Hi, @Fantastique11 in answer to your question it’s money on vintage cars and bikes.
Since therapy, I feel like it’s only now I can see things clearly. I was recommended to find someone who was a chartered clinical psychologist, it’s expensive but she’s a woman of my own age with a lot of experience.
In a nutshell, I became the emotional crutch for my own mother at a very young age. I continued to feel responsible for her as I got older. When I married I allowed myself to be the junior partner with my husband. His needs and wants came first, mine second. My therapist says this is because I had been trained up by my mother to forgo my own needs. Having a child was easy because it was second nature to think of others first.
I had a long marriage but as time went on I became more resentful. My husband always convinced me that my expectations of him were unreasonable. By the time the menopause came and went, my mother had died and my child was an adult in a happy relationship. I realised I had lost some of those caring hormones and was getting more and more angry and resentful at my husband.
I sought therapy and began seeing that my husband had been taking advantage of my good nature, and instead of thanking me for it, just used it more and more as an excuse to have his own way in everything. So having seen the light, I am trying to cast off my old life as fast as possible. Even during this period I am having to grey rock and be fake.
I agree it’s harder for you with young ones. What does your therapist say about him keep bringing up your past behaviour? Oh and something else I discovered about husbands, just because they say something eg “the sky is pink” doesn’t mean they actually believe it. It’s just a head fuck to keep you in your place - under their thumb.