25th wedding anniversary blues

[AzureBlue]

So we did not even make it to a movie or go out for a drink for our 25th wedding anniversary yesterday. DH spent last weekend at a country cottage with close work friend (female - platonic friendship although I've told him I'm happy for it to be more) and 2 other friends (a gay couple). Texted me on Sat to say was I free on Tues to maybe go to cinema. Hardly an exciting invitation! Of course half-way through family supper last night he said we'd missed the film anyway.

TBH things so strained and unmentioned between us that rather relieved but SAD that what should be a happy day is buried and forgotten with as much energy as we can muster. We really have nothing to celebrate at the moment.

Wanted to leave last Jan but DH said he would chuck in his job and become full time carer (4 kids, 2 over 18 but youngest only 10). I was welcome to leave but would need to work to pay the mortgage(he said he would stay in the family house), support the family and use left-over (ha,ha!!)for a bed-sit for me , he would prevent me looking after the kids. I only earn 18K a year working from home but working every hour I can as have been a SAHM for 23 years. This is obviously not viable so I am stuck living in a (lovely) house with (perfectly wonderful) children so we can both see them every day. Even if I go the legal route it makes even the very first step of leaving impossibly hard - which is what DH intends as he wants me to stay.

Tried counselling for 18 months. I found it helpful. DH did not open up at all. Stopped on understanding we would go out once a week to talk about our relationship - we have been once in the 14 months since.

But DH acts in public as if everything is just perfect in our relationship - and says he has no problems with it. It's just me being awkward. So it makes me feel like a louse.

Never been a hit with men so was very lucky DH asked me to marry him in the first place and worried I will be poor and lonely if I just leave (and anyway it would need to be in a year's time after child 4 settled in secondary as too disruptive to go earlier).

Feeling blue! :(

Is poor and lonely better than what you have at the moment? A husband bunked up in a weekend with another woman and your self-esteem on its arse?

Please put the whip away and give the horse a decent bural. Get legal advice on where you'd stand financially and in terms of shared parenting. Do you have friends and family you could talk to?

BTW.. Womens Aid 0808 2000 247 can point you in the direction of solicitors that specialise in cases where this abuse, bullying and controlling behaviour present. You're being bullied into thinking you can't leave, will have no money, no house, no access to your children etc. It's quite wrong.

My mother told me only one of her friends is happily married - what I have is normal. She was only married for 18 months before my father died so has little experience of this. She mostly dated married men after that so I guess they were all unhappily married too. We spoke of this only once a year ago - she is not a confidante.

My divorced friends have advised me that as he is not abusive I'm pretty lucky and divorce is not to be recommended.

My married friends split between saying I hardly deserve a bed-sit if I walk out and certainly that I would not deserve to look after the kids (well I guess they won't be friends if/when I leave). I think they won't speak to me again. The other friends just hope it'll get better.

I have actually told very few people - really just to ask for advice on lawyers (all have said don't do it and won't send on recommended solicitors names). I don't have a close circle of girlfriends, just lots of acquaintances.

I'd love to be a martyr to the other woman at the weekend thing but it probably really is platonic. Also, I rather enjoyed a weekend in the house with just the kids! I think DH really does love me but just shows it in ways that I don't connect to and is not prepared to make an effort to think what would please me (was even like this on honeymoon - I spent a lot of time wondering if I should leave even then). Maybe I'm just a gloomy person.

With respect, it's not your mother or your friends that are in this marriage. They're not in your head, feeling what you're feeling. There are lots of ways a relationship can be abusive and one of them is bullying... Just to quote some of the more disturbing things you wrote originally

" DH said he would chuck in his job ".... that's a threat
"I've told him I'm happy for it to be more"... cripplingly low self-esteem, characteristic of those living in abusive relationships
"he would prevent me looking after the kids"... another threat
"DH did not open up at all".... DH is perfectly happy with the way things are and feels no sense of responsibility for the health of the relationship
"acts in public as if everything is just perfect"... saves his nasty side for you at home. Classic

"is not prepared to make an effort to think what would please me "... and what is the point of a relationship if this is absent?

The bottom line is we both get to see the kids (well the ones who still live at home) every day.

Oh I'm just feeling slightly depressed today after looking at all those anniversary cards with loving expressions on them and realising none applied.

I'll try and file it all away, put on the blinkers and carry on. I have a very lovely life really - mostly my friends tell me I'm a role model and ask my advice on everything as I so obviously have it sorted(ha ha)!!

Sorry for sounding off..but I really have no-one to confide in and just once in a while I need to vent off!!!

If you believe this is the only life we get why on earth would you waste more years in a relationship where you are unhappy - just because others, outsiders, say that it could be worse or this is what you signed up for.

Well I can't leave in middle of final A level year and halfway through secondary transfer. Too traumatic for the kids.
Unfortunately there always seems to be something!

Was going to leave this summer (we had separate holidays - I took 2 kids to the beach, DH went climbing in the Alps with a friend) but DH was in a serious climbing accident - broke 3 vertebrae and a rib. He will recover fully but still not 100% fit yet. So I could hardly leave him when he was only just out of intensive care! Thank goodness he's not in a wheel-chair!

Maybe next January when youngest is settled in school will be an opportunity?

But why am I not able to make the most of living with a perfectly reasonable and pleasant man? and make the most of what I've got?

How is he perfectly reasonable and pleasant if he threatens to jack in his job & commandeer your kids and your house just because you were planning to leave? I'm seeing a gilded cage, not a lovely life....

a perfectly reasonable and pleasant man is this who he is?

Ordinarily I don't think things would be so strained and unmentioned between you if that were the case. If things are marvellous why do you have nothing to celebrate at the moment?

You consider yourself lucky that H proposed to you. Any problems are your concern, not his. Your own DM is not a confidante, dating married men was her business but hardly a wonderful role model. Friends are clutching at their pearls and sounding aghast you should voice unhappiness.

I bet he took it for granted you'd be looking after him after an accident.

No wonder you feel blue.

Do go and seek legal advice from a half hour free solicitor and see where you stand!

How would he stop you from still being primary carer?

Is your name on the mortgage? Does he have a pension? I am not legal but I suspect you could claim half of his pension if you gave up work to look after DCs and weren't been able to pay into a pension for yourself.

Why shgould you be the one to move out? He makes it sound like you'd be living in a garret, actually it's only reasonable that you are able to house yourself in a property that allows for overnight stays with your younger children.

I think a court can order that a property be sold once the youngest child is grown, so H would have to comply with that. Then you'd get a share of the proceeds when he sells.

All this should be looked into, don't trust what he tells you.

Sorry for typos/grammar blunders but this really made me cross on your behalf.

Thanks for taking my side. I spend most of the time wondering if I'm just being awkward.

I'm also not a great communicator so maybe it is just me refusing to get close to DH.

But I feel if he really wanted to make me happy and make a good family life he would think of ways we could have fun together - almost never has he organised anything for us to do together and will procrastinate if I try and organise something so that it does not happen(I now just go off and do things with the kids without him or by myself as it's easier that way- at least we get to do things).

I spent 15 years running circles around him to make him happy and then just got fed up with it when the penny dropped that he would not do the same for me. Maybe he thinks he is...in his own way?

Without the kids we'd have nothing. But he's an intelligent and well-intentioned person. You would like him if you met him. Only wish I could change the axis of our relationship so we could have a happy family life.

azureblue,

Re your comments:-
"I spend most of the time wondering if I'm just being awkward".

No its not you, its him.

"I'm also not a great communicator so maybe it is just me refusing to get close to DH".

Again no its not you, its him. Why would you want to get close to someone who has treated and still continues to treat you with the utmost contempt. He's been abusive throughout your entire marriage I daresay. No wonder your already low self worth is well and truly now buried.

Abusers can be very plausible to those in the outside world. You have been systematically ground down and worn out by this person and you are a shadow of the person you once were. He won't leave you because he gets what he wants out of this - keeping you in a cage of his own making.

Your mother showed you a piss poor template of how relationships are conducted when you were growing up so its not entirely surprising that you also learnt damaging lessons about relationships. (Lessons btw that your children are now learning). What do you think your children are learning about relationships here?. I think they know an awful lot more about the state of your parlous marriage than you care to realise.

Do you stay within this because you feel you have no other options or for the children's sakes?. You are so wrong on both counts if you think either.

What do you get out of this relationship now?. Why have you stayed for so long?. You cannot use the children as a justification to stay and there is always some actually spurious reason to stay (their exams, there will always be something that stops you) if you were to tell them that you stayed because of them they will call you a silly mare to have done so. They won't thank you for remaining with such an individual in the long run; they can see how you are being mistreated by him. If you were to go next January (and you likely won't because there will be some other spurious reason not to leave) you have another year of his abuse to put up with and further erosion of your self worth.

You have a choice re this man - your children do not. You're worth a million of him because he is an inadequate excuse for a human being because he is abusive and abusers do not change. You and he should no longer be together.

Womens Aid can and will help you leave him, once you have taken the first, often the most hardest of steps to go, it should hopefully get easier.

It would not surprise me as well that you married this man because your home life was awful, your mother was crap and remained emotionally unavailable to you and this man was the first one to show you any real interest. You just wanted someone, anyone, to love you.

Unfortunately abusive men at heart like your H have radar for picking out vulnerable women with low self worth and esteem and you have been used and abused by him as a result. The only good that has ever come out of your marriage is your children.

You do your children a huge disservice by remaining married to this person.

Amazing how often a hitherto aloof parent can suddenly threaten a SAHP with jacking in his or her job to be a SAHP once the eldest DCs are fully grown and the younger ones nearly independent. Years of running around after the salaried partner or trailing with family for the sake of the career suddenly pouf! forgotten.

So I asked again for a divorce yesterday.

But DH said he felt things had been better and we were more in balance this past year as we had not spoken about personal matters since last Jan....but as far as I can see nothing has altered. I thought a year cooling-off period would make him realise we were going nowhere and he would see sense.

I feel if he wanted to change things he would be making a supreme effort to try and woo me or something, but I know he is scared to go out for an evening with me as it usually ends with me asking for a divorce. Last Jan we went out and it ended up with me giving him back my wedding ring. I still do not wear it.

He says, rightly, that I have given up trying in our relationship, and need to give it a chance. I made it very clear that it was absolutely impossible for us to ever have a sexual relationship again (I finally plucked enough courage to say no to sex with him about 3 or 4 years ago - it just didn't work between us).
He thinks that if we experimentally cuddle and kiss and even lead onto other things I will find I am attracted to him. I did point out that at what point was I allowed to say that I did not enjoy it without being accused of not trying hard enough to love him.

Have others found this has worked, however??? Maybe I'm being closed-minded?
Would be very nice to be in love in DH and not live in this limbo anymore.

He said he nearly had a nervous breakdown last Jan after I found somewhere to live(but did not get my finances in place in time to secure it so did not leave - also was too worried about what DH would do re chucking in his job - he was in a bad state). He also said he thought of suicide when we were in counselling. I think he would go to pieces if I go. I have every reason to stay as lovely house, kids etc. and very nice man who only wants to be loved :(

I can see his point...he really does love me and is helpful around the house and supportive of my aims. I will not find anyone as supportive of me again. He is an exceptionally mild mannered man - to the extent he dare not plan anything in case I might not want to do it. How do I bring myself to make the effort to spend time with him and fall in love with him?

I find it hard to assert myself in our relationship (although we are both pretty assertive at work) and as DH is also very unassertive it is really hard to ever to have a chat about anything other than work or kids. Almost impossible to decide things like holidays as we don't want to over-ride the other person. But long-term I feel unheard.

Would organising a night out once a week and saying exactly what I wanted to do, help re-build our relationship? Can't help thinking I'd have more fun going out by myself or with friends, but would really like to have a long-term partner to share hopes and dreams with and a bit of sexual chemistry! and I do have one on my doorstep already! Just that we have treated each other like doormats for years.
Any thoughts?

If I'm honest it sounds less like love keeping you together than apathy. If you really feel baby steps at rebuilding an attachment is going to work when by his own admission DH thought everything was tip top simply because you hadn't had the energy to raise concerns about 'personal matters' in the past year, then good luck. To me it speaks volumes he hasn't made any effort and wouldn't participate in counselling yet now suggests you try harder.

Nothing wrong with deciding you are too comfortably placed materially to give up your married life but he's going to keep pretending everything is fine and if you want more you'll be the one forever compromising.

Have a look at the Emotionally Abusive Relationships thread. Read some of the suggested links. Compare your H to the checklists on there.

I think he's done a right number on you. Now you're finding your feet and realising that what you are living isn't right, you'll find out how his behaviour is starting to change to hoover you back in. Like the threat to be a SAHD, the suicide threats etc.

Start getting your ducks in a row. Look out for all the financial paperwork, lists of assets, pensions etc. You don't have to make a song and dance about it. Make copies and take them to a solicitor for a free half hour chat. Make appointments with a few, find one you feel really comfortable with and is an expert in family law. I think you'll find his threats are empty and you will have the wherewithal to sort your future out with minimum disruption to the children.

Listen to YOUR head and YOUR heart and ignore the naysayers surrounding you. You DO NOT have to say unhappy.

Stay.

He's spent your wedding anniversary shacked up with another woman?
I'm sorry I don't believe for minute that it's 'platonic' and on some level I'm sure you don't either.

Please have some self respect and leave, he is not a nice man.

He's a nice man? Really?
-He couldn't care less about your anniversary, spent it with other people
-Threatens you with taking your children and suicide (this is all bollocks btw, I guarantee it)
-Won't attend counselling
-wWon't discuss your relationship
-Will go skiing and on holiday with other people but won't even go to a film with you
-Says you are to blame for the relationship being shit.

Basically he doesn't care one tiny bit about you. He's happy with how things are and that's all that matters, how you feel is irrelevant. Anytime you try to force change he pulls you back in line with threats.

You're not happy because you're with a man who treats you like you're nothing. This is not a normal marriage.

I really think the woman is just a mate..asked him about her again yesterday. He said I did not seem that over-keen to go out on our anniversary, so that's why we did not go (tbh this was probably true).

Reading the pages about emotional abuse etc...I think I'm just as much the emotional abuser with additional avoidant tendancies thrown in for good measure..proabably worse than he is!!!

So he's trying to cope with pleasing me and does not know where to start. Some sympathy for DH is called for!

But it's useful to know that not everyone lives like this - I thought behind closed doors 90% of marriages were like this....

My marriage certainly isn't. But even if 90% of marriages were like that that wouldn't mean it wasok. You chose to be with your dh in the hopes it would be a good relationship. It's not. That's sad but staying in a bad relationship is just a total waste of your life. Doggedly sticking with a bad choice for years and years and years is just madness.

Sympathy for DH, why? I must be missing something. The man who spent the weekend before your anniversary away with another female and another couple. Why not you? Even on honeymoon he was disconnected.

You wonder if you are gloomy person well I daresay we'd all be like that after 25 years of wearing blinkers and keeping up appearances.

If there were no children involved, would you and he be together now?.
I doubt it very much.

You have a choice re this man azure, your children do not and never have. It is not their fault their parents marriage is shite; after all you had a very poor role model in your mother and she certainly did her bit in teaching you damaging lessons about relationships. We learn after all about relationships first and foremost from our parents; what did your mother teach you?.

And what are you teaching your children now?. Honestly, what do you get out of this relationship, what needs of yours are being met here by your H?. Minimising it and venting only prolongs your own agonies. Apathy and a fear of change keeps you in the cage he built for you.

Maybe sympathy for both of you is called for. Two people who are so fundamentally incompatible, make each other miserable and yet, for reasons best known to themselves, stay manacled together to the death by a band of gold. Maybe a hundred years ago that's how a lot of couples existed because there were so few alternatives. These days, it's just a miserable waste of two perfectly good lives.