may i please rant irrationally for a few moments?

[divastrop]

cos if i mention this subject in front of dp again he will be gone....

BUT

he plays this online game,and chats to other players,some of whom are women.i dont like the fact he chats to women online,even though its just in character,about the game.i have seen some of the convos on there and im aware a degree of flirting goes on.dp doesnt tell anybody his real name or anything,but i get all irationally jealous about all these girlies who could be flirting with him,and worry constantly that he could be tempted to flirt back.

yes,i do have low self esteem.i am suffering from PND and feel pretty crap,plus i feel fat and unattractive since having my baby 9 weeks ago.

dp is bloody good at computer games,he completes normal ones in days,so he likes the challenge of this big online game.he is a very high level and now also the leader of a 'guild' and i keep thinking about all these women who will be sticking their virtual tongues down the back of his virtual trousers cos he's all important

sorry,i had to say it somewhere.

((((((((((((((((((ds))))))))))))))))))))

i understand how you feel ds. i have low self esteem sometimes and keep having pnd relapses. you are not fat and unattractive you are a gorgeous lady who has just had a baby, tho you might not believe it - you are. may be in a way it's just a way of trying to protect our families from interlopers so to speak x

and if he can't at least try and understand how you feel he's a git of the highest order for you

do you feel better now that you have had a good rant have to say i would not be over the moon if my dh was playing games all the timeand possibly flirting but if he is not even giving out his real name there cant be anything more than hrmeless banter going on, just think all these woman he is talking to might actually be men sitting wearing dresses.

lmb

at least hes doing it in ur presence, it could be worse and be in a club or something he has to physically leave to go to. try to understand everyone needs to escape and relax, this is just his way.

and if u have just had a baby ur beautiful, try not to upset urself, its gets better, u WILL lose the weight. i promise xxx

'Leader of the guild' go on read it back to yourself. Is this or is this not jumped up pomposity on a grand scale? He sounds like a real star!

Divastrop, EVERYONE feels like shit a few months after having a baby, and they deserve the support of their loved ones.

Do you have a pair of scissors? I find a cut monitor cord normally gets a reaction.

Don't be sad, get angry, make him take over while you have a nice long bath or go for a walk.

NB if you want to really put him off, point out that the majority of 'women' playing the game actually have penises and are just getting their jollies off pretending to be girls!

he has told me about 3 million times that he doesnt even know if half of them are male or female,he would tell anybody who asked him anything personal to eff off,and if somebody blatantly flirted with him he would block them from speaking to him again.and he gets p*ed off that i dont trust him.

he came to the doctors with me yesterday about the PND,and he is always telling me he loves me and thinks im totally gorgeous etc etc.

i think im just looking for something to be wrong,iyswim.

hes told me that most of the 'women' are really men

Oh dear. PND is the pits!

Do you think you are being irrational though? If it's real problem to you it's a real problem.

I'm sure you are not fat and unattractive, but you are probably going to take a while to get over having a baby, it's a MAHOOSIVE thing to do - a wonderful thing sure - but your life so totally changes with each baby and I'm only seven months in and just starting to surface again.

But you will there, one day at a time.

can you not come to some kind of agreement about how long he plays these games, i.e he baths baby after dinner to give you a bit of "me time" then he can play games for no longer than 1 hour or something, i have to say he does a bit lovely, are you not maybe taking the hump a bit because he has a hobby that takes him away from you and your baby iykwim

Well at least he knows its a fantasy then.

What can you do right now to make yourself feel a bit better? Is the baby asleep, can you have a nice cuppa and a sit down with the paper or a bath? Start being nice to yourself and stop worrying about the past or the future. You are where you are with your weight. You will recover from this weight blip and get on with things, but right now, start being nice to yourself and don't expect yourself to bounce right back - you've just gone through a major life event.

its been bothering me for months,but i manage to supress it and get on with life when i feel ok in myself.the thing is,i used to be able to ask him for reassurance if i was concerned,but the past week we have argued constantly about it and it got so bad he said he was going to walk if i didnt stop interrogating him about every person he chatted to.

atm there is one person hes mentioned a few times,who he says he doent know if they are male or female,but he chats to this one alot and i'd really be unhappy if it turned out to be a lass.but i cant say anything else to him.

god i sound so pathetic,i wish i could just not care.i know i come on here all the time chatting about my personal life,but as far as i know everybody i chat to is female,unless there are strange men out there who have inside knowledge of pregnancy and childbirth.

he does do stuff around the house and with the kids,its not the amount of time hes on the pc thats an issue,its the chatting to women thing.

Divastrop - but it's NOT REAL! Seriously. Do you honestly think that tomorrow all the people posting here will remember? Or that the blokes who post on Mumsnet will come and sweep you off your feet and away? Nope, of course not.

But if it's really upsetting you, say so. Tell him you don't want to hear about it and you don't want to see it and ask him to respect that.

its upsetting me cos i cant say anything

Divas, do remember you have just had a baby and are vulnerable right now. He might need reminding of this as well.

Try not to be too hard on yourself, or on him. But do try to make him see you need some reassurance.

Gosh, it sounds like he plays the game I do, or something similar. It's very immersive and demands a lot of time to play properly, so the nearest and dearest have to set firm boundaries to stop it replacing real life with us addicts. Well done your dp if he manages to pull his weight around the house in addition to his important duties as guildmaster.

My marriage actually broke up in the course of a row we had about a man I played with. (Well all the men I played with, to be fair, but one in particular - who I never met in real life.) However that was one marriage that really should have broken up a long time ago and the row was just the last straw really. The problem is not the game itself or the women who play it, but your current insecurity, which you are aware of and are taking steps to address, like a sensible person. The first few months after a baby can make you feel really unlike yourself - after DS4 I got acrophobic, agoraphobic, and every other phobic you care to mention until I went back to work four months later. I hope you feel better soon - I'm sure you will.

Some wives get a second pc and take the game up themselves. Then you can keep an eye on him and understand his hobby at the same time. However this can lead to issues about whose turn it is to raid the dragon's lair and whose to change the nappies!

he has his own pc,but i wouldnt want to play such a game,for one thing i would find it more interesting to watch paint dry,and it would be like me expecting him to come on MN every night and talk about life as a parent

ive always had issues with computer games,as my xh used to play on the playstation all the time (when he wasnt at the bookies)and never did anything around the house or with the kids.combined with that,i went out with somebody for a while who dumped me for a lass he met in a chatroom on WAP(they never met in rl but apparently they were in love with each other)and totally broke my heart.

i made it clear to dp when he started playing this game,that i would find it unacceptable if he started chatting to one particular female regularly,and formed an online relationship,even if the chat was just about the game.he has no idea if this particular person is male or female in rl,but i would like to think that if he finds out its a woman he will stop chatting to her,but he thinks thats unreasonable of me,and that i have no right to question him.

he thinks im making mountains out of molehills.maybe it would be different if i felt better,and felt like an attractive woman who was equal to him ie that other men may find attractive.he says i should trust him as he trusts me 100%,but i think its easy to trust somebody when they are fat and old and have 5 kids,i mean,no other man would look twice at me,so dp knows he would have nothing to worry about anyway

Diva once your confidence and self esteem is back up again it won't fizz on you.
Be patient with yourself and kind to yourself.
Your Dp probably gets some reassurance from your jealousy, I know I like it if I notice my dh is a bit jealous. (if he got very jealous and possessive it would do my head in but wouldn't stop me loving him especially if he was trying to overcome his problem...)
Also you are maybe pushing him away, testing his devotion to you because of your past hurts...
Obviously you guys are under stress at the moment but I'm sure your dp will go the course with you if you let him.
Don't be afraid to have a relationship that works You do deserve it. And it doesn't mean you skip into the horizon and live happily ever after because all relationships grow and change and take a bit of effort.
You'll be fine! (keep taking the tablets)

thanks rosy.maybe theres a bit of truth in that jealousy thing,i think thats where i have a problem,cos in the first few months together he would mention blokes were looking at me in the street and stuff now+then(not that i ever noticed),and he would ask me who texts were from etc-but after many months of the answer always being 'my mum' he doesnt ask anymore.

i dont know how to handle it though,cos i didnt let it bother me for a good few weeks,then he started mentioning this one person and at first i didnt really notice,but then i thought 'hang on ,hes mentioned that character a few times and seems to be chatting to them alot,i hope its a bloke' and of course i asked him and then it all kicked off again...he got annoyed and defensive ,which in turn made me think he was hiding something(past experience has taught me that when people are lying they gat defensive as they try and turn it all around onto you)(not that he was lying,just that thats what i automatically think when somebody reacts like that now),which made me question him more etc etc.

i just want it to go away

Diva... I think Rosy's advice speaks volumes. You have a supportive dp who loves you for just being you. You are a fantastic Mama who keeps a tremendously busy house running smoothly. It is fabulous that you take an interest in his hobby - I can't be bothered with the games my dh plays! Keep at it Diva - I am sure that you know that this relationship is worth the effort. He obviously thinks that you are worth the effort