I've been married for 13 years and really really love my wife but she recently told me she has realised she has been very unhappy in our relationship, and although she cares for me a lot she no longer has any romantic feelings for me and can't imagine ever having romantic feelings for me again.
Obviously it has been a huge shock and I feel completely and utterly devastated. I can see now that I have made all kinds of mistakes and wasn't doing enough to make her feel loved and appreciated - I have been pretty hopeless around the house and not as supportive as I could have been. At the same time I have also begun to realize just how unhappy I have been myself - she has not shown me any real affection for years, our sex life has been terrible, she never wants to spend any time with me, and at times she seems to have an entirely negative opinion of me. As I said, I am certainly no angel but she cannot seem to appreciate any of my good qualities or recognize any of the things I do do, only find fault in the things I don't.
There are all kinds of other things at play too. We have two small children and she gave up work to look after them but is now bored, lonely and frustrated. (This is something she chose to do and which I supported her in, not something I pushed her into doing.) She says she has lost all sense of who she is, has been unhappy for a long time, and needs space to work out what will make her happy.
As I said, I really really love her and desperately want to try to make things right. I also can't bear the thought of being separated from my kids and can't see how i could ever make the decision to leave myself. At the same time however, she seems so adamant that she won't ever be able to have romantic feelings for me again that I am wondering where on earth I can go from here. It feels selfish, but I have realised that I am no longer prepared to indefinitely stay in what now feels like a loveless marriage.
I know it is still early days and I can't expect miracles over night. But what I'd really like to know is whether there are many women out there who found themselves in similar situations who managed to turn things round. Did you ever fall completely and totally out of love with someone but then get the feelings of love back again when other aspects of your life improved. If I do my best to change the things she doesn't like about me and she turns around the other things in her life that are making her unhappy, might she one day fall back in love with me?
Or is it pointless me trying to rescue a relationship that the other partner seems to have given up on? Would I be better walking away and giving us both the chance to find new people who we might be happier with in the future (even though at the moment I can't see how I can possibly do that)?
I really don't know what to do - I love her so much but just feel completely dejected and like my entire life is indefinitely on hold while she takes time to work out what she needs to make her happy...
:(
Help!