DH left me a month ago and has refused all contact with me since. Please help.

[Banks]

The story is very long, but I'll try and nutshell it for you.

I met dh four years ago. He holds very prestigious degrees but had been unemployed and living in his parents' basement for half a year when I met him. He was undergoing adjustment disorder after having left his career as a corporate attorney to volunteer in the Sudan. He spent two years there. When we met, I thought it would just be a fling. But I quickly developed feelings for him. After three months of dating, I told him that he needed to decide what he was doing or I had to leave as I was falling in love with him. He assured me that he would stay in our hometown. He even went through the very long and involved interview process with the two top law firms in town and had offer letters in hand from both. But at about five months into our relationship, he received an offer from Médecins Sans Frontières and took it without counsulting me about it. The job was overseeing their efforts in 15 different countries in Africa. He asked me to join him. I did, giving up my whole life (great job, great car, great flat, cat, etc.).

I had a hellish time. I was sick with infectious disease the whole two years we lived abroad (I had everything from TB to MRSA to malaria to dysentery everything). It was horrible for me. But I stayed because I loved him. I accompanied him to site visits on occasion and saw such horrible things that I can't even begin to descrbie emaciated children left in the mud to die, babies who had been raped so that their insides were falling out, albinos whose heads had been severed for voodoo purposes, women who had their labia cut off and eaten in front of them, etc.).

When his contract was satisfied, we returned to the States (is it ok that I'm an American?, I hope so...). But we didn't go back to the smaller city that we were both from. Because of the economy, we moved to New York City. DH got a job as a highly paid lawyer again.

During this time, I started developing symptoms of PTSD. Neither he nor I really recognized it as such during the first year. Of course, I also had HUGE adjustment disorder NYC is a hard city to live in even if it's your dream and adjustment disorder can affect even expats who are returning from London (which is a far cry from places like Bangui or Goma). I barely ever left the apartment. I made ZERO friends. I stayed at home and cried all day, basically. I did not find a job or even try. I did nothing that I used to do. I felt destroyed. I would fly into rages at him over the smallest things rages that were extremely scary for both of us (but less so for me as I hardly recalled them after the fact (which, according to the therapist I just found two weeks ago is very typical of people with PTSD)). I have ongoing physical medical issues that I developed while living in Africa, including one that means that I may be infertile. I blamed him for all of that and really verbally abused him. I admit that and totally regret it. Occasionally, when I would get into a very heightened state, he would attempt to restrain me and I would fight him off of me. We both left bruises on each other on a few occasions.

It was truly horrendous. I did start seeing a therapist a year after this behavior started happening, but she was someone I picked randomly from a list of names that my insurance approved of and was not at all trained to deal with cases like mine. She validated a lot of my bad thoughts and behaviors instead of challenging them and my condition actually worsened during the time I saw her.

My dh is a very passive person and never really challenged me on the behavior. He always reassured me that he understood and loved me.

But in August I took a trip to a European city that we were planning to live in to make sure that it REALLY was as nice as it seemed. He was to have joined me at the end of the month, but instead of doing that he lied about being sick (saying that he was vomiting and had bad diarrhea and that he might have Crohn's disease or colon cancer). He said that he was going back to our home town to seek proper medical care (which made sense to me as it is hard to find good care in NYC). I flew back to meet him and, in front of my mother and father, he said that he needed a separation from me.

I was completely shocked. I had no idea it was coming. The last emails he had sent to me said things like "I can't wait to see you soon and hold you in my arms", stuff like that.

He didn't even tell my parents that before flying to our home state, he had filed for divorce in New York.

He was talking to my mother a for months behind my back about my behaviors and did not seem to accept that they came from PTSD. He had built this image in his mind that I am just abusive-- even though I never have been before and never was to him until after the disorder set in. She did not tell me because he made me seem so dangerous, she thought I might seriously harm myself or him if she did.

While I admit that the fight-or-flight rages were scary, I was pretty shocked to learn that he had taken them as an indication of who I was and what I really intended, not a symptom of an illness like vomiting.

He now refuses to talk to anyone in my family, saying that he thinks that I "can't change". Which is so absurd as he saw me change right before his eyes from a woman who would (and did) do anything to him to a radically depressed and PTSD ridden creature.

His leaving gave me the shock I neeeded to gain the perspective on what was going on. I now have found a very good therapist who specializes in the disorder, I am on meds to keep my mood stable, and, most importantly, somehow all of it seems to have just been blown off. I feel like a drunk who hit rock bottom and I'm done with all of it-- I have heard from many medical professionals that this can happen as anger becomes a self-medication addiction in some people in much the way that drugs do for others. I just have to work to maintain it.

The only thing is that dh won't talk or give me a chance. He has refused to go to counseling with me. Everyone who knows me thinks I should just let him go-- that it's horrific for a man who purports to be compassionate for others to misrepresent the behaviors of his sick wife as fundamental personality flaws in order to leave her with a clear conscious. That it was horrific of him to ask me to uproot my life and to keep me in such an unsafe place where I was getting so sick all the time. But I know that he loves me and I believe that where there is love, there is hope. I think he has what they call compassion fatigue going on (something that often happens to the SOs of those with PTSD). I just hope he can snap out of it.

So, please, tell me what you think. Honestly. I really need a way to try to just talk to him. I have no idea how this is even within the remote realm of possibility. Even if we do end up splitting, this silence is too cruel to bear.

Blu, you make a lot of good points. He is very very passive and has extreme difficulty with vocalizing what he really wants or thinks. Another problem is that I had decided on living in Berlin after falling in love with it. He COMPLETELY went along with the idea, lock stock and barrel. But when he dumped me it turned out that he never wanted to live there and that was part of why he wanted to leave.

I think he IS very embarrassed at the way he left. Part of me wonders if he did it in such a harsh and dramatic way in the hopes that it would make me hate him.

You make a good point, too, about what was wrong with me that I thought it would be a good idea to chuck my whole life to leave for uncharted waters with him when I hadn't known him for that long. I thought of it as true love not being stopped by obstacles at the time, but there is probably more under the surface...

Supercherry,

Is there any part of you that thinks that your abuse of him was under your control?
In retrospect, yes, actually. IF I had been conscious of what was going on, I think I could have controlled it. The hitch is that I would get into those states and not really understand what was going on and that's when it would happen. I just wish I had had a good therapist then. I really liken it to being asleep and lashing out in your sleep. I was asleep. If I had been stronger, I would have woken myself up and been where I am now months ago. But I wasn't. So, basically, I think that if I had had the persepctive and mechanisms to see what was really going on, I could have stopped. But at the time I did not have acess to them. I feel as though I have found those now. But that it is probably too late now. It makes me really sad.

Did you hurl abuse at anyone else or just him? I ask because I wonder if part of you blames him for your illness?
No, I totally isolated myself from everyone else. I only abused him. I DID blame him. That was wrong. I was in love and felt powerless, but, yes, I could have left at any time. I just never wanted to leave him. So instead of leaving him (as I probably should have done) I blamed him and cultivated a deep resentment of him that would express itself when my brain would go into fear response mode and my higher order processing would shut down.

You say everyone who knows you thinks it 'horrific of him to ask me to uproot' your life and to keep you in an unsafe place. Do people really say this? Or is this what you think? You talk here as if you had no choice but to go there and stay with him but you did have the choice- you are an adult.
Yes, people really say this. MANY people actually told me that as I was in the process of doing it. I blithely ignored them. You are correct, again, if I had been more analytical and less emotional I should have stepped back and said "this is NOT working for me". But I was incredibly deeply in love with him and he was with me. he wanted me there by his side and I was incapable of saying no.

A non-abusive person would accept the fact that he has the choice to end this relationship. You have to respect his wishes and back off no matter how difficult that it for you.
This is a good point. I do accept that he can end the relationship, I just think that the way he's doing it is incredibly cruel and that it sucks that he never really gave me a chance to change. It went from "I love you so much" to complete silence.

Furthermore, like the other posters have said, if there is any small hope of him giving you another chance, you have to let him come to this decision of his won accord.

This seems to be the consensus.

Supercherry,you said "abuse, no matter the reason, destroys relationships. It is really really hard for the sufferer of abuse to be able to trust the abuser once they have made the decision to leave."

I know that and it is tearing me apart. It built up slowly over the course of a year-- like a frog in water. I'm NOT blaming him at all, but his passivity fed it. The fact that he never challenged me and that I was seeing a bad therapist who validated my negative outburts all added up to the situation I'm in now. That said, I accept responsibility for not figuring out a way out of the fog sooner. I could barely get out of bed somedays, though, let along research and locate proper care. I wish I had looked deeper inside and mustered the last bits of strength I didn't know I had in order to stop it from growing until it become so horrible.

Recently I have done a lot of research, however. PTSD very often blows relationships apart because if left unchecked it can produce abusive behaviors. These relationships are more likely to heal as PTSD is, thankfully, very treatable. All it would take would be for him to be willing to see that. That is what makes it a bit different from a normal situation.

Well, I asked that question as someone who has done many ill-advised things in pursuit of dodgy men, and I am sure that I didn't put my own needs high enough, didn't set a high enough (emotional)price on my own well-being, and was seeking to gain vicarious kudos from supporting men who were in diffuclt situations, make the best of something that, in reality, was barely 'good enough' etc.

Don't beat yourself about it - many of us have done things which didn't work out as we hoped, but it is worth having a throrough look at why.

Banks, I admire your honesty.

Banks - I absolutely accept that nothing is black and white, and that yes, we have responsibilities towards others - especially those we love.

I think I've come across as harsh because I'm looking at it from his point of view. I just think it sounds very controlling and unhealthy for you to be talking as though its not definitely over, as though he is somehow mistaken on thinking the marriage has ended, that he ought to still be talking to you and working at it.

That in combination with how he has chosen to end things suggests to me that you are not willing to hear that he just doesn't want the marriage to continue. I have been there myself - trying to end the relationship and it was as though I was speaking another language - because he didn't AGREE that it should be over, so my reasons were of no interest to him. It is utterly draining to know you want out but the other person just sees your explanations as arguments to be knocked down. Looking back I should have done what your H has done and just informed him it was over and ended all contact.

Of course I dont know the ins and outs and I certainly dont want to upset you - but these are my honest reactions to your post. Also - and I tend to roll my eyes when people post this usually but - I cant help but think that if you were a man posting this about his W you would certainly not be recieving this sympathy. Thats not your fault though. I do wish you all the best.

WhenwillIfeelnormal,

Believe me, I've had those thoughts too. There have been multiple instances in our relationship where he said one thing to my face while doing another thing behind my back. I do think that while the PTSD is definitely a major factor, that there are MANY other things going on.

One of my huge problems with him has always been, since the very start of our relationship, his difficulty with intimacy.

We had a very bad sex life. We very infrewquently did it and when we did, it was usually perfunctory and not pleasant for me (despite my many attempts to gently communicate what was wrong and what could be done to change).

Also, he has a rather strange sexuality in terms of weird fetishes and the need to humiliate and dominate in bed. I am very "good, giving and game" and generally went along with them, however. So most times that we did have sex, it was in this manner. He also had a fixation on watching pornography involving pubescent (13-16yo) girls being raped/abused. When I found this on his computer in Africa, I freaked out as that kind of stuff is illegal here in the States as well as being, well, kinda horrifying. Even though he had 10-15 videos like that mixed in with more "normal" porn, he always maintained that he accidentally downloaded them. I chose to believe him, even though my gut says that it was no accident. We agreed that porn of any sort was going to be out of the picture from then on and I never found evidence of him looking at it again.

Besides that, has a physical condition that makes getting and maintain an erection difficult. If he does get one, it generally only lasts for about a minute or two. He refused to explore other ways of being intimate-- he did not like touching me down there (he did not like that I stopped waxing because I became prone to UTIs in Africa and those are exacerbated by removing hair (which otherwise traps infectious particles)) and almost never gave me oral sex. I tried helping him with this the best I could, but it never really got better and, of course, through all the various illnesses and unhappiness we suffered, it only got worse as time went on.

This was my huge issue with him. It was something that we worked on but something that never seemed to approach resolution.

Ugh, the more I write the worse it all sounds.

WHy on earth do you want this man back (having just read your last post)? This relationship sounds like it was apocalyptically toxic from the beginning. Neither of you sound like good partner material, either. so the best thing for both of you would be to stay apart and sort yourselves out, separately, with the help of good counsellors.

Banks - he sounds hideous! Why, why, why are you so keen to get this relationship back?

Be glad that his shit is no longer your problem. And seriously look at why you're so keen to remain in the relationship. You can do so much better, i'm sure.

Blu, thank you for asking those questions. It's good for me to consider all sides. I know that there are reasons beyond "truly madly deeply" for why I would put myself in that postion. Did you ever get to the root of why you were chasing dodgy men? If so, what were they if I may ask? Did you sort it out? Are you in a healthy relationship now?

I am beating myself up, but, hey, I think I deserve it a bit. I'll stop in a due time, but maybe it's a good thing for a bit-- I'll learn more this way. I should have been pulling myself out sooner, etc.

Supercherry,

Thanks. I need to learn to be completely honest with myself if I want to get past this and heal. Again, not just for the marriage, but for myself. Thanks for asking tough questiosns. It's good to have to confront that stuff.

FallingWithStyle,

Thaks for the follow up post. This one sounds a lot less hostile. :) You certainly are looking at it from how he sees it.

I guess to me I'm not ready to acknowledge it's over not because of my need to control him, but because it just seems so sudden and so out of character. I mean, the panic attack symptoms were real-- he was having a very hard time during the week he filed. Whether that's a cause or an effect or both I have no way of knowing.

The fact that he went from being totally lovey with me to ending all contact is too dramatic to be able to process all at once. It's creating an enormous amount of dissonance in my heart. That's what makes it feel unreal. The fact that he never called me on my behavior, he never made an effort to get me help or research PTSD (unlike me who when he told me he might have cancer, read a ton about it in a couple of days and did a lot of Googling to try and find where the best clinics in the States are for it), that he never gave me an ultimatium doesn't help either. There was never mention of divorce or separation. It all came rushing out of left field.

If I had seen it coming, if we had talked about it AT ALL, I think I would be more prepared to accept this as final. As it stands, it is REALLY hard for me to process.

I do think that people tend to be more sympathetic to abusive behavior that is precipitated within the context of PTSD, regardless of gender. At least in the States they do as there is some awareness about the condition here due to the large number of our soldiers coming back with it. I just wish I had figured it all out earlier.

I appreciate your input and I'm sorry if I took your first post a bit hard. I am in a very sensitive and vulnerable place right now,

FallingWithStyle and SolidGoldBrass,

Yeah, it sounds incredibly horrible on paper and it WAS incredibly horrible in life as well. It made me feel incredibly rejected and unloved at times. The reason I was ok with it is that I love him and I realize that some people have a lot of demons in some areas. I was hoping that we could overcome his in that area together. I think that it may yet be possible if I am not in a place where I am collapsed in on myself and am barely able to get out of bed, let alone lend him emotional support.

I made a commitment to him and I am able to overlook his massive failings in that area therefore. Part of his issue is physical, as well, which is not something that I can hold against him. The need to degrade and the appetite for disgusting porn is a more complicated one, yes. But I thought that there would be a middle ground there somewhere. Like I said, to my knowledge, he had given up all porn after I found those disgusting videos. Then again, who knows if he was telling the truth considering how good he is at deception.

A relationship is always going to be complicated. Ours was a lot more complicated than most, yes. But, and maybe this is just pure madness of some sort talking, I do believe in love and hope and that people CAN change and grow and shake off even decades old defects.

Of course, since this post is all about what has gone wrong, it's hard to get why in the HELL either of us would ever want to even think about the other again.

I guess primarily is that when all of the nasty emotions are in subsidence, he is my best friend. We have so many interests in common, it's kinda scary. We are both total and utter nerdlingers I looooooove reading all I can read and so does he. Only he doesn't have the time for it so I go through The Economist, Harper's, etc. for him and bookmark articles that he'll like. We are constantly talking and are never bored of each other. We often say the same exact thing at the same time often really weird things that no one would normally say anyway. When things are good (and I'm not dwelling on the bad sex and I'm not in a dark depressive/PTSD place), they are very good in that way. Even though I have zero education in law, we discuss his job a lot and I have helped him have epiphanies on problems he's been stuck on. In Africa, when I wasn't busy throwing up all over myself, I was even more useful to him as my background was in the sciences and I was better able to parse a lot of the medical things he had to deal with than he was.

I realize that a romantic relationship needs a lot more than that, but it is really the first and only time in my life where I have had a partner who even remotely satisfies me in that manner. We had a lot of fun together as well as a lot of bad times.

Hello banks :)

I do think that you are better off out of this relationship. I can only offer my own experiences, which are different, but I'll share anyway. Ignore it if it's irrelevant.

My h became emotionally abusive when he became severely depressed. He never got physically abusive, but there were moments of restraining and frightening me.

Now, he was very ill. But he still did those things to me. So it's a difficult thing to resolve.

We are working things through, slowly, but there's a lot of pain there. I left him because of his treatment of me, and that gave him a jolt to change.

If h hasn't been mentally ill he may never have treated me like that, but he did. I know it's different, and it sounds like you both need space, but no matter what, you need to take responsibility for what happened.

If h blamed the depression I would not be with him (although I know it is partly to blame).

If I were to give you any advice it would be to concentrate on you and to get well. Because no matter what happens in the future you cannot rebuild things until you have sorted through your PTSD (and I am so sorry you are suffering with such an awful thing).

It is up to him if he decides to engage with you again, you cant force it, but you can make sure that either way you are in a position whereby you can cope.

I really hope you find some peace. But the answer is not in him. He has a right to think of himself now, just as you do. So make that choice!

Sorry for the ramble :)

WhenwillIfeelnormal - exactly the same thought had crossed my mind as well.

Blu - that's a really good post.

I hope I didn't sound heartless OP. I'm not suggesting you quit on your marriage entirely but just give him space and lots of it. It's hard as it must feel so out of your control in a way Sometimes when people feel pressured they can dig their heels in harder though IYSWIM? Space my help him. I think an e-mail outlining your position as others have said and saying you're going to give him some space now but you do want to work things out, will get the message across. When I was trying to save my marriage I sent a huge, well thought out e-mail to my H. I tried to be considerate and caring in it but state my position one final time but in a sensitive way. I didn't want to pressure him.

I need to bath my DCs and get them to bed but you're getting some great advice here so I may duck out now and leave you in more capable hands. Best of Luck Banks x

YouKnowNothingoftheCrunch, Wow! Don't apologize for rambling, I found your post to be very interesting. When you said that if he had blamed the depression for the abuse, you would not have taken him back do you mean to say that he ended up taking responsibility for the terrible things he said to you and that's what made you reconsider? And that if he had blamed it all on depression you would not have felt comfortable taking him back?

teaandcakeplease, You certainly don't sound at all heartless! :) It is interesting that almost everyone here is recommending giving him space... I need to seriously consider that, I know. If you do return to this thread, would you mind sharing what ultimately happened between you and your dh? Have fun with your dcs and thank you for the good wishes!

He obviously had to mean it rather than just say it, but it was the beginning if him caring about me again. He also got treatment and made a lot of progress in himself.

However (and this is the big but!) before he got ill we had a good and balanced relationship. I'm not sure your h is worth the effort from the small amount you've said about him.

They are very different circumstances.

Has he really ever put your needs first?

Can you put things with your h to one side while you get well? Because that is really what you need to do.

I really hope you can work through this, and by that I mean work through it on your own x

Banks, no, I no longer have any contact with my Ex, and I certainly have no desire to contact him now.
It did, however, take a good two years for me to recover from the separation, and to adjust to the idea that he was out of my life completely, and forever.

I noted your later post regarding porn/fetishes/domination etc with interest, as my ex had similar issues. He was also a habitual cocaine user and the two were, in his case, inextricably linked. Once established in the relationship, I started to go along with alot of things which actually made me far more uncomfortable and compromised than I even realised at the time. On a subconscious level, if you are tolerant of a partner's demands (sexual or otherwise) you can sometimes expect them to be tolerant of your own failings elsewhere. Hence, when I had a breakdown and my ex was unable to support me, I felt a deep sense of injustice about it.
Another thing that strikes me about your posts are the remarks regarding your dh's status/qualifications/familial wealth etc. I think in many respects I was in love with the 'idea' of my ex, who would also have sounded superb on paper, as well as with his physical appearance (he was very good looking), as opposed to the man himself, who was inherently selfish, shallow, and riddled with contradictions. I am now convinced that it was actually the idealised figure he presented to the world that I mourned when the relationship ended, rather than the deeply flawed individual I had actually known and lived with. Hope this makes sense.

I find myself agreeing totally with Fallingwithstyle. You married in haste, with awareness that there was a sexual 'issue' and commitment issues. You sold up, lock stock and followed him to Africa. You now need to take your share of the responsibility for this crap marriage and its ending.

Its called a break up because? What part of Divorce are you not hearing? I really mean it, why can you not accept that it's over? It sounds toxic, totally toxic, and here you are spouting therapy speak and over analysing it. It would serve you better to get your mental health straight and then move on with your life, to Belgium or wherever that may be. But you have got to leave the man alone.

Somethings don't need to be talked over.

Oh, and so much for MrCompassion. The porn taste alone would have sent me running

Oh and I also think Whenwillifeelnormal hit the nail on the head, there is probably another woman. He is not going to discuss that with you, for obvious reasons.

Sorry for you, it must have been a terrible time, but see this as a chance to start a new life.

Banks, here is what I see from your post.

You bargained away all sorts of marriage-reducing behavours throughout this relationship. You didn't react to a whole army of warning signs that would have had emotionally healthy people running for cover.
I am now wondering whether the PTSD therapy you are having ought to concentrate on not just the horrors you saw in Africa, but the horror of being in this marriage.

What seems to have made this worse for you by far is that your Mother seems to be colluding in what is only a partial story. Did she know about his paedophiliac rape fantasies and porn use, his sexual pecadilloes about you being waxed to resemble a child? His refusal to give you pleasure?

The facts are this man has ended the marriage and I would lay bets this is simply because he has found someone else.

Well pity that woman Banks because although you might not see this now, it has set you free.

I would urge you to get some additional therapy about how you came to bargain away so much for so long. Whilst I would echo everyone's sage counsel about how difficult it was for him living in an abusive relationship, that abuse was coming right back at you. Who knows where this started and what is a response reaction. Sometimes the mind fights back the only way it can and it takes over a person's cognitive choices.

Let him go Banks and start fixing yourself.

YouKnowNothingoftheCrunch, What was it that convinced you that he meant it and was not just saying it? Is your relationship now as good as or even better than before? I hope it is! :)

You're right, our relationship beforehand was always very unbalanced. I made all of the sacrifices he asked of me and I asked very few in return (he did give up porn when I asked him to, as far as I know but that's the only really big one I can think of). I never felt as though he put my needs first. He always seemed mostly interested in his career.

I know I have to try to put him to the side, but it's just so hard because it's so abrupt. For me, a warning and a discussion would have made the transition more bearable and easier to accept.

Thank you for your kind wishes.

cornflowers,

Thanks for sharing your story. I'm sorry taht you had to go through the weird sex stuff, too. It isn't something I've been dwelling on that much lately as the maelstrom that's been kicked up in recent days has so many aspects that that one has faded from view, but you're right-- it is very compromising. What also makes me feel violated is that he has a lot of pornography that we made together (that was part of the compromise of him stopping using other forms of porn) and I don't know if he will destroy it if we divorce.

I totally, totally TOTALLY get you when you say "On a subconscious level, if you are tolerant of a partner's demands (sexual or otherwise) you can sometimes expect them to be tolerant of your own failings elsewhere. Hence, when I had a breakdown and my ex was unable to support me, I felt a deep sense of injustice about it." Right or wrong, I get you.

I also think that the "great on paper" thing was similar between us as well. That said, I did have the opportunity to be with a man who was, in my opinion anyway, better educated than my dh and whose family was much more wealthy than dh's... The reason I didn't go for him, however, was that I simply wasn't in love with him. My friends all thought I was nuts as dh's history is a bit unstable and the other guy's left no questions. I think I was able to fall in love with dh because in some weird way I thought that I WOULDN'T fall in love with him, if that makes any sense. That said, he is still very close to perfect on paper (like your ex, he is very handsome as well as being prince charming in other ways too) and a lot of my friends are pretty shocked by some of the things I've revealed about how he treated me and his prurient interstes.

Like your ex, my dh in many ways could certainly be described as selfish, shallow, and riddled with contradictions. I mean, it's a bit absurd for someone who spent so much time and energy trying to save the huddled African masses from their ailments, someone who supposedly is that filled with compassion to turn his back on his wife whose illness is directly linked to her blind love for him; who put herself in a bad position because he asked her to and she couldn't bear to be parted from him. After seeing him bargain with taxi drivers down to local prices instead of accepting the elevated "white price" and not give alms to old women beggers, etc, etc, I got the sense that what he was doing there was less about actual compassion that he felt for those people than about proving to the world that he did, in fact, have compassion. Which, on some levels, he really is almost totally lacking.

I think that the fundamental problem with dh, as it is with a lot of people and it is with myself as well nowadays, is that he doesn't know himseslf. I actually saw this about him when I first met him and had empathy for him. I thought that it would be a good match he had been to 50+ countries and I had taken a lot of time to get to know my inner self before meeting him. If things had turned out differently, I would have really loved to have helped him learn how to traverse the most difficult of journeys that into your own heart. But I guess I was too arrogant. If I really knew myself as I thought I did, why did I fall apart so easily?

So anyway, I do get a lot of what you;re saying, cornflowers. I do think that I did idealize him in some ways. I mean, it would be sorta hard not to romanticize a man of privileged who casts that off to do good for the world. But the underbelly of that image was a whole other story. I think that some of my rage towards him, while exacerbated to ridiculous levels by the PTSD, was born out of disappointment that he wasn't exactly who he seemed. That was wrong of me, too. None of us are ever exactly as we seem. I should have found MY compassion and either helped him work through his defects or looked beyond them. I'm just so heartsick that it's probably too late now.

Banks - DCs now in bed and I have realised that I x posted and missed the last few, particularly on the poor sex life, erectile issues and porn. My H also had a porn addiction I actually wasn't aware of this until after we'd already separated and the truth was slowly coming out. He too appeared to have some form of erectile dysfunction (so I thought) and our sex life was a disaster, despite my best efforts to be a good, pleasing wife etc in that dept I suspect actually his own issues within were what impacted our physical relationship the most. He admitted that his mind was a mess and he apparently was depressed after separation btw

Ultimately it came to light that he was having an affair and had been living a double life. Even after we separated it took months and months for me to get the truth out of him instead of lies. He ran away from all resposibility with me and DCs for a fantasy life with a 21 yr old. I do have an old thread on here but I don't think I discussed the porn on there at the time, feel free to read it if you wish. It may help you.

WWIFN advice here is very wise, so I am going to leave you in her hands, along with Blu and other great MNs on here. At the time when my life came crashing down it was because of these people on mumsnet that I found the strength to move on from H and let go and they were right. Hard as it was to swallow at the time. My situation isn't the same as yours but I truly sympathise and want to send you a huge ((hug))

Good luck.

Banks,
i couldnt read all the posts, but here is what i think:
this man doesnt seem to me to give his heart for any marriage like you doing for yours.
for his sudden divorce idea;
i think he has spoken to his family-who you said dont want you-told them what happened between you when you had ptsd and he agreed with them and he is trying to end it gently.
at this point; because you are not able to hear anything from him all you are trying to do is making assumptions, that will tire you out.
it is nice to try to save a marriage especially at this age when couples are divorcing so easily. but he doesnt seem to be in this mentality.
if i were you, if you are sure you said to him all you have to say stop contacting him.
put all the experiences with him in a box to use in future relationships.
good luck.

I suppose it was when he stopped trying to convince me with words and worked on his actions instead. there's no one thing, but as I say, he got help for himself.

You need to be careful not to be seeking therapy to "win him back", this is about you now banks. You can be the person you want to be. But please, please, please do this for you and not to win him back :)

perfumedlife,

You're right. I do need to take responsibility for not looking out for my own well being and investigating why I allowed "love" to drive me to abandon my happy life and to stay in a place that nearly physically killed me with a man who didn't really seem to understand or care that that is what was going on.

I guess the part of divorce that I'm not hearing is any mention of divorce BEFORE the divorce was filed. Even in the conversation that we had in my parent's house, he only mentioned separation. I cannot figure out if he is forcing himself to make this choice and that's why it's so hard to vocalize OR if he has really wanted it for a long time and just deceived me. Those are two rather different things, don;t you think? So it's the abrutpness of it that is confusing me, the complete 180 from "i love you and can't wait to hold you in my arms" to total silence.

For me, talking would help. Even if it ends in divorce, as it probably would. Open wounds heal better with treatment. This will leave more scars for me.

I guess I got off on a tangent the last time I tried talking about an affair, but somehow I don't feel as though that's the case. If anything, he's patronizing escorts. I don't think he really likes being in a real relationship. He had never had a real LTR that was in the same city, involved sex and lasted for more than six months before me. That's a huge red flag, I know, as he was 34 when I met him. I think that he has a lot of issues, between a lack of compassion and a fear of intimacy, but that on some levels he's aware of them and he tries to compensate in different ways (i.e. volunteering in the hope that he will find real compassion or simply avoiding a real realtionship in the hopes of not failing in an intimate way).

The porn thing almost did send me running home. I threatened to take the next flight out with the computer and turn it into the American authorities. In retrospect, I probably should have.

WhenwillIfeelnormal,

You're right. Even though I saw those red flags, I was very busy rationalizing them all away because I did (and still sorta do, admittedly) hew to the idealistic (and pretty immature I now realize) idea that love is a transcendent thing-- that even though there are a LOT of glaring signs saying "DO NOT TREAD HERE, THERE BE DRAGONS" love will somehow have the power to keep them at bay.

Actually, right now my mother and all of my friends are incredibly angry with him. Like I said, I had spent YEARS out of touch with everyone-- at first because it is difficult to be in regular contact from Africa and then because I was so enmeshed in mental illness that I couldn't really bear to expose myself to even those who were clossest to me. I felt that distance as being insurmountable. So she basically hadn't talked to me in years. The things he was feeding her made me seem worse than I was (not that I wasn't BAD, but he made it seem a lot worse and took a lot of stuff out of context). Since he left me, she and I have spent hours talking. I have not lied to her about the horrible things I said, I have not shirked my responsibility and put it all on him, but I have told my side. She's heard it and is pretty embarrassed that she didn't try to reach me earlier. He just had her so convinced that I was dangerous to myself or him that she didn't dare bring it out into the open with me. It's pretty screwed up, I know.

You are right, I need to make a big point of understanding why I felt that my love for him meant that I had to give up everything and keep sacrificing until I had reached the end of my tether and snapped. This IS a pattern with me. I met dh when I was 25 (he was 34). I had just exited a seven year relationship that was also highly dysfunctional (in that relationship, my ex was sexually AM-A-ZING and emotionally present but was incapable of supporting himself financially (we were musicians together and he was your traditional starving artist stereotype). I left him only after seven years of him basically living off of me and might have gone back had I not fallen in love with dh soon afterward.

I think dh saw that I would be pretty malleable early on and took advantage of that to its fullest. I guess I'm just codependant and afraid of being alone on some levels...

That all said, I still want to save my marriage along with myself. I don't want to go back to a co-dependent, abusive relationship where he calls all the shots and my resentment bubbles over in ways I can't control (well, I know at least THAT would be different this time as I now have the consciousness and mechanisms to control that kind of thing, which was lacking before) but I take wedding vows and love very seriously, and I wish that more people did. I know it all sounds impossible, but in an ideal world, that's what I want.

So in an ideal world, you would have a different relationship with a different man?

Sometimes love is like a madness. A friend of mine is like this with a married man - everything (to everyone else) screams that she's wasting her life on him; it's as though she's been hypnotised into loving him.

Objectively, this man sounds absolutely vile. If my daughter were involved with him, I'd have to stage an intervention and rescue her.

Why don't you see it as though you were addicted to alcohol or drugs? You'd know, then, that you should keep away from them, wouldn't you? He's worse - for god's sake, he likes to watch children being raped? Are you out of your mind wanting to be with him?

teaandcakeplease,

I'm glad your dc are peacefully sleeping. Thank you for the link to your story, I will certainly read through it. I'm sorry that you had to go through that. I hope it's a different situation than mine, but I simply cannot say one way or another. It must have been so incredibly painful to learn that about the man you loved over time.

I honestly do not understand the deal with many men and porn. I still miss my first ex for that reason-- he was never interested in it and we had an amazing sexual relationship. It seems like most men do have a porn habit these days, however. It's very sad.

Thank you for your sympathy, support and insight. I greatly appreciate it! It is inspiring to see others who have been through similar things who have come out the other side stronger. :)

noraa,

My fear is that you may be right. He doesn't seem to want to really put his all into our marriage. He never really did, and, ironically, that is one thing that we would fight over quite a lot. I may have made my own bed on that one as words create reality... What I'm hoping is that he just needs some time to think and that my contacting him occasionally will help him shake all of the many negative feelings he's having and remember that, at base, despite all of our dysfunctions that we fell in love for a reason and that marriage is work. If we have love and we work on it, we can make it through even though things have been done on both sides that to outsiders look unforgivable.

Whatever happens, I will certainly learn from it. I will, for one, never ever EVER allow myself to completely buckle under the weight of mental illnesss of any kind, ever again. I will always seek appropriate help and medical aid if it ever rears its head again. This is the first time I've ever really dealt with that and I did a shitty job. So there's one life lesson.

Thanks for your insight!

YouKnowNothingoftheCrunch,

Your situation fascinates me as it seems to somewhat parallel mine. What kind of actions did he display that made you think he was changing? What convinced you that the help he was getting was for himself and not you and that it was working? Did you and he ever have a period where you totally didn't talk? How did that end?

I know I'm asking all of these questions for insight, but I DO want to get help for me. For the last four years of my life, I was miserable for some reason or other. That is not really like me. I want to shed that skin. It doesn't suit me well at all. It will all be for me in the end, whether he's willing to give me another chance or not.