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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

When is it time to leave?

25 replies

Unknownmember · 17/11/2013 06:46

How do you know when it's time to leave a relationship? That you can't make it work?

I feel like we are going around in circles. That I'm becoming this angry bitch.

There are so many good days but there is so much resentment. I don't know.

OP posts:

PoppyInTheFog · 17/11/2013 06:58

Why are you becoming an angry bitch?

Do the bad days outweigh the good days?

It takes two to make a relationship work.

CogitoErgoSometimes · 17/11/2013 07:13

I think it's the point where you no longer want to make it work. When you can no longer summon up the energy to even care about the other person. Conversely, it's time to leave if you know the other person is feeling the same way.

PoppyInTheFog · 17/11/2013 07:16

I agree, if you don't care about the other person it is kinder to them to leave, they deserve better.

RandomMess · 17/11/2013 07:20

Have you tried to deal with the resentment? Are the reasons for the resentment still there?

My dh badly let me down for a couple of years and it really has taken me a couple of years to grieve etc. and it is only now that I'm ready to be emotionally open to him again. Not sure if that makes sense but that resentment took a few years to dissolve in my heart even though in my head I'd forgiven him.

Original poster

Unknownmember · 17/11/2013 07:47

I care about my husband. I do love him. But I feel like I've lost so much if the person I used to be. That person who believed in proper love, in her marriage and was so much more optimistic.

It's been two years since I found out he slept with a prostitute. We are working past that, but I have days where I really resent what happened. What it did to our marriage. I went through a period where I had to think about whether to abort my baby. This is when we were waiting for the std results. Just in case of HIV. When i look at my baby now I feel so much guilt about what I could have done.

Now, we don't really talk. He comes home, we talk for about 10/15 minutes and the. We just watch tv. We have sex every four/five months. We rarely kiss properly. I miss and crave that intimacy.

It probably doesn't help that I've put on weight. I over eat now. I just keep eating to fill that hole. I feel
Like I have lost that control in my life. So who could blame him for not wanting to sleep with a beached whale

I feel like he's forgotten how to talk to me. I feel like he talks down to me or treats me like a child. He denies it and I feel like maybe it's all in my head.

My responses to arguments are over the top. It's the frustration of our marriage. I just let it all loose. It's not good or healthy.

I just feel overwhelmed.

OP posts:

PoppyInTheFog · 17/11/2013 08:01

How did you find out he slept with a prostitute?

Lovingfreedom · 17/11/2013 08:06

Blimey...sounds like it's time.

RandomMess · 17/11/2013 08:07

It sounds like you need to go to couples counselling to see if you can get the intimacy back. My dh and I have really really talked about stuff since the shit hit the fan but it's only recently that I've been ready to be emotionally intimate with him and properly try again.

Alternatively get some counselling for yourself. Have you ever told him how angry your still are at the damage he has done to your marriage and to you?

CogitoErgoSometimes · 17/11/2013 08:08

If he's not making you feel loved and cherished then, even if you love him, he is not working at this relationship at all. Who could blame him for using prostitutes?... everyone with a shred of decency. Your body-weight and low self-esteem are symptomatic of your unhappiness. He is the cause.

Original poster

Unknownmember · 17/11/2013 08:09

I found out by checking his email. I had a funny feeling and it linked to a question he'd posted on yahoo questions.

I stayed with him. It wasn't an easy decision. But I have.

OP posts:

CogitoErgoSometimes · 17/11/2013 08:10

Sounds like it was the wrong decision. You're allowed to change your mind.

PoppyInTheFog · 17/11/2013 08:12

It sounds like you didn't trust him anyways to go snooping. When did you start to get funny feelings about him?

Original poster

Unknownmember · 17/11/2013 08:13

I have told him that I'm still angry at what he's done. Whenever something comes up on tv about prostitutes or lack of intimacy in couples we both freeze. And an argument will always follow.

He apologizes for what happened, but it's two years on so he doesn't know what else to say or do, and gets frustrated. So we argue.

I have thought about counselling. But we live abroad, it's so expensive. We can't afford it.

OP posts:

akawisey · 17/11/2013 08:14

I could have written your post 3 years ago (and further back than that, actually) but not nearly as succinctly OP.

In the end we were communicating in a series of letters even though we were under the same roof and even that stopped in the end.

We had stopped caring about each other and the only thing keeping me with him, I know for sure now, was fear of being alone.

You must take action, definitive action.

Original poster

Unknownmember · 17/11/2013 08:16

We have had trust issues before. So once those issues are there it's hard to get rid of it.

I don't think staying was the wrong decision. We do have lots of good times. It has taken it's toll on me and our marriage.

OP posts:

Anniegetyourgun · 17/11/2013 08:18

Don't feel guilty about thinking about aborting the baby. If you had done so it would not have been for your own health or convenience, but for the welfare of the future child who might have been born with a horrible disease, with who knows what consequences for their future. You have to make choices on behalf of your children while they are helpless, including whether they should even be born at all. Thank goodness it was not necessary in the end to make that terrible choice, to terminate a pregnancy that could have been a wanted, loved baby. If anyone should feel guilty that you even had to consider it, that person should not be you.

PoppyInTheFog · 17/11/2013 08:20

So what caused the trust issues before the prostitute?

Original poster

Unknownmember · 17/11/2013 08:24

Thank you Annie. Your post made me cry.

The guilt I feel when I see my son's face light up when he sees me. The affection I get from him. It kills me sometimes when I think about all the bad things I thought about him.

OP posts:

CogitoErgoSometimes · 17/11/2013 08:25

'Trust issues' makes it sound like irrational suspicion. When you're living with someone who is genuinely untrustworthy, you don't have 'trust issues'. You may have lots of good times but you're miserable...

Anniegetyourgun · 17/11/2013 08:27

(Please note I don't mean to imply that anyone who has terminated for reasons of their own health etc should feel guilty. This is about the situation the OP was in with her particular pregnancy and the baby who is here now, who she loves.)

Original poster

Unknownmember · 17/11/2013 08:27

He lied to me about going on a business meeting. He called me when he got there and before he went to bed. Instead he had a belated stag do. The calculated ness of it was horrible when I thought about it.

Going out drinking till 4/5 am, even when I was heavily pregnant and not able to get in contact with him. So staying up all night worried sick about him

OP posts:

Original poster

Unknownmember · 17/11/2013 08:29

Finding a number for an escort agency on his phone. That killed me. But apparently these were for his business clients not him. I really do not want to go into that further or think about how naive I was to just trust him on that

OP posts:

PoppyInTheFog · 17/11/2013 08:32

I am so sorry you have been messed about far too long as it is, I will say it first, LTB!

Anniegetyourgun · 17/11/2013 08:34

Hey, my own mother considered aborting me when I was conceived (unmarried, 1950s!) but things worked out and she became the most loving mother anyone could wish for. (I just wish she could have been happier, but that's a whole other story.) All sorts of horrible things do go through a new mother's head, well they certainly did through mine. Them 'ormones are the devil. You can't help that and you did keep him, which has worked out splendidly. He is happy to see you, you must be doing something right!

As for staying with the H, it probably did make sense to stay with him at the time, but you have the right to review that decision and see whether it is still the best thing for you.

CogitoErgoSometimes · 17/11/2013 08:36

Don't demean yourself keeping a liar in your life. You will never have a minute's peace. He thinks that just because two years have passed you should put it all behind you. Probably says you should 'move on' or 'forget about it'. 'Why are you dragging the past up?' Very selfish behaviour

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