Is he having a mid-life crisis or some kind of breakdown?

[sausagelegs101]

I just want to connect with others and get some other views as I'm so upset about what has just happened with my partner of 7 years.

Our relationship has been really good, great friends and really attracted to each other, able to talk about everything, able to give each other space and trusted each other. I thought we had it great. I've got so many amazing memories with him.

Well I am devastated because I have just been off work recovering from surgery for a few months, pretty rough going.

Getting through it though and recovered really well. Into the third month of me recovering he starts to act a bit off, not sitting close to me, looking really excited when he gets a text (the way you do when you're flirting maybe) Not paying much attention to me and always on his phone.

Well I didn't think too much of it at first, I thought he was going out and letting his hair down as it been stressful few months and he deserved some fun. I think it must have set something off because I started having nightmares that he was with other women. Thought it was odd.

Then he started dressing differently, not sure how to explain, bit younger than his years? He's not one to buy new clothes much and he started buying new clothes every few days.
Asking how he looked. I thought ok, nice that he's treating himself. He then starts going out drinking a lot even when he has work at 6am and not telling me where he is.

One day this all came to a head when I was talking to him about a hospital appointment and he couldn't keep off his phone and smiling at whatever was on there, not answering me so I got angry and said stop pushing me away and he exploded and said 'I'm leaving, I've had enough of being with you, I'm finding a house share.'

I was really upset and we had a really horrible few weeks where he was out all day and all night and blowing hot and cold with me and changing his mind.

I feel like in the space of a couple of weeks he has turned into a different person completely. He started going out with 20 year olds from work drinking, dressing differently, and now I find out that it was because of some teenager he met.

He said 'she turned his head' and he wants to 'try it out' with her. He's moving into a shared house up the road and is starting a relationship with her (she lives with her parents!) he says he doesn't even know if it will last but he wants to try it out.

I'm so bloody confused, I feel like in a matter of weeks he's completely changed. I keep wondering if he's having some kind of meltdown? He's throwing 7 years and a home and financial security away for what? 'to test out a teenage life'?!

I've tried to reason with him and ask if it was anything to do with me being not able to be there for him the last few months. I told him what he meant to me and that he can talk to me about anything he's worried about.

I asked him what kind of girl he thinks he's getting involved with that won't wait for a clean break and messes about with an engaged man of 38? (Not just blaming her, I did say he was just as bad)

Pretty much just the same answers every time 'I like talking to her' I like being with her more than you' and stuff like that, he says he only has 'familiarity' with me. But everything was fin a few weeks ago?

He's booked holidays and trips with me just a month ago? He hasn't even told anyone what he's doing, friends family etc to get anyone elses' perspective.

Anyone been through anything similar with any thoughts or advice as to what is going on?

sausagelegs101, I find knowing others who going or went through the same helped me, I know I was not alone and there is light at the end of the tunnel. I don't even know how to ease the pain because I still feel pain but a lot less over time so time does heal.

The way I personally cope, definitely not for everyone, is looking for a new start. I wanted to move on and forget about him asap. I could date a guy I met at that time, he was lovely but decided to work on old relationship, it is also at that point he knew there is no return and he panicked.

Please look after yourself, drinking too much probably make things worst long term. I havent been able find self help forums for this kind but I think posting help for some. Feel free to vent if make you feel better. I will be watching.

Really still struggling with the shock of this. I'm having counselling now and they keep saying 'get angry.' How can I just switch my feelings at will? I feel really empty and sad all the time trying to overwrite all these dreams I had with him.

Look back. No way it was as fabulous as you seem to be remembering. Look back and see all those red flags. They are there.

Try stand back and look at the whole situation instead of how you feel. Look at your first post again and again. Quite clearly he has been an arsehole and he will treat someone else the same, I really think you have a lucky escape! You are young, new life can still be build. The sooner you get up, the sooner you feel happy again. Wish you all the strength.

Cmon, he's knocking on 40 and chasing teenagers, living in a house share, doing the same job as a 19 year old, he's lied and cheated on you, he's out drinking and Hanging about with teenagers. It's all a bit sad.

Is that really what you want in a partner, this ageing lothario, doing the same job as a teenager, dressing like one, trying to have sex with one?

I'm sure if you think about it, you will think no it's not what you want. I'm also going to assume the teenager will also think it's very sad very shortly, when the novelty wears off.

One of my daughters friends got together with a guy this age, started trying to hang out with them, they were all creeped out by it. He just didn't fit in. 19/20year olds tend not to want some forty year old bloke hanging out with them and trying to act cool.

Honestly you're better off out of it. He's going to be a very lonely old man as he spend his days chasing teenage girls.

Slowly the balance tips the more one does for oneself (I have been finding as in vaguely similar position)
So new haircut, new make up, personal styling session etc etc all help
Slowly slowly the dreams are written over by doing other stuff for yourself

What Hiphop said x1000. So very true. Start living your own life. Reinvent yourself. See how it fits. Reinvent again.

Cheers for the kind words and the advice. Getting a bit better, changing decor at home and eating better. Thinking about myself and how to rebuild life as I cannot change or control anything . Today I thought, I don't deserve all this, I'm looking out for myself now.

Sounds good, great to hear

@Bluntness you made me laugh a bit there.

He is a perv. He's old enough to be her dad. Hope you recover well from your surgery and can move on from the twat xx

Cheers @Rozzz I am getting better, nearly fully recovered now. :) Thanks

I think if you step back you will see it is actually laughable. He is turning into a right saddo. Move on. He can don his teenage clothes, make peace signs, say everything is sick, do his teenage job, chase his teenage co worker, and livein his shitty student homeshare. Happy days.

On his fortieth he will be wondering where it all went wrong. Whilst you'll have moved on, and be enjoying life again.

@Sausagelegs101 just wanted to add to the messages of "been there and got the T-Shirt" albeit the genders were reversed. I can totally relate to the sense of "WTF just happened??!" One moment we were laughing and joking and enjoying life. She wrote on Facebook I was the love of her life and how lucky she was to have me. In many ways I wish she hadn't. In retrospect it all felt a bit much even then. Then suddenly, in the space of about a month, all the same symptoms. She met the OM on the school run and that was that. Again, I don't think she even really cared if it lasted or not. She just wanted to behave like a teenager again.

But, like you, I'm slowly coming to realise the catalyst wasn't him per se (as much as she might wish to protest it was) but more a stressful situation we went through prior to this. My response was to roll my sleeves up and deal with it. Hers was... well, guess.

I think an earlier poster had it right. Some people - whether it's 'cos they're naive, lacking life experience or else self-centred - find it easier to run away - either literally or mentally to a fantasy land - when times get tough. When you (I think) said "that's how I would have behaved when I was a teenager" I think you've hit the nail on the head. Some people never evolve from that. Maybe because they never had to. When things get difficult they run. It's a form of self-medication and they compartmentalise the damage away.

I'm reading a book about infidelities by Kate Figes at the moment, and she cites statistics that affairs often happen after birth of children and a partner's illness. Some people are quite weak and cannot cope with difficulties in life, so try to escape by cheating. Sounds, sadly, like your situation. Don't let him back. At 34 you are young and will be happy again. My marriage broke down when I was your age but 8 years later I', happier than I ever was. You'll just have to live through it, and this bad experience will give you warning signs in the new men you'll meet as to what to avoid.

Few weeks later, finding this really crap. Feel sick all the time. Don't know what the best thing to do is. Move away? He moved a road away. The teenage girl he left me for has started plastering pictures of them on facebook putting things like 'this has been a thing for a while' and all her teenage friends are loving it. It's all so humiliating. I feel so down. I know I shouldn't look at anything like that.

Don't even know what I'm asking for posting back, I just feel really alone and hurt and I keep making steps to move forward and then wanting to hide and cry all day.

It's going to take time for you to get over it OP. It's only been a short time. For a start, get off social media and block him. Don't fantasize about things going back to how they were. Start to work out how to make a better life without him.

Yeah I don't know why I keep looking at it, it bloody hurts and all their work colleagues are commenting and liking it too. They all knew I was at home recovering from major surgery. It's so bloody humiliating.

I feel like he gets some shiny new life and doesn't appear to have a care in the world and I'm still hobbling about having physio etc, in pain and having to sort out all sorts about where to live and family member is dying. I feel so overwhelmed.

7 years is a long engagement, it doesn't speak of a real committed plan re a future together. You're both 30+.after all.

A man who cares about you doesn't pull this shit whilst you're down recovering from surgery.anyway.

He's throwing 7 years and a home and financial security away for what? 'to test out a teenage life'?!

^ Those things aren't enough to hold a person who wants out of the relationship and to move onto pastures new. If they were, there wouldn't be so many relationship breakdowns.

He'll probably be back. A 19 year old will soon enough get bored of him, without the thrill of illicit messages and sex. Unless he's absolutely loaded, in which case maybe he'll keep her whilst she eventually sneaks around behind his back with boys her own age.

Is he going to meet her parents and family, go partying with her?🙄

The problem is if/when he comes back, he'll do this to you again.

There are other men out there who won't be as unkind. You're only 34, do whatever it takes to learn to live without this silly guy, then go out and live your life

Yeah deep down I know all that, just finding it hard to accept, suppose it's still early days and just have to work through it. Just feel so humiliated.

Thank you

I wish I could change the title of this thread as I feel so stupid now thinking it was a breakdown.

Sausage101 you're not stupid at all - but he is very, very stupid. Besotted with a teenager. Good luck to him competing with the men of her age that will be in her eyeline - young, fit and vital.

You'll get over him in time, you just have to go thru the fire first unfortunately, as horrible as it is Time is a great healer is a cliché, but true.

He's of no use to you. Fickle = you can't depend on him to have sense and be there in a crisis etc so what can you do but move on really. Even if he returned, how stable would you feel with him? He's been unkind to you. Time to look out for yourself now.

As said you're only 34..make a life for yourself it's never all about men. At least you're not the fool here.

Thanks @MistressDeeCee yeah not bothered about being alone, a bit worried about trusting people again in the future.

Just want to press fast forward at the moment, hate going out in case I see them and stuff like that.

Thanks for the advide and kind words. :)