Can a relationship ever be salvaged from the depths of rage, contempt and disgust?

[Kitttty]

Been in a long relationship and marriage with 3 kids. Been thru a lot together but the last few years the marriage has deteriorated badly. I am very angry about certain big issues. But I find myself searching constantly for the final straws - down to to he wont cut his toenails, go to the dentist or pluck his monobrow. Just saw him on the way to the shower and I felt such disgust and contempt. Does this mean its all over? Even if we work on the big issues -- does the level of irrational rage and contempt that I feel for him over these little things mean that I have got to a dept or a place of no return?

I found it impossible to comeback from that point in my marriage. It was the disgust and disappointment for me. Game over.

Sounds like you have detached from him OP. Its often a prelude to leaving.

When you say the final straws, what would happen when you found the final straw? What are you trying to do that you need a last push for?

Re your question - possibly a relationship could be salvaged but it would need total effort from both partners & a willingness to let the past be forgotten or at least 100% forgiven. But tbh if we are talking disgust & contempt when you see him then it doesn't really sound like you want to salvage it. Do you think he feels the same? Perhaps if the big issues are resolved then you won't be on the lookout for things that annoy you & would be more likely to let the little ones go?

I have felt like that before and it signalled the end.

I tried to ignore my feelings and carry on regardless but you can't live with someone you feel disgust for.
Time to move on?

Yes I have been massively let down on the big issues. He is desperate to prove he can fix everything and can turn things around and be a proper father and husband - maybe this is a threat to me - I don't want him to fix anything - because I know he cant and I cannot forgive - maybe I am looking for more ammunition in the little things as I want to move on. But I am not proud to have these feelings of rage, contempt and disgust - it feels bitter and wrong. The idea of him flapping about to try and make me happy fills me with terror -- it feels dysfunctional, suffocating desperate and unnatural.

You won't win any awards for staying - I didn't.

I felt I had to give XH the chance he was begging for to make it all right. But after a few days he said he'd had a rethink and realised he hadn't done anything wrong after all, everything he did had been for a good reason and I was only making a big deal out of it to give myself an excuse for what I wanted to do (ie dump all my responsibilities to run away with a young lover ). I was part horrified but mostly relieved, because I didn't have to try any more. Of course I did have the right to say no, it's over anyway, even if he hadn't; but I would not have felt that it was right to do so.

I think I was a different person back then...

I felt this way too, he was an abusive a-hole and I should have gotten out way earlier than I did, but once the contempt was there I realised I couldn't continue. Everything about him basically made me furious inside or disgusted - the way he ate, breathed, his appearance - EVERYTHING!
The violence and EA weren't healthy for me but feeling this way, in my own home whilst trying to raise children ate away at me and made me even more miserable and depressed.
I kicked him out, it was the best thing I ever done.
So for me it's a no, it can't be salvaged.

IMO no.
From experience (more than once!).

I think the contempt is fatal
There really is no way back from there IMO

AnyF - this is how I feel. I know that EVERYTHING he does makes me feel irrationally angry, bitter, miserable -- and I don't want my children to see or sense me like this....Is it realistic to try to contain or control my feelings of contempt so that I can appear relaxed and civil with my husband for the sake of my children.

I would agree with most of the other posts, I stayed and stayed and finally felt as you do and it was the end for me. Very hard to go back when contempt sets in

What "big issues" do you mean?

If he's an arsehole, failed as a father/partner in a big way, had an affair you can't forgive or been abusive, for example, and feeling the way you do it would be more rational to leave than try to stay and overcome your anger.

Agree with the PP. Why do you feel it's your responsibility to find something loveable in him? As Shakespeare would have put it, isn't that 'the triumph of hope over experience'?

I'm not sure if it's what you want to hear, but yes, I have come back from that.

But it took a lot of forgiveness, self-examination and, at times, determination.

IMO once the anger and hatred sets in, that's it. There really is no way back from that. When it happened to me and he said he would try and change, it made my skin crawl so badly that I moved into the spare bedroom. From there is was all downhill.
Sorry, but it really sounds like you're at the end there.

I think you could only cone back from a situation like that if both parties were utterly committed to making it work and willing to make drastic changes.

Todays - that is how I feel - suffocated and disgusted that he is begging and pleading to stay and change.

I have been in the spare room for months already.

I feel guilty that it is me making the decision 100% to separate and I feel guilty and pathetic that now it is the little things that are disgusting me and that I am in this constant state of irrational heightened contempt...I have never felt like this before.

But contempt is a visceral feeling of disappointment and anger - and that is where I am. The big issues I cant overcome from a moral/values perspective. And I think that although the incidents have ceased, I haven't forgiven and I am transferring that feeling of disappointment and anger to anything he does.

Perhaps you're feeling that he ought to have done the changing before things got this bad. That he's only begging and pleading because you have reached the end of your tether. Was there ever a time you begged and pleaded and he didn't hear you?

Ah the old, 'even the way he breathes annoys me' ! Been there a couple of times! Others on here may know better but if you can overcome it, I suspect it will all go back to the way it is, at some point in the future.
As another poster has said, you won't win a prize for staying and need no other reason to leave than the things alluded to in your op. If you feel it's over, then it is. You don't need anyone else's approval. You are the most important person to you.

Did he cheat OP? If yes, did you have any counselling to cope with it?
It sounds like you have a lot of emotional hurt, anger and turmoil inside.

Annie -- I have begged, pleaded and squealed with frustration but have not been heard for years and years and years.

Dinna - I want approval from my children - but I suppose that is not realistic.

No he didn't cheat - but I think that you are right - I do need counselling to cope with the hurt, anger and turmoil - whether we stay together or not. Our conversations are getting nowhere - I feel so intensely the way I do now - he doesn't accept and I am exhausted going over and over and over with him. I asked him to set up relate counselling as I only want to have these emotional discussions with him with a mediator as I feel that I am going mad and just giving to him

I tried to contain and control. Until one day when he did something, and it all fell down on me like a tonne of bricks. All the many years worth of it. I think I actually lost my mind for a brief moment.
On the plus side, that was the end of that as I fully realised that I could not do it, so what ever he was going to do/not do was pretty irrelevant. It was very freeing.
Regrettably my DC were witnesses to this, which I can't forgive myself for.
So from my experience no its not possible to overcome, its a matter of when and how you make the break now. I should have done mine earlier. Although at least now I never wonder 'what if...'

Thread hijack alert!!!

theendoftheendoftheend
How did you make the break? How do you do it? What about the dcs? I can't get my head around it.

jade I didn't make the break, it more just happened to me. It was realising that I can't do it that did it for me. I could try not minding, keeping my mouth shut, ignoring the lack of respect and occasionally contempt he should me... But it wouldn't work because i'm a fucking person, I do mind and I DO deserve better!!!
It'll be much better for the DC too. People have children together but then find they can not live together. And that's ok. It has to be OK, because what's the other option?
I find now he's the children's father, but somehow no longer my responsibility, I quite like him and can get on with him perfectly well. But if I had to be in a relationship/live with him it would be hell on earth for all concerned.
In moments when I see festive family cheer and feel a little sad, I remind myself I never had that with him and neither did I have the prospect of it. I get through sad bits by stopping myself from looking back and only think of the present and the future.