What were the early warning signs that your marriage was over?

[WoodenRainbow]

What were the early warning signs that your marriage was over?

If there were no big indicators such as DV/EA/Affairs etc.

I have worries about my 10 year marriage and wonder if it’s the beginning of the end if it’s salvagable.

I ends d up with nothing in common with my ex, and we split...but..I know several couples who seemed in as bad a state, and ended up, through counselling, finding that they had got into a rut, and turning things around.
Could be worth trying to start over, remembering why you were together at first and trying to stop the bad habits? Maybe he feels bad that his career took off and your has been put on hold, who knows unless you have a proper talk.
Tell him you want to try counselling and that its really serious, that you can't see how your future together will work without some changes.
If he can't be arsed with it, you kind of have your answer. If you really don't want to try it either, you probably have an answer too (but I:d still recommend you try it, if only to separate knowing what went wrong, so you don't repeat it!).

My moment of epiphany was when he went away for a week and it was the least stressful, most cheerful week I'd had in years.

For me it was feeling envious when I heard of people getting divorced.

We would have the same recurring rows over and over again and nothing ever changed.

By the end I resented the food he was eating for keeping him alive.

I honestly look back and have NO idea why I married him.

Sorry OP, so late replying! No plan at all, that's what is worrying. We have one DD, age 2. He is still being coldand just seems so distant, amd just not bothered!

He used to ignore me for days and weeks. Then one day I simply realised it didn't hurt me anymore.

For me it was the realisation that he loved alcohol more than he did me or our DDs. We are divorcing and he is moving out soon. When I think of the house without him in it, all I feel is relief.

OP - you could be me. My daughter has had MH problems and we as a couple have been to her therapist, and I have been on my own too. The therapist made the same point as a pp - how does he know how you feel if you don't tell him? So I've started to tell him. All the thoughts in my head that I pushed down (when he did something that I thought was unacceptable) are now coming to the surface and are spoken out loud. Not in a shouty or moany way - just calmly. I now feel a lot better about myself, and am more hopeful for the relationship. There is less tension in the house, and my DD is a lot calmer.
It doesn't have to be the end of the relationship - any change will have to start with you. (it's bloody hard, I have to admit)

Supersop, that sounds brilliant, well done! I think too often we think 'if he loves me, he'll notice x, or he'll realise I feel y', but life's not perfect, and he might be bad at reading signals (or a bit lazy, or complacent..).
Worth a go at calmly asking for what you want..
In my case, the ex continued to do the same things, even small stuff he could easily have changed, even when I'd politely asked him, day after day (e.g. splashing me with stuff on plates and cups as he loaded to dishwasher, which he always seemed to decide to do when I was at the sink, dressed ready for work). He wasn't stupid at all, so I concluded that he really just didn't care what I thought at all (and I'm much happier without him, a few years on). But it was worth trying !

With my ex husband it boiled down to a ridiculous hypothetical conversation between friends one night, were the question was posed who would you give a kidney to if you were a match for husband and BF and they both needed a transplant I said BF as I knew they'd always be around and in my life forever and unfortunately I couldn't say the same about my then husband. Here I am many years later with a new husband and in a position were he would get my kidney without question and if anyone who confides in me about relationship woes I always pose the kidney question. Very silly and very simplistic but it makes you think.

Another one here that was praying for my ex to have an affair. He started to repulse me and the thought of him touching me made me want to vomit. I also had zero respect for him because of his appalling behaviour.

A lot of these comments are now I feel but I'm currently just living day to day sadly and faking happiness. Did have a bit of a breakdown to my mum over Christmas and she said she could feel the tension in the house. Hoping he'd have an affair or something would happen to him, repulsion, separate sofas, yep experienced them all. Hoping 2018 will be the year I grow a pair and leave.

When I posted about our problems on MN and everyone said that I wasn’t BU.

Before that I thought it was all my fault.

He was headhunted for a job a three hour drive away and I tried to persuade him take it.

I didn’t want to go home, if I was at work I worked as late as I possibly could. If it was my day off I’d go out and stay out as late as I possibly could. I remember sitting in a cafe and they were closing up around me. I prayed he would go out so I could stay in the warm. Couldn’t stand to be in the same room as him. His total lack of empathy when my dad died was the final nail in the coffin. Disrespectful, untrustworthy and violent, I keep my door in the hall as a reminder of what I saved myself from, it still has the marks where he put his fist through it.

He’d roll his eyes at me, mimic my voice in a sneery manner, didn’t care in the slightest if I was ill. But that was in addition to the drinking. By that point I was pretty sick of him as well, I was just a lot nicer about it.

In my 1st marriage I used to get a feeling of dread walking up path to house and hoping he was out

He used to fall asleep on the sofa in front on the telly in the evening. At first I didn’t want him to be asleep and I’d wake him to watch tv together or go up to bed together. Eventually I was pleased when he fell asleep, even looked forward to him falling asleep and would then tiptoe up to bed by myself leaving him sleeping on the sofa.

We started making our own cups of tea and not asking each other if they wanted one.

Not just that (obviously) but for me it symbolised that neither of us thought of the other anymore.