Husband left me but still wants a sexual relationship but i still love him, help

[user1495964242]

My husband left me around 6 weeks ago, I have added a screenshot of my post detailing the situation, we have been together 11 years (since we were 15 and 16) married for 8 and have a 5 and 7 year old together please read if you can it will make more sense to the rest of this .

Following the events in the previous post, we are now at a point where he is back living with us while he finds a place of his own to move out to, I and the kids have enjoyed having him around as it's felt like normal before he left and he has been sleeping with me consistanly since he's been home, I have tried everything to make him see how good it is with us at home and make him want to stay but he just doesn't. He reminds me all the time he's now single and makes jokes out of it which really hurt me.
He sends me very mixed signals as he knows how I desperately want him back despite what he's done and how he's acted but he tells me it's not what he wants and he wouldn't be happy coming back to a relationship but then 2 days ago he texted me and asked if I would go on a date with him, I said yes and then he txt saying don't label it, no boyfriend or girlfriend stuff it's just a date..
So we went on the date for dinner and had a nice time.. we came home and he was saying we'll always be friends yeah and I said no, you either want me or you don't and he replied I do want you, I want your body...
And that it's much better now were just friends (I don't feel this way I love and miss my husband and want him back as that again)
Once we got home he also said if we are going to carry on a sexual relationship I need to go on some contraception (we always used the pull out method) and I said why that's been good enough the last few years and he said yeah we were together then.. I got really upset and said this isn't sustainable, he said so you don't want to be my sex buddy then, ok I'll respect your wishes...
I'm in pieces because i love him I always have and he's treating me like he really doesn't care how I feel. I have sex with him because it's all I have left to cling onto but after a nice date and that talk I turned over and cried while he slept.. I know if I carry on he will just do it with me until he meets someone else then throw me to the kerb and he said to me he's happy to be my sex buddy until I meet someone else but I just want my life and husband back I don't want to meet someone else but I can't change his mind and I really thought when he asked me out it was going in a good direction but he has no intention of wanting to get back with me, I'm so so lost :( thanks for any help/advice x

You are still sharing a bed?!! and why..because its yours too. come on OP big girl pants..you are playing games too. ...just tell him straight to get out..if he won't then make those boundries clear...tell his childcare committments..don't do another thing for him and..a camp bed ..in another room signals you mean business.

Are you in England? You should get more than 1/2 if you are the primary carer of the children. Ask friends and get better legal advice.

You are both different people to what you were when you were kids. People change as they grow up and what they want changes too. You shouldn't take this personally. You have grown older but apart in your wants and needs which is very usual, if sad.

Maybe he does still care for you/love you in a way, but it is obvious that he is no longer in love with you. Maybe it is his immaturity and the need not to be seen as an arsehole that is making him blow hot and cold (If we want to look at him generously) but the way he is ending things is still the actions of a grade A dick. He's not thinking of you, or his kids, at all. He's putting himself first every way. Can you get a mattress in dd's room/living room, so that you at least are not sharing a bed? Him not even being gallant enough to move out of the bed, considering he's the one who wants to leave, is appalling.

Make sure you have copies of all his paperwork, see that solicitor and get those benefits sorted. The sooner you get him out of that house, the sooner you can start healing and moving on.

Thank you, AF, that means a lot to me, it really does. :)

OP... A mattress you say? Let him have his mattress. This is what you do:

1. You arrange for a new mattress to be delivered for YOUR bed. You bid your time until the delivery date.

1. Get one of those locks where they're in the handle for YOUR bedroom and fit it. It doesn't always need to be locked but it's for you, your bedroom is for YOU as your safe space.

1. New mattress arrives and you ask delivery driver to please deliver it to YOUR bed and put it on. Ask them to remove the OLD mattress and dump it in the garden. That way, if ex-husband wants to reclaim HIS property, he can.

1. Tell ex-husband that he may have the right to share the house until the divorce is final but that your bedroom is your safe space. Tell him that this is in the hands of your solicitor and you will not hesitate to go to the police if he attempts to invade your space.

I believe that what he is doing to you is abject cruelty and attempting to have sex with you under those circumstances is tantamount to rape. Make it absolutely clear that he will NEVER have access to your body again. He has lost his privilege as your husband and now his is an unwelcome housemate that you tolerate for the sake of your children.

You are worth it. You are deserving of a wonderful life and you have years and years and years ahead of you to discover this. For now, it's your time to accept the loss of your marriage, of what you thought you had - and reconcile that fact in your head so that you will never accept this crap again.

I'm sure your family and friends will stand next to you, every step of the way, so delighted will they be that you are jettisoning this evil and deliberate obstruction in your life. Try it, tell them what you're doing and see the relief on their faces. I'm quite sure they would happily buy a new mattress for you - and if they can't and you can't - set up a 'go fund me' page for it and I'll be thrilled to contribute to your new (uncontaminated) mattress.

I can't promise you that all of this will be easy, it won't, but I PROMISE you, it will be WORTH IT. You can do it and your life is going to be so much improved that you won't recognise it. :)

Yes and stop cooking for him etc. He's now a single man and that means not having a wife doing things for him.

You need proper financial advice- and so does HE!

I honestly can't see how he can possibly pay for the mortgage AND a place for himself at 26 when he's self employed (and thinking of giving it up as you said earlier.)

I also don't see how you could pay for food and bills on a low wage. Shop work is ok as a 2nd income but it's never going to be enough to support you and your children long term on £7 an hour or whatever it is. If he stays self employed, his income is likely to be all over the place and if his business goes tits up, where does that leave you? You don't want to depend on handouts from the state.

You need to think about getting some qualifications to improve your income and prospects for the next 40 years.

There is no reason why you can't study or get work during the day because your children are in full time school.

I understand it might be hard for you to see the Big Picture at the moment with all the emotional stuff going on but you need to think long term.

Sharing a bed with him is ridiculous. See a solicitor. Make your separation legal. This will include not doing anything for him and certainly not sharing a bed. Could your children share a room short term so he can have their room?

I think the reason you still share a bed is you are clinging onto the hope he may want you back.

You both need to grow up because at the moment you are like two co-dependent children clinging to a sinking ship with neither of you willing to make changes.

Please don't sleep with him!!! When my daughter was 3months old I discovered my partner at the time and my best friend of 12years had been sleeping together! He continued having sex with me and it mentally destroyed me. I loved him and he used it against me. Please for your own sanity don't sleep with him! I've been there done that and ended up in such a horrendous mental state I tried to overdose.

"If you love someone, set them free. If they come back they're yours; if they don't they never were."

I think this famous quote sums it up.
The more you cling on the more you'll push him away.

However even if he ever did come crawling back you need to question whether you really want someone back who could treat you like this, who has so very little respect for you.

OP It sounds very likely that he has aspects of narcissistic personality disorder. If that is the case then the person you loved never ever really existed! It is this false person that you miss, but what you have to realise and come to understand is that it was always just an illusion.

When something like this happens it is very very like a death happening, you have to mourn the death of the person that you thought they were. It hurts like hell and you are confused precisely because his actions are making all of the betrayal and hurt much much worse.

Read up about covert narcissists and emotionally abusive people and look at the red flags. I would bet you anything that you will tick lots of the boxes.

While I understand that you don't want to let him go, you have to. He doesn't love you and probably never did as narcissists are only ever interested in their own well being. They can play the game and pretend and say the right things so that you think you are in a mutually loving relationship. In actual fact everything is only alright whilst he is gaining much more than he gives and it is what he wants.

His callous and hurtful behaviour has shown you the person he really is deep down at heart. Please have no illusions that he would have come back to you if the ow hadn't kicked him to the curb, he wouldn't. No matter how he dresses it up he was kicked out after a very short time probably because she realised what a lying tosser and a horrible human being he really is.

You have been conditioned by him to believe that he is your world and you can't survive without him, well that's simply not true! In actual fact it is the other way round he is the inadequate person who cannot survive without someone else making him feel important.

When he has said some of his most hurtful things has he had a smug look on his face? Have you looked at him and thought how can you say these things? He will have looked like that because he is actually enjoying your hurt and distress.

You should contact women's aid. What he is doing is tantamount to emotional abuse and possibly financial abuse since I bet you anything he spends a lot on himself but makes it so that you're not allowed to spend anything much on yourself. This is actually a criminal offence now which you can report to the police.

You are trying to keep this relationship together partially because it is all you have ever known and partially probably because you don't want your children's lives torn apart but that ship has sailed. All you will do if you stay in this relationship is allow your son to think that this is how women are supposed to be treated and your daughter that this is how her future partner can treat her and she has to accept it. I'm sure you don't want that for either of them.

So you never went out and he got to go out 3-4 times per week.
You don't know where he was those nights. I still believe this ow wasnt the first. It is just because you never knew before.

This must be so scary OP but you can do this. You are young and strong and it will be ok eventually.

The comment about ordering a new mattress just for you is a great one. He instigated this not you.

If it helps in any way, there's strong evidence now that the adult brain is still forming between 19 and 24 so people can literally change personality in their early 20s. I moved in with exH at 18. Got married at 24 and divorced by 31. Left it too long to split. We were different people. Take little steps each day. You will be ok on your own. One day you will be more than ok, you will be a better person without him. The journey to get there is hard but it can be done.

Thank you for all the above replies, I'm feeling alot better about things today so that's a positive, I talked to him thismorning and said things have to change now, I can't be your best friend anymore and u can't call me for a chat like you do, that's gone now, my voice cracked a few times telling him this but i didn't break down.. he admitted that he slept with the other woman 1 more time than the one I know about so twice in total and swore on the kids lives thats it so I'm feeling angry and hurt again over that but accepting it's not my problem now, surprise surprise he's suggested spending a whole month apart to see how he really feels and if he misses me or not, and asked if he did miss me could I get past what happened with him and her! x

He also said he's afraid of being alone and needs someone which is why he jumped straight into it with ow and why he chose to come back instead of going somewhere on his own x

He is completely using you. Please have some respect for yourself and tell him to fuck off then fuck off some more. What a horrible man he is

www.lyricsfreak.com/b/beautiful+south/a+little+time_20015215.h

he's suggested spending a whole month apart to see how he really feels and if he misses me or not

It's still all about him, isn't it? Not 'we need time apart so you can decide if you can forgive what I've done'. No, it's 'hey, you need to sit over there all by yourself and wait until I've made my mind up whether or not I want you around'. In essence, he's waiting and hoping OW takes him back, or another OW appears on the horizon. His statement about not wanting to be alone is complete proof.

As far as the bed situation, this isn't a time to play 'no it's MINE'. If he won't vacate the bed, buy a blow up mattress and sleep in DD's room. I'm going to try to put this in a way that doesn't sound 'potential victim blame-y'. He's made it clear that he wants sex. He's also made it clear that he doesn't respect your physical boundaries. To stay in that bed puts you at risk of sexual assault. Don't put yourself in that high risk situation. Vacate the bed, it's just not worth it.

As far as the 'month apart', ask him when he's leaving. He also probably expects you to cry and beg him not to leave. Don't.

You are doing so well op. Be proud of yourself. Get him to move out but make no promises. maybe give him hope if that is what it takes to get him to go but be resolute in your own mind that he's got a lot to prove which will take far longer than 1 month, if he's got a cats hope of ever returning.
Maybe it is a case of thinking the grass is greener and he may discover it isn't, but he hasn't exactly treated you with respect in the process.

If it does come to it don't just let him move straight back in. How will you know it's you he wants rather than just not liking being on his own? That will take months and months for him to prove. He has to fight to get you back.

And yes *acrossthe pond8 is absolutely correct. It's still all about him.

It is all about him, always!

Please listen to the lovely mn's on here. I really wish I had know about mumsnet 8 years ago and had come on here then. I know I would have been told that it really wasn't me and it was all about him and to LTB. It would have been seriously good advice. It took several more years and for my DD1 to actually point out to me that he was a narc! I really couldn't see the wood for the trees. I had spent so many years of my life believing the lies he told me and allowing him to convince me that I was to blame for everything that was wrong with his life. Also, despite having sworn on our kids lives 8 years ago that he had never done anything like that before, he had! I would never have believed that he wouldn't swear like that if he had done it before but it turned out he had cheated on me ever since our DD1 was a baby, she's an adult now!

OP, please don't let him sweet-talk you. You're so vulnerable at the moment and so desperate for any crumbs, however 'mouldy' from him, that you're in danger of letting your heart soar when he feeds you lines like you've just posted.

I agree that letting him think it's a temporary break might be a good starting point if you're not ready to go full force down the legal route to get him out immediately but you have to keep it clear in your mind that it's a ruse on your part, the objective is to get him OUT. Then you can take this at your pace and work with a solicitor to finalise things.

There is no way back, you know that deep down, don't you? I'm sorry but it's true. He's said the cruellest things to you, lied to you repeatedly and nothing that he can ever say or do now will make up for that. I'm sorry that you're forced to take action but you are - either now or later, it's coming and the only choice you really have is, as PP said, whether you're 6 months/1 year down the line of repair and recovery - or back to square one.

That's your choice OP and it's here. The sticking plaster analogy is one that you need to keep in your head now, it will keep you focused.

So he wants a month of single life while you nervously wait at home with the kids for his Decision. He's trying to remain firmly in control of you. Time to take the reins, OP. Woman up and show that you have some self respect.

I'm letting him go for that month because that will help out the situation at home were in, he wants to take dd with him so he gets some idea of the responsibility of having a child to look after (although he's going to his mum's for this month so it won't be too real as she'll be there to help him out and cook/clean for him ) x

Does he mean to take DD for the whole month? Surely not. He can have access as any separated parent would. Perhaps EOW and one night during the week. You could use this time to have a bit of time for yourself.

What I would love to happen is for him, at the end of this month, to want to come crawling back, but for you to have realised how much nicer your life is without him and to just say that you have decided what YOU want - and it isn't him.

So instead of you looking after his daughter while he goes out shagging other women his mum is going to do it ?

He is surrounded by enablers