Divorcing a Workaholic

[Lilliannagrimshore]

Hi
Just been having some counselling due to feelings of overwhelming guilt over my decision to divorce my husband and leave a lonely, marriage of 32 years where I constantly felt "invisible"
Through this councelling I have Come to the realisation that it was due to my ex being emotionally absent due to his obsession with work - I knew he was a workaholic but had no idea how this addiction is as destructive as alcoholism or drug abuse - I kept telling myself it was me and I was ungrateful for my ex working so many hours to provide for us - even though I worked and never put pressure on him for money.
I'm now feeling like a complete fool and feel as though I've wasted so much time on a selfish, self obsorbed, ego driven father of my now grown children
Has anyone else have a similar experience? Just need to chat with someone who has got through the other side!!

Hi
Has anyone else divorced their partner due to workaholism????

Hi there I've not much time so will come back later but I've just split from my partner of 12 years.. quite a few issues but is a definite workaholic, to the point where I've felt completely invisible & like the whole world revolves around him!! I feel your pain and hope you're ok.. counselling is a really positive step xx

Gosh. I'm guessing it got real bad.

I'm self employed and it can get all consuming. Not easy to just dump the work though as I employ 8 people!

Have you tried chatting about it. He might just see it that he is doing his best to provide for your family. he might be able to make some changes - even small ones to start - to get over this.

I didn't divorce mine solely on the basis of his workholism, but he believed that work was the thing that defined him. Because of his upbringing (father military, mother never worked) he'd been brought up to believe that 'men worked, women did EVERYTHING ELSE'. Once I realised it was as ingrained as that, and nothing i could ever do would change things, it made it easier to leave.

Was yours one of these Lillianna? A man who thought that work was who he was? Did he retire at any stage (because I believe this kind of man doesn't deal with retirement well).

He was also self employed as a musician/entertainer which fed into his ego and the accolade/ applaud (drug) he needed for affirmation of his worth
I could never compete with this therefore work was always a priority over every other aspect of his life.
I enabled this behaviour as I had 3 young children to look after and frequently felt like I was a single parent
I did everything in the home - he paid the bills but I too worked to bring in money.