dp doesn't love me

[hobbgoblin]

firstly excuse typing as am bf (as usual!)

there is a lot of history to this and ive posted and recapped several times over the last couple of years as things have evolved. advice i have been given was not wasted and i see that i was being used for much of our relationship and treated dreadfully. i am certainly no longer blind to that.

i posted most recently about how well dp and i have been getting along since he finally completed his divorce and that has continued and we've had our dd and he is a doting father and supportive partner. blah blah. i said i felt that we were in a weird friendship orientated relationship and that along with the turbulence gone was the spark. the advice was to relax. i have. however, last night dp announced that he sees no future as he does not love me.

can't really argue with that but he said he felt it was the perfect relationship, that he wanted desperately for it to work but that his heart wasn't in it anymore and he felt he had to tell me.

we've since had a confused convo. about ending it, carrying on seeing each other, still going on holiday in a fortnight, staying friends. i don't know which way i am facing now.

i feel that this soarkless relationship is somewhat inevitable given what we've been through and that we need to try and rekindle that now that we have a more solid friendship as a basis. he says he has tried sooo hard and i think maybe he has tried too hard. we've had no downtime since the divorce, we have a 6 week old baby and 5 other children between us. i think he is expecting too much and is quitting too soon but maybe i am deluded. if he no longer loves me he no longer loves me and maybe that's that.

please help.

[hobbgoblin]

sparkless

[FabBakerGirlIsBack]

{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{hugs}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}

You can learn to love someone again but I think you have to want to.

Have a break, go on holiday, then when you come back sit down and talk practically.

[hobbgoblin]

that's what i think too, and he professes to want to. i've seen him trying too, iyswim and it hurts that things can be rather forced at times. we spend our time these days showing we care about each other by helping out with the business/home for each other which is great in a way but we are starting again here and yet trying to do so on the back of a fucked up faded relationship...we deserve that buzz of a new relationship but we are going to have to create it for ourselves because this is an old new relationship!

i know you know this first hand fbg. thanks for the hugs.

[FabBakerGirlIsBack]

I think I had a time where I was doing things consciously as I so wanted things back to how they were and some things had got lost in the madness that is 3 kids and a house to run.

There still isn't enough time and money to do the little things we used too but there are free ways of showing affection and now hubby and I are really really solid and I know this is it for the rest of our lives.

I have nearly thrown it all away, twice, for someone who just wanted an easy lay and I am damn lucky my husband is the man is he and has forgiven me.

I know our circumstances are different but I was questionning if I still loved him.

Now I know I do.

[hobbgoblin]

oh and he said weird stuff like it's not fair on me i need to be with someone who loves me but it would kill him to see me with somebody else. wtf is that supposed to mean?

[FabBakerGirlIsBack]

Mixed messages as his head is probably truly mixed up.

I would try and give DH a get-out clause when really it was me wanting out and not being big enough to be truthful.

Men can be possessive and that is probably part of him not being able to see you with anyone else.

Do you still love him?

[hobbgoblin]

the way i feel about him is that the strong genuine loving feelings for him i once had (thought i had them all along but i didn't i just couldn't stand the rejection at the time) are coming back. i accept that they had gone amidst all the awful behaviour from him and i am now working on forgetting and forgiving the past.

so, yes i do love him but it is not a strong feeling of love. the stronger feeling is of companionship right now and being parents together and working on the lust free side of things. i still fancy him and he means a great, great deal to me. i don't love him all the time but i can look at him still and feel i love him fairly frequently and more and more so in an all consuming way.

[FabBakerGirlIsBack]

Does he know how you feel about him?

[hobbgoblin]

i told him this last night and tbh. the conversation we had was a different version of one i was planning as i feel that things can't stay as they are, i.e. with the loss of, um, passionate feelings i guess. i expected us to make more space for our relationship, to see if the holiday with just us and the baby affected things positively and for us to talk about getting back on track in a more comprehensive way than just the friendship. i didn't expect it to be over in the space of one evening.

[FabBakerGirlIsBack]

Has he said exactly what he feels and what he wants?

[hobbgoblin]

thanks for singlehandedly taking on my post!

the short answer is no he hasn't. in one respect he made it clear he doesn't love me but on the other he is on about still seeing each other 'as friends' but his desciption of this scenario is not a friendship at all. we wake up this morning and he's on about doing lunch, then having our planned DVD and Chinese night watching Brighton Rock (because Brighton is our 'special' place) and oh yes we'll still go on holiday together though we haven't booked it apart from childcare and staff cover so it's no big deal to cancel. my idea of ending the relationship is not this. my idea of a necessary friendship is not this.

his most repeated phrase over the last 15 hours or so has been 'i'm not saying i don't want to see you i'm just telling you how i feel' and how he feels is that he hasn't got the love back and doubts he ever will.

[carelesswhispers]

sorry i feel like I'm interrupting a private conversation here
first of all congratulations on the new baby & I'm sorry your going through this with your dp i don't think your dp knows what he wants as he sounds confused , i do hope you do go on this holiday as it might bring you both closer together & give you a chance to talk properly , could it be that you both feel bogged down with 5 children & household chores ?

[FabBakerGirlIsBack]

I just feel that there is more to this than you know but I just don't know what to suggest other than you put the kids to bed and lay things on the line.

You want this.

If he doesn't, then this is the option.

No mans land is no life.

[hobbgoblin]

carelesswhispers, thank you and no you're not interrupting!

I was very anti the holiday but perhaps you are both right, we should go and see what that brings. I just think as things stand we will be going with different agendas.

I was thinking of saying to him that either we continue seeing one another and actually making every effort to reignite our relationship in the ways we both need or we don't see each other at all.

I don't think he is very insightful and though this could be my desperation speaking, I'd hazard that given his previous form he only recognises love as a relationship that is all about excitement or spending money and drinking and partying. He left his first wife for an affair with the wife's best friend so that was all passion and secret liaison and then he was divorcing the woman he had an affair with when we got together after sepnding 5 years together with her spending thousands of £££ on luxury weekends away and 5 grand holidays in the sun and the rest of the time pissing the evenings away. He loved her to bits but now hates her with a passion as she was out for his money from the outset it would seem. To me, that was not real love. Even DP acknowledges that with he and I it should work because of the supportive and honest and caring person I am (even if I do say so myself, a stark contrast to the previous 2 women in his life even though I get on with one of them fine so no sour grapes from me). Funnily, i said to him this morning "if I acted like a right immature and selfish cow and loved your money more than you it would work wouldn't it?" I could be so right there I fear.

Suppose I can't make him redefine 'love' in his own head. If he wants that sparky catastrophe crap then we're never going to be zinging with love. He reckons I have this all wrong but he is stumped as far as explaining why our perfectly fine loving and friendly partnership, which involves VERY good sex too I might add, doesn't add up for him.

Can aNYONE possibly explain this?

[thumbwitch]

Hi hobb!
Congrats on the baby and hope she is well and gorgeous etc.
Your DP is still messing with your head, then?

Would it be any use to suggest you try and freeze your feelings and just go with the flow? Don't try and push, let him just "be" for the mo. I think you are right, he has a very confused idea of what "love" is - no doubt he thinks it is all about passion and excitement, but that is immature love, not mature and lasting love, as he has himself proved.

He needs to come to the realisation that his definition of love is not great, and that what he has with you and the DC is more real life, iyswim; and he might need to come to that realisation by himself.

Remind me - is his relationship with his mother on the odd side? FUll of drama etc.?

[FabBakerGirlIsBack]

It sounds like he isn't realistic as to what a proper grown up relationship is like.

[hobbgoblin]

thumbwitch hi!

do i do that by stopping seeing him, taking a break, carrying on with the odd 'friendship' thing..?

spoke this afternoon about it and he agreed with all i said and suggestion that we do the holiday and see how the land lies.

his mother died when he'd just hit his twenties - tragically. i think as youngest of two boys he may have been a little spoiled by mother but also abused by his step father physically not sexually and resents his mother for not protecting him. both he and his brother are a tad rough around the edges but dp has kinda 'made it' since and is very different to his family. his dad drank himself to death pretty much and so on...

[Mumfun]

There are people addicted to the exciting sort of love - usually lasts about 2 years when you are madly and passionately into someone. It is called limerance by those who study such things.

Thos gives way to a more mature love etc etc. He needs to be able to live in that mature phase and not chase the limerance all the time or Long Term relationships are in trouble.

Only finding this all out atm due to own relationship trouble. I ll try to get a web link and post it

[Mumfun]

decent Guardian article here: www.guardian.co.uk/theobserver/2003/dec/14/features.magazine47

[SolidGoldBrass]

Sometimes a person gets into a relationship with a person who is lovely and nice and ethical and not physically repulsive, but who person A is simply not that into. This happens a lot with people who have had one or more truly horrible relationships; they are so happy and grateful to have met a pleasant, kind, considerate partner who does'nt hit them, steal from them or do them up the bum without asking that they decide This Is The Onem when actually they are just two nice people who happened to have been available at the same time.
It does sound a bit like your P is Just Not That Into You but scared of being single. It's probably best to devote your attentions to yourself and your own wellbeing for the moment, don't be in the position of hanging around waiting for him to make his mind up.

[mathanxiety]

They say Once a Cheater Always a Cheater? He is an excitement seeker and to me, it doesn't seem as if he knows what emotional intimacy and a real day-in-day-out relationship really mean. When he talks about friendship and all that, I think what he really wants is three square meals a day and his laundry done nicely until the next bit of skirt comes along (if that hasn't already happened).. You've just had a baby (congratulations) and therefore, it hasn't been 'all about him' for a while -- this can come as quite a blow to the ego of a man who craves the feeling he's the be all and end all to the woman he's with, the passion and the excitement of conquest.

[AnyFucker]

hobb, perhaps now is the time to throw in the towel on your romantic relationship

and work on your link as co-parents

because it sounds like you could do it in an amicable way (which I know was not the case a few months ago)

do you think you could do that ?

of course, you would both have to accept that ould mean one or both of you meets someone else

he says he can't stand the thought of you with someone else, but says he doesn't want you in that way anymore

that is not reasonable, nor fair

have you pointed that out to him ?

do you think there might already be someone else for him? Or, frankly, there has been for some time ?

[thumbwitch]

I agree with AnyFucker, Hobb - I think you need to find that middle ground, pretty much as you are at the moment, of amicable co-parenting and try and rein in the romantic feeling resurgences you are having. It may never happen for him, or it might. WE can't possibly know, especially as he doesn't!
Either - as SGB says - he's really just not that into you (I have a friend who, despite all the signs being good and us being single at the same time, there really was just never a spark there so we have always stayed just good friends so it is possible);
Or - he is still in that immature phase where he wouldn't recognise a mature relationship if it bit him on the arse. What you say about his early family life is interesting - he had no real opportunity to witness a mature and loving relationship by the sound of it, just one possibly filled with lots of drama - so he has no model for this.

The main thing is to protect yourself, lovely - and don't let your feelings run away with you. Keep telling yourself that you are just friends, let it be that you come across as you are just friends, don't give him any ultimatums.
BUT don't try to stop seeing him either, although you could cut it down more, I think - you don't need to be as available to him as it sounds like you are being. However, that is possibly something for when your DD is perhaps a bit bigger - he can take her by himself for a few hours to help you out. Is he being a doting and adoring Dad? It would be a bit mean to stop him seeing his DD if he is.

I think I'm over-talking this - the only thing you have any control over in this situation is your feelings - you can choose to stop them, just put them in a mental cool-box and tell them to stay there and behave themselves - and keep going with the amicable co-parenting.
And see what happens (for a bit, anyway)

HTH
And (((( hugs)))) as well

[FabBakerGirlIsBack]

How are you feeling today Hobbgoblin.

[hobbgoblin]

Really confused tbh.

Thanks for Guardian link and other replies.