Told my DH I want to separate and now what....

[loveyourself2020]

I just recently started a thread where I said I wanted to separate from my DH and as it usually happens in life only few days later something happened, and I “had” to tell him.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/relationships/4226381-Sorry-I-just-have-to-offload

It has only been a few days and I already feel like I am losing my mind. Obviously, he is very hurt and upset and does not talk to me or the kids. We still sleep in the same bed but neither one of us can really sleep as we are both tossing and turning. As you can see from my original post a lot has happened to us, him especially, and this was not a perfect timing for such a decision, but when asked directly I felt I could not lie and say that everything is ok, so I said I wanted to separate, but stay together a little longer until we are back on our feet.
Now I wonder how I can survive this. It is torture. I literally feel sick, my body and my soul are sick and it hurts to see him so upset too.

Listen up, you have not done it to him, he has done it to him. It’s so hard when you are an empathetic and loving person to think that you are causing a loved one pain. He is not going to do you the same courtesy. You have mentioned in the past to him that you have been unhappy, but he has chosen not to alter his behaviour.

I finally had a good night sleep last night. Slept on the floor in the same room but felt so much better.

That's great news. One foot in front of the other.

My DH just texted me that he may be able to move out on Jul 15. Immediately I texted him, no, you do not have to go yet, until you are back on your feet. Bloody hell, guilt is killing me.

OP,
Please help yourself.

Lying to him is not helping anyone, least of all your children.

Help yourself by being honest.

Let him move out asap.

@billy1966
Thank you so much for your post. I know, of course, that the sooner he moves out the better it is for all of us, but the default is always, no, lets wait a little longer. It is really sad, but that is what it is. Let's just hope that he is wiser then me and that he will stick to his plan, bc to tell you the truth we are both just miserable right now.

@loveyourself2020 you have a way out now! With a definite end in sight! I’m sure it won’t be easy but you know it’s the right thing. Have you told DC yet?

@Yellowswan
Thank you for your support. Last night I asked him again if he is sure he wants to move out, will he manage and he said yes. But then he comes back and says: "Just for the record I do not want to move out nor do I want to separate it is all you. I think that you made a rash decision and that you did not do much to try and salvage this marriage. What are you going to tell the kids? I am not going to say that I agree with this”. I felt frozen. He is right, I was thinking, we did not do much to solve the problems. We did not yell and scream and fight, tried and failed. We lived 25 (actually 26 that we have been together) years together, somehow managing without really talking and solving anything. I also have no idea how we did it. Perhaps I should have tried harder to fight for our marriage, but you know what I was thinking, while he was talking and I felt really bad about everything, I was thinking in my head:” Perhaps I am a bad guy and this is all my fault, but I do not want to be with him anymore. I just do not want to.” Still feel bad, guilty and horrible. Still have to face the kids and the friends and the whole world. I hope I survive this. I feel that I am losing my mind.

No, we have not tell the kids yet.

OP,

You have had 25 years of this domineering, disrespectful man whom you have shared an unhappy, stressful marriage with.

You are now done.

He is doing what a lot of nasty pricks do when their emotional punching bag decides they don't want to be around them, rewrite history.

Let him talk whatever shite he wants.
How convenient for him.

Stop talking on board what he is saying and considering that it may be true.

25 years of being silent, ignored and disrespected has hollowed out your self belief.

He is a nasty, self serving, arrogant prick.

You are done.

Answer him the next time with the truth.
He has behaved badly for years and you are done.

Tell the children that you have been very unhappy for years and no longer want to be married to their father.

He will say I don't want this, this is all your mother's idea.

Answer YES it is. I don't want to be married to you any longer.

Own it OP.

Tell him a big YES. I AM DONE.

He is such a bully he thinks if he blames you, you will be afraid to go through with it.

Who cares what self serving bullshit he tells himself...once you get him out of the house.

Own your decision.
Your children will cope.

25 years of this misery with him is enough.

@billy1966
Yes, you are right, he is trying to bully me into not doing it. The first moment when he said it, I thought to myself, it is, it is my fault. But later on when I unfroze I realized what a load of BS that is. No it is not my fault that this is happening, it is yours. See he will never take any responsibility for anything. He never once said, I am sorry this is happening, I am sorry that you feel this way, never said, I know this is my fault or I know this is partially my fault. No, no fault of his, it is all me.

But I though to myself, it is your fault, but YES, I want it, i want out of this marriage because you make me miserable. It will be difficult to tell the kids especially because I know he will not help me at all, and I have no idea how they will react, but one thing is for sure, they know who he is and how he makes me feel. They see it and they feel it.

Good.

The children will take your lead from your expression, body language, head tilt, eye contact.

Hold yourself up straight and strong.
Look directly at them calmly, in the eye, passive but assured.

Let them see that their mother is calm, confident, strong, firm and resolute in her decision and in her plans going forward.

Let them see your confidence in owning that Yes kids, our marriage is over but I am going to be so fine, you are going to be so fine, we are going to be SOOOOO fine.

Life will continue and we will thrive.

They will take enormous comfort from your show of calm strength.
That will be all they need for now.

That truly is the best thing you can do for them and yourself.

Fake it till you make it.

Show them you are done and you are owning it.

Stay strong @loveyourself2020 I'm with you trying to do the same.

Thankfully my kids are grown but somehow that doesn't help.

Anyhow hope you are doing well and sleeping better on your mattress. Sending hugs

You don’t have to fight for your marriage. You are perfectly entitled to want to end your marriage because you’re miserable. He doesn’t want to end the marriage presumably because it works ok for him, and he’s blaming you for not fighting for it, rather than telling you there are things he is willing to change to make you happy. He isn’t fighting for your marriage either. He’s trying to delegate that job to you.

@Mumof3dogs
Thank you, yes, I am following your thread. It feels good to know that I am not alone in this. This is all very hard for me. I am by nature compassionate and a bit of an empath, so I am suffering for me and for DH. I cannot help it but empathize with him.

He is definitely not helping. I did not really give him a chance to fix this, as I just said that I want out of the marriage, but still you would think that he should try. Not a peep. Barely speaks with me, as per usual and this is driving me nuts. Yes, I wish kids did not live with us and I did not "have to" tell them right not, but we do. I feel that this will liberate me. I have so much anxiety, I feel like I will get stomach ulcer or something.

@Babyiskickingmyribs
He’s trying to delegate that job to you.

Exactly. He really has not done anything in the last year or years, to make our marriage better, you are right he thinks it is my job because I am the one who is not happy.. OMG he twists things so much that I can barely make any sense of it. Do you know that most of our life together it was like this. He would say something that would twist things, possible something I said, so much that I would not even know how to reply. I know it is BS but it is so nonsensical that I cannot even explain it. I am sorry, I probably do not make sense. Like this, I told him I want out of our marriage because he makes me miserable, but his conclusion is that it is all my fault. Wtf!! He would say to me, "you always complain, and I never do". Well, you do not complain b/c you do not have reason to and I "always" complain b/c you NEVER change. aaaahh... OMG my brain hurts.

@billy1966

OP,

You have had 25 years of this domineering, disrespectful man whom you have shared an unhappy, stressful marriage with.

You are now done.

He is doing what a lot of nasty pricks do when their emotional punching bag decides they don't want to be around them, rewrite history.

Let him talk whatever shite he wants.
How convenient for him.

Stop talking on board what he is saying and considering that it may be true.

25 years of being silent, ignored and disrespected has hollowed out your self belief.

He is a nasty, self serving, arrogant prick.

You are done.

Answer him the next time with the truth.
He has behaved badly for years and you are done.

Tell the children that you have been very unhappy for years and no longer want to be married to their father.

He will say I don't want this, this is all your mother's idea.

Answer YES it is. I don't want to be married to you any longer.

Own it OP.

Tell him a big YES. I AM DONE.

He is such a bully he thinks if he blames you, you will be afraid to go through with it.

Who cares what self serving bullshit he tells himself...once you get him out of the house.

Own your decision.
Your children will cope.

25 years of this misery with him is enough.

This in spades. My ex tried this, telling his 4 year old "Mummy wants me to leave". Bloody right I do - I hate you and I want you gone. It's just as well I am not party to what he has told other people about why we divorced because I think I would claw his eyes out.

@loveyourself2020 how are you doing ? Has he moved out yet?

@Mumof3dogs
Thank you so much for checking up on me. No, he is still here. I know I told him he can stay until he is back on his feet and I thought it is really early when he said he may move out in July, but now, only two weeks later, I am really struggling. This is killing me. Him being still here, me sleeping in the same room on the floor. Have not yet told the kids.

Things are confusing. While at the same time I feel terribly guilty for initiating this, and grateful to him that he did not make a scene, I am also a little disappointed that he did not even try. The other day we started talking about separation agreement and he said, he would leave me "95% of everything we acquired together, and he will only take a few possession", which is ridiculous because all we have is ran down furniture, in an old house that we are renting, but he never mentioned being separated from the kids or our dog.

But he did say, lets divide our joint accounts and "keep" our personal accounts, which shocked me, because I know that he has some money in stocks as well as severance pay he got last year from his job. Did he think I would let it go? I know that for him money is most important but was he really going to cheat me out of my part of his savings?

I am just so sad, these days. I wish I can be happy for getting my self free from his control but so far, I am stressed, sad and i a very bad place. Perhaps it is going to be easier when he leaves.

@Mumof3dogs
How are you doing? Thinking of you.

OP,

He is consistent in his behaviour.

A selfish pig looking out for himself.

Leave you the chil4and take his savings🙄.

What a selfish prick.

I really hope you wake up soon and find your anger.

How little respect he has for you that he would actually think you would agree to this.

The only thing you two have in common is that you are both putting him first🙄.

Please wake up and protect yourself.

July is months away.

You will be a shell of yourself by then.

If you can't do it for yourself, do it for your children.

Get him out and get a solicitor.

@billy1966
I wish I were as strong as you are, but I am not. I was angry for so long, but as soon as I told my DH that I want to end our marriage the anger left me and guilt (my therapist says it is actually shame) overtook me and I cannot shake it off. I feel guilty for leaving him at the difficult time in his life and I think that he may be using it against me.

I told him that by law we are supposed to divide our assets equally, but of course, I have to give him spousal support since he is currently earning 1/3 of what I am. This can either be monthly or we can agree that he can keep a bigger portion of the money that we have but first we need to know how much that is.

He made a big fuss about me “wanting to take “his” saved up money and stocks”. He says, what kind of a person am I that I am dumping him like this in this difficult time and wanting to take “his” money too.
Like I said I feel guilty, I am also tired and worn off, really, plus one of the reasons I decided to leave him is this, my inability to fight my battles with him. It was always like this, I could never get my point across, it was exhausting. I wish I can hire a lawyer to do all this for me, but I am afraid that the little savings we have is not enough. Also, I do not want to make this into a war, I want us to separate as peacefully as possible.

He is not a good man.

Please get a solicitor to support you.

Do not agree to his demands.

I know you are tired but when he is out of the house, the peace will restore you.

Hi OP. Just wanted to say how brave you've been so far and that if you cave now then you'll regret. Keep going. Mid July isn't too far away. He's playing on your vulnerability and kindness as he's knows how to play you after all these years. Stick with it. As they say you're stronger than you think. I hope there's a friend in RL you can confide it as that would help you sort your head out and hopefully stop you doubting yourself. Although you'll always have support from so many of the lovely people on Mn of course. 💐

Just Re-read your original thread that you've confided in your sister. Sorry missed that before. Keep talking to her. You're not going mad you're stressed I think, understandibly. I don't understand why the therapist said shame. You have nothing to be ashamed about, you're just getting your life back. Wish I was as brave as you.