Can’t forgive H for the baby years.

[MountainSun]

H abandoned me big time during the baby years. No other word for it. He’s a workaholic, I’d moved to another country to be with him so I was completely alone. No friends or family, just my overbearing and bullying in-laws.
I had 3 under 3 (one set twins). It was awful. I barely slept for 5 years, I never had a moment alone, I was bullied by his family, I was basically completely on the edge, then found out he’d been having an affair and I ended up having a nervous breakdown.
At this point, he seemed to realise things were not ok. I had told him repeatedly before this point.
He hired a nanny, confronted his family and ended up cutting ties with all but one of them, and promised to be around more. He said it was an emotional affair only - I don’t believe this, they had texted saying they loved each other and he’d been on multiple work trips with her in the same hotel. I’m not thick. I suppose there’s a chance he’s telling the truth….but not a big one.

This was all 4 years ago. Things are better now - he’s tried very hard to make things right, fully accepted blame for what he put me through, and is kind and attentive.

But I just can’t forgive him. It was all bad but the affair was the proverbial straw. And the whole thing just broke me. I used to be the happiest, most cheerful and positive person you’d meet. Now I’m bitter, miserable, full of resentment and constantly tired.

Had a massive row today because he was complaining about me buying a new bike for one of the kids. I’d bought myself one last month so I can go cycling with them, and at the time he said how nice an idea it was. But since then it’s been constant comments about the cost of the bike. And I just think to myself, after all the fucking shit I went through, and you’re earning £100k a year with no mortgage mainly due to having a fucking drudge at home raising your kids and running all your life admin whilst you gaily built your stupid business up (which I’ve also helped lots with), if I want a nice bike then I’ll fucking have a nice bike.

Instead, I’ve taken a loan out today to pay him back for the bike because I can do without being reminded of the cost of the bike several times a week. He’s predictably said ‘oh no I don’t want your money keep it’ but he’ll bloody have it and much good I hope it does him.

I know I could leave him but we have a nice house here and the kids are happy. He works away most weeks so I muddle along ok. If I leave then we’d be in a much worse house and away from the kids school and friends. It’s never that easy in real life.

But there. Most likely no one will read this but I don’t half feel better for getting it off my chest.

My advice is, live like you are single but within your marriage for now with a goal to escape when timing is right. He's away all week so there's that at least. continue with your education, try to seek out social opportunities on weekend etc when he can take care of kids, squirrel away what money you can. Start looking at rentals you won't actually move into but look at the costs and start to make a plan. Work out in a divorce what you'd be entitled to from him and what if anything you'd get benefits wise. Work out what your income would need to be to live reasonably comfortably and aim for that. Meantime, use the family money for the things you need and just block out the whining. Remove yourself from the situation or just say yes darling and move on. Fake it til ya make it.

Even having a plan and plotting in the background may give you some hope. Imagine the life you want, it will help you focus on getting there. And if you're depressed, get medication and seek counselling. Use additional help at home (cleaner, nanny etc) to free up time for thinking, education, work, socialising.

You get one life - decide how you want to live it.
You are your children's mother - decide what kind of example you want to set them (especially, but not only, your girls) and how you want them to remember you when they think of their childhoods.

Taking out the loan to pay the bike off is cutting off your nose to spite your face. It's not going to do you a lick of good or make your husband respect you. In fact, it will do the opposite because it will show your husband that if he pushes you down, you'll grab a shovel and start digging yourself a deeper hole to lie in.

Pay the loan back. Sit your husband down and tell him that his sniping at you about a bike you believe the family can perfectly well afford triggers all the old feelings of being undervalued and financially vulnerable that came up during the previous major emotional ruptures in your marriage.

It seems like attempts to fix the marriage, he still doesn't see and value you as a true partner. If he has a genuine concern about the cost of the bike, he needs to speak to you about it clearly, sensibly and with respect. If there is a genuine reason the cost of the bike is a problem, you will listen to his reasons respectfully. But sniping is contemptuous and not acceptable.

You are raising his children, you care for the home he lives in and you contribute to his business. In return he has treated you contemptuously in the past. You won't stand for a return to that kind of treatment.

Respect must be maintained consistently if love is to flourish. He has made a big effort in the past, so it seems like he wants the marriage to work. But this recent incident must be addressed seriously.

Did you have a rough experience with the birth/any troubles there OP? Your description sounds like he withdrew when things were bad because he may well have been scared. What was his mental health like at that time? Are things different?

You're looking after the kids, you've clearly navigated the family through a bad time, you say he has recognised it and has tried to make it different. Theres too many that leap to LTB.

Have either of you sought help? Have you spoke about it properly together and the effect on you? What has he said? Have you both had some form of Relate type discussion?

Good luck

@Salmakia

Your only options aren't leave or put up with this.

In terrible relationships, in abusive relationships, in just plain substandard relationships we leave when we can. If right now you can't leave that's ok. You leave when you can and if you don't reach that point then you stay.

So if you stay how do you build a life you don't want to run away from but feel you can't? How do you become a fun mum? How do you stop him making snide comments (cost of a bike this week but it will always be something) or if you can't stop that from him how do you build the resilience to allow that stuff to go in one ear and out the other?

Could you have therapy? Not couples therapy but just for you. To work on self love, resilience, healing from the trauma of those baby years and his affair.

Could you join a choir? A gym? A book club? A feminist consciousness raising group (not kidding)?

Where can you build the connections that will sustain you till your children leave home? How will you become the you that you would've been already if those years of trauma and let's be honest humiliation didn't interrupt and set you back?

There are answers and you will find them. You have to choose the life you want. If you choose to stay then choose every day to make staying work for you. Choose to love you. Choose to build you.

You've started that with your return to education. Just keep going. And bloody rinse the bastard for any money you need. It's family money. You're his wife. You sodding well earned it.

Thank you for this.

Thank you so, so much for all the thoughtful and constructive posts. I’ve read every word and I am so grateful not to just see LTB. I genuinely don’t believe it would improve my happiness, just exchange one set of problems for another which would be further out of my control.

He’s not abusive. I have full access to the money as well as my own account. He’s tight but that’s it really. It just really fucking grates on me when I think of the totally disproportionate contribution I have made.

Good example whilst I’m getting it off my chest. Last week I said I’d decided to look into getting a cleaner for a couple of hours once a fortnight. To do the extra jobs, not daily stuff - cleaning out the fridge, washing the inside windows, etc etc. with 3 young kids, a full time uni course and full time hospital shifts on placement, it’s easy to fall behind and I like to try and keep the place clean.
He was appalled at this extravagance, said give me a list and I’ll do it (he would too, but he won’t have time so he won’t) and just kept shaking his head at me saying ‘you’re nuts. A cleaner? A CLEANER!?’ then shaking his head and walking off. Like I’d proposed employing a team of people to comb my hair 3 times a day or something.

And I think yes, a fucking cleaner. I’ll get the cleaner too. I’m not afraid of him. It’s just low level shit that wears me down. And I don’t want him to think badly of me or that I’m lazy etc. Why? Why do I care what he thinks??

Sorry I’m just getting it all off my chest now.

Well of course you care what he thinks, he's your husband and you live with him, it affects you.

This walking off business isn't OK. Do you talk budgets in detail?

I really do think some couples or individual therapy would be a hugely beneficial investment...

Absolutely get therapy and absolutely get a cleaner and leave him with the drudgery to do or not do whilst you have a great time with the DC. Every weekend give him a very long list of jobs that need doing whilst you have the DC or study or even work.

Work on emotionally detaching from him and believe me you will no longer care what he thinks.

I can't see how more therapy would work. He is like this and has ample opportunity to change.

In your shoes I would continue to make as much of a life for myself as I could and get as qualified as I could. I would then plan to leave as soon as the DC are old enough to get it and be less prone to the full force of the toxic inlaws.

Quite how the marriage would look though is another thing. I would never be able to have sex or even want to cook and care for someone like him. He puts in just as much as is needed. I get that you say he goes above and beyond but the old stuff is still there not far below the surface and it bubbles up now and again so there is clearly resentment from him too.

It's dead in the water as far as I can see but maybe hang on until the time is right to go?

Thing is, 99% of the time nowadays he is lovely. Seems to genuinely love and care for me etc. Appreciates me. Blah blah.

Well he doesn't if he's capable of treating you like that. Sounds like a miserable existence.

I think it's sometimes the 1% behaviour that shines a light on reality.

He isnt generous to you despite using you like q slave and cheating on you, qnd 99% of the time daily life rumbles qlong but sometimes he does something that reveals what he thinks of you.
Bring reasonably easy-going in a life with no money problems doesn't bring that in to sharp focus the way his reaction to you wanting a bike did.

I was meaning individual therapy.

For someone isolated, been through trauma and living with someone who thinks so little of here it keeps on sane and strong.

Similar stories except I wasn't married (or living in another country) but the basics the same.
He eventually left me for someone else. Wise up x x x

I'm so sorry OP.

What he put you through isn't fair. And it isn't 'over' if you are still living with the impact it had on you.

I went through something similar with my DH (minus the affair), but him being emotionally absent and throwing me to the wolves (his abusive family) resulting in terrible PNA and a PTSD diagnosis.

We got through it but recently I decided I wanted to apply for another graduate degree and he was really negative about it and the time and energy it would take away from the family. It all came back. I couldn't fucking believe after all he put me through that he was begrudging me something for myself.

I had a lot of unresolved anger. It needs to be addressed or it will always come up.

Equally it's not fair for DH to never have an opinion on anything because he 'owes you'. Thats not healthy either.

Your anger is rightful. But it's not about the bike.

I see a psychologist and she helped me see it as two separate issues.

1. I was depleted and I needed to do things to build myself back up. My time, my health, my self esteem, my emotional world. I can do all of that without DH.

2. the relationship and the damage that was done. That takes time and work with DH.

But 1) comes before 2).

It's not hopeless, people come back from this stuff. But it takes time and anger/grief/ trauma isn't linear. It will come up and down over time.

How do you access money?

I put off divorcing my useless twat of a DH because low self esteem/lifestyle/couldn’t bear the idea of them having to be with him without me around to look after them.

The big mistake I made was to end up with so little respect for him that I had an affair. This was the worst possible thing - I should have had the guts and the honesty to split up with him. He took me back, and I had to be grateful and contrite etc. Can you imagine?

So if you do stay, and I can understand why you would, then don’t fall into the arms of the first nice human who shows you respect and love.

And if you do go, it will be very messy for a while but then suddenly it will be fantastic. FWIW both XDH and I are happily remarried and the children are now fully functioning independent happy adults.

@Salmakia

Your only options aren't leave or put up with this.

In terrible relationships, in abusive relationships, in just plain substandard relationships we leave when we can. If right now you can't leave that's ok. You leave when you can and if you don't reach that point then you stay.

So if you stay how do you build a life you don't want to run away from but feel you can't? How do you become a fun mum? How do you stop him making snide comments (cost of a bike this week but it will always be something) or if you can't stop that from him how do you build the resilience to allow that stuff to go in one ear and out the other?

Could you have therapy? Not couples therapy but just for you. To work on self love, resilience, healing from the trauma of those baby years and his affair.

Could you join a choir? A gym? A book club? A feminist consciousness raising group (not kidding)?

Where can you build the connections that will sustain you till your children leave home? How will you become the you that you would've been already if those years of trauma and let's be honest humiliation didn't interrupt and set you back?

There are answers and you will find them. You have to choose the life you want. If you choose to stay then choose every day to make staying work for you. Choose to love you. Choose to build you.

You've started that with your return to education. Just keep going. And bloody rinse the bastard for any money you need. It's family money. You're his wife. You sodding well earned it.

Great post

However, I still think you should LTB eventually, even though I understand why you don't want to now.

He's awful.

For what it's worth OP, you sound fab, very fiesty and funny (am still laughing at your comment about him acting like you had suggested hiring people to brush your hair). Cultivate that side of you, live YOUR best way in the marriage, enjoy your children and the level of financial security you have, embrace your future career. The quality of the relationship with a significant other is not the be all and end all of everything.

I love the idea of counselling, but I tried it and it was a disaster.

The first was a woman. She straight away said I had to LTB because he was a bastard. It was like being in one of those threads where the OP keeps going ‘but this is how I’m feeling…’ and the whole thread goes ‘LTB! HAVE SOME SELF RESPECT! And don’t come back here until you do!’ and she kept asking really probing questions about our sex life.

I left in floods of tears feeling even more of a failure than I had before. I didn’t go back.

The second was a male NHS psychologist. He wasn’t interested in the domestic stuff, thought my issues were due to a traumatic birth, and then asked if I had any phobias because his particular interest was phobias and he thought that it might be a phobia at the root of it all. I sort of said ‘er, well, I don’t really like heights or being sick’ so his face lit up we spent 3 weeks addressing these non-issues, then covid hit and I never heard from the service again.

I’d love to talk it all through with someone but I found these two experiences quite stressful and upsetting tbh so I can’t see me giving it a third go unfortunately.

It took me 4 therapists before I found the right one - this therapists sound dreadful. If you are prepared to give it another go, the right therapist makes all the difference. It sounds like it would help you because right now, it appears you're in the state of mind of thinking husband doesn't want a cleaner and he abandoned me and had an affair. They're not the same issue,and if you can't mentally move forward from the latter 2 (which would be understandable of course!), every other normal marital issue that comes up ike different spending viewpoints) is going to take on significantly greater importance than it should and in read your unhappiness. Until you address your feelings about what happened properly and either decide to leave because you can't move past them, or stay but commit to moving forward from them, your marriage will always be filled with resentment and nothing he (or you) does will ever be enough to overcome it

@MountainSun
You shouldnt be discouraged aftef two attempts. I understand it can be disheartening but you need to think of counselling almost like dating. Its about finding the right counsellor that suits you and you feel most compatible with. Some counsellors you just wont get on with, or you grel you wont get the most out of them as their methods amd guidance may not suit.

Its really important that you pursue with the counselling. You cant change him but you can change yourself/circumstances and counselling is a good way for that. Dont give up on counselling. Then you are effectively giving up on working on yourself

@MountainSun I agree that it can be hard to find the right person for a counsellor.
There are many different techniques in counselling and not all of them will work for you to start with.
I also found some people are just carp at it (I had one who was teaching in a degree course counselling and was judgemental! I dare to think how her students faired).
The best counsellor I’ve had were all psychotherapists. Training DOES a make a difference (oh and seeing a woman….. esp if there are some issues within the relationship)

Agree, talking therapies are a broad church. I would definitely seek a psychotherapist. They will have had years of training. I would also always go for a woman. I only once had a male therapist and it just didn't feel comfortable

Finding the right therapist is so key ones that specialising trauma and relationships is the starting point. Phone them up and discuss briefly the issue and see if you gel with them.

You need some decent emotional support.

Bad therapy experiences make the whole thing worse (been there got the t-shirt).