This is an essay so apologies in advance’
H comes from a culture where they believe sex before marriage is wrong as the woman should be ‘pure’ as it is her womb that carries the baby (obviously a medieval mindset due to risk of STIs affecting the baby). I found this out a long time after we met. He was brought up in a Muslim country but has always denied being one as his family never practiced it but they have a lot of traditions rooted in it.
He always refused to discuss previous relationships as he said he didn’t want to know but he said he’d never been with anyone for longer than 3 months before he met me but wouldn’t elaborate on how many partners. I found out last night it was 4 before me. I’d had 10 previous partners before him which I was open about from the start. Mainly one night stands (very low self esteem), a few short term relationships and a 3 year one where I’d been engaged but ended it as it fizzled out.
A few weeks before I met H I think my drink had been spiked and I’d been, as I know now, raped by a colleague after a group of us met up for after work drinks. I was very ashamed and embarrassed as this guy was about 30 years older than me (I was 21 and in no way attracted to older men!), married with kids I think, and I couldn’t figure out how I ended up in bed with him as I wasn’t a big drinker at all. I had no knowledge of date rape drugs back then and only realised what must have happened years later as I remembered coming to for a brief period, not knowing why I was in his room and trying to get off the bed while he was standing over me taking off his boxers but I couldn’t as I was completely paralysed, then passing out, and waking up in my room with no knowledge of how I’d got there. I worked in a conference hotel in London and lived in. The colleague was a regional manager of the hotel chain who travelled around checking up on the hotels. We’d only just met as I only been in the job and living in London for about a month and he left the morning after so I never saw him again.
I moved jobs shortly after due to embarrassment as other colleagues knew that I’d slept with him. I realised I had an STI soon after getting with H, assumed I’d got it from colleague as he insisted I didn’t get it from him and we both had to get treated. He was very upset but wanted to stay with me so we carried on and had our 1st DC 3 years into the relationship. Although actually I don’t know if H actually passed it to me instead of me to him and it’s always hung over me as something I ‘did to him’.
Our marriage has always been problematic as his very sexist ideology didn’t become apparent until we had DC and I’d was forced to open my eyes somewhat!
A year ago our oldest adult DC got into her first serious relationship and has been having issues with her boyfriend which she talks about a lot with both of us despite my telling her to not to! My view is that if the relationship is not making her happy then she should get rid. I’m very conscious she’s been aware of the problems in mine and her father’s relationship and I don’t want her to think she has to stay with someone who makes her unhappy especially as she’s not tied to him with DC and before she is! Whereas H thinks she should try to work out her issues (she can be very difficult and combative admittedly) and not jump from relationship to relationship.
There was a discussion last week where DH was saying that if you’ve already been with ‘9 or 10 people’ before you can’t really love someone and take relationships seriously as you should stay with the same person. I knew he was referring to me and challenged him on it afterwards. He then started saying if he’d realised when we met how many people I’d been with before him and known I’d been engaged, he wouldn’t have got with me. He did know! He also started saying that early in our relationship a guy had knocked on my door and on seeing him pretended he’d got the wrong address and he was sure I’d been seeing someone else at the same time as him
. I have no memory of this. Then started implying that I wasn’t raped by this colleague and must have agreed to have sex with him or how did I end up in his room and I only said that due to the STI. I also apparently said that I needed to tell this colleague about the STI so he could get treated and why would I say that if it had been rape. I basically told him he was a cunt and he should fuck off then.
After this he gave me the silent treatment for a week which was very out of character so last night when we got into bed I asked him how long he was going to keep this up for as DC had noticed and he was free to leave if he wanted to but this couldn’t carry on and he was not the victim in this. He then started saying I was nothing but a whore before he met me and I’d deceived him! I was obviously raging, got quite upset and it got quite heated waking up oldest DC who came into our room to find out what was going on. I’m mortified that it got so loud and DC saw me so upset. I told her what he’d said too. She’s disgusted but said she can’t take sides and I don’t expect her to obviously.
It was absolutely horrible and I was quite concerned that he was having some sort of MH crisis. I asked him if he was looking for an excuse to end our marriage and told him he didn’t need one and could just fuck off. I’ve told him to get out as this has brought all our previous issues to the fore and I’ve put up with him projecting his culture, which is not mine, onto me for many years. He won’t go as he says he had nowhere to go. He has family about an hour away. I am NC with my family and have been a SAHM for years as he would never step up to doing equal parenting or household stuff and I had to give up my much better paid job when one of our 4 DC was diagnosed with a disability as I couldn’t manage working, running the home and constantly dealing with meetings, appointments and trouble at school. H’s job was too important for him to ever take time off so I always had to take time off for DC being sick and school events and got sick of it. I also have longstanding MH issues (exacerbated by H and stress of having an SN child) from childhood. I used to think I couldn’t cope on my own because of my MH and SN DC has very challenging behaviour but he’s older now and I know I can (obviously need a job) but H is saying it’s his home and DC too and he won’t leave (children are the father’s ‘property’ in his culture). He also says he’ll never touch me again now he’s realised what I am not that I want him too!
WTAF! There absolutely no coming back from this. I’m absolutely devastated but having to carry on as normal but how can I? I actually came downstairs to sleep last night but decided why should I give up my comfortable bed even though I feel sick sleeping in the same bed as him. We have no spare room. Adult DC can’t afford to move out even though she has a good job. Don’t know where to go from here and DC all at home all day due to holidays so I can’t even process it properly.
I was feeling pretty good before this. Got back into exercising. Time for lots of self care. Felt strong and confident. I can’t believe this is my life at nearly 50!