Blindsided by DH telling me tonight he’s had enough of our marriage

[Jack32]

It was a normal Friday night tonight, got the baby and toddler asleep at 7, DH went out to pick up our take away and we watched our Netflix series. I asked him what’s the plan this weekend, I checked the weather app and mentioned how I’d be going for my jog first thing if the rain stayed away, around 8am. It’s a new thing I’ve taken up since the baby so keep fit. I normally get up at 6am with the kids, take them downstairs, feed them, wash, dress them while DH stays in bed. He comes downstairs to take care of them while I’m out for an hour jogging. I like to get it done early so we can spend the day together. Tonight he completely snapped at me when I said about my jog. He said he dreads the weekend with me, hates the weekend, is fed up of this marriage. I was blind sighted, I reached to grab his hand and asked if he was OK and he snatched his hand back so coldly. He said just leave me alone. I was so shocked, I’ve gone upstairs to bed and I feel sick. What should I do or say ?!

Seriously?? Jezzzzz

I’m nipping this in the bud tonight

Did you?

There's the door. You're free to leave is what you should say.

could you go jogging at a later time at the weekend?
Maybe sleeping in is one of his life's pleasures.
Compromise is key in marriage.

I would hate it if my other half got me up at 8am on a Saturday so he could go jogging - you should have discussed it with him beforehand and agreed a time that suits both of you not just you.

@JoClogs but she is already up from 6 with the children.Surely him getting an extra 2 hours in bed is fair enough

Surely some of the responsibility has to fall on him to make suggestions about what to do at the weekends if he isn't enjoying them as they currently are. He sounds like he is just expecting you to know what he wants and provide him with it without him actually saying what he'd like to do. Parenting small children feels relentless and sometimes quite boring but it soon passes (even though it doesn't feel like it every will). Trouble is some men just don't want to stick it out. They want an easy life.

Not if it hasn't been agreed in advance.
Also if he has a very physical job he may need / enjoy the rest.
I used to feed the baby and go back to bed at 6 in the morning on weekends.
There are multiple options.

@JoClogs from what she’s said this is a weekly thing and hasn’t been sprung on him,

How did the talk go?

Curious to hear whether the chat was had. If he thinks things can carry on as they were, best acting and allow him to think that. Meanwhile I’d be speaking to a solicitor & getting ready to end things. I appreciate as a stranger that’s easier said than done, but how dare he think you’re an option. I’d guess he has someone else, but I’d guess again you two won’t be together in 10yrs. Which is why I think you can save yourself some years of misery by nipping this in the bud.

That depends what time they go to bed at and what his routine was before children came along. Was he a night owl or an early bird?

For those advocating divorce immediately, OP's opportunity to go jogging will be severely restricted if she is a single mother.

He may be fed up with the monotony of family life at the moment - who wouldn't be after 6 years - it's part of the natural process. Maybe more adult activities are needed - get a babysitter etc.

I'm a counsellor.

Hes a dismissive avoidant who has let issues hes felt for a while build up to the point where he hasn't discussed them, and that's where the blindsided comment comes from.

They can't communicate well, and they get to a point where everything has built and built up without so much of a prior comment from them, and then they leave relationships abruptly.

There is information online about avoidants which will give you a better understanding. One thing you don't do is put pressure on him to tell you what exactly he wants, as they don't know how to open up, and they prefer to run away rather than deal with things that could quite often have been changed with communication.

It hurts like anything dealing with an avoidant, especially if you are a good communicator.

Very good.

Didn't we have this thread yesterday, but with the OP being 'blindsighted'?

Same thread, but the title has been corrected. I didn't know that was possible.

You sound like great mum and very considerate wife. I don’t think I’d want to be with him either if I was spoken to like that. Tell him to go forth if that’s what he wants, doesn’t sound like you’d be missing out.

You need to talk about this. You've smoothed things over for now but nobody blows up like that without some huge underlying resentment underneath. I'd get my investigating hat on, just in case there's an addiction or another woman in the picture, and if there isn't, you need a chat about what makes both of you happy, because it seems you're on different pages.

@JoClogs it doesn’t matter what his routine was before though does it! Because what about what OP routine was? Everything changes when you have children and should be shared equally between both parents,

Since you’re a counsellor, don’t you think you could have provided an actual suggestion for what to do, not just don’t try and talk to him about this? Because just accepting this ‘because he’s an avoidant’ would not be an option for most marriages. And please be clear what proportion of the work of this marriage you expect the op to do vs her partner. And if that proportion is grossly uneven, why do you think anyone should commit to that?

When you enter a marriage none of us know what our partners attachment style is. People often have a mix of more than one.

As I suggested look at information online about how to communicate with a avoidant. I could write a 10 page post in reply.

I merely highlighted the attachment style in response to where the blindsiding comes from.

Asking an avoidant to talk about how they are feeling and what they want to express will be like talking to a brick wall. They very rarely change unless they go to relationship counselling & are taught how to change from keeping quiet to being a securely attached partner who can communicate more confidently & freely.

We had two conversations over the weekend. He’s rubbish at opening up and communicating, so it took two separate nights to get to the bottom of it. We rarely have these kinds of conversations. It’s true he’s been feeling low since our second baby came along, so 8 months and probably while I was pregnant. It’s nothing to do with the lack of sleep, both of them sleep through the night. He said ultimately he’s finding the financial pressure too much sometimes. So when the weekend comes around, he panics. Yes since I’ve been on maternity leave, we have had to budget more but we’re doing OK. He says he misses when we used to have more money to go out more and do more as a couple, and as a family. He says he doesn’t have a problem with me going out early for an hour to jog but personally, I think he does, before kids he did like a lay in and I’d be up early by myself. I don’t believe he’s being fully honest. I think he’s finding having two young ones hard. Since our second baby came along, I have been prioritising myself a little more, like with the fitness because I suffered so badly with PPD with my first. He swears there isn’t another woman. Trying to get him to talk for longer than 10 minutes is like getting blood out a stone. He just wants to stop the conversation and carry on as normal. He ended the last conversation on a positive note saying something was changing at work in Jan, so he’d be earning more and things would be better. I still can’t forget how cruel and cold he was Friday night with his words. As @Luckyness45 I don’t believe he will change and I don’t believe he is ready or will ever be for counselling. So we got everything out in the open but we haven’t come up with a solution yet.

It might it if was trained on MN posts.

It's good you got some discussion going with him - it's not easy with someone who avoids conflict at all cost. It's normal for him to feel financial pressure with a second child - I think all men do but there is a lack of support for men who become fathers - everything is focused on the mother which is natural to some degree but men need help adjusting to the dramatic change in lifestyle that comes with children. Nowadays everything focuses on the individual rather than the family which is making people increasingly selfish and lonely.
Being a parent usually means putting the children first in most cases. Are there any men groups for parenting he could join - even online. He may be more comfortable talking to other men.