need some help seeing wood for trees and deciding what to do next

[EvenBoringMyselfNow]

I need some help seeing wood for trees and finding a way think about the future

we've married 8 y together 18 (gulp!) - 2 kids (7&4)
some issues over the years, mostly wabout wanting kids/not wanting kids. both very happy we have them now, tho they do put strain on relationship at times. both work and get quite stressed. DH currently very stressed over work, has been in some shape or other for past x years, quite bad for last year.

Over the years his libido has been quite low compared to mine. I used to try to instigate sex but be rebuffed so I gave up about 6 years ago as it was getting quite depressing and not doing the old self -esteem much good. Then abut a year and a half ago I decided to give it another whirl, bought sexy undies etc and ravished him in the kitchen on valentines night. He seemed to enjoy that. But when I tried it again seemed quite bored. So after a few tries I stopped making that effort too. Now we have fairly stratighforward one up one down sex when he wants it which is about twice a month. He often doesn't orgasm.

He drinks a lot which I am sure is a major factor in this.

I am on ADs for depression and have been for 2 years now.

Last year we went for couples counselling. Was not much use tbh. During the counselling period we went out one night and got quite inebriated and DH said lots of stuff about how he fancied other women etc etc etc - nothing wrong with that per se - he also said he wanted to have sex with other women. Hmm. Next day he "confessed" to a one night stand with some woman at a conference. I felt like I'd been slapped in the face with a wet fish given that he was never that interested in sex with me. When I would ask him about us staying together he claimed he wanted to (after a couple of months thinking about it) but he always says you can't tell the future and so nothing is definate for ever. I used to find this very difficult to take but in the last year have thought about uncertainty and impermanence A LOT (read Pema Chodron if that means anything to you and began to really appreciate that of course NOTHING is certain, apart from NOW)

We went on from there, decided to stay together after he'd slept in the spare room a while. I thought he would start to make more of an effort after that but he didn't really. I totally stopped making an effort wrt "moments of intimacy" at this point. We still have sex about twice a month, when he hasn't had too much to drink

He still gives me a kiss morning and evening but I can't be bothered anymore tbh. Most of my physical affection goes on the kids now.

I am going away for a few days on my own this weekend and I know I'll be mulling over all of this. I felt it was fair to have a chat with him before I went and let him know how I am feeling. We rarely talk about any of this stuff as it makes him too tense and stressed and it is never really worth it. I have mentioned a couple of months ago that certain stuff was causing me problems still and he admitted he hadn't been great and said he didn't want to talk about it anymore but that his actions would speak louder than words. So I shut up again.

Well, he took the kids out to library that day and did something else nice with them but there have been no efforts at intimacy with me since

Last night I opened up to him. I told him how I am feeling, how I felt quite disappointed that after all the fuss last year and him admitting the fling he hadn't made more of an effort, how I didn't feel any great intimacy or desire between us anymore. He claimed that his outbursts last year were not his responsibility, that he had been an equal victim of the therapy as I had. He has also in the past claimed that the one night stand was not his responsibility (apparantly it was rainging and the co-delegate couldn't get a taxi and so had to sleep with him) I told him how I've worked hard on myself this year on dealing with my need for security and certainty and I feel much better equipped to deal with that now but that I was just getting no real sense of desire or intimacy from him. I told him I feel that he is just not taking responsibility for stuff but leaving it all for me to decide as then he can get away with just dealing with MY DECISION and having to bear none of the responsibility for it. I also told him that I feel his primary relationship is with booze rather than me. At this point he talked about me reading too many self help books (I don't - I've been reading quite a few books on buddhism and spirituality of late, and on taking responsibility for oneself but no "men are from mars, women..venus" type stuff) and asked whether I had been talking to soemone about this stuff in the last few days. He doesn't like the idea that I discuss our relationship with anyone else. Although I have been quite clear that I do talk, to my counsellor and to my sister and another friend. I'd have gone doolally by now if I didn't.

He ummed and ahhed. In the end I just asked whether he did desire me and whether he did want to stay with me. He said nothing. For about ten minutes. He ummed and aaahed audibly, said "oh fucking hell" quite a bit to himself, and said nothing. Then he said something about sometimes not being able to just answer questions straight off. He talked about the fact that silence could be construed as an answer and that this would be the wrong conclusion to jump to. He always does this, talks about the meta-narrative of "our" (my?!) discussions rather than the content.

What the fuck do I do? basically I think I need to wake up and smell the coffee. There is no desire or intimacy left here, there probably hasn't been for some time. He won't make any decision about things. Some day some apparantly more attractive woman will fall for him and he for her and that'll be it. I think if any other woman he felt attracted to offered a shag he'd go for it (depending on time of day and how much he'd had to drink of course, if too much he'd be no use)

He doesn't even help much around the house, though he claims he does. He does do a lot of drop offs of the kids to school though, so I can go to work early.

What do I do? Am I mad to put so much importance on desire/intimacy/closeness? At least 3 of my women friends husbands don't want sex much either and one of them is like me, she has given up. She said it is too awful to have to basically beg for sex. She is drop dead gorgeous too. They keep going though. IS this normal. Do I put up with it and just continue to live my own life with him on the periphery (which is where he is heading at the moment)

any advice or shared experience so so welcome, feel I am at the end of my tether (again)

(Sorry is so long, have just looked again - bloody hell - well done if you got to the end)

and he is always so bloody reasonable (except when he's been drinking and I draw attention to the fact that's he's had way too much, again, then he can get all shouty and sulky) I can see myself telling him I (and the MN jury - can you imagine if he found out ) feel he should move to spare room and we plan for separation - his face, and his little hurt expression, and his "OK if that's what you want" and then the weeks where we go on as normal and he acts all surprised when finally I give in and bring it up again...

aaaarrrgh!!

wish we weren't so finacially interwingled and I would just cut my losses and go

thanks all of you, you are helping me (loved that Woods:/Trees: analysis !)

But it's a huge thing to do - and it's an easy thing to say.

I'd go for asking him to leave for a bit, I don't think the spare room is going to work at all well. It might be just what he'd like in fact? Will drive you wild with resentment imo.

There is a part of me that think maybe you need to rock this boat. But if he's the sort to lie next to you while you wail into the night ('just letting you work things through, didn't think you wanted to be interrupted, wasn't sure what to say, if you'd wanted to talk to me why didn't you, I assumed it was a private matter etc) then don't expect him to react in a loving or thoughtful way to the boat rocking, or indeed to want to come back.

he doesn't sound like he's big on responsibility taking, whilst at the same time dressing up that position as being one of everyone taking responsibility for themselves.

You know the drink, impotence etc - is he depressed?

100
get on teenage word thread

I ended up on ADs for the last few months of my marriage. Prozac - ah, wonderful things!

Anyway, I left my marriage, stopped taking the ADs and surprise, surprise, wasn't depressed anymore..... make of that what you will.

Another thing - you should be thinking of your DCs' feelings rather than your DH's and DCs can do well without both parents necessarily living together .....

sorry... that sounded really bossy of me.....

I wonder if you saying that you are boring yourself comes from a feeling that he has created by being so flat and apparently uninspired by you (because he will make it seem like YOUR fault, not his)? He is certainly treating you with no respect, and you deserve much more than sleepwalking through your life with a drone of this type who sees himself as battered to and fro by The Fates (and the rain)...no wonder life seems tedious!

Do try and take back some control- you sound like a thoughtful and generous woman who should be getting a lot more out of her life than he is offering you.

please - don't worry at all about sounding bossy - sometimes I reckon that is exactly what i need - someone to tell me what to do and make sure I've done it

(am not so lame in other areas of my life btw)

100times agree that I may well be quite resentful if he is in spare 'oom but will keep wheels oiled wrt kids/school/finances for now

the finances are going to be the bugger - we live in london with huge mortgage and although we not in hugely posh area things are expensive round here, especially if you looking to buy two places.

Part of me just wants to move home anyway but he has never wanted to.

bugger.

decisions decisions - have never been very good at them...

There's a glimmer of something that might help you be happier then...

Well let him go sleep on a mates sofa for a month.

Clear the air

Give yourself (and perhaps, him?) a chance to see wood for trees etc

Then work towards the tough practical stuff?

thanks BoF - your bit about him being a drone battered about by the fates brought a smile to my face. That's exactly it. He will never make plans for the future.

In fact I first started to really feel worried about 3 or 4 years ago when I went to a freinds party and met all these "lovely couple" (cliche I know) but folk who seemed to have shared dreams and ideas. We can't talk about the future.

he doesn't have many mates, other than hubbies of friend sof mine. Some footballing buddies, he'd love that, lots of boozing and football.

I still need someone to take the kids to school every day...

gotta go pick them up now

will be back later - thanks guys this is really helping me

You sound you are married to Mr Casaubon.

Enough!

It's impossible to leave this relationship because it isn't a relationship, you are the only one in the relationship.

You are waiting for him to let you know when you can start living your life as you'd like it to be. He sounds deeply unpleasant; It's as though he doesn't care for you at all.

I love ahundredtimes' no schit schtick post.

I had to google that but found an interesting article on what the author calls the "Casaubon Delusion".

Well he's a dry old stick and no mistaking Mr Casaubon.

Also he wraps up his own inability to love freely as a kind of intellectual superiority , and turns his own insecurities and lack of success in attempting to finish his book into a criticism of his wife.

Hah! the Mr Casaubon analogy is a very good one. I was in awe of his intellectual capabilities at the start , he was just finishing a very intellectual philosophy/english PhD and really did change a lot of my ideas and perspectives on things (I was but a simple girl )

we used to joke that he had a "fragile Psychic make up" (even anagramised it to FPMU for gods sake) and so he never really had to face reality cos I guess I sort of enabled it thinking of him as someone "above all that"

then we had the kids and I needed him to face up to things, take more responsibility etc (ffs I do everything wrt mortgages/finances etc too he has NO idea how any of that works, or chooses not to anyway), his drinking etc and general lack of facing things, allied to his lack of real affection to me just made things impossible it feels now. You know if I really felt he loved me, desired me and actively wanted to be with me I could probably put up with the rest.

reducedtothis - your comment about me being the only one in the relationship rings horribly true

anyway, apparantly he went to GP today and she has prescribed a low dosage of ADs. Do I give him another chance as finally he seems to be taking some action? Part of me thinks not, he won't allow me to talk about him going on teh ads, or what it signifies. He will expect me just to be silent, wait and see. You know what I am sick to teh eye teeth of doing that.

Have just remembered another thing he said to me last night, when he was telling me (again) that he is not someone who sees the value of these "talkiing about your realtionship" type of chats (honestly folks I might bring it up once every 5 months or so - it's not every time he sits down or anything, and we are obviously in distress as we've had unsucessful counselling, I am still in counselling and waiting for psychodynamic therapy, I'm on ADs...what more does it take to signify trouble afoot???) anyway (sorry for digression) basically I asked what the alternative to talking about it occasionally was and he said, "just waiting and seeing". It's been a fucking year! how long more does he expect this WAITing and SEEing to go on. He kept making this plotted graph type gesture and saying that he charted the ups and downs of our relationship like that, and he could report there are ups and there are downs. So lets wait another five years to make sure that pattern is the true one...and then what?

Jeeezus!

this line would make me leave him....

"if any other woman offered him a shag he would go for it..."

he already has

he puts no effort into your relationship, he rejects your advances

I see no reason for you to still be together, he plainly can't be arsed

even you are bored by it

it sounds bloody awful to me

Well being able to plot that there are ups and there are downs isn't exactly a searing or helpful analysis of the current crisis is it?

Oh it's tricky. I think you could just keep banging your head against the graph to be honest.

Yes, you could wait and see if the ADs improve things, but also suspect that they aren't going to transform him into a warm, generous partner who desires you and when you're sobbing into your pillow say, 'darling, what is it?' Or who has some understanding of how a relationship works and that the weather has really no bearing whatsoever on infidelity.

I used to have a similar joke with dh btw - he used to say 'you don't understand the artistic mind' when he'd failed to wash up or pay a bill or do whatever. But the difference is - honestly, it really was a joke.

You do sound unhappy - though I do like the way you talk about him too.

Decisions.

I know some people on ADs have had to stop taking them so they can properly feel and dream even. Might the ADs just dull the pain of something that should get addressed?

I was once in awe of an ex boyfriend's intellectual prowess, but after a while I realised he was a bit flimsy in spite of his Cambridge degree in philosophy. In my opinion there's an exremely fine line between being a high minded intellectual and being a complete wanker.

hi ebmn. love your name by the way. i am in similar position, though not for as long as you. after boring myself for just six months i have come to conclusion it is very very difficult to leave an unhappy relationship when you have children just because you are unhappy. thus members of the unhappily married/partnered club try and engineer a "proper" excuse -- having affair, having so many arguments its affecting the children etc. being really unhappy does not seem to cut it somehow as reason to break up, yet it destroys you. i imagine you would rather like someone to make the decision for you too. i know i would. anyway i take my hat off to you for trying for so long to make your relationship work. you can say with all honesty you tried everything......good luck

Time for some blunt therapy, with apologies in advance... This man is an arse. A total arse. He thinks himself a high minded intellectual and therefore sees this as an excuse not to meet any of your needs (including blatantly disregarding your feelings by messing about with someone else, even if the penis wasn't willing).

Yet he sits about wanting you to wash his skiddy pants and wait on him while he soaks himself in booze and casts his eye about for someone he considers more 'worthy' of the great 'him'. Oh - and all his personality faults (of which there are too many to recap on) are supposedly YOUR fault, because it is beyond his comprehension to consider that he might be less than perfect. So he is being a shit to you in the hope you will leave and then he can wallow in self pity. Twat.

And the truly worst thing? You are clearly smart and together, yet you have been so undermined that you think you can't do better and that he is what you want and need... and you'll even take ADs to numb the pain and struggle on. Stop it!

The fact that you are merely depressed after this treatment is a bloody miracle and a testament to your strength of character. But it isn't your fault... The ADs will just numb you and prolong this misery. He doesn't deserve any partner. Can't you get away for a bit to clear your head, think and show him you mean business? Even the sex is on his terms ffs - if you are serious about trying to save things (or at least be able to walk away having tried), then you need to stand up to him, tell him that normal people don't behave like this and don't take 'I'm an intellectual, you wouldn't understand things because you're just not on my level' as an excuse for him controlling the whole relationship anymore.

What have you got to lose if he walks away? Not much, really...

Look, there are loads of men who do this. He wants you to carry on feeding him and raising the DC and washing his pants, because he can't be arsed to go and look for another woman to do those things. So he'll alternate between making the odd vague gesture or promise towards considering your needs and treating you like a person, and criticising and undermining you. The idea is that you alternate between burst of hope that things can be fixed, and a miserable demoralized feeling that you deserve no better, so you carry on servicing him, and he tunes out your 'whining' till it reaches critical pitch and applies either stick or carrot.
Well you do deserve better, and what you really deserve is to be free of this parasite. I bet yo uwill be off the ADs within a fortnight of showing him the door.

ah but you see he isn't that bad - he does wash his own pants, and quite often mine. And even sometimes hang them out to dry (rarely takes them in and NEVER folds and puts away though)

he is home a lot though (wfh a lot of time) and often when I come home the place is like a bomb went off, the last time I went away for two days it was like a whole bomb squad had been overhead. I spent the whole of the next day (literally) trying to sort it out. I mean every room in the house. But he gets really cross if I get annoyed about this. I suppose I often think of threads on here where the woman is home all day and the man comes home expecting a pristine house and how he is seen as totally unreasonable. However, in my defence, I don't expect a pristine house at all , our bedclothes pulled up and his breakfast and lunch things dealt with would be fine. Kids are out all day.

He doesn't claim he is intellectual and I am too dumb to understand, well, I suppose maybe just not in so many words. Often I do follow a thread of thought of his and then question when he ends up contradicting himslef, then I get the whole "oh don't be so logical" or "oh don't be so literal" thing

tonight he is acting as though nothing was said last night, asking whether I will be up to eat together when he gets in etc. He always does this. Unless I have really laid into him (rare) when he acts all withdrawn, shocked and hurt.

Oh bolleaux, am sick of this.

I keep making excuses for him. Am i just frightened to be alone after so long? do i actually really love him (if so why the fuck?)? he is attractive (amazingly the drink hasn't ravaged him, yet). Do I just not want anyone else to have him (though I should be glad to foist him off on them!)

It was me whpo surmised that he'd be up for anything that presented itself with another attractive woman. Although I did put this to him last night to be met with silence. I suppose I should be glad he is decent enough not to lie to me. Although he tries to cover his back by saying I shouldn't read anything into his silences.

What an idiot (him/me take your pick!)

have just reread some of your responses, god they make so much sense

ducati I am sorry you are in similar position, it is shit when there are kids, you feel so selfish for wanting out just because you are unhappy in what feels like a vague can't pin it down sort of way (until you come on here and get the sort of talking to I've had ) tell you what - how about I decide for you and you decide for me? that'll make it all easier eh?

SGB, as usual, you talk sense. So much sense. That whole carrot and stick analogy, while putting me in the rather unattractive role of donkey, makes a lot of sense. I honestly don't think he means to do it though. He is not a bad, manipulative person.

Abdelia, your advice is great too. Stand up to him and tell him "normal" people don't behave like this. He'll start to ask what is "normal" though. Just like when I say something like "please be honest with me" he asks "what is honesty". don't imagine he will ever walk away, unless he has met someone new of course. Really, given as he is obviously not that into me that should tell me everything I need to know. cf. SGB's analysis of situation.

what's that phrase again, goes something like Head, brick, wall, beat...

'i 've slept with someone else because it was raining'.

Now i 've heard it all!!

Even apart from this all the rest is identical with my ex! Pseudo-philosophical answers, silence that 'could mean yes or could mean no' , 'lets wait and see', 'i'm not into talking' and other crap.

After wasting the best years of my life trying like you are trying now (and my heart feels for you) i had enough. I ve told him that i want a real and emotional convertation for once and not pseudo-intellectual one. I want proper answers because i 'm not psycic to guess what his fucking silences meant. I don't want to interprete his laconic responses, i want proper responses from a grown up man. I don't want to 'wait and see' because i 'm not going to live for ever. And if he is not going to contribute into the relationship i will leave.

His response? Yes, silence! And then another pseudo-intellectual coment. I left!

After few weeks alone he panicked. He suddenly wantent to talk (ha!), he wantend to make plans (again ha!), he expressed emotion, and he even discovered what florist shops are for and started sending me flowers. The problem is that now i was too drained by him and i didn't want him back.

I was living life to full after i left him. Years later i have a wonderful dh and 3 dcs. He lives alone. He told friends he regrets taking me for granted. He had 100 chances, he didn't use them.

Why i 'm telling you all this Even? Because i beg you not to waste your life with this man. These people suck your energy. Stop trying.

I am not saying file for divorce tomorrow. Leave him 'for while' and start building your own life. If he gets the 'shake up' and comes back a new man begging you then YOU will decide. If you still want him you can give him a chance then. But honestly is not point giving him chances now when he has everything in the plate, he will not try.

Bloody hell, this was long post... Sorry.