When did you know your marriage was over?

[Mermaidsdonthaveathighgap]

I have been with DH for 5 years and we have the most beautiful DS. However I think I have fallen out of love with DH, I feel like I can't do this anymore and would be better off alone. It's so difficult though because he is not a bad person. When I married him I really wanted it to be forever.

I don't really know how to articulate how I feel. But I feel like he adds to my stress and I feel that he is like having another child rather than a husband. He lies about things which may seem quite trivial to others but not so much to me. He also relies on me to organise everything, he can't even change a lightbulb. We have had no light bulbs in the hallway for 6 months now. I realise I could have a go myself, but maybe he could too. He also doesn't put DH nappy on properly, I have shown him so many times but he just doesn't listen.

It's sounds silly but I'm in such a state because I find him so frustrating and don't like him and don't want to continue the relationship, but he's not an awful person so I don't want to do the wrong thing.

Just to add we are going to counselling, which just seems to cost a lot of money and cause a lot of arguments.

When, one evening when he said something about having the next thirty/forty years together, I felt like I couldn't breathe properly because the thought horrified me so much.

He's not a bad man, at all-in fact I very much hope he'll meet someone lovely- but I don't love him any more, and haven't for some years.

And perhaps, as he surmises, that I'm one of those people that would just be better on my own

Our 5th year wedding anniversary when he made no effort at all (hadn't other years either), I booked a nice hotel and arranged childcare and as soon as we got to the hotel room he said 'well shall we have a shag then?!' I didn't even get a bunch of flowers or anything (romance was dead) and I thought to myself - what am I getting out of this marriage..

When he made me apologise to him because apparently it was my fault he shouted at me in public in front of all our friends...

OP, your reasons are valid for you. You don't need to compare them to everyone else's reasons. Just don't waste your life with someone you don't love - it's as simple as that.

When he said to me we needed to buy a new sofa but a more expensive one. A lightbulb went off in my head and I thought shit I don't want to buy a new sofa to it on with you......I went that very day

When I was very upset after being caught up (but thankfully physically unharmed) in the London terror attacks.Was pregnant with dd at the the time and having had a previous miscarriage was even more sensitive to any potential harm to her. Was in bits and very distressed when I finally arrived home.He just brushed it off and went out as planned with his brother. That was the beginning of the end for me but it took us many more years and a lot more issues before the actual end.

Oh Mrs TP I relate to your post. So many little things that drove me bloody insane, as well as the bigger things. And that feeling looking at him when I think "that's my EX, I don't have to worry about him being my life partner and not feeling like I should."

There were lots of "moments" that added to my resolve but I think the writing was on the wall when I went to comfort a friend whose DH had cheated on her and left her. And inside I was thinking "you lucky cow, I wish mine would do that!" Still it took a couple of years after that to fully admit it to myself.

My ExH was a lazy git.
My current DP is a real do-er and it's so so great!
Change that lightbulb yourself.
If you want out then you'll have to learn anyway.
YouTube will have loads of videos but it's really easy.
If it's a ceiling light it's probably a bayonet bulb. Easy twist out and in.

You just need to imagine yourself with this man in another 5 years time.
Are you happy?
Resentful?
Hateful?

Don't waste any more time with him if it's not right for you.

This thread is so reassuring and helpful. Some of you had some really awful moments

I am going to change the lights this evening when I get home from work. Bet he won't even notice!

I seldom questions any of the 'rules' he insisted upon. Looking back, I think it felt familiar, just like living at home where my father was generous, but very much in charge.

One day, X and I were in the car and he was insisting on something or other, no idea what. The thought came into my head that the whole point of growing up and getting a job, had been exactly to get away from anyone telling me what to do. So for once, instead of agreeing with what he was proposing, I said OK, your right, we should sell the house and go our own ways. No fuss, no bother, all sorted.

Over the following months, he told me that i would never be able to run a house myself, that i would always forget to pay bills etc. I remembered his words as i made out the first of many direct debits to pay my own bills in my own house. Such a good feeling, there nothing like your own front door.

Took me ten years to share a house with someone else. Our relationship is very different, and while by no means perfect, we do at least treat each other as equal adults.

I think of my first 'serious' relationship, and how unconsciously I had modelled my parent's relationship. My sister did the same. We both had a second go, which was much more equal, adult and hence successful.

When I found out he cheated, when he got drunk and threw things at me, when he demanded an apology because I got drunk (he was regularly drunk, I hardly ever drank), when told me he wanted to leave just before ds's first birthday, when he demanded an apology because I showed him up by making him shout at me in front of our friends, when the sulking started, when he'd pester for sex despite not having spoken to me for 2-3 days previously (and strop if he didn't get it) and finally when he tried to leave again. By this time I had realised how much better my life was when he wasn't around (and that I would more than survive, I would thrive without him) and encouraged him to go. Apparently I broke his heart

When exH told me if I was a proper wife I would be at home on time to make his dinner.
I was late home from work, working to support him at university, (this was the 1970's)
It was very difficult to leave your marriage in the 1970's people were very judgemental.

When he said he would rather kill me than let me leave him.

When he started to do so much of his expensive hobby and go away with work a lot and I didn't miss him and started to dread the crunch of the tyres on the drive gravel.....he'd already lined up a replacement for me anyway.

New DH is a lot better and I learnt a lot about what I will not put up with. I won't ever be anyone's domestic slave anymore and my career is just as important as any partner's.

When he told me he didn't love me anymore the night before my last day in my old job, where I had had a horrendous time and two days before we went on what was our last family holiday with our 8 and 5 year old for 10 excruciating days

OP, feeling unsupported and being lied to are not silly things, they are BIG and are a cause of marriage breakdown, it sounds like you are trying to convince yourself that he's not so bad, re read what you have written, do you really envisage the next 40 years with him being happy?

When he threatened me infront of our baby.
When I felt sick hearing the sound of his key in the door.

When he told me he had lung cancer.

He hadn't - it was yet another lie. That was a lie too far.

The end of my marriage was the death of a thousand cuts, in all honesty he was too selfish to have kids with, and it was his utter uselessness and lack of support that killed my feelings so dead. Let's see, the day after I'd given birth and nearly bled out, lying in hdu covered in wires and drips and having to listen to just how sore his back was after leaning over a birth pool for 17 hours, while looking at my son still wrapped in just a fucking blanket because it hadn't occurred to him to dress Ds; a week into colic where me and my horrendous mil had to race into kitchen (me holding my section scar together) to stop him screaming into the face of Ds, leaving a six month old alone in a bath, telling me on my first ever child free evening when Ds was about 4 months old to consider spending it going to the gym, not buying any bits for the baby but somehow our hospital bag shop needed a new watch and footie shirt for him, and expecting me to ask him every month for housekeeping money rather than just setting up a direct debit, pestering for sex while prem dd was still on a ventilator, describing the first year of Ds's life as 'hell' - yunno the little things. I could go on but I'm boring myself. TBH I think it was the roaring at my son that killed my love stone dead. OP if it feels broke, it probably is.

Making me turf an entire back garden, alone, in the pissing rain, with baby dd sobbing in a sling on my back while he had important computer work to do and watching me without once offering to help was the last of so many nails in the coffin.

When he failed to show up to the hospital where our 3 month old was being treated for suspected meningitis because of 'transport issues'. He lived twenty minutes from the place. He'd already left home but that night was what made me certain I couldn't reconcile.

If counselling isn't working then you're probably done.

When I watched him eat and realised I hated the food that was keeping him alive.

Still married, still together. Can't seem to make the break but these are my reasons-
Gave up work despite me asking him not too, has changed ds nappy 5 times (10.5 months) never bathed him, fed him, dressed him, taken him for a walk, anywhere at all. Ignored my birthday, Christmas, mothers day. Doesn't cook or clean. I've still done all shopping cooking washing cleaning after c section. Negative, critical, miserable.

When you're delighted that he's off to another shagfest conference and you don't have to put up with the constant noise of him

I had a car crash and though I was unhurt, I was v shaken and upset. The car was a complete write off. He went out that night, despite my pleasure for him not to and came back two hours later than he said he would, stinking of booze (he was driving).

Then the final straw, one month later, was when I found out he'd gambled his entire months wages in two days and borrowed money to cover it up.

*despite my pleading for him not to