I 36 M feel as though life is better alone. My wife 33 F and I have been married for 10 years. Despite everything not being perfect, we have a pretty good life. We’ve had our ups and downs, but each year seems harder. We have 2 adorable little girls that bring us so much joy, but if weren’t for them, I probably would’ve ran from this relationship years ago.
To say that we don’t have our problems would be an understatement. But most of the issues come from a sense of animosity that has grown within our relationship. I feel as though she is never happy with things. We both have great careers, I take great care of myself physically, I initiate intimacy 99.9% of the time, I’m conventionally attractive, but none of that matters. Everything I do is wrong.
To me, it’s all a facade of some fake utopia that she tells her coworkers about having the perfect life. I hate it. It feels like prison.
Having a spouse that is cold, having assets tied up as we do, and two sweet little girls it doesn’t make it easy to move forward without hurting someone. So over time I’ve began to build up these walls because of constant criticism and rejection. I don’t hate her, I’d love to work things out, and we’ve tried. It just turns into the her deflecting questions to the therapist, then making half hearted promises about changing, and then returning to her old ways. Our marriage life has become so grey and bleak that I prefer sleeping on the sofa or my office because it’s warmer than our bed.
The only way that I see out of this prison is waiting until our kids are older to divorce her or suicide and neither sounds enjoyable. I wish that things could work out between us, but I doubt it.
My wife thinks that I’m inadequate
r/Advice
Comments
You should really mention the D word with her. And how if you don’t water your marriage’s grass, it’s just going to die. You understand that the grass is greener where you water it, does she? Or does she just want to spray green paint on top of dead, yellow grass?
Either she’s already checked out of this marriage and it’s too late, or she doesn’t understand the gravity of the situation. I’m goad you guys have a therapist. Mention this then (minus the suicide part)
How you’ve remained cordial is a phenomenon.
As a child of divorce, I’d rather have had two loving homes than one empty house. Kudos for not leaving yourself behind.
What are the problems?
For the love of god – shit or get off the pot. Be married. Choose with all your might to it – or get divorced. Pull the fucking bandaid. Youre gonna wait a decade? It is your life. You only have one.
Tomorrow tell your wife you want to go out to have a talk – get a babysitter – get a coffee – go to a forest preserve and say, we fix this or we get divorced – what do you want to do.
Not a fight. Just two adults deciding if they should part ways or actually try.
If she doesnt want to fix it or you dont – it is over.
If you both want to fix it – date your wife.
Men act like pawing at their wife is initiating intimacy. It is not. I dont know if this is you – but if you aren’t dating your wife – I would start their.
take her out anf talk about eachother’s hopes and dreams. Get to know eachother again.
Would love to hear your wife’s side of this marriage.
What do you bring to this marriage?
Google
https://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/blog/divorce-busting/202209/the-walkaway-wife-syndrome-revisited
oh my. All that came into my head is that I hope this is not just a normal progression of marriage, but people are just not as honest. I think my husband might feel the same way. I think he thinks “woman are just like that, never satisfied”, and finds a way to deal with it. I feel like I am constantly praising him and thanking him for the very few things he does take care of. But I am very resentful of how much of the burden of running our lives falls on me. I literally have done 90% of the labor behind raising the kids. I mean like he has never shopped for groceries or cleaned the bathrooms, or cleaned the refrigerator, washed the household laundry, or swept the porch, or mopped a floor or 100 other things ever once. Not once. I made our entire life work. Holidays, kids friendships, every doctors appointment, every paper signed for school, every summer camp, every vacation, every present ever purchased, connecting families, all the furniture in the house, all the consumables in the house (clothes, toiletries, food, toys, etc). I not only pay for all of them, but I provided them and replace them whenever they are empty. He pays all the monthly expense which is a substantial contribution. He is a very good dad and we love each other. But we have undeniably become more like you describe. I obviously am just venting myself, but I was wondering if you think she may feel the same way. Like you both have built up walls because you both are not getting what you need and are tired of trying. Maybe she is just a cold shallow person who had higher expectations of where you would take her, I dont know. But I do think that at least some of what you are describing is simply being married for 10 years. I think its great you are in therapy. My only suggestion is to maybe try another one? I think you should find a therapist that you can communicate what you wrote in your post.
Maybe you’re not loving your wife the way you did when you first started dating and she’s building resentment towards you so everything you do is “wrong” …
before you mention divorce or any of the ridiculous suggestions here, start dating your wife again, and maybe look at your own behaviours, are you having your wife clean up or pick up after you? Because weaponised incompetence is a real thing that’s often overlooked.
Spend quality time away from the kids with your wife, where you can both breathe and let go of day to day responsibilities
You’re only 36, don’t waste your life in a prison. If you’re this unhappy and therapy hasn’t helped, find a way out. Children aren’t stupid, they pick up on parental stress and it transfer to them. It’s better to have 2 separate, happy parents than 2 together, miserable parents.
Maybe she done with the relationship. When a woman love her man she going to
tell the world about how wonderful is your man. When a woman doesn’t want to have sex with the husband is because she doesn’t have feelings for him.
Are you able to discuss this with her, have an honest mutually respectful conversation. Have you told her how you feel?
Has she told you how she feels?
Is she burned out from work by chance? Is the resentment money related?
I cannot stand living in a house when I know deep down my parents do not care about each other. Unfortunately my parents aren’t even divorced for some reason, I know my mom hates my dad… yet he is still there. She’s only there for him because of the support, it’s just sad seeing love not being reciprocated in front of me all the time, and also just… why? Why waste so much time on someone that doesn’t care anymore.
Couples therapy. It’s eye opening if you’re open to it and there’s a neutral person there to help facilitate. It has been helpful in my relationship.
Coming up on 19 years divorced. Staying together for the kids is the worst possible thing you can do. You’re miserable. Pull the plug before it consumes the rest of your life. The sooner the better for the sake of your kids.
It won’t be easy. It won’t be fun. Everyone involved is absolutely going to get hurt.
Do it anyway. This is no way to live.
Set ultimatums in your next therapy sessions for specific, possible improvements. There’s plenty to fight for but you can’t do it alone.
Have you even told her this???
Why aren’t you calling out what she does with the therapist? Be brutally honest at your next session.
Hey OP
You need counselling or divorce. Most jurisdictions require some level of counselling/mediation anyway so it’s always useful to get that kicked off.
Have an honest discussion with your wife, tell her that you have a deep feeling of dissatisfaction with the relationship and you want to work on it.
This may sound disingenuous, but you can always see a lawyer and plan an exit just in case the counselling highlights that your relationship is unsalvageable
Ok but I would have love to read more about how you both contribute to the relationship and what are your past mistakes, concrete things about how she is never happy, what is her way in it …
But you decided talking about the way you look was more important.
This sounds so much like me, I’m just a little older and with only one daughter. The key difference, however, is that I realised I was the problem before it was too late.
My wife did go cold for a while and I felt that it killed my love for her. That jaded position made me see so many things in her I didn’t like… I started to see her as not doing enough for the family (to be fair, I do all the school runs, extra-curricular runs, groceries, cooking, travel bookings, paying bills…) as she’d just go to work and comes home, feeling she’s doing plenty while I’m making at least double her salary (or more) while still doing a bunch of extra stuff. Anyway, that resentment built to the point that I couldn’t see all the good in her… what had started off as a relatively small problem had snowballed into something huge… and it was all my doing.
Finally I was able to see that she was doing her best, was genuinely grateful for everything I do and any shortfalls were her limitations, not carelessness or selfishness, she’s quite the opposite. Once I changed my attitude towards her, things improved greatly. I always knew deep down that I never wanted out of the marriage, but it does take work to stay in it.
Anyway, I wish you all the best. As bad as it seems now, you can get through this problem, although only if that’s what you want. Otherwise, divorce is an option and your girls won’t appreciate you staying together just for their sake, that I can tell you. My own daughter, at one moment, told me that she didn’t want me to stay with my wife (her mother) just for her as she wanted me to be happy. Food for thought.
This sounds like she has the issue. If she makes you feel as if nothing I do is right. Tell her or give her a taste of her own medicine
With a view of genuinely helping you here I have some questions…
Who cooks the dinner and cleans up afterwards?
Who gets the girls up in the morning and gets them fed, washed and dressed to go to minder/school?
Who bathes them and puts them to bed?
Who vacuums and mops the floors and cleans the bathrooms.
Who organises the girls clothes for each season or turns over their wardrobes when they grow out of clothes and need the next size up.
Who loads and empties the dishwasher
Who does the laundry, folds it and puts it away
Who cuts the grass
Who does the food shopping, puts it away, checks the cupboards for out of date items.
Who keeps track of appointments and play dates.
When you “initiate intimacy” is it always in bed and to have sex. Have you ever just kissed her in the kitchen or cuddled her watching a movie?
I could go on but what I’m trying to figure out is are you sharing 50% of the household mental and physical load. If you genuinely are then I think it’s time to talk about a divorce.. but if you’ve looked at this list which is only quite small and your wife does all or most of it then this situation you’re in is entirely fixable.
I speak here as someone who has come out the other side of a similar situation and am happy to try help
It’s not a prison, relationships are optional and you can leave even if it’s messy and painful. You can be a good father to your kids without being married to their mother.
I’ll start with – Dont ever stay for the kids, ever. Kids can sense tension in the house and I know of a number of stories where adult children would say that growing up, their house had no love between the parents etc etc.
I’d start planning a true exit strategy including moving assets.
Lastly, just fucking tell her you are done and either she stops the bullshit and does what she says in counseling or you’re out.
If that’s the case, then come to the realization that the marriage is over and aim for a fair division of assets and a good co-parenting plan.
I lived like that and although I lost my ass in the divorce I wouldn’t go back to it .
Sounds like your wife may be abusive. Maybe she doesn’t deserve you. Why put yourself through that?
I agree that you should have a frank talk with your wife without the children and away from the house. Listen, children are aware of what’s going on and will have those memories into adulthood. Two separate homes where they can be with two happy parents is way way preferable to being in misery. I wish you strength