Think I will die from the emotional pain

[atticusfinchatemybaby]

I am in such deep emotional pain I can’t breathe.
Got married almost 6 years ago, been together 10 years total. Like any couple we had ups and downs but ultimately we were happy, well suited, and knew (or thought we knew) what we wanted in life. We were emotionally mature and getting married for the ‘right’ reasons – i.e. a considered decision to support each other through life, not a crazy hormone-induced love fest or desire for massive wedding. Our wedding was a wonderfully happy day and people still tell me today they’ve never been to a wedding where the love was more palpable. Nobody can predict the future but I would have put our chances of divorce at less than 1 per cent.
Cut to today. For the past few years DH has been slowly, gradually emotionally freezing me out. Over the past year it has become total. Externally probably nobody would be able to see what has changed, but there is no affection, no sign of love, no interest in anything about me. We have two small kids who he alternately loves and rejects. He says he feels trapped, suffocated by family life, desperate to escape and be with someone else (but simultaneously admits he knows this is a fantasy that wouldn’t be how he imagines it in his head). He says he feels nothing for me and can’t imagine his feelings ever returning, no longer can see us growing old together. He has a crush on a woman he knows through works (but simultaneously says he knows it’s ‘bullshit’ and just a symptom of his escape fantasy).
A few weeks ago we started seeing a marriage counsellor but we only have one hour a week, and she will be on leave for the next few weeks. I feel totally rejected, unloved, unwanted, humiliated, despised, abandoned and in absolute agony to have lost the person I loved most and who, just a few years ago, was the shining beacon in my life. He was everything to me, and me to him at the time. Now I’m nothing. It’s like living with someone with Alzheimers who has no recollection of who I am or what we once meant to each other.
I can’t bear the daily pain of sharing a house with him, but I’m afraid if I kick him out now he’ll never come back. And the pain for our two lovely kids of us splitting up is more than I can bear.
I don’t know why I’m writing this or what help I hope to find, I just have to let it out somehow. In the past when I felt awful about something he was the one I’d turn to. Now there’s nobody. I’m being tortured to death by the person who was once my saviour. If it wasn’t for the kids I think I’d top myself.
This is agony. I can’t bear it. I don’t know what to do to relieve the pain. Please help. Please tell me you've been through this total emotional shut down from your OH and come out the other side.

OP, I can feel the pain in your post and I'm so sorry for what you're going through. His behaviour sounds extremely cruel and hurtful. I know you say you can't bear the thought of him leaving and the effect on the kids.

However
'We have two small kids who he alternately loves and rejects.'

Don't underestimate the effect this will be having on your kids. This is extremely frightening and confusing behaviour for young children.

Do you have friends / family members you can talk to? Well done for posting here, its really important to let the pain out in healthy ways

You poor thing Atticus that sounds truly awful and I am so sorry you are feeling so rotten.

I have no experience of this sort of thing, but didn't want to read and run.

Fwiw I think it is truly unfair of your dh to say those things about not wanting to be with you and still staying! He either needs to be living with you and be fully committed to improving the relationship, or he needs to go. In your place, I would ask him to leave. It's too soul destroying for you otherwise, especially when he is rejecting the dc. He sounds as though he needs to grow up frankly.

You are NOT nothing without him . That is just how you feel right now owing to the rejection of your dh. Be strong op! Tell him to shut up and commit, or leave ... . Good luck to you.

I'm so sorry

Could you maybe look into counselling for just you? You sound like you need some emotional support just for you right now.

The most important people here are you and your kids, focus on that. You've got to stay strong. Your heart has been been broken but you will survive this, no matter how your marriage turns out. Start making some practical plans, get support from counselling, friends, family. Don't be afraid to tell people what you're going through.

Good luck OP.

It is heartbreaking but I think for your own emotional health you have to accept it. Don't beg, plead, fight. As you say, he has been locking you out for several years. It doesn't sound like he is going to change. I don't see what else you can do but start to adjust to the situation.

Thanks. Yes, he definitely is depressed - extremely. As of ten days ago he started taking antidepressants, and his mood seems to have brightened greatly (comparatively speaking) but then he said in counselling today that he still feels fundamentally the same.
As a result of things he said over the past two weeks I have learnt for the first time that he was sexually abused as a child over several years. I feel like this must be the explanation for this total emotional withdrawal, although I can't see why it has suddenly come out of the blue, or how the fuck we resolve it. He says he's committed to counselling and wants to make it all work but just sees it all as hopeless. When he sees how upset I am, like today, he tries to be nicer and obviously feels guilty, but I can't tell anymore what's real and what's just an act. He is being incredibly sadistic and cruel but I know this isn't the real him. If it was, believe me I would be gone. I feel like a monster has eaten him and is eating me too, and I can't bear to abandon the person who I knows is such a good person really.
Yes, I worry about the effect on our kids. He is/can be a wonderful father and he says the mean everything to him. But his emotion coldness and rejection sometimes extends to them too. He tries to hide it and it's not obvious, but I think at some level they must feel it. What the fuck do we do? He says he wants to fix it all but just feels numb and overwhelmed. He has talked about suicide, how he's letting us all down, but if I try to get close to him he just shuts down more. It's unbearable.

*he says they mean everything to him

My goodness I have been here and know the real physical pain you feel when it happens. The pain will go when the anger creeps in, and it will creep in. Be kind to yourself and go through the process focussing on getting through a day at a time. You will regain your strength and it sounds like your life may well be better for him not being in it. Never has the saying 'This too will pass' had so much meaning

You need to go OP, or else spend the rest of your life trying to fix this man and make him love you again, which will not work; it will only cause you more pain, more anguish, the man is cruel and selfish; I don't know why you cant see it.

Atticus - this is awful for you. I think you are dealing with a man with severe emotional issues that are eating him from inside. I think only he can make the decision to deal with these. Rejecting the children is quite odd and certainly points to a profound depression.

But I do think you should consider him moving out. Even if it is suggested as a temporary issue. Then YOU need to get a counsellor for you. Nobody, however much you love them can be 'everything' to you, so when you are ready you will need to address this. At the moment you are in shock, grief and high anxiety and you need some support. I think this is too serious for couple's counselling in my humble opinion. You both need some individual support, however I think it would be a mistake to assume that he can mend his 'issues' for you and your relationship. The feelings he is expressing about the relationship are very strong. Some physical distance and the anti-depressants should help him decide if they are real. No amount of wanting a relationship no to end, will stop it ending. I have been here, 6 months down the line (different story though) A good friend said one word to me that helped me through th every worst . Courage. XX

sorry - typo - "wanting a relationship not to end"

This sounds emotionally excruciating - I'm not surprised you are in pain.

I wonder whether there is something else going on here - as someone above suggests depression maybe reactive depression as a reaction to feeling claustrophobic due to family life? It does sound a bit "personality change" as opposed to "I've just fallen out of love".

Nothing really to suggest but I would persist with the marital counselling. How old are your children? It maybe if you can stick it out, things may improve as they age.

I remember once reading something about how love in a marriage is like a pendulum and it swings back and forth (ie. some times you can viscerally hate your partner because they are annoying you or going through a bad patch) and sometimes a couple of years will be hard and difficult but the pendulum swings back. I suppose it depends on whether you can stick it out (and whether he is prepared to as well) and whether you think there is some prospect of the pendulum swinging back.

Sorry - cross posted with your update OP

Ah - the depression makes sense. The priority is treating that - I suspect all will be well once he gets a handle on it and it passes.

My doctor friend always says "depression never lasts for ever".

I felt very sad reading your story. I mean this with all good intent, depression isn't an excuse nor reason to treat you like shit.
Why be with someone who's so cruel to you.
You need to put distance between you two and heal yourself because your children needs you to be strong and capable for them.

I would be asking for individual counselling for you and him. Him probably moreso due to the abuse.
I wonder if one of your children is near the age he was when his abuse began? And that was maybe the trigger for him withdrawing from you...? Often people need to detach from reality (dissociate) during abuse and this can occur again during times of stress or anxiety. Poor guy. Holding onto that secret for so long must have been exhausting.
Honestly? It sounds so tough but maybe the best thing for you both could be a separation to give him space to deal with all of this whilst not damaging you and your children. And you need support to- to help you see it's not actually about you and may not be your issue to fix sadly.
As a counsellor I would be urging you to work separately initially with couple work coming later.

Thanks for all the responses. Maybe I'm an idiot but I am surprised that everyone blames him so much. To me it seems that he is really suffering himself and this spreads out onto the rest of us, rather than deliberately being cruel to me for the sake of it.. If he could stop, I believe he would do so in a heartbeat. But he doesn't know how to, and neither do I.
I have suffered terrible depression in the past and he stood by me. I feel if I walk out on him now, I would be letting him down at his darkest time. On the other hand, when I was depressed I didn't play it out on him the way he is doing with me.
I don't know what to think. I just want it to end.

Isadora that is what I have been thinking. But it makes me feel worse to think 'it's not about me'. If our marriage was over because we were fundamentally incompatible, then I could deal with it. To think that our marriage may be over because he has been so damaged by abuse is the ultimate tragedy. He has lost all his happiness in life, that he fought so hard to attain - the people who abused him have stolen not just his childhood but his marriage and his kids too. It's unbearable.
But then everyone else is saying he's just a prick basically and I should accept that and leave. Maybe I'm letting the abuse be an 'excuse' for terrible behaviour. I don't know. But if one of my kids was abused and their partner walked out because they couldn't face the emotional repercussions I'd think she was the shallowest bitch on the face of the earth.

What a truly awful hell you’re in atticus, my heart goes out to you.
I’ve been in a similar situation...the coldness and emotional
freezing out with all affection and sympathy evaporating seemingly overnight.
I stayed another 15yrs hoping he’d change back in to the man I married
but he never has.
If I was you now I would leave without a moments hesitation.

Do you mind if I PM you? I went through something similar to what your husband is going through at the moment, over the past two years. DH and I are not divorced but it was on the cards for a while. We do not have kids, which makes the situation somewhat less dicey.

I can explain what DH and I are doing. Some of what we have learned may help you.

You write very articulately about how you're feeling. Unfortunately this is the devastating effect that abuse can have. It sounds like it's all come to the surface for him and it's drowning him.

The fact that he's on anti depressants and having counselling is very positive. However, you need to be able to draw your own line in terms of what you're willing to put up with. Recovery is possible but he needs to realise how much could be destroyed along the way.

You would not be abandoning him, as you said, when you had depression you didn't take it out on him. He is choosing to say the things he says to you, behave the way he is behaving.
I am currently going through a divorce with a man who sounds just like your husband.
He too has depression, he too was abused as a child- not sexually but emotionally and physically- he too switched from being my everything to treating me as though I was dirt.

He had an affair in the end, then made out I knew our marriage was dead anyway. It wasn't to me, I felt as though we were finally coming out the other side of 3 bad years- then he told me it had all been a lie and he'd been stringing me along for an easy life.
I'm not saying your husband will treat you so badly but do not excuse his bad behaviour on his past or his depression- it is his choice to say he fancies someone at work etc when he knows it will hurt you.