Trapped

[Bellyrub1980]

Gonna bullet point a load of information. I'd like opinions on what to do next....

1. Husband and I have been together for 5 years and married for 6 months. We have a 2.5yr old daughter. Co-own a house, I own a flat in my own name, I work 3 days a week. He works full time. We get free child care from our parents.

2. Financially we are struggling a bit. We can pay the bills and have enough to eat. But absolutely no money for luxuries or holidays. We are saving now, which is great, but it will be about 3 months before we are out of debt, and then another good few months before we have any real disposable cash. Therefore I'm trying to earn more money by doing some freelance work, but to do this well (in a way that meets my professional standards) I need to delve a bit further into debt for equipment, the very idea of which causes tension in our relationship so I've not taken the plunge yet.

3. I'm recovering from (perhaps still have?) PND. Weaning off my anti depressants. Gone from the largest dose to half way. My H also had depression and anxiety (around the same time post natally), but more due to his job. He changed jobs and is apparently much happier now and no longer on medication. But his pay is considerably lower. I'm fine with this provided that he is happy.

4. H has an issue with alcohol. He knows this, has read a self help book and hasn't drunk for about a month now. He seems to have more energy to do things, is exercising daily, losing weight and back into all of his 'medium' size clothes. He genuinely does seem happier in his own skin. But I wouldn't say he's happier in our relationship.

5. My health, physically, is terrible. I'm heavier than I was full term pregnant. All my joints hurt because of it. I take painkillers everyday. I have a terrible junk filled diet. I hate the way I look and feel. But for some reason I can't do anything about it. I feel almost paralysed by it.

6. Our relationship feels empty. We don't have fun anymore. Our days consist of working (I love my job, he seems ambivalent about his) and then killing time until bed. I dread the weekends with 2 whole days to fill. Virtually everything I say and do irritates him. We don't sleep together because I snore, so I sleep in the spare room.

7. Our daughter is amazing. But I feel guilty about the life she could have if it wasn't for the way things were with me and her dad. I see happy families, parents who go places, laugh together, who respect and support each other. I don't feel we're like that anymore. I don't know why or where it went wrong.

I feel trapped. I think about suicide or about just running away. But I won't do either because I couldn't do that to our daughter at her age.

Today I was booked in for the gym at 9. I joined the gym a few months ago, with my husband's encouragement, to get fit, lose weight and have some 'me' time. But today I got in my car and drove to a nature reserve and sat and cried in my car.

When I go home he will see I've been crying. He won't be sympathetic, he will be irritated. If I try to talk to him about it he will say I'm over reacting and being melodramatic. (Maybe I am?) So i will try my best to hide it, have a shower, and just carry on. But he will still be able to tell and he will still have those thoughts.

In the short term I'll just keep doing this. But in the long term I don't know what to do. Maybe it's normal to go through stages like this?

Please don't tell me to LTB. I want to make this work. I want to change.

I think the key here is your self-esteem. If you feel this bad about yourself then it affects the whole of your life.
Instead of going to the gym - which is a daunting prospect for many - why don't you start taking walks? Walking is a great form of exercise, plus it gives you some time in your own thoughts and away from other stresses. You said you drove to the nature reserve, which sounds like a nice place to walk! Once you start feeling a little more confident, maybe you can try the gym again.

I don't find the gym daunting, I used to go 5 nights a week before. But I couldn't go today as too tearful. But walking does sound good. Walking alone.

Ah ok, sorry I thought that had been your first appointment. Still, walking is good exercise and I find it therapeutic!
It sounds like you're both unhappy and maybe bogged down in it all. Have you spoken to him about your feelings? Have you told him that you feel suicidal? Have you told anyone?

Don't come off the antidepressants-this is not the right time to do that. You should wean off when in a stable time of your life. This is not it...

What about him changing as well, changing is not your sole responsibility. Also doing that is very hard when patterns are ingrained and are of many years standing.

What made you both get married to each other?. Continuing as you are even in the short term will just make you feel as miserable if not more so than you feel now.

What too did you learn about relationships when growing up, was your parents own marriage similar?.

What do you get out of this relationship now, what needs of yours does he still fulfill here?. Something is still keeping you within this and it should not be your child.

No it is not normal to go through stages like this and you need support. He is not ever going to be the one to give you that.

Have you spoken to your GP to date about your thoughts and your weight?.

You cannot make this work on your own; he has to want to do his bit as well. I do not like the ways he interacts with you at all, your DD will also pick up on that and normalise that too.

Your DD is very young but she is still learning about relationships from the two of you, what do you think she is learning here?.

Points 2, 4 and 5 are themselves potential dealbreakers in a relationship regardless of anything else you have written. A month without alcohol if he has a dependency on it is no time at all and he could easily restart drinking at any time.

Were you given advice by the GP to wean yourself off the anti depressants or is that a decision you made of your own accord?.

We barely talk to each other properly. Just say to day conversations, but if I talk about how I feel, it doesn't go down well. I think I exhausted his patience with my PND.

We married for our daughter. And because we love each other. Or loved. He says he loves me. He just doesn't appear to. I genuinely question whether he even likes me. Everything I do seems to piss him off.

My parents are still happily married. Nearly 50 years. Very respectful of each other. They still sleep in the same bed. His parents divorced.

You ask: "What do you get out of this relationship now, what needs of yours does he still fulfill here?" He is my daughters father. She adores him. We live in the same house. We both contribute half to the mortgage and bills. We both like watching TV. We both like eating.

My GP isn't aware how I currently feel. I was doing really well. I was happy and motivated. My anxiety had gone.

It is very unlikely that he will acknowledge how I'm feeling or talk about it. He will say I'm being dramatic or over reacting or that it's my PND.

I'm home now. Feels fake being here.

Yes GP knows I'm weaning and agreed it was a good time to try.

Well it seems clear that this isn't actually the right time to try to stop the anti depressants, so go back to the gp. It's just not quite there yet.

You ask: "What do you get out of this relationship now, what needs of yours does he still fulfill here?" He is my daughters father. She adores him. We live in the same house. We both contribute half to the mortgage and bills. We both like watching TV. We both like eating.

There is nothing about your needs in your response so what does that tell you. What needs of yours does he meet? He does not meet any. Ok so you both pay the bills equally, eat and watch tv together; is that really all you can write?. That is the barest of bare minimums which makes me also think that your relationship bar is so low as to be almost non existent.

And there is that bloody word adore again - children love their parents no matter how they are. I refer to a poster by the name of Itsgraceagain because her comments below resonate with me now:-

" Nonetheless, it might be worth remembering that all children 'adore' their parents, simply because they're hard-wired for it. This does not necessarily mean the kids have made a balanced judgement that their parent is adorable. They're children; the parents they've got are the only ones they know.

It's more reasonable to look at how much give-and-take of love, affection and respect there is between parent and child. Balanced judgements can be made by you, the parent, because you have the benefit of wider knowledge & experience. How the child appears to feel about its parent is, in & of itself, a reflection of a child's instincts: nothing more. You need to look at grown-up evidence".

Your child should not be used as glue to still bind you and he together.

Also you do not have to live together to co-parent well.

Saying that he loves you and showing it are two very different things. Its easy to say it after all.

If you married primarily for your child was that really the right decision?

It is his problem that he is annoyed by your PND; who died and made him king exactly?. Developing PND was in no way your fault and his actions to date are simply further contributing to your current low state of mind. Please talk to your GP again, that person would be interested unlike your H who really seems not to care less about you at all.

Good point re. Adore.

Atilla, you've got me thinking about his parent's relationship. His father was (is??? I've never met him) an alcoholic and they divorced when he was in his late teens.

His mother hasn't talked about his dad much, other than to say he was a very selfish man.

So I guess he never grew up in a happy functional family. Even his grandparents and aunties/uncles all divorced. The polar opposite of my close and extended family.

Maybe this is relevant?

Only a few hours to go, then daughter to bed and, maybe, we can talk. Bit nervous.