It’s going to be a long one and I probably won’t articulate myself properly but feel I need to get this out. I don’t feel I have anyone personally I can share this openly with. I am so grateful to anyone who takes their time to read this.
I have been with my partner since I was 17. In this time, we have been very in love. We have been engaged, bought a house, had two children and I am now pregnant with my third. After the birth of our first daughter, he struggled with alcoholism. This wasn’t known to me as he was very secretive, I know this makes me sound naive but I honestly had no idea the extent of it. I had no idea that addiction could so dramatically change someone’s personality. For the couple of years that he suffered with this, I suffered too. He was not the man I fell in love with or anything close. When I look back I’m not sure how I survived those terrible years. I am very angry that those years were my years becoming a new mother. Both of my children’s early years and births are tarnished with these horrible memories. Though of course I try my best to not think like this most of the time and focus on the positives. I do feel grateful they were young enough to not remember any of it. On the other hand, it hurts my heart to think of all the trauma we endured together in this early days and how much of it they must have felt.
To cut a very long story short, I decided enough was enough and left him. This was difficult as he had no family here or friends to go to. His addiction ruined all connections he had built here. We ended up living together though not in a relationship. Needless to say, the lines were blurry. I felt very trapped in the situation. There were times I’d move out to my parents house but my eldest daughter struggled and always asked to go home. She wouldn’t sleep well and as soon as we were back in the house she’d be perfectly normal. It wasn’t so much about him but the house. I tried for months, it was no short lived attempt. As I always seem to do, weakly, I came back home. I maintained I didn’t want a relationship with him. I asked him to find somewhere else to live so we could stay in our house and he agreed. However, in this year or so of back and forth and me finally being clear I was done, he found his way out of addiction. He sought help on his own accord, and put a stop to the drinking. I didn’t think it would last but it has. It’s been nearly a year since he’s had a drink at all. The bad behaviour has completely stopped.
My girls are 2 and 4. I find them hard work and I do the majority of the parenting. They are perfect girls, but they require a lot from me and this can be exhausting. Their dad is very hands on. And even throughout addiction he still did much more as a father than most. Since the drinking stopped, he gets up with them every morning without fail, does their packed lunches and breakfast and gets them ready. He doesn’t think this is anything special, in fact he always thanks me if I do something small like brush their teeth or do their hair. When he is home from work, he will do everything for them without being asked. He would wait on me hand and foot if I let him. He is always supportive of me, building me up and encouraging to do whatever I feel is right. So much so that even though he says he loves me and wants to be with me and is sorry for what he has done, he would let me go. He tells me constantly he wants me to be happy and understands if I can’t have that with him after what he put me through. A couple of months ago, I had a really bad day. I struggled looking after the girls and he came home from work and took over, no questions asked. At the time I remember feeling so grateful and feeling that I was scared for him to move out into his new place in a few weeks. I was worried how I’d cope and wondered if I was making the wrong decision. I slept with him. We used protection and I have fertility issues but by some miracle we got pregnant. I am now 10 weeks.
When I found out, I was very upset but decided to continue on with the pregnancy. I had started feeling differently about him again, feeling warmer now he was back to the man he was before. I said I wanted us to try again. I was fine with this but in the last couple of weeks these feelings come at night. If I ignore them, my dreams are full of them. I feel panicked at the idea of another baby, of staying with him forever. He is very attractive and I still fancy him but sometimes I don’t want him to kiss/touch me. I never felt that before. When I let myself think, I wonder if this is how I’m meant to feel. Will I learn to love him fully again? I definitely love him but not the way I used to. I feel trapped again. He was so worried I’d feel this, he apologised over and over that I was pregnant saying he never wanted to put me in this situation. He’s told me time and time again if I need to leave I can. But I think of our girls and how happy they are with us. He’s a huge part of their lives, could I split our time? It feels so mean. And I really enjoy his company. I look forward to him coming home, I can’t wait to tell him about my day and to laugh together etc. He is my best friend. But this nagging feeling won’t go away and it’s driving me insane. Is this something I just need to work through? Or is this telling me it’s done and I need to accept it and cause all this damage. Is it the hormones making me question/panic?