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Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

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Original poster

Is anyone or has anyone lived in a loveless marriage?

17 replies

imcassie · 28/06/2011 09:46

How do you do it?

Does it become easier with time or does it grind you down until you are just existing but not living?

Is it possible to get to 60 and think right my life starts now or are you just old, bitter and full of regret?

I'm trying and some days are good but on other days I'm full of contempt for dh. He hates me but he can't see it. I'm the unreasonable one. He is the voice of sanity. And yet I love him because we have been through so much together and he made my beautiful children. But the love is just a tiny tiny fraction of my heart. The rest is taken up with negativity.

OP posts:

MariaMaria1984 · 28/06/2011 09:59

If there is no love, surely that is no basis for a marriage, or a life together? the children will pick up on it, so don't do it for their sake...

Original poster

imcassie · 28/06/2011 10:02

But there was love once. Can that love not come back?

Can't leave. We would have nowhere to go, not prepared for my children to live in a hostel.

OP posts:

allegrageller · 28/06/2011 10:03

I know several people who are doing so. Waiting until the kids grow up, until they leave.

I think the kids will feel the suppressed anger and misery, tbh. But if it would ruin you financially to leave maybe they would suffer more.

I was in a loveless marriage- we were just 'friends'- and I chose to leave. I regret the misery that has ensued (I've lost house, job and 50% of my time with my kids over it) but I don't regret leaving xH. It was a lie.

allegrageller · 28/06/2011 10:03

imcassie- how long has it been like this.

:( for you. I know how desolate it feels.

Original poster

imcassie · 28/06/2011 10:06

See I wish we were "friends". The loss of my best friend is much harder to bear than the loss of my lover or partner.

OP posts:

UnhappyLizzie · 28/06/2011 10:10

There was love once for all those women on here who are divorced. I am married, and feel as you do. Lots of problems in my marriage, including sex life.

I started another thread with an insanely long post. Read it if you have the patience.

dh says that 'we had a good sex life once, can't it come back?'

My answer was the same one I have given to you - so did lots of people who are divorced. Sometimes it can't come back.

I feel as trapped and sorry as you do, and am turning into a bitter old hag when I am still young. Don't know what the answer is, I make excuses all the time for not leaving. There are some practical issues, but main fact is I can't take the responsibility for breaking up the family when dh won't accept situation and meet me halfway. Can't face being the wicked witch.

It's crap and there are no easy answers. But just want to assure you that you are not the only one, there are heaps of us in this leaking boat.

Original poster

imcassie · 28/06/2011 10:11

7 years. Since we had children. Thats not to say that there weren't problems before but they were overcome because ultimately we wanted the same things in life. Thats not the case anymore. The lack of respect for each other as well has frustration with our financial difficulties has killed the relationship.

OP posts:

Original poster

imcassie · 28/06/2011 10:13

Thanks UL. I'm not bothered about the lack of sex but I think dh is. I don't want sex with someone who hates me.

OP posts:

hariboegg · 28/06/2011 10:19

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

UnhappyLizzie · 28/06/2011 10:19

Sex is only a symptom. It was never a problem for either of us until relationship broke down. dh thinks that all we have to do is WANT things to work out and they will. But too much water's gone under the bridge, I wish I could make it work.

I'm sitting tight for now, but I know I won't grow old with this man. Even my mother, who likes him and is ultra-conservative, doesn't want me to.

Life is short, seize the day, etc, but sometimes you can't. You just have to wait and hope, and have faith that the future will be better.

I've given up kicking against the traces - for now. Dh thinks things are better because we row less. He's wrong, we row less because I care less and am less emotionally involved.

In my heart, I'm just biding my time. A good friend said that women leave their marriages before they leave and it makes sense. I've left, but I'm still here.

Not forever though. No way.

Original poster

imcassie · 28/06/2011 10:30

Thank you everyone for being so honest. It makes me sad. I know life moves on but I don't want it to. I want it to go backwards.

We married young and had difficulties early on in the marriage. Friends encouraged me to leave "You only live once" was their mantra. But I stayed and I'm glad I did because we went on to have the best 7 years of our marriage.

Its funny how things seem to go in 7's. We had 7 years before we hit a rough patch then 7 wonderful years and its been 7 years since things started going horribly wrong.

OP posts:

Threaders · 28/06/2011 10:41

UnhappyLizzie - your last post was worded absolutely perfectly. Although I am a man, I can relate to what you are saying and I agree 100%.

UnhappyLizzie · 28/06/2011 10:41

Yeah my marriage went tits-up at 7 years. We're pushing 12 now - what a waste :-)

You have to NOT want things to go backwards though, things always move on. I'm not even saying you won't be happy with dh in the future. My marriage is over. You sound sad like I was about three years ago. I was eaten up with misery about the 'failure', so so sad about what we had lost.

But you are not me, and your dh is not my dh. You might turn this around and you might be happy with him again. It won't be a return to the happy times of the past, it would be new happy times, with a different background to them.

MariaMaria1984 · 28/06/2011 10:51

Hun, I know you say things are financially not viable for you to leave, but life is too short to spend it unhappy. Can you get some advice? maybe get to the citizens advice? there is lots of help out there.

Could it be that because you want the marriage to work so much, you are choosing to ignore problems within the marriage? I say that, because I know I have been guilty of doing that.

My H left me with our 6 weeks old baby (I feel like I keep repeating that on here, so sorry for anyone that has read that 8,000 times from me!), a month or two down the line he tells me he doesn't love me anymore. We have been married for 2 years (!!), and it absolutely kills me. So I have spent the last 2 months in mourning, just a complete wreck. BUT I am at the point now that I can see a life without him, and its a happy one. Maybe because he had the strength to see the issues that I chose to ignore, and would have carried on doing so for our DS's sake. Like my counsellor said, there being no love is the reason to walk away from a marriage, children or no children. The relationship will have no endurance without love, and ultimately, will fall apart. Maybe not now, or next month, but in the long term, there will be nothing left, and you will probably end up hating and resenting each other.

Sorry to be blunt, but since I am on the other side of the situation, I thought I should let you know my thoughts...

ineedabodytransplant · 28/06/2011 10:59

OP, I'm a man and have just seperated from my wife of 35 years. Married at 19 she was 17. Saved and bought our first house then our two girls came along. 27 and 24 now.It all started to go wrong when the sex side of things just stopped. She just would't be intimate any more. No hugs or kisses either.

I tried to stay with my wedding vows, but eventually realised that she had chosen to end my sex life at 42, not me. 12 years wasted

Things weren't going to change, she would talk, go to counselling because SHE didn't have a problem. I didn't want to look back in another 10-15 years and wish I had left sooner.

I think you need to look deep into how you are going to move on. Don't syat just because it's convenient. If you are in a miserable marriage you deserve to find happiness. Your children may be confused at first, but with their mum happier they will be happier.

Original poster

imcassie · 28/06/2011 11:08

Maria, I would be entitled to benefits and whilst we wouldn't receive a lot we have more disposable income than we do now. Lack of money has had a huge impact on our marriage.

The problem is we would have to sell the house and we would have to move into a hostel because we wouldn't qualify for social housing immediately. There isn't even a homeless hostel in our town so it would mean a change of school for ds1. I couldn't do that to him. I couldn't move into a hostel with them. If it came to that I would let them live with dh and then my life really would be over.

OP posts:

Original poster

imcassie · 28/06/2011 11:17

If I look into how I move on it would mean when I can financially afford to provide a home that isn't a hostel for my children. We could be talking another 5, 6, 7 years away. Ds1 will be a teenager then which is terrible timing. Deep down I knew the answer all along I will have to wait until they are grown up and start my life a 60.

OP posts:

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