want you to imagine a woman asking this very question in one of the women’s subs. What do you think the responses would be? Do you think it would be filled with women telling her to gut it out and just deal with it and lie in the bed she made And stay together for the kids? Fuck no. They’d be telling her to make a plan, start saving money, and as soon as she can file for divorce.
But because we are men, we are expected to just live with a miserable existence because we made a promise however many years ago. No, if your partner isn’t invested in your relationship, then the relationship is over. And you should be planning to exit it in a way that best ease as the transition for your kids.
Normal life, right?
Go to counseling and talk like a adult
The grass is green only where you water it.
This sounds like a justification to cheat. And even worse, to use cheating as the excuse to end the marriage.
I know it’s hard, but facing reality, sitting down with your partner, aknowledge you both have a problem and decide what to do, is the only way to unstuck yourself.
Let’s say you get a clean do-over. No social stigma. No guilt. No financial consequences.
Do you think you’ll find someone?
If you do find someone, do you think it will be different? Or after a brief honeymoon period, will you end up in the exact same situation?
Maybe stating the obvious, but it isn’t just men who feel this. Yes, the sub is /r/askmen , but recognizing that it’s a common human condition might provide additional insights.
Go the centre of the marriage to find what’s wrong. Deep seated resentment can keep festering unconsciously and that’s what chokes intimacy, so on the surface it looks like you just don’t love each other but it almost always has a very tiny fixable cause. Find that, discuss what you found, it’s you and her vs the problem. Fix the problem together.
I always wanted to ask those of you in this situation.
Did she changed after the marriage or was it after the kids?
Were you blindsided or did you overlook the flaws and signs?
Perplexed to see how most people are so quick to assume :
There were no efforts to fix things
Somehow it is the poster’s responsibility to do all the work and put in all the efforts
More of something somehow will lead to a solution
One has to find someone and be with someone to have a life
A bad situation is a pretext to cheating
Needless to say, absolutely mind boggling responses!