The back and forth of whether to leave / stay

[Armadillosocks]

It is exhausting - I’ve been in this loop for about 5 years.
I decide to stay. It doesn’t feel final. I decide to leave. It doesn’t feel possible.
I’m paralysed by indecision.

For staying -
Two dc - late primary / early secondary age
It’s safe
Financially it makes sense - we are comfortable
It’s familiar
DH and I get on ok on the surface of it
There’s nothing terribly ‘wrong’ and maybe this is just as it is after 20 years
DH is a good dad - he wasn’t involved for a long time but had a bit of a change about 18 months ago and now is much more involved.
I find it difficult to think of the dc going between two homes
DH would be devastated
The ‘nuclear’ family is easier in lots of ways

For not staying
I’ve never been ‘happy’ from the start
I don’t feel I am myself with DH - I have to be a certain way
It’s all very superficial - I don’t think he knows me and possibly the same is true of me to him
Our sex life is nonexistent and has been for a decade
I’m lonely
I find it hard to get excited about the idea of planning anything with DH. I can if planning things with my friends / just the dc
I feel like I am treading water all the time - as though im waiting for my life to start

Am I just depressed? I’m on antidepressants. I know I should be happy with what I’ve got, why am I not? What is wrong with me? I’m so ungrateful.
I KNOW I should keep the family together the dc have to be central. My marriage is ok. So what is it that is missing? We’ve had counselling before and it hasn’t helped really.
I know he loves me. I know the grass isn’t greener and it would probably be MUCH harder in every single way if we split up.
Why can’t I just accept what I have and it be enough?

Anyone?

Hi Op.
Can I ask why you haven't had sex in a decade?
Have you spoken to him about how you feel?

This is hard op. Hopefully someone who has experienced this will be along to share their story with you soon.

You’re unhappy. You only get one life. You don’t have to be abused to end a marriage. Children thrive better when their parents are happy. Put YOU first. You’re not responsible for your DH’s feelings.

We’ve only had very very rare sex in the last decade because neither of us are that bothered I think.
I don’t know really. I don’t want to have sex with him. He says there are more important things. I don’t want to live like a nun forever though.

OP I know exactly how you feel.

In fact my sister told me last weekend that I can't live my life going round in circles ie should I leave or stay.

I haven't been happy for years and really feel in my gut that something is "off". We've never had a great sex life and I've never had that urge to rip his clothes off, even in the early days.

We just trundle along with our DD. Were due to separate after Christmas but he wanted to try again.

He is making some changes (trying to improve his moods, be more involved with family life) but I cannot shake the feeling that there is more out there for me. That I could meet someone who makes me excited to be with them.

Of course it's a massive risk as said person may never come along. Some of my family have warned that I'm hoping the grass is greener on the other side and they remind me of his good points.

I am early 40's and am so worried I'll never have that happiness you see other couples have. There is zero chemistry between us.

OP I could have written your post, same kids age, no sex for a decade. Except I don't thinking my DP loves me really (I'm mum to him too) and he seems happy to shuffle into old age with the comforting shield of family life whilst I'm imagining a life without him.

I actually had this thought today of my life passing me by and me letting it. But I can't move on until I'm financially independent so uproot the kids as little as possible which will be really hard with house prices as they are (Southern Uk) so its taking a while to get myself in order.

Thing is I wasn't very successful in relationships before so I can't see why that would change so upsetting the kids for what? I'd be happy on my own. And drinking less.

Could you afford to break up OP? Maybe get some advice and dip your toe in the water? How old are you?

OP, ask yourself

Do I want to be feeling like this in 1/5/10 years’ time?
Do I want my children to think this is how a good relationship should be?

Your kids are older primary/ early secondary and your DH only bothered to get more involved in being a parent 18 months ago? Well whoppee do, how big of him.

Sorry, but what you have here isn’t a healthy, evolving, deepening relationship. You don’t have a good marriage!

You’ve not been happy from the start . That’s just so sad. You deserve better, why don’t yo7 fight for it?

I'm in a very similar situation but only have one DC who is pre school age. I kind of think if I decide to leave its now or never because it would in some ways be easier when DS is younger. But then I get sad that I may never be able to give him a sibling and that my life is "comfortable" so I wonder if I'm being ungrateful. I've been with the same person for 15 years (never been with anyone else) and if I'm being honest with myself there have always been niggling feelings. As someone else said in their reply, I've never had that "wanna rip your clothes off" feeling about him. I've always wished I was more attracted to him. He's a good person but seems to have got more boring as he's got older and I don't look forward to spending time with him really. I'm early 30s too which seems too young to feel like this. I worry that if I don't do something now I'll still feel like this in 10 years and won't be able to get that time back.
But leaving seems like such a huge risk and I keep coming back to DS and him having to go between us and it makes me sad. If DH was on the same page as me it would be easier, if we could agree to separate but he's not at all and it would devastate him. I think he's scared too though about the idea.
I'd like us to be able to part amicably as "friends" but I think I'm living in a dream world.

It’s really hard.
Yes - until about 18 months ago he’d had very little involvement. It took quite a lot of threatening to break up before he’d do anything.
He’s much better now but my oldest dc isn’t especially impressed.
In some ways it would have been easier when he wasn’t as involved as Im not sure the dc would have noticed much difference if he’d not been here.
I’m just so sad about it all.

So are you going to split when your DC have left home, or just wither away together unfulfilled into old age & that's it?

I know how you feel.
It’s easier to stay, better financially, but I feel like I’m waiting for some to happen. Never relaxed.
I’ve wondered if it’s peri menopause with me, or if this is really it, but I’m not prepared to take HRT to find out.

I don’t know. It’s all a bit rubbish.
I feel like whatever I do it’ll be wrong.
Currently the dc and DH are ok. I could risk it and we could all be unhappy.

You only get one life
Don’t waste it being unhappy

@Armadillosocks

I don’t know. It’s all a bit rubbish. I feel like whatever I do it’ll be wrong. Currently the dc and DH are ok. I could risk it and we could all be unhappy.

What would you do differently if you were separated? Sometimes it's hard to think long term. The initial separation would be really hard but eventually things would settle down. I sometimes struggle to think like that. The thing I always come back to is my DS which suggests to me those feelings just aren't there for DH anymore. I read Too Good to Leave, Too Bad to Stay and in that it says you have to think of your relationship separately to any children. Easier said that done though!

You do sound really unhappy - do your children pick up on that?

It does give you an ego boost to know that someone else desires you - hopefully a DH/DP in life. You've not had that feeling for a decade, so no wonder you are feeling low. It's highly unusual for a man to lose his libido too when young. What was it like when you got together? If you didn't light fires from the start with each other, there's your answer, you may well have just been convenient to each other from the start, which is why things just carry on out of convenience now.

I don’t feel I am myself with DH - I have to be a certain way
It’s all very superficial - I don’t think he knows me and possibly the same is true of me to him
Our sex life is nonexistent and has been for a decade
I’m lonely

If you think that perhaps you don't really know him, how do you know that you have to be a certain way? It sounds as if you two never really got to know each other. How about starting to be yourself, OP? If you did that, what do you think would happen? Would that make life any better?

Armadillo

In your case I would seek legal advice and from there start divorce proceedings. You're on anti depressants and still feel pretty much awful. Better to be apart than to be together and miserable as you are now.

Staying for the sake of the children (or it could be argued staying for your own sake because its somehow "easier" which is really not as you are seeing) rarely if ever works out at all well for all parties involved. Your children know that you're unhappy and even worse could even blame their own selves for their parents marital troubles.

What do you want to teach them about relationships and what are they learning here from you two?. What are you both modelling to your children?. You would not want this sort of marriage for them as adults but you're showing them currently that a happy relationship and or marriage is not their birthright either. Divorce is not failure here Armadillo, living like this is.

And your reasons for staying do not stand up to scrutiny either. Why are these types of lazy arsed men always good dads - women in poor relationships often write this when they can think of nothing else positive to write about their man. He was not overtly involved re parenting these children for years and your eldest child certainly knows this.

I can relate. Am late 40s with late primary/ early secondary kids. H seems happy to trundle along but I feel numb most of the time. It’s just not as it was. There was addiction and emotional abuse in the past… he dealt with it to a large extent but it’s like it killed the relationship and I can’t get my feelings back. We had genuine love … but I’m just coasting now. Was also wondering was peri menopause behind some of the flat / numb mood

I wonder if some of it is the pandemic too.
I always had a full life but a lot of my friends have drifted and I don’t see them as much.

@Armadillosocks

I wonder if some of it is the pandemic too. I always had a full life but a lot of my friends have drifted and I don’t see them as much.

Yeah the pandemic has definitely changed things for me too. It feels a bit like nothing is the same anymore. I think lockdown made a lot of people scrutinise their lives and relationships a bit because there was no outlet anymore.

I can relate. Am late 40s with late primary/ early secondary kids. H seems happy to trundle along but I feel numb most of the time. It’s just not as it was. There was addiction and emotional abuse in the past… he dealt with it to a large extent but it’s like it killed the relationship and I can’t get my feelings back. We had genuine love … but I’m just coasting now. Was also wondering was peri menopause behind some of the flat / numb mood

Yes, I could have written much of this post and I've done the weighing up you've done too op.

But added to all this, I now believe I have attachment issues following an abusive/neglectful upbringing (I'm most likely an anxious fearful avoidant). Until I tackle this a bit more I think I find the prospect of leaving very difficult (there is at least some stability in what I know and the idea of forming new relationships is not a particularly comfortable feeling).

I suppose the only way I've got any sort of peace is to look at making myself a bit happier - being more at peace with myself and developing interests. I hope in time I will have a larger social circle/more interests and will find greater peace with being on my own (I can really relate to the lonely feeling described by op and others).

You've already tried, for 20 bloody YEARS, and yet you are NOT HAPPY.

How many years are you prepared to throw down the same blood sucking drain, just so that your DC and your H are 'hopefully/maybe' just OK ?

You said yourself that you weren't ever really happy, even at the beginning.

Your DC barely even knew they HAD a bloody father until you threatened to LEAVE !

You site the 'disruption' you separating 'might' cause your DC and H, but you say ZERO about YOUR happiness, YOUR life, YOUR dreams etc !

You've been flogging a dead horse since the bloody beginning hon !

You just need to 'bite the bullet' and stop living this cruel charade !

Do you really want your DC to suffer from copying your 'marriage' in the future ?
Or would you rather show them that you only get ONE life, so you'd better damn well LIVE IT and not simply exist to serve someone else !

It doesn't matter whether leaving causes disruption or makes others a little less OK for a while, it matters that you give your kids a role model to aspire to, and not one that causes misery and depression.

It matters that you actually try to find a way to live a life with laughter and happiness, a life with possibilities and potential, rather than be too scared to ever even try !

People in healthy relationships don't ask this question, so, leave.

Why arent you yourself? Would you be like that with any partner or just him?

Making a decision is the hard part.

When I diet, I like that after dinner I just know that I dont have dessert. I dont spend all evening hinking about dessert and rationalising that maybe i could just have a tiny bit. And then caving at 10pm and having some anyway meaning the last few hours were a waste of time.

Think about it. 5 years ago you didn't decide. Decide now, in or out, and take the mental load off. Everything else will fall into place but dont use that as a reason not to make a decision.