Hi,
I'm not sure what I'm looking for here, maybe just to vent or to see if anyone else is in my position.
My husband and I have been together for nearly 7 years, married for 1 year and to say that I'm disappointed with how our relationship has turned out is an understatement, but I feel like I only have myself to blame, I overlooked so many red flags at the start, feeling like I was in love and telling myself things will get better.
I've never found proof that he's cheated, but tbh it wouldn't surprise me if I found out that he had. He's always been so closed off and secretive. I've gone through his phone before and found him flirting with other girls, but nothing suggested he was cheating physically. But even the flirting he denied until I told him I'd seen the messages. He was closed off to the point that he wouldn't even open up about how he felt about me, just saying "that's just how men are". The first time he told me he loved me was two years into our relationship when I told him it's over, I believed him and took him back.
There's a lot more that's happened, but fast foreword to now, we're married, have a 6 month old, and I feel like overlooking all of the red flags I saw at the start was the biggest mistake of my life. He's on leave from work atm and is out all day doing all the things he enjoys- riding his bike, socialising etc while I'm home all day with our baby. He cleans every now and then, but not as often as he thinks (as he's out literally every day) and then complains that I don't do enough around the house. He's easily irritated and is cold in his responses to me in probably 50% of our interactions. He'll go cold on me and then there's a noticeable difference in his demeanour when he wants sex. He plays with our baby for a short period of time in the morning before he leaves, and usually gets home as I'm putting her to bed.
He also has lied to me a lot in the past, which was another reason why I tried to leave before we were married (he convinced me to stay). Since we've been married and had our baby I've found that I'm just constantly replaying all the sh$tty things he's done to me over the years and can't move past them, it just makes me feel so much regret for not leaving him.
We've tried couples counselling, but that fizzled out because our counsellor saw us a few times and then wanted to see us both separately for a session each, I booked my session and went to it and left it up to him to book his and he never did. Whenever I bring up anything that bothers me he's very dismissive and accuses me of just wanting to start an argument.
I feel so trapped, I have a good job but it doesn't pay enough for me to afford a decent place suitable for me and my daughter. I'm also worried about how nasty things could get if I do leave. When I was around 3 weeks post partum I was really struggling, I was crying every day and he was so cold (he had a go at me 2 weeks after my c section for not putting my clothes away), I told him during an argument that I wa going to stay somewhere else because I needed some space, and he said "that's fine, go, but you're not taking the baby", he didn't care that she was exclusively breastfed, he would give formula.
I feel depressed constantly, it's not postpartum depression, I'm happy when I'm not around him and when I'm not thinking about all of this.