DH isn't abusive or unkind but I feel overpowered and confused by him. Help!

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I am feeling really confused about my marriage, and I really want to get an outside perspective on how I can fix things (or not). I need an outsider's perspective. I don't have any close family (only child, only my mum left and she is not someone to discuss problems with) or close friends sadly. He is so subtle that I can't decide whether any of the things he does are deliberate or if they even exist but I feel all the time like I am going a bit crazy.

Backstory: I met my DH when I was 22 and he was 33. At that age, I was extremely immature, unconfident and insecure and only just really learning who I was. We were married 2 years later, and now we've been married for 15 years (I'm 40 now). We have two children aged 10 and 4. He's an amazing man, extremely intelligent, not from the UK, lived in many countries, speaks several languages fluently and several others well. He's a flamboyant and enthusiastic cook and makes friends with all kinds of people effortlessly. He was so different to anyone I'd ever met before and I adored him. We started out as friends but quickly fell in love and within weeks he said he was going to marry me.

I still love him very much and really don't want to hurt him. He's a great father (apart from one thing I write about below) and the children adore him.

And yet I feel like I want to get away from him because he kind of sucks all the life out of me. Currently I've been able to be a SAHM for a while I am very grateful for, but I'm now wanting to go back to work because I need some independence and interaction with other people.

The key issues:

• We haven't had sex for 4 years. Yes, YEARS. Basically the last time was when DS was conceived. The same happened after DD was born. We didn't have sex for years until it was convenient to have a second child. This makes me feel desperately unhappy to be honest. I've tried to talk to him about it but he says he just doesn't feel like it because he's overweight. He says he still thinks I'm attractive but he has no sex drive. That's the end of the discussion. We're basically roommates at this point and he's fine with that.

• He controls all our finances, even when I was the breadwinner for the family. When we moved to this country, he knew the country and the language and I was overwhelmed with my first baby, so I just left him to it. Until recently, my name wasn't even on our bank account. We now have a joint account but I don't have my own credit card, he controls that.

• He talks to me as though I am stupid. Very subtly and it's made out to all be jokes. But it undermines my confidence and I find myself becoming this dizzy chaotic silly person that he treats me like, even though I have a PhD and as I said kept the family afloat while he retrained. Because we live abroad, my career basically died and I haven't been able to find a job that I love, but I have slogged away and earned good money anyway.

• (This is a biggie for me): He talks to DD the same way. This slightly teasing, jokey but insidious "you are so stupid" tone. I really can't describe it better than that. He thinks that DS is "intellectual" (he's 4!) and DD isn't. I really dislike the way he speaks to her more and more. He is getting much worse as she gets older. He is a teacher and always talking about how ditsy the girls he teaches are and how DD is just like them. And he always seems to be picking on her, just finding something wrong to comment on.

• When I try to discuss anything with him, I always end up feeling confused and wrong. I can't explain it, but somehow it all turns around to where his point of view is the right one and I somehow had it all a bit wrong. I try so hard to stand up for myself and be assertive but I get myself all turned around and dizzy almost every time. I end up feeling guilty for even thinking whatever point I wanted to make. If he does concede he makes a big deal about how he is doing what I want.

• He's totally self-absorbed. He has an office in our apartment where he spends at least 80% of the time he is at home. Sometimes he is working, but equally often he's playing computer games or streaming TV shows. He's totally disinterested in buying anything for the children or taking photographs or improving our living situation. I had to fight for YEARS to buy DD her own bed. The only pictures I have of myself when I was pregnant last time are selfies.

• He has continuously refused to talk to me in the language of the country we live in. I have learned the language, even though I make a lot of grammatical mistakes, and have tried talking to him in the language. He always answers me in English, even when I ask him not to. This seems like a small thing, but I don't know if this is another way of subtly making me feel stupid.

• He used to be funny and misanthropic in an amusing way, but he is becoming more and more simply nasty. He is pretty homophobic and is always so rude about women on TV. And in front of the DCs. He swears all the time in front of them and to them as well (e.g. what the fuck are you doing? or what is this fucking shite you're watching?) This sounds AWFUL when I see it written down.

This is so long, I'm trying to get it straight in my head. Is any of this so bad? I don't know if I'm even describing any of this in a way that makes sense. This is the problem - it doesn't make sense. I can't get a grip on what is wrong or why I am feeling this way. Can anyone help me at all?

I thought the same, Beinghere.

I also wondered if gay too. But seriously OP he is hideously abusive. You are so worn down by him you haven't even recognised it.

I've known several married gay men who subsequently came out. They might have been unhappy or distant but not one of them abused their wives. Primarily, they were concerned about how the truth and the consequences would hurt their partners and children and wanted to minimise it as much as possible.

....in other words, there is no excuse for abusing someone no matter what internal dialogues you have going on

I read the no-sex aspect of their relationship as just another way that he expresses his contempt for the OP: not caring enough about her to consider her feelings about the lack of a sex life, and not doing anything to resolve it.

(if it's a medical issue, he could get checked out, for example. But instead he is choosing not to bother and let the OP suffer. Similarly, if he is gay, or has a madonna-whore complex, or whatever it may be, he can do something rather than choose to let the OP suffer. Yet, as an abusive man, his choice is to not care about how this impacts her).

Absolutely AF... If the absence of sex is what's throwing people I'd have thought this outwardly gregarious, bon-viveur, misogynist with an arrogant, bullying streak a mile wide would prioritise a naive young replacement who didn't challenge his natural authority. The office where he spends 80% of his time.... the hidden finances... all sounds like a cover up for creepiness....

I am the suspicious sort. A man does not eliminate sex from his life for years at a time. He just gets it elsewhere.
Sorry if that's going off on a tangent, but truly your feelings that things are bad in your marriage are valid and founded in truth.

How about you suggest that you take a trip with your DC's to visit some family/friends back home? choose a time/date that would make it difficult for him to join you, then ask for a payment card in your name?

When yo are away then assess what you would like to do? you need to urgently undestand what is happenign with your finances, it doesn't sound mike must of a joint account if you have no cards in your name.....

It's not always a case of them being homosexual if they withhold sex and affection. It can simply be a case of control.

I'm really amazed by how very unanimous everyone is. Everyone who knows him in real life think he's wonderful and assume we have a model happy marriage. I've been too ashamed to tell anyone how I feel and even now I feel like I should defend him and say it's not that bad. He would absolutely deny all of it. Is it possible that this is all subconscious and not deliberate?

Yes I worry that this is affecting DD.

For those who wondered, we live in a Western European country and he is European.

Oh op, this sounds like a half life. It doesn't sound like he wants the marriage to be honest. Definitely abusive and you need to believe this is not ok and you are not imagining it.

He's absolutely not having an affair. I almost wish he was a it would give me a concrete reason to leave. I think sex is just not an issue in his life. Kind of like Sheldon in Big Bang theory. We had a decent sex life in the beginning but almost always initiated by me and he wasn't interested in experimenting.

Very abusive, emotionally and financially. FWIW, my XH had similar attitudes towards women. He was ok with our DD until she got old enough to have an opinion, and he had started his crap on her. This was one of the final straws for me. As adults we choose our relationships and what happens to us. Children don't. I had to get her out of there. My self-esteem was so low it was later that I realised how bad an effect it all had on me, and kicking his nasty abusive arse out saved me as well.

Hi OP, I saw the update about him encouraging you to go to the wedding but how can you travel internationally if you don't have bank cards in your name? Could you use that as a starting point to get involved in your finances? Don't be fobbed off with suggestions of travelling with cash.

I have a DD too, in your shoes I would be very worried by his behaviour towards your DD and how it will affect her self asteem.

Re your comment:-

"I'm really amazed by how very unanimous everyone is. Everyone who knows him in real life think he's wonderful and assume we have a model happy marriage. I've been too ashamed to tell anyone how I feel and even now I feel like I should defend him and say it's not that bad. He would absolutely deny all of it. Is it possible that this is all subconscious and not deliberate?

Yes I worry that this is affecting DD.

The first part of what you write here is for two reasons:-

1. Abusers can be very plausible to those in the outside world although I am certain that the mask has slipped once or twice in front of one or two of them. I would think that some of your friends have their suspicions about him. What do your own parents think of him?.
2. Abuse like you are experiencing basically thrives on secrecy; you're enabling this to continue by not speaking out about his ill treatment of you. You need to open up to trusted others about what is really happening within your marriage.

You know deep down your treatment of you at his hands is wrong otherwise you would not have posted here. You cannot really defend the indefensible behaviour he has meted out to you.

You certainly should be worried that this is affecting your DD: infact all this abuse at home is affecting you and in turn all your children. They see how he treats you even if he does not shout at you; its all the unspoken vibes given out by the two of you that are picked up on. Home is certainly not a sanctuary for you or your children is it.

All his actions towards you are deliberate; he knows exactly what he is doing here and is actively enjoying seeing you floundering around at the end of his hook. It is not your fault he is the way he is; he would have acted the same regardless of whom he married.

I would also state he deliberately targeted you when you were much younger and his abuse is rooted within his subconscious. He learnt how to do this from somewhere; most likely one or both of his parents?. Talking of them, what are they like as people and what sort of relationship does your man have with them these days?.

Abusers always deny that abuse is taking place and say that the other person made them do it or make it all out to be the other person's fault. It is simply not true.

You have a choice re this man, your children do not. This is no life for you or your children is it?.

Is this country you currently reside in a signatory of the Hague Convention?. Have you considered now seeking legal advice for your own self?. Knowledge after all is power.

"Everyone who knows him in real life think he's wonderful and assume we have a model happy marriage. "

Most people assume that about other people's marriages, to be fair. We take others on face value and, until we see evidence of something that doesn't look right, we assume all is well. Even then, there's a reluctance to get involved in a personal matter. If you take someone into your confidence, don't be surprised if they tell you that they don't think he's all that wonderful but 'didn't like to say anything...'

If he is Mr Hail Fellow Well Met with everyone else and a nasty bastard behind closed doors with you .... the probability is that this behaviour is a conscious choice rather than anything subconscious or accidental.

"He's absolutely not having an affair. I almost wish he was a it would give me a concrete reason to leave"

You already have concrete reasons to leave; his various abuses of you and by turn your children who you also cannot fully protect from seeing his abuse of you directly.

when you get to the point of wishing he would have an affair/hit you/walk off the edge of a cliff etc then you should be registering that your marriage is over except in name

Very true.

it makes him worse that he is the Popular Guy

it means he chooses to switch the abusive behaviour on and off at will, and he saves it just for you and your dc

He is also already picking on your 4 year old DD; what do you think he is going to be like towards her when she is a bit older or a teenager?. I hope you will have left long before that stage. This child will have had her own self worth completely crushed by him and her own relationship with her more favoured brother will be damaged too.

Now you have been enlightened to the fact that your H IS abusive and unkind, you need to plan your escape.

Just to clarify, I do have a bank card, I can get cash. I don't have a credit card.

And his parents are long dead, so is my father. My mother isn't usually someone I would talk to about stuff but she has in the past described DH as being very selfish.

the aunt I used to be closest to, funnily enough DH really dislikes and has been awful to her both times she has stayed with us.

"when you get to the point of wishing he would have an affair/hit you/walk off the edge of a cliff etc then you should be registering that your marriage is over except in name" -- yes very true and something that drove me to post this morning because I genuinely couldn't figure out if I was being unreasonable.

The thing is that you all make total sense but when he comes home this evening he'll be all friendly and normal and cook dinner, and I'll feel like I'm the crazy one again.

you are not the crazy one

look here cycle of abuse

Your aunt likely has the measure of him hence his dislike of her. Even your own mother has in the past described your H as selfish which in itself is telling.

You need to plan your way out of this marriage because staying within it will be far worse going forward than leaving. He may well be friendly and "normal" tonight; that is really the calm/nice part of the abuse cycle but he will abuse you again at some point as certain as night follows day. He has trained you well to obey him I am sorry to say.

Have a look at this link:-

www.hiddenhurt.co.uk/cycle_of_abuse.html