Am I about to throw everything away?

[stevea565]

Can I first state, I'm new here so have no idea about the etiquette of the forum or any of the abbreviation, so please be gentle.

Right now my life is in turmoil.
I've been married for nearly 18 years to a wonderful person. She is the nicest kindest and most caring person I know and a wonderful mother to our children, sounds ideal doesn't it/

However for at least the last 10 years our marriage has been virtually sexless and lacked any emotional maintenance ( both 45).
I've lost count of the number of times we have discussed it and the effect it has on the relationship. She understands all this but seems unwilling or unable to do anything about it, she just has no drive ( yes she did go to the doctor many years ago)

In addition to this we have very different interests and different friends, we are now at the stage where it feels like we exist purely has parents.

Recently I met up with someone from a long time ago who is also in a long term relationship and my head is all over the place, as is hers.
It was meant to be just a casual drink and catch up but it stirred so much up for both of us. I know it's irrational and I'm not stupid or naive but we just want to be together right now.

It seems the only thing I can really do is be miserable as the alternative is inflicting a great deal of pain on everyone around me.

Help!

Can I also add support for dahlen's suggestion that divorce doesn't have to have a massive impact on the dc and your dw. The dc and i are about £200 per month better off apart, despite this we now qualify for free school meals etc.

My h has about £4k pa just for leisure. You should get advice concerning finances which may reassure you. I don't think staying married because you are worried about divorce is a good plan. Loveless/dysfunctional marriages can do untold damage to children.

Apart from h that is.

End the relationship you are in.

Start a new relationship.

that's generally the best way to go about these things.

You never know - your wife and children may be quite relieved if you were to split up. Maybe speak to your wife about it.

Do you love her?

Your wife that is.

I think I gave the same advice to the woman posting a while back saying she wanted to divorce her husband because there was no sex, though she hadn't had her head turned by anyone else (Yet). That thread went on and on for ages with her talking about having an open marriage and not sure what the eventual outcome was but I guess she is still with her husband, hasn't talked to him about an open marriage and didn't have the courage to leave him despite her unhappiness..

These threads do generally tend to go the same way - in circles.

Seriously. If you are unhappy and no longer in love then end the marriage. it's the only sensible adult thing to do.

oh - sorry - I didn't read the update which makes me a fool.

It's advice not 'Advise'.

Seems to be a common spelling mistake in some of these threads about sexless marriages.

I take it you are 45 - well I wouldn't be happy in a sexless relationship at that age, sex is all about intimacy, closeness, sharing, loving, if you don't have that then you are basically just two people sharing parenting. No wonder your head was turned, get out, doesn't sound like there's anything to salvage.

So, what's the next step?
Do I speak to DW about what nearly happened, as it happened for a reason and that reason hasn't changed.
I guess it forces the issue and we have to work out we do both want the same thing and work towards it or we agree that we have just grown to far apart and agree an alternative future.

In my shoes. What would you all do?

In your shoes I'd tell the truth - what happened, why it happened, and why you walked away from it. It open up, tell her everything about how I was feeling. I'd ask her what she wanted out of life, out of marriage. I'd talk and talk and talk until there was nothing left to say.

Then I'd ask for a period of separation, to clear my head. You need to decide what you really want. I think it would be unwise to go straight back into the hum drum of married life. The pull of the OW will be too much. You both need to know what you are giving up.

I don't think your wife needs to know about a near miss. Nothing actually happened...

I don't think the 'OW' here is relevant, she was just a catalyst for seeing exactly what was missing from the marriage. If it wasn't her it would have been someone else.

I would try & talk to her & if that doesn't work, go to relationship therapy to discuss where you are, what you want, what point you can both agree to work towards, either together or apart.

It doesn't like sound like she'll ever budge on sex. But it might be possible to rekindle emotional intimacy and integrate the different interests & different friends into a more cohesive relationship.

Agree with Twinklestein. Express your feelings about the relationship, your sadness about the lack of intimacy and how you feel it's driving a permanent wedge that you're finding difficult to tolerate. If you think time apart is wise, suggest it. If you think counselling would help, suggest that. But leave the nearly-affair woman out of the equation for the time-being because that's a bridge-burning item that is very difficult to recover from.

No, don't tell her. It will sound like you are saying 'give me sex or I might stray' which would make you sound like an arse.

Agree with not saying anything to your wife about the "OW"- you didn't have an affair, you both realised that contact had the potential to become inappropriate and backed off, which was the right thing to do. Telling your wife would sound a bit like you expected some kind of payback for remaining faithful, which is never going to help.

Is it sex which is missing, or all forms of emotional and physical contact? Have you both looked at ways of rebuilding he emotional bridges first, rather than looking at sex as the priority? Sometimes lack of sex drive can be due to a breakdown of any kind of emotional connection/ affection, rather than somebody's "fault".

Hmmmm, but if you don't say anything, she'll suspect anyway, and probably beat you down until something comes out, at which point you'll look like you're minimising and she'll suspect a hell of a lot more than what actually happened.

Or, you might find this discussion turns into exactly the same as all the previous ones i.e. the ones that went nowhere as she didn't realise how serious you were.

I'm probably wrong, in the hand book of how to do this right, but I do think my points have some validity. There is no way she is going to believe there is no one else. On here, every time a man goes to his wife and tells her he needs space, time apart, the relationship isn't working, every single poster screams 'OW'. That is what her brain and her friends will be saying.

Naturally, if the DW asks a straight question she deserves a straight answer. But the conversation will get fixated on this 'OW' if it is mentioned at the outset and the problems in the relationship are nothing like that black/white.

Surely OPs wife needs all of the information, if only to realise how serious OP is? DHs ex never took him seriously and I think it was a shortcoming of his that he never pushed it until he left.

Yes it might feel a bit threat-like but frankly, what does she expect?

"Surely OPs wife needs all of the information, if only to realise how serious OP is?"

the over-riding message being 'look what nearly happened because you don't want to have sex with me' rather than 'what can we do about the fact that you don't want to have sex with me'?

You make a point of stating that your wife and you share different interests and friends. Has this always been the case? If so, why wasn't it a problem when you got together and is now? Can you develop a shared interest which brings the two of you closer together, aside from being parents, from which the way you describe it, sounds more like a job description.

Re the "OW" - would she be happy being labelled that? Most decent women wouldn't have anything to do with a man already in a relationship.

The world is full of bored middle aged men who like to flirt with other women and then draw back. You can choose to become one of them, you can choose to work on your marriage, or you can choose to divorce. No-one on here can tell you which choice to make. If your marriage hasn't been providing emotional support for the past decade, I would say its unlikely you will do anything about it now, since you were only 35 when the pair of you started to pull apart. Many people do stay together for financial reasons, and convince themselves its because of moral reasons.

we had similar interests but have gradually grown apart.
You clearly haven't read all the posts, as nothing has happened.
OW was an attempt to use local terminology, we also go back over 25 years and lived together for quite some time

You are also very wrong on a number of points.
I'm already doing something about it, we had a very deep and meaningful last night and both agreed we need to change else it will fail. I don't know the future, but I do know things cant stay the same

Finance are not an issue and are not the reason we stay together.

Have you tried counselling Steve? Would you be able to get away for a weekend together if your children could stay with grandparents or other family so you both get some time together to talk

I suggested it last night. While she is reluctant, she feels like it's admitting we have a problem......, I'm going to push it.

We need someone with an external, impartial and professional view to give us some guidance.

You do have a problem, and the first step to address it is to admit to it.

Maybe she is afraid of the consequences of counselling?
It's possible that her feelings for you are not the same and she doesn't want to admit to them.

I think you need to be clear to her that as it is going you may well end up apart regardless.

I think that you have to be totally honest about OW and that she is the reason why you have reached this make or break point. Because she can't respondbi sh isn't know the facts.

Well the first step has already been taken Steve, she recognizes there is a problem. At least she isn't in denial.

Get a weekend away. Have a good talk, just the two of you and figure out where you go from there, whether it's to split or to go to counselling and try and salvage your marriage. You both may feel that you have grown too far apart and a split will be the only sensible route to take.

Remember that whilst your children will be upset to begin with, they will be happier seeing both of the their parents happy and moving on if a split does happen. They're getting to an age where they will notice and pick up on things.