To ask how you knew your LTR / marriage was over?

[Babystepstinyshoes]

How do you know for sure when the pull of the DC is so strong?
I’ve read Too Good to Leave, Too Good to Stay and it didn’t really help.
There’s no cheating or anything like that as far as I know, but we’ve stopped having sex and there’s no emotional intimacy either. There’s just not a lot at all, but it’s civil. He seems to think everything is fine but then I think he’s always been like this and it’s me who has changed, I am lonely but if I were actually alone would that be any better? My needs are not met in this marriage but it’s familiar and safe and the dc are happy.

Did you get together when very young? I thought myself and my childhood sweetheart would be together forever but after almost ten years I had most definitely changed. Basically I matured and he remained the same. The main issue there was he wished to remain in the rural backwater we had both grown up in.

I left and moved. Over the course of my life I have studied or worked in London, Birmingham and Nottingham. I ended up with a DH who was also prepared to travel for opportunities.

You have dc which does make it much harder. How much have you discussed the issues with him? Relationships do go through peaks and troughs. What job, hobbies and friends do you have? I think boredom kills a lot of relationships that intrinsically have two good people in them.

My ex remains in the rural backwater we grew up in.

We got together when I was very young.
He wasn’t as young as me.

It is the DC that make this so much harder, as I’m sure it does for many people. I sometimes wish he’d have an affair. Then it’s cut and dry. This middle ground ambivalence is just a wasteland.

I felt like my emotions were screaming at me - it literally felt like noise in my head. But I left it many years too long as, like you, I didn’t want to split for the DC. In the end I had to, no other choice.

It’s less lonely in your own... or it was for me. I described as death by a thousand cuts. No one thing big enough to end the marriage but it was clear (at least to me) that it was dead. I felt like I couldn’t breathe in case a huge scream came out. Carefully moving past him in our tight kitchen so we didn’t make physical contact as one or other of us would flinch. Lying in bed at night listening to him breathe and thinking ... another 40 more years of this, I’d rather just not exist.

In the end it popped out over dinner and once the words were out they wouldn’t go back in. He left for a fortnight and that evening I sat in the living room totally totally numb. It took a week to feel anything and then what I felt was relief.

There were occasions that divorce was hard or where I felt incredibly sad at what should have been. There was lots of guilt about my H and DD. I hung on to that relief though. That feeling was totally honest and unclouded and I pushed on until everything settled.

Am 2 years passed now. We co parent well. DD is very settled and happier than she was living in the tension. We don’t argue, we do whatever suits DD.

I have a boyfriend now but even when I was 100% single I was so much less lonely than sitting on the sofa not talking with my husband.

I’d say bite the bullet, expect it to be a rollercoaster, try to be fair to him and don’t get sucked into bitching at each other but know that alone is better, lots and lots better!

Yes, I make the decision to stay and my brain goes this doesn’t feel right and I make the decision to leave and my brain says that doesn’t feel right either.
I’m not sure if this place of indecision where neither path seems right is in some ways the hardest part because I’m trying to deal with both outcomes all the time and I never feel settled.

For me, I had to go through a process of forcing myself to visualise what living and managing on my own would be like. Initial reaction to the thought was always scary and negative. It would be, because it was unknown! I never allowed myself to actually think past that gut reaction fear and actually imagine in detail how it would work, what my life would be like, where I would live etc
Once I did that, and could consider divorce in terms of my future that would bring, it became a simple weighing of pros and cons vs my future of staying in the relationship

Many people will say it took them a long time to admit the relationship is over and to say it out loud- I suppose it was a bit like that. I needed to be able to get past the term “divorce” and think about what my life would be like as divorcee 2,3,5,10 years on.

Took me last 10 years of 30 year marriage to realise that🤦‍♀️ Took me less than 5 months to get divorced once I did start to visualise my potential future life and realise it would be much better than my future life remaining married.

I think it depends on how much you value being in a relationship. I know some people who cannot stand the thought of not being in a relationship. It leads to many poor decisions. After I broke up with my childhood sweetheart I was single for almost two years. I just concentrated on retraining in my career.

You don’t love him it’s obvious, do you like him?

I would say if this relationship is draining you then you probably are better off alone as a single parent I would advise you to take plenty of time out of dating for a while. My Mother was alway dissatisfied with men and left them all, she married four times. She never gave herself a period of reflection and finding herself between each husband. I mean she was a Merry Widow and financially incredibly well off but she made too many hasty decisions jumping in to new relationships.

Have you spoken to him about it, told him what you want and need?

I have a set of acquaintances who have just amicably split after 40 years, 2 children, 2 grandchildren, but being locked up 24/7 this year, both have had significant health conditions and they found 'we get on each other's nerves. I'm in bewilderment that people would throw away 40 years to separate and live in two bedsits for their retirement. They get on, they like and respect each other, there are no other parties involved. The house was big enough for them to have their own space and get away from each other. I'm utterly baffled by it. But I'm probably overly thinking it as my DH passed away and not having someone to have your back is a phenomenal change.

Just knew I couldnt do it anymore. Felt like the love was gone and/or couldnt live like that anymore.

Its never ever felt like an easy decision though and leaving someone is just as hard as being left

How old is you dc?

I would stay until dc is at secondary school.

I'm a single parent and have been since the dc were babies, I would have put up with lack of intimacy for someone to share the burden of bringing up the kids.

I knew my last LTR (before I met my husband) was over because he was working away and I was glad. I would purposely ignore his calls and then text saying I couldn't answer because I didn't want to spend an hour on the phone trying to make conversation with someone who I no longer really liked or trusted.

As soon as he came home and I made excuses not to see him straight away, I knew it wasn't just the distance - two years earlier I'd be weepily waiting at the airport with a homemade sign every time he came home. I just knew it was over.

Turns out he'd been renting a flat in the city he worked away in with a very pretty colleague, so I'm glad I was already checked out.

@happinessischocolate

How old is you dc?

I would stay until dc is at secondary school.

I'm a single parent and have been since the dc were babies, I would have put up with lack of intimacy for someone to share the burden of bringing up the kids.

and yet, the longer you leave it, the harder it is on the kids usually. I say if youre going to split, do it when kids are younger

@Babystepstinyshoes

How do you know for sure when the pull of the DC is so strong? I’ve read Too Good to Leave, Too Good to Stay and it didn’t really help. There’s no cheating or anything like that as far as I know, but we’ve stopped having sex and there’s no emotional intimacy either. There’s just not a lot at all, but it’s civil. He seems to think everything is fine but then I think he’s always been like this and it’s me who has changed, I am lonely but if I were actually alone would that be any better? My needs are not met in this marriage but it’s familiar and safe and the dc are happy.

'My needs are not met'.

That's all that I'd need to know, OP. Life is too short to spend being married to someone who was on the same level as a housemate.

With my ex i just wanted to blurt out "its over" several times a day. And i saw a future without him in it evwn if i didnt yet know how or when i would get there.

No kids but within 12 weeks my life was 1000 times better. And i know now if i can get through that with no friends or family nearby i could do it again.

I think you need to ask yourself if there’s the potential for it to improve? If not then you’re wasting your time not being happy.

I know you have children but they will grow up and have their own lives.

I ended things with my ex because I’d ignored the red flags for so long. I still remember looking at myself in the mirror and saying remember this moment and how unhappy you are whenever you feel like you miss him.

For those who ended it, how did you have that conversation- I'm in the same boat. I raised it 5 years ago, then some life stuff got in the way, elderly parents care and passing, now I'm ready to have the conversation again. But how do you say oh by the way, I'm not happy can we separate please? We don't talk, it's the death of a thousand cuts someone else said

That’s where I’m at I think - how do I start the conversation?

@Babystepstinyshoes I wish he'd have an affair isn't that awful 😥

My marriage was over when he threatened to thump my daughter.
It took months to get him to move out. He didn't want to listen and was convinced I was depressed.

I wish mine would have an affair. Or we were fighting all the time.
This ambivalent meh is just no man’s land.
Maybe it’s just what happens after a long time together?

I would stay until dc is at secondary school. I'm a single parent and have been since the dc were babies, I would have put up with lack of intimacy for someone to share the burden of bringing up the kids.

Sharing the burden how happinessischocolate? Do you mean the day to day grunt work or the financial burden? I'm just curious as in my marriage I do all of the day to day stuff anyway so it's money that's my only real fear/concern.

I do all of the dc stuff too. If we were able to stay in this house - apart from holidays and Christmas etc - I’m dubious as to how much the dc would notice.
DH does very little with them, I was trying to think and I don’t think he’s ever taken dd anywhere on her own and she’s 6.

Spent 7 years in misery, made to stay home unless I was going to work, not allowed to see friends unless he was there- the usual controlling bullshit. I tried to leave several times but he would guilt trip me into letting him stay (crying, saying he had nowhere to go, threatening suicide). One day he aggressively called me a "lying sack of shit" in the middle of the street (over washing dishes) and I knew from that moment I was done. I had been walked over for too long and NO-ONE calls me a liar. I switched off completely from the relationshit and gave him the boot two weeks later. Couldn't be happier!

When I opened a card that came through the post for him - an anniversary card from his mistress! . It was surprising, and another shock came when I found out about the second mistress he had on the go at the same time, a few weeks later!

And my overwhelming feeling - as awful as it sounds - was relief. Our marriage was a shambling zombie which should have been put out of it's misery with a baseball bat about 3 years earlier. No sex, no conversation, no emotional intimacy, no feeling for me of being important or cherished - because I simply wasn't!

So much happier now, with a lovely new boyfriend who adores me and wants to share his thoughts/feelings/life with me. But do you know what? When I met him I was already happier single than I'd been with DH for years. I realised I'd been sort of squashed down by his disapproval and it had chipped away at my self esteem over the years - it was so liberating to be able to stretch my wings and get to know myself again!

Married young. No affairs on either side. Became increasingly depressed. When I realised I was seriously contemplating suicide as an exit route I knew it was time to call it a day.