When did you know it was time for divorce?

I’m knew it was time to leave my first husband when I had been away from him for a few weeks. At the end of my time away, I went to a friend’s for the weekend. As I left her house to go back home to my husband, I cried my eyes out. I had had a lovey time and I didn’t want to go back to him. There wasn’t one bit of me that wanted to go home and see him. I preferred time away and alone than time at home with him.
That was the moment.

A lot of this rings very true, for me the tipping point was my 38th birthday. He hadn’t got me a present (normal), he always said “oh I’ll take you for a weekend away” and he would, once I’d sorted the childcare, researched where we would go and found the hotel. This time when he said that I rolled my eyes and he got all defensive and said, “well I was making you breakfast in bed as well”

He went downstairs and came back up with a bacon sandwich on bread with ketchup and a white coffee.

I have bacon sandwiches toasted with brown sauce and take my coffee black.

14 years together, 10 married and he couldn’t make me a coffee…

That should say without me.

In response to sone of these posts, I didn’t want my children to come from a broken home either.
I think that’s why I tolerated so much.
My ex h was never violent or abusive. The dcs loved him and so did I, but he never put us first.
Even his friends said he had the absolute life if luxury. They told him he had a wife who did virtually everything and I include all the gardening, cleaning the car and decorating in that as well as childcare and housework. Yet he carried on as if he was single. Going out without us, spending money on drinking, socialising, nights out with me, weekends away with me or the dcs.
Eventually it just got too much.
After saying he didn’t want to married with children he is now married to someone else and she had 4 dcs!
The same as others he fought the divorce. Made life as difficult as he could. Refused point blank to see the dcs. Stopped laying child support.
Told the dcs I was a bad parent ( after telling me I was an excellent mother). Ranted to the dcs about how come none of my friends spoke to him, yet every single one of his friends still spoke to me.
Told the dcs he would make life difficult for me.
Ranted at dcs saying how come they like my new dh so much.
How come they don’t like his wife.
Refused to sit next to me at ds’s graduation.
Told the dcs that his new family were his family now and they had better get used to it.
My dcs don’t speak to him.
He trys to contact them.
The new wife said he sits crying.
His own sister no longer speaks to him but sees my dcs and we still speak.

Some people are just crazy.

Just to add to @jackstini 's post, the thing I've learned from being in an EA marriage is that no one should put up with a partner that makes you feel like shit every day. It can be subtle like guilting you into doing the washing up all the way up to calling you names, verbal assaults, gaslighting, all that. And yes YES to that sinking feeling when you hear his key in the door. The treading on eggshells. Dealing with his immaturity. Him not being able to deal with anything difficult without exploding. No-one should live with that.

Whereas men live in competent denial. They know they are behaving badly but if they don't admit it it can't be claimed to be true.

Even when I told mine I couldn't imagine ever having sex with him again ans didn't love him he still wanted the marriage to continue🙄

@Gettingbysomehow this last line resonated - I was assured so many times, by mum, counsellor/s, female solicitor, older friends, that women live in hope - that
life will improve, he will grow up, he will stop carping, criticising, creating drama,
the usual stuff which men apply from the same script, on and on and on, when we are fooling only ourselves - the years are long when we are unhappy.

Surely you know divorce is the better option for your DD?

It's a hard question as everyone will have red lines. My reason is too unique to post but when you know you know.

I also worry about my daughter not having had a dad. She has this friend, let's call her Juliet, and Juliet's Dad is always in her corner. He will say things like, you worked hard, you deserved that grade. Your consumer rights have been breached, you have every right to ask for a refund. So they called you loud? Go ahead! "Be loud! Advocate for yourself!", (and then later if that doesn't work, he will go get the refund/wages she was owed when she left... )
My daughter has witnessed this. We don't have a Dad like that, neither of us, but ive often discussed this with my daughter, cultivate your own inner Dad. If Juliet were in this situation, what would her Dad advise? And that helps both of us! I had a weak passive co dependant Dad, so I was never encouraged to stand firm in my own interpretation of events, quite the opposite. So we both cultivate an inner Dad who is in our corner, encouraging us to set goals, meet them, assert ourselves, advocate for ourselves, say no, walk away from below bare minimum effort level men / situations.

I hope my daughter doesn't make the poor choices I made but if she does, her real mother and her inner mother will be compassionate and supportive

It must be so nice to have a dad who is angry that people treated you badly. My dad does this weird thing where he makes me see it from their side. So invalidating.

I should add, you meet someone you really love and want to marry, at last you think you are happy.
But then you find out he isn't a prince after all or even a half decent partner.
But it's difficult to let go because you had your whole future, adult life, retirement mapped out with this person, you might still love him, it's so hard to let go of the dream.
Just let it go or your might sit there hoping things will change for 20 years like I did.

When I realised that he did nothing for me at all. I earned the money, ran the house, did the boring jobs and all other jobs and worked full time.
All he cared about was his myriad of hobbies and being a total sex pest.
When I was happy that he was going away to do one of his hobbies for the weekend so I didn't have to look at his miserable sulking face for 2 days.
Not giving a shit when I was really ill.
Making every christmas and birthday a misery. Its so easy to have one lovely, happy day but he couldn't manage it.
One day he said he was leaving me in a huff, I was very happy.
He crawled back sometime later asking if he could come home and I said no thank you and changed the locks.
He couldn't believe I wouldn't let him come back.
It was my house incidentally not his. This after a 20 year relationship.

Yes
A 14 cannot consent-shes underage
It is rape (even if she was laid naked on his bed while begging for him)
The nasty,creep pervert had a 'relationship' with her (he was in his late 30's) behind my back,got her pregnant and fucked off leaving her holding the baby
(All her own fault apparently for 'getting herself pregnant')
He ended up in prison for drug dealing but this crime he seemed to shake off and nothing was ever done
They even did a dna test on the baby,which proved he was the father
He didn't even pay a penny for any of his kids (which won't surprise anyone) and didn't do a second of time inside-he just walked away

@FluentRubyDog

See, that's my biggest concern, expose DD to a divorce or let her grow up with a completely skewed idea of what a relationship should look like.

Divorce may well be hard on your daughter - or she may already be aware and will come through the process, with understanding, love and care from you. Or staying may well show her that this is how marriage works - and leave her vulnerable in the future to someone who'll treat her like her father treats you. 🌹

When he started on the children.
When I couldn't trust him to be decent towards them.

I put it off for years as I was waiting for the kids to grow up. When my youngest was 11, my ex’s behaviour had become so awful, showed me no respect, staying out at night etc. I just realised one day that you only get one life, and if anything were to happen to me (I’d had a cancer scare not long before that) I wouldn’t have had a chance at happiness, be that in my own or with someone else. We split up then. I had some very hard times with my son who I suspect saw his dad as a “victim” for having to move out, and went off the rails. But no guarantee he wouldn’t have done that anyway. I’d say do it.

That's so disgusting. I hope he doesn't see them now!

I’m so sorry.

Are you okay? This sounds very worrying.

My dps ex wife fought the divorce for almost 9 years

(Covid didn't help)

You'd think they'd be glad to get rid of each other,but she wanted to say she was still married even though he'd left her and was with me

He left due to her behaviour-ran up thousands of pounds in debt-he cleared it but made it clear that if she did it again,he was off-she ran up twice the amount again within the year after conning dps mum out of 10k and when he tried to leave,she stabbed him

I believe him when he says what happened-ive been on the end of her endless spite and its backed up by the people who where there at the time-it took a lot of time,money and the bailiffs to get her to sign those bloody papers

For me it was when I started to get itchy 'down there'

He'd given me two stds but claimed I'd given them to him (a line he still comes out with to this day)

I threw him out-he did nothing for our dc unless it was in front of others,gaslighted like hell,demanded sex when he wanted it,I'd heard he'd got a 14 year old child pregnant (he swore it wasn't true but it was) spent all my money on himself (even if it meant his kids went without) and promptly got sent to prison for flogging drugs

It got to the point where hearing his knock on the front door made me heave

I pity his new girlfriend (she's 17,he's 48-his own words 'just how i like them-young and legal')

Disgusting arsehole

I relate to that key in the door heart sink. My x would come home and instantly start dumping on me to make himself feel better. The house was a mess (my fault), there was no milk in the fridge (my fault) some food had gone off (my fault). I hadn't bought enough meat, I'd bought too much meat! how dare I not be hungry when he was hungry, how dramatic / weak / needy of me to be hungry when he was full. He just didn't see me as a real person. I was a vessel to dump all his irritations and inadequacies. Oh boy. What an arsehole. He still HATES me for existing 17 years after I left him.

The moment I found he was cheating on me. I had no hesitation. I packed his stuff into black bin sacks and got the locks changed. Then I text him to come home immediately. I got my BiL to come around when h arrived home and BiL told my h never to come back and not to try to contact me. A solicitor would be in touch with him.