This is a long one sorry- I need some opinions on my relationship . . . .

[OneDS]

I have name changed as this is all very personal stuff, some of you may ?recognise? me from other threads, but please don?t out me!
Not sure what I want or how to feel. DP and I have been together for 8 years, and have been going through a bad patch, I think it started when DS came along (he is now 4).
There are several issues going on/have gone on, and I can?t get my head around things.
He has previously (spring 07) been on a gay cottaging website, saying he was bi-curious, and (early this year) an amateur porn site saying he was bi seeking a guy on which he posted pics of his . When I found out about this he said we didn?t have sex enough, basically blamed it on me, and skirted around the bi issue. I pointed out I was also dissatisfied with certain things (money issues, his awkward ex spoiling Christmases and holidays with access disagreements, lack of household and childcare input), and these things have improved. At the time I said I would give ?us? one last shot, and that I wasn?t sure us loving each other was enough.
We do love each other, and most of the time I feel content, but at the back of my mind are always certain issues niggling away. These include the bi issues, it seems to me this is something he feels compelled to explore but refuses to discuss it and says it was because of our lack of sex life. I was suffering from PND, and also know that I have a double prolapse.
I am also concerned at certain behaviours, I feel my increasing lack of confidence is more due to him than I have previously realised. He does subtle things that are making me feel self conscious or low in confidence. For example, if he is drying the pots he inspects each item whilst giving me a sideways look, implying I need my pot washing skills to be checked ? if I have missed a spot on a pan or plate he tells me, points it out, and gives it back to me to be rewashed. If this were the other way round I would just wipe said item myself and put it away!? He also rarely compliments me, last night we went out and he told me I looked nice ? I realised this was high praise indeed and it made me realise he rarely compliments me, I am more likely to receive a compliment from anyone but him, yet he is often complimenting himself(!). He will also often go off about the house being a tip, or go on a pointed (and imo passive aggressive) cleanup operation. Yesterday it was the kitchen, sometimes it feels like he resents my things being around, or toys about the place? He also seems to think objects and decor should last forever, whereas I am more laid back and realistic.
We both also are in debt, me a lot less than him, but I am annoyed that my catalogue debt includes approx £300 from xmas presents he ordered for my two dss in dec 07! It got to mid dec and he still hadn?t bought them anything so I told him to order from there and pay me back over this year. He has made a one off payment to me of £50 so far. He is terrible with money and imo selfish. I would spend my last pound on ds, his spare cash tends to go on carling.
Last week I found two pornos of dubious porn (some of you may have read that thread ? I had it deleted as it was so personal and raw). I then also found in his work bag, his old phone, and my old phone, DP?s old phone had pics of himself on it. There were two pics I was very shocked at, he was trying things out (alone) he had not mentioned to me. He has always been into taking pics of his , he always has pics of himself on his phone, he seems to be turned on by himself (does that make sense?), as well as porno pictures too. I have let this slide in the past as I have a low (very vanilla) sex drive, and he has a high sex drive (and is apparently very experimental). I now feel what is the point? Will he ever be satisfied with me? Why do I even put myself through trying stuff that holds no appeal to me.
Last night we went out, great night, and then DP pointed out his ex fiancé, and ex best friend, who had been shagging behind his back whilst DP and ex were engaged. DP was insistent that he wanted to talk to ex best friend and have ?closure?, and say kind of a ?ha ha I won the battle? type thing to him. I didn?t get this on many levels, he kept staring across and saying he wanted to speak to him. In the end I got really annoyed and stormed off, he caught up to me and we walked home, DP was upset, but again put the issue at my door, said it was my issue, and that all he wanted was ?to speak to someone? and couldn?t understand why I was so annoyed with him!

I know I have rambled and I?m so sorry, if you have read all this please let me know what you think, and what you suggest. DP is a good dad (most of the time, and particularly now DS is older), we both love ds to bits, and are meant to be going into fostering too! I go from wanting to work through things, to thinking about walking away and feeling relief but sadness at the thought of it. Please give me your honest opinions.

Oh crap I'm sorry that is terrible to read I thought I had left gaps!

Aw what a rotten time you are having.

IMO he sounds really confused about himself and his needs/sexuality, and is taking it out on you. It looks like he is trying to push and push you to bring it to a head, and is laying his own guilt at your door. I've been on the recieving end of behaviour like this for similar reasons.

Will he go for counselling?

Thank you so much for replying!

We went for an initial sssion at relate at the beginning of the year, but never made it to regular ones as we couldn't afford what relate showed us on the sliding fees scale, and we were both working imposible working hours. We could look into it again I guess.
I don't know if counselling would acheive anything - there is so much going on, I feel so despondent about it.

I have thought of some other things too. Writing it all down helps I am finding.

DP has started to do this: he makes a statement or asks a question, then pauses, I assume he is finished and answer him, and he jumps in really cross saying he wasn?t thinking, why do I have to jump right in, and then ?finishes? his statement or question, in a way that turns it around and makes my reasonable response seem out of order.! Or he will ask a question, and if I actually say how I feel about it say for example, ?well actually I?d rather not?, this also means he gets to accuse ? ?ok you don?t have to be so defensive/arsey/I was only asking?. I don?t know if he realises he is doing this. My head is all over the place.

He can also be really sweet, for example makes me cups of tea without me asking him (although to be fair he is usally making them for himself too), or the other night got out of nice warm bed to go through cold house to get me some ibuprofen.

I also forgot to put in my OP, our ds is autistic (aspergers), and is very tiring as he is anxious, repeats things over and over and doesn?t sleep well. I just feel so tired.

My Grandma gave me her car as she wanted me to pass my test, I had had some lessons, but couldn?t afford to continue them, the idea being I could drive around with DP in car, and become able to go for my test. I have not found this possible as DP makes it clear in the car that he has no faith in my driving skills, which makes me so anxious I stall ? I was doing really well with my lessons, and just needed to fine tune my manouvers and that would have been that. DP is now driving my car and running it into the ground, as he can?t afford to sort his out and he needs a car for work. I feel he has discouraged my driving progress as it is in his interests to do so.

You sound so like me with my first husband.

I ended up walking on egg shells, avoiding the obvious clues he had left around, because if I did question him on them he made out I was making a mountain out of a molehill or mad.

The money and driving sound familiar too. I was taking lessons, when we split he took the car which my mum had bought us with the intention of me using as I worked shifts.

Looking back now I think he was desperate for control of something, anything as he could not control other areas of his life. He also had drink and probably drugs issues going on, although I never had that confirmed.

I think you know now that you need to do something, even if he won't/can't do counselling, can you?

Yes I guess I could go alone, it may help me sort out my own head a little. I feel totally lost, like I no longer know what I want from life, or a relationship.

I think he knows I am withdrawing from him a little. Last night when we argued he said 'don't let this be the end of us' - putting onto me and making me feel bad. Sigh. Thanks for taking the time, there is so much of this on my mind, and I don't feel I can't talk about something so personal with my usual confidant (my sister who I see a lot of).

it doesn't sound good i remember your other threads too. it seems to me that he is always making you take all the blame and making you feel bad for things that are part or all of his instigation. does he ever take responsibility?

you really don't sound very happy. only you can decide what you'll do about it.

Sorry, but he sounds dreadful - an inadaquate
bully (and a bit of a pervert).

I dont think you can "fix" this as it seems your p thinks the problems in your relationship are all down to you, when in reality it seems the opposite.

I know I am stating the bleedin' obvious , but ... this is not the right time to consider fostering.

Oh, and please continue learning to drive - increased independence wont go amiss here.

I'm not happy no. I feel low.

I think that is it. I am starting to believe it is all up to me. That I should work hard and fix everything. It's starnge though, we have been together 8 years - and we have ds so it would never be a clean break. It would be hard in that way as I do love him, but living ike this is slowly killing me.

I know, I never really told anyone about my first husband until after I had a partial breakdown and got counselling.

I think it would be really useful for you to be able to talk this through with someone.

To this day there was never a final confrontation with xh. He managed to push me too far one day and never came home. I changed the locks and froze the bank accounts and never spoke to him again. He never admitted his sexuality to me, or explained anything. I was the monster for kicking him out.

The only closure I got eventually was through counselling. My only regret was not having it sooner.

I cannot continue learnng to drive. There is no way I can afford lessons at the moment, and no way I can gain confidence and fine hone my manouvers with DP.

I think I have read some of your other threads and I think (as I may have said before) that you need to prepare for the end of this relationship, because this man does not want to be in a couple-relationship with you any more. He clearly has major issues around his sexuality, and he can't help these ie if he is gay then it isn;t going to go away. He can help his behaviour towards you ie constantly trying to blame you for what's wrong with the marriage - which I think (and OK I am conjecturing a lot here) may be because he was brought up to think that to be anything other than a Heterosexual Real Man Who Fucks Women is utterly unacceptable, so he has to make it your fault that he can't stop thinking about sex with men because to admit to himself that he's not 100% heterosexual is too frightening to bear.
His behaviour is understandable, but that doesn;t make it acceptable: it;s not your fault in the least.
But it's not something you can fix, either, and trying to fix it will make you wretched -the same as trying to force or persuade someone to 'love' you ie form and maintain an exclusive couple-relationship with you when that person doesn;t want to, is utterly demoralising and very damaging to you.

If he's a good dad now he will remain a good one when you separate and you may well find that he becomes a better friend and co-parent to you when he is no longer trying to convince everyone but you that he is the perfect hetero husband.

Dp and I have had some issues in our relationship to do with him being quite controlling and critical, we have been having counselling for a while now and it has made a huge difference. I am of course not innocent in what has happened as I know I am a difficult person to live with.

However it has not been easy and I dont know if I would be bothering if we had to deal with the other problems your and your dp have to overcome.

In order to make ny decision I sat down and asked myself if the things that made me fall in love with dp were still there, and I think they are/were they have just become hidden under other stuff. He feels the same way.

Good luck in your decision I think you know in your heart what you need to do.

We are not married.

The house is in his name "in case".

(I don't want the house, just trying to paint you a picture of his lack of commitment to me).

Oh god. I am so devastated.

Crikey, you poor thing.

I really don't think you can make it work/better unless he is willing to be open about his sexuality. It's such a basic part of a person.
It sounds as if he is unhappy, not really with you, but with the fact that his sexuality is not being met, and because of this he is taking out his frustration on you.

I agree with everything solidgoldstuffingballs has jus

The house being in his name would worry me on top of everything else tbh.

..has just said!

Sorry!

Ok, I do remember your previous posts about this. My heart went out to you.

I was you.

If he will not deal with this, you need to. Hard as it is it's the only way.

He is who he is, and ime it will get worse.

You need to take back some control, you know you can't keep living like this.

Can you speak to your GP?

I agree with the sentiments that your dp is taking out his frustration about his sexuality on you. I really cannot see this ending in a positive way. Sorry

I came off my ADs 3 weeks ago - the irony! I really don't want to go back onto them if I don't have to.

How do I do it. I can't get my head around this being the end as on the surface we a re fine. Everyone we know would be soo shocked if we spit up. He can't even admit his sexuality to himself or me yet the general consensus seems to be that he is.

I will walk away with DS, DP will lose the house most likely as we pay 50/50 to it each month.

Speaking as someone on AD you do not want to be making huge life changing decisions when you have just stopped taking tablets.

I know twinset.

I'm sorry I will be back soon, I am roaring my eyes out and I don't want to wake ds who is asleep next to me.

I thought everyone would be shocked too.

Turned out they were surprised we lasted as long as we did. Apparently it was obvious to lots of people, but they never wanted to interfere or help me.

To this day he has never admitted to his old friends and family that he is gay. He upped sticks, moved to another country and created a new life for himself, one which is obvously gay. But he never told any one here. He just could not deal with it.

And I agree with twinset.It's crap timing.

Why don't you find out where you stand legally and financially, quietly, so you can at least know where you are in that area?

and please go back to your GP.

I found the worst thing was feeling I had no control, that everything was revolving round keeping him happy.
I have terrible memories of a holiday abroad that should have been a holiday of a lifetime....everyone enjoyed it apart from me, because I was so careful not to rock the boat.
I felt better once I took back some control.
Where is he just now?