Thanks.
Yes I'm in the U.S. and I'm shocked learning how messed up the alimony laws are here. It almost feels punitive.
I actually don't have anything against paying child support. I get the concept of taking care of your kids. That's just common sense. You want me to help take care of my kids. Yeah of course I'm going to do that. I assumed 50-50 custody and visitation and all that which is pretty much standard here.
But what is crazy is that, I guess because I'm good with 50-50 custody and because the kids would be staying on my health insurance, the estimated child support I'm being told I could face is actually shockingly low. The majority of the roughly $1,600 to $2,000 a month I've been quoted as my potential full court ordered responsibility would go to alimony to her even though she is perfectly physically capable of working full time at her current job and would make close to if not as much as I make now.
That is what pisses me off. You want me to take care of my kids, no problem. You want to quit on our marriage and quit on me but you still want the benefit of me subsidizing your life and paying your bills while you go off and screw somebody else? If I'm not good enough for you my money is not good enough for you. You want all the benefits of being with me, then be with me.
And yes I have absolutely thought about the impact this could have on my kids. I hate that. It has absolutely been a factor holding me back from leaving. But I also know them growing up seeing us fighting all the time and seeing me miserable can't be particularly great for them either. So I don't really know which is worse having your parents together and miserable or being shuffled between houses. Its all bad choices at this point. But yes I am fully aware and fully feel the guilt of my decisions either way. I just don't talk about because it is hard to think about.
And I want to get our marriage back on track. I have tried to get our marriage back on track. But I can't do it if I am the only one who thinks there is a problem and I am the only one doing any of the work and she is just fine in an existence where I am miserable.
She basically quit on the marriage part of the marriage. She said she loved me. She said she was attracted to me. She said she wanted to have a lifelong committed relationship in every way including sexually. So I do what a good man should do when the woman he loves makes those promises to him. I settled down, married her, left my chosen career for a much higher paying job and now make twice what I made when we met. We bought a house together, had kids together, went deep into debt together. The American Dream.
But since she had the kids she doesn't care about the relationship part and has actually said during arguments a few times that she only married me to have kids. I didn't sign up for that. I deserve better than that. I couldn't possibly try harder to be a supportive partner, stake as much burden and chores off her as possible I even learned how to cook halfway decent to take that off her plate. I am still in good shape approaching 50 not fat not bald. She is incredibly sexually inhibited to the point but I have tried to learn ways to still turn her on and satisfy her within her boundaries. But she just keeps checking out of our intimacy and sex life more and more. She takes more things off the table to the point I can't even do any form of foreplay anymore, all she wants is straight to intercourse no warmup rough quickie and she goes in saying she won't be into it I have no chance of making her orgasm and I should just make it about me, and still with that attitude I usually manage to get her to get out of her own head and get into it about halfway through and get her off at least sometimes. But despite how hard I work to be romantic, make her happy, be there for her, make sex good, support her, she just doesn't care. She won't fight for our sex life and I am doing all the work of keeping any spark alive between us and she seems just fine if we slowly turn into roommates.
She has her reasons but she won't do anything about them. She has body image issues. She has past trauma. She is depressed and hates her life because I'm not rich and we can't afford a big house with a pool. She is perimenopausal. I understand the impact all these things have which is why I have been patient for so long as I went through hell and felt my self esteem completely destroyed. But at some point be a grown woman. Don't let the excuses run your life and ruin your marriage if you care about it. Fight for it. She won't work on her issues in therapy. She won't do sex therapy thats a hard no. She won't even talk to a doctor about HRT let alone actually try it. She has just given up on our marriage without a fight and expects me to just do all the hard work of being a husband while she waives a doctors note to excuse her from ever wanting to be my wife again and any personal responsibility to our marriage. She wants me to just shut up and accept slowly becoming roommates. Put yourself in my position. Would you want to live the rest of your life like that, especially knowing there are things that can help if she would just work with me and try.
But I'm the bad guy for wanting to leave when she has quietly quit our marriage?
I just want to be with a woman who appreciates what I have to give and finds it attractive. That being me does it for her and makes her feel "that way" about me and I am worth something more than just paying bills and doing chores to her. I want to not be doomed to go the rest of my life never knowing what it feels like again for a woman to want me, be turned on by me, to give a woman an orgasm ever again. I don't think that is unreasonable.
And I am not an incel as was suggested. I don't hate all women. I don't even hate divorce. I am frustrated and hurt by the specific woman I married and a system that keeps me trapped married to her because of money. Let me pay just child support I'll be gone in a heart beat and restart my life. But tell me I have to choose between either being miserable with her the rest of my life or miserable alone while I pay her bills the rest of my life, how is that a fair choice?
And I know all women aren't gold diggers. I just also know that to get to the relationship stage where a woman can see and fall in love with the non financial things I have to offer requires going through the dating phase which costs money and I really find myself wondering if any woman would be willing to take a chance on a guy they just met who doesn't have any money not because he doesn't have a job but because he is saddled with alimony and look past it to see my other qualities. Or if they will all say its not their problem and go for the guy with money too. I am worried about the massive competitive disadvantage I would be at basically. That's all.