do you ever feel like you have outgrown a relationship?

[Iforgotmyusername]

I do not know what to do and do not know if what I feel is normal.I have been with oh for nearly 20 years, 4 children (7 - 12).
We lived miles apart when we met, I ended up giving up my career so that we could live together. I tried various other jobs but ended up giving up work when we had kids as oh worked away a lot. He now has a different job and works from home.
About 3 years ago I went back to work in the higher education sector - what I do is very low paid and long hours but I really enjoy it. I have also started to do another degree.
At the moment the combination of degree and work (trying to claw way back up career ladder) mean that I am working/studying long hours. oh is now at the relax and enjoy work stage - ie he has proved himself, got promoted, can relax more.
We now do not seem to get on at all and haven't since I went back to work. oh does help around the house/with childcare but seems to resent it. I have tried to explain that I was on my own with the kids for years whilst he got to where he wanted to be career-wise but he cannot seem to see it like that (cannot see that being away with work all week is the same as being at home working/studying all week). I also find that I want to talk about things (politics, economics, etc) while he wants to watch TV or gossip about the neighbours. He does not go out or socialise at all and we have no joint friends that we can spend time with. I also work primarily from home and feel very isolated. I cannot afford to leave him and I think that he would try to take the children if I did.
Am not sure what to do - I just feel that I have moved on from where I was mentally when I met him whilst he has stayed put/regressed - he has started to read the Daily Mail and seems to be becoming less and less tolerant whereas I seem to be moving the other way.
I just so want someone to talk to and he will not talk to me.

At the moment the combination of degree and work (trying to claw way back up career ladder) mean that I am working/studying long hours.

OP where do you fit in time with the kids or time for hobbies of your own?

Wildswans: Actually, being kept for decades as a combination of family pet and well-treated servant is not a blessing. This bloke will have done the usual mix of coaxing, complimenting and emotional blackmail to get what he wants: a submissive woman who accepts that she exists to benefit him rather than being a person in her own right. He's got all that cultural history on his side, after all: women aren't people, they are men's appendages.

Thing is, it's bullshit. ONly a very small minority of human beings can really live full, happy lives as permanent second-class citizens, existing only to serve.
So the OP's growing contempt and resentment for her self-elected owner is perfectly understandable.

.....My first impression was that you had many blessings in terms of your everyday life - your DC, generally supportive DH (even if he grumbles a bit), comfortable environment, and work/study which you enjoy....

I think that this is part of the problem - to me my everyday life isn't as full of blessings as others see it. The children are a blessing (most of the time )but they also involve huge sacrifice (eg never being able to go out to anywhere without them etc) but the "comfortable lifestyle" isn't that important to me. Yes it is very nice but I'd swap the money for a sense of fulfilment any day. Money/being well off isn't everything - it isn't even that important as long as you have enough to live on. The extra "stuff" doesn't make you happy.

....OP where do you fit in time with the kids or time for hobbies of your own?

time with the kids is hard but I tend to work around them. I don't have time for hobbies but that isn't too much of a problem as I see parts of my work as a hobby. I know that it isn't :) but there are parts of my job that I find relaxing.

being kept for decades as a combination of family pet and well-treated servant is not a blessing

that is so true