Anyone around for a handhold? I think my relationship is ending.

[ontherocksandgutted]

(NC'd) Is anybody around?

OH came home last night and was acting weird. Suddenly came out with a big speech about how he can't handle X* and he can't cope with me and we should break up. Said he's been feeling this way for a long time.

(*X is a situation that is actually resolvable with a bit of compromise on both sides and sensible discussion. It came up in discussion earlier in the week without that compromise but things were fine after that.)

And things have been fine generally as far as I knew. OK, bit of a rough grumbly patch due to heavy workload and some personal stresses lately. But nothing massive/that we haven't dealt with before; and outside that it's been normal and we've recently been planning and booking stuff like an expensive holiday and organising a big birthday event for late in the year and generally getting on with life, discussing "the future" all as normal, and laughing and enjoying being together (so I thought)

We talked at some length but I don't know what is happening. I asked him "what now?" before bed and he said he was done talking for now as he had an important and longstanding commitment early today and needed to sleep . He wasn't being an arse about that, it is true and he headed off some time ago, and was talking to me and gave me a kiss goodbye as he does every day.

So I'm sat here now waiting for him to get home later this afternoon when we can resume the discussion and I feel sick to the pit of my stomach. How can he have been thinking this stuff while simultaneously acting completely normal and going along with spending thousands of pounds on future plans etc.

I'm in absolute bits. This is my life.

Housing is fine. It is my house (mortgaged) and he lives with me.

Not married, no children.

I just feel like such a failure. My love life was a disaster until he came along and we have been so good for each other. As far as I knew we were growing old together.

Might I ask how important X is. Is it a small thing or a big thing? Is it maybe more important for him than for you?

When men come in and act weird it's almost 100% because they've done something with someone else.

You are in a strong position. Pack his stuff and leave it outside. He's made his decision, you need to take charge now.

Why does everybody think so @Colabottle

How long have you been together?

Sorry if this hurts darling but could he of cheated/be cheating? Xx

@ConfusedWife1234 Yes, X is more important to him than me, but still resolvable.

I'm sorry for being vague but it's an issue which divides MN so I don't want to derail the thread with it. Not dodgy or illegal or anything!

Let's call it potholing. He loves potholing and has done it for years, but I'm scared of confined spaces, so it's not great for me. But I am willing to give it a go on a smaller scale and get more used to it, because I know it's important to him and he likes teaching me and we can enjoy it together.

However he says he now wants to do potholing much more often and at inconvenient times, and more advanced locations which I am not ready for yet. YET. That's where I feel the compromise comes in.

He's not cheating. It's about the X thing.

We've been together about 5-6 years? It's a late relationship for both of us (mid 40s) after both having horrible pasts, and we went into this after lots of conversations about our various baggages and hangups from the past - neither of us wanted to get hurt again or hurt the other one.

Okay, so X is a sports, not potholing but something which divides MN. Maybe hunting? No, you do not have to tell me, just wanted to be sure if I am right that X is really a sport.
It is not a sexual practice but a sport that means much to him.

We left it last night that he needed to be rested for today, but that no decisions would be made.

We know we are good for each other, we know we have helped the other one deal with the fallout from our pasts. We know we are stronger together than apart. We spoke about all this last night.

I certainly reached points in my marriage with Dh where we looked at each other and said 'that's it we have to split up' and one if us would take a break and then we would carry on again.

I would make sure that he knows clearly that you love him and want to be with him and that he doesn't have to 'cope with you', it would ideally be a team effort. I hope he will talk more.

Marriage? Swinging? Having kids?

Op this is so difficult to do but when my ex left me do you know what I did when he said he was leaving? I just said "right ok, if thats how you feel..." it sounds ridiculous but i couldnt be arsed fighting for him, crying...pleading....

It shocked him and inside i was dying, heart break is so painful don't get me wrong but some times there is genuinly times when you need to take a step back and go "right...ok".

He may just be venting and being all up in a tizzy...or it could be genuine.

If he knows that you're willing to compromise and meet him partway on this issue, but is saying it has to be all his way, then it's possible it's actually not about this, it's about breaking up.

Based on what I know of how his mind works and what he has going on in his life, this could well be a "cover" issue for the real thing and even he isn't aware that he is lashing out at the wrong thing/person to try and resolve it.

He knows he is loved, and he loves me back. I told him I have been trying really hard to be the constant, easy thing for him, and that I am gutted I have apparently not been.

The compromise thing. Using the (bad) potholing analogy, it's like he is saying "I want us to go to super advanced potholing miles away before work every day" because that sounds fun and exciting to him and he's taken with the idea and not worrying about the practicalities.

My position is "I am not good enough to do that, and we can't get there and back in time for work, can we try something easier, on a weekend, first?"

In his present state of mind, he sees that as me as refusing to do it at all, ever. (Sorry, I know it's annoying to be so vague)

Just take a step back op and let him clear his mind. Like I said he could just be venting.
Just say "ok, i get it, just do what you need to do"

Your in a safe place, you in a house thats yours, he has to physicallty leave not you. If he was telling you go how different would that be?

If you plead with him does that make him feel better?

And bloody hell dont revolve your life around "pot holing". There's more to life, go sodding live it!!

When i say "just do what you need to do" i mean leave not pot hole.

The weird suddenness of it all in context too.

As I say, we have recently booked a big holiday, with him being just as excited and keen to go ahead as me - we could easily have waited though. He has been the one pushing another future trip for 2019/20 too. And we've been talking about various/general bits we want to do to the house.

None of this has been met with any reluctance or anything other than normal discussing future plans. You don't go from normal, happy couple to break up in the space of a few days.

So he has/is either
Cheated
Asking for attention
Needs some drama

Just be nonchalant about it and ask him out right, stay calm and be basic.

"Right ok, give me a reason why you feel this way? If your not happy, lets not have you live a lie, you know where the door is"

Putting these demands to leave if they dont intend to or if the are thinking irrational in their hands scares the shit out of them and the truth comes out.

Empty threats to leave are a pain in the arse

You're right, it doesn't matter what X is and you've described it well. Assuming this is the 'only' issue that is making him consider going, the problem is that X is frustrating and/or stressing him to the point that he is starting to think that leaving so that he can get on with X (alone or trying to find someone else if can't be done alone) seem a better future.

It is a difficult one because the only solution is indeed compromising, but the key to success is to why extent so that both can be find some happiness, ie. no or little stress/frustration in that compromise. You need to talk more.

Alternatively, it might require him to realise the good things that he could lose by focusing on X as the most important mean to his happiness.

I think it is the only thing (well, at least the only thing he is transferring other worries, that are nothing to do with us, onto).

If he did leave, he still wouldn't easily be able to advance pothole every day because of work, but I guess he could move closer to it. But part of what he enjoys is having me there, which obviously wouldn't be so. I don't know if he realises how unhappy that element would make him; nor do I think he realises he can actually have both.

We will talk more when he gets back. That might not be till mid or late afternoon though. I have been up for 3hours already and not yet found anything I can focus on for more than a few minutes. It's going to be a very long day.

OP he sounds like an idiot to be honest 😬

Ok OP I think I might know what the issue is. Might be barking up the wrong tree too.
No-one should be coercing you to do something you are uncomfortable with. And it sounds like he is pushing your boundaries beyond what you have said you will accept.
If it's what I think it's a compulsion he has that's probably only going to get stronger. You have to decide if you can live with the extreme end point.
OK
Hope I've got it wrong in some ways

Yeah he's an idiot but he's my idiot and I love him, and I'm an idiot as well!

Quentin - I think you have got wrong end of stick. It's not a sex thing whatsoever, which sounds like where you are going with it.

Oh dear, poor you. Have you got any nice friends who can help distract you today and stop you from just replaying this and all the ifs, ands and buts?

Take care

OP, I don't think it matters what X is. It's clearly a big issue for him. But I also agree with colabottle about the trigger for this abrupt change of heart being likely to be an outside person. That's not to say he has cheated, but maybe he's talked to someone who really is into X, is friendly, and has got him thinking that a big life change is the answer. I'm sorry to say that in my experience, someone who's borne with differences till now but suddenly decides they are now intolerable, has been triggered into it by someone outside the relationship in some way. In which case you need to back off from the talking about it for now, because he's not going to listen straight away. Sorry, it sucks.