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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

Feel so utterly worthless after this experience

80 replies

crazyafterall · 03/12/2013 18:26

A lot of this post is just getting it off my chest I suppose as I feel it is eating away at me horribly so hopefully this will help.

I am a longstanding lurker and poster NC because I am totally ashamed.

DH and I are in a sexless marriage. After trying to get him to have sex without feeling like he was doing me a great big favour for 3 years, it has finally reached the point where I don't want him in that way either and we are left with DC and a warm friendship and mutual respect.
I have suffered from mild MH problems for a number of years which must have been v difficult for him to put up with. It has left me unable to work and I am on AD. Sometimes I feel since taking them I have been in a kind of dream...I am 34.
We are on what could be described as a "break" at the moment while I get my head together about what I want to do and what is for the best. DH still wants me and thinks we should stay strong and together for the DC.

The way I chose to deal with this crisis point is by having an affair/ fling with a younger man I met at a sports activity I do. For 7 weeks I became totally besotted with him, although we only saw each other once a week and he was always quite cold and distant, I felt a real emotional connection with him and over the weeks I became very attached. He was quite a selfish lover, but I absolutely loved the sex with him, it was so different and wild. He was so attractive to me and I really fell for him. Like a total fucking fool.

He ended it last week as he feels like it's all getting too much and "it has to come to an end sometime". I feel, like me, that he was developing feelings and it just wasn't part of the plan for us. I found myself sobbing on the phone like a teenager whilst he said there was nothing left to say. The final and worst humiliation was when I asked him could we please end it on a positive note and could he not thing of anything to say to make me feel better -via text- and he patronisingly listen off a reel of good things about me and how we had had great sex and a laugh.

A fucking laugh. Right. I think I was iin love with him.

I could just crawl up for a month under a blanket. I feel like that bob dylan song " a corkscrew to my heart". If this is what guys are like out there I can't be single again I will be eaten alive. I feel so blank.

What is so strange to me is that my friends tell me I am beautiful. I look in the mirror and I see I am tall, blonde v slim with even features but I don't feel worthy until a man gives me validation and lusts after me. I feel hideous and unlovable. Good to fuck but no more. Apart from DH who just sees the friend and companion.
I don't know what i am going to do.
Thanks for reading.

OP posts:

Original poster

crazyafterall · 03/12/2013 20:43

The last few posts are really thought provoking I really appreciate them!

I know DH and I are over deep, deep down. But I am petrified of being alone and single. Many of my single ( with children and without) friends describe very similar experiences to what I've just had. They feel the men back off v quickly when they open up and fall for them. All v nice at first then cold and distant.

I also live on a part if the uk where the women are super into grooming / looking incredible and there must be so much choice for guys out there they don't seem to settle. At the moment the thought of this happening to someone I potentially wanted a relationship with is terrifying.

I am v vulnerable to falling deep I think. Esp if the sex is good. I had a v difficult childhood and was sexually abused maybe that's it? I honestly don't know.
DH has never been passionate sexually really, even before FC.

OP posts:

Vivacia · 03/12/2013 20:49

"I know DH and I are over deep, deep down" and nobody could blame you given that he won't even try to address the lack of sex problem. However in my opinion (albeit one which appears to be a minority opinion on this thread) that does not excuse you having an affair. That isn't a sign of mutual affections and respect. He deserves better and he deserves the chance of a happy relationship with someone who treats him with respect. Your fear of being single is not a good enough reason to deny him that.

Original poster

crazyafterall · 03/12/2013 20:53

You are right vivacia, you are right. I know.

OP posts:

MissMiniTheMinx · 03/12/2013 20:54

Your last post makes a great deal of sense in explaining how you come to be where you are. The mental health problems, are they in relation to abuse or is it tied up with your marriage? Are you having counselling to help you deal with what happened in your childhood? Does your husband understand how lack of love/sex and affection is affecting your ability to cope with your past and help you stay strong?

MissMiniTheMinx · 03/12/2013 20:56

Vivacia, does he deserve a happy relationship, when he isn't working hard enough to make the relationship he has a happy relationship? Does he deserve to be happy more than OP? no he doesn't. Doesn't he owe it to the woman he loves to try and make her feel happy and loved?

Original poster

crazyafterall · 03/12/2013 21:01

MissM the counselling I have had over the years hasn't really encompassed the abuse. It only surfaced after I had DD and I have only v recently started to digest what happend. DH knows and is utterly sympathetic but doesn't know what to do now after all it was in the past.

It's all quite complicated but I know I like feeling objectified sexually ( which DH never really did only in v early days) and this leaves me vulnerable to getting hurt I suppose.
There really isn't any hope for me to be happy, that's how I feel.

OP posts:

Vivacia · 03/12/2013 21:02

They both deserve to be happy, obviously. Having an affair is not conducive to this.

MissMiniTheMinx · 03/12/2013 21:21

There is hope crazyafterall, it might not feel like it at the moment, but there is and you deserve to be happy.

Do you think your husband has backed off physically because he knows about the abuse? maybe he can't rationalise it or finds it very hard to deal with? or maybe he is worried about causing more upset?

It sounds as though you really need to talk to someone about what happened to you in your early life and then perhaps you and DH would benefit from joint counselling. Feeling objectified is probably linked to what happened to you and although we all want to feel desired, we don't all want to feel objectified. In some ways if you pursue sex and attention outside of your marriage and this ultimately leaves you feeling used/objectified it may not actually be the thing you need to make you feel happy and secure?

tinmug · 03/12/2013 21:30

A lot of my self esteem is directly bound up in men's desire for me yes. But I thought this was somewhat normal for women if we are being honest?

So are you resigned to the fact that as you got older and less desirable your self esteem will dwindle until it's non existant?

joblot · 03/12/2013 21:46

Now you're aware of these issues, including the abuse, you're in a much better position to sort them out. I'd suggest therapy not counselling. I know very well the bleakness you're talking about but there's hope- you posted on here and you sought out human contact elsewhere. It's a start.

tinmug · 03/12/2013 21:47

I agree with joblot. You do need to talk to someone IRL.

Original poster

crazyafterall · 03/12/2013 21:48

Yes MissM that makes lots of sense. I feel a bit better now.

OP posts:

CailinDana · 03/12/2013 22:02

I did wonder when I read your first few posts if you were abused. I was abused as a child and I understand where you're coming from.

What sort of sex did you want with your dh? Was he uncomfortable with it?

Original poster

crazyafterall · 03/12/2013 22:31

Hello cailin, I suppose I needed the more animalistic, urgent kind of sex.- God this is horribly personal isn't it-. I suppose that is what I need to get off, after this experience I know it's the kind of love life I need.
DH was always very accommodating and giving but he is in no way a sexual person whereas I feel it's a prime drive for me. More so now.

OP posts:

MissMiniTheMinx · 03/12/2013 22:41

I think CailinDans's question is important to think about. Thank god we don't all know each other eh!

Maybe that sort of urgent insistent sex, where he feels he has to be more dominant makes him feel uncomfortable because he knows about what happened to you? Maybe it could make him feel that he is perpetuating a pattern of abusive conduct where you are objectified. You like that because so much of your sense of self is tied up in that idea. That's understandable but not necessarily healthy.

Original poster

crazyafterall · 03/12/2013 22:48

Yes MissM I think it is. I don't feel it's healthy as I think it leaves me vulnerable to being hurt or... Overpowered. But I can't do anything about it as that is what I like.

I have a friend I talk to about this. One dear friend who thinks to blow my family unit fort libido is madness. But it makes perfect sense to me. I just don't think I can ever really be happy anymore.
So many conflicting emotions.
Still miss other guy.

OP posts:

CailinDana · 03/12/2013 22:55

When I was first dealing with the abuse
I experienced I used to want dh to be quite rough. I even asked him to hit me a few times (he wouldn't). I think, looking back, that I confused urgency and roughness with passion. Dh didn't like it at all as I was putting him in the role of dominator which can be thrilling but can also make one feel like an abuser. It was a fucked up dynamic basically. I also developed infatuations.
We worked through it and have a healthy (though sparse due to children!) sex life now.

Original poster

crazyafterall · 03/12/2013 23:10

The sex with the guy was getting to that point which is what I enjoyed about it do much. But even if DH was rough with me it wouldn't turn me on as he really loves me and it wouldn't be real if that makes sense...

OP posts:

MissMiniTheMinx · 03/12/2013 23:20

It makes perfect sense in the context of what you have been through, outside of that, no it wouldn't make sense at all, which is why it is important to talk to someone. You could make a deal with your husband, and then he could sit idly by while you do self destructive things to get your rocks off, or he could support you to have therapy, tells you that he thinks you are the most desirable women in the world and agree to work on things with you. In time you could work it out. Or you could leave in search of rough sex with selfish men who not only play at using you, but actually do so.

Original poster

crazyafterall · 03/12/2013 23:34

Yes MissM . Who on earth would go for an open marriage outside of a weird foreign film. It makes nonsense but DH is so set in his ways he says he will try and change but never does. Couples therapy was the ultimatum before this " break" I think he must agree to it. Not just say so.

But then this affair will come out...

OP posts:

DistanceCall · 04/12/2013 02:18

I'm going to go against the flow here. It doesn't matter that you had an affair because you don't have a relationship with your husband. Your marriage is dead in the water, and it sounds like it never was alive to begin with.

Wanting to feel desired and wanted and loved by a man is absolutely normal (if you are heterosexual) - it's not pathological.

And you say you are terrified of being single and alone. You are already alone and have been alone for a long time, love.

Leavenheath · 04/12/2013 02:39

Listen to Cailin's advice here love, because it's sound.

I don't recommend couples counselling, but I do recommend you get some on your own.

I think your sexuality has been defined by your abuse.

In turn your self-esteem has been defined by your sexuality.

A kind, loving bloke just wouldn't do it for you in bed. Maybe your husband senses that and doesn't want the type of sex you crave? So although he loves you, he just isn't turned on by the sex that turns you on- so he withdraws?

Everyone's right about the other bloke. He was just after a bit of fun and really is as shallow as he sounds. Tbh, no bloke having a affair with a married woman is usually worth a light, but he made no promises and probably got out quick when he got bored and could see you were turning it into a love story.

Most women (IME) really don't get all their self-esteem from men's attraction to them. But I can really see how your associations with sex might have got fucked up so badly at an early age, so find some counselling that can help you to re-programme yourself about what makes sex good.

I wouldn't make any decisions about your marriage till you've had that counselling on your own.

CailinDana · 04/12/2013 06:49

What you say about the rough sex and your dh not meaning it makes sense. I get it. What would have happened with the other man if he had become more connected and loving and had refused to be rough with you?

Lazyjaney · 04/12/2013 07:44

Agree with DistanceCall. Also, what's wrong with the OP liking rough sex?

Or is soft focus Mills and Boon sex the only sort now acceptable, and anyone who likes anything different needs reprogrammimg counselling?

She had an affair because she is young, sexy,and her DH can't get it on, she got dumped. But that has forced her to realise her situation is untenable, so thats scary, but she knows things have to change - it's as simple as that.

All this cod psychology with tinges of puritan morality is a load of carp.

Vivacia · 04/12/2013 08:04

You think there's something fishy going on?

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