My wife says it's too little, too late

[benthebuilder]

Would have put this on Dadsnet, but it seems a bit quiet and I urgently need advice.
Basically, my wife has told me that my attempts to become more understanding regarding her needs and feelings is too little too late.
Dinn't realise how serious problem was until I read a letter of hers from solicitor regarding divorce.
Have attempted to talk with her about this, but she says it's far too late to show concern now, about 3 years too late actually.
I don't want a divorce, but she seems to have come to the end of the line with me and refuses to talk about it, saying I have left it too late.
What do I do now?
Also. I think things have come to a head over past few days and she is removing herself emotionally from our family.

notalways a lot of people have joint friends with their dp and for whatever reason might choose not to offload on those people

mn good for a bit of ranting/venting when one tires of the Stiff Upper Lip

DH is friends with all my friends. They very rarely see him as he is. He is too clever for that. Plus, I wouldn't want to put them in a position whereby they felt they had chose between us. I don't think it is that unusual, tbh.

Excellent advice given = disappearing OP

Questions raised about his motives = fireworks.

I think this is weird from what i read of his post it seems he was looking for advice on how to fix his relationship not looking for sympathy any way his gone now so no point me saying anything further.

Agree with those who think BTB got a rough ride here. Always saddens me when I see this happen

I think he went because his wife was in the bath (so he said) whilst he was posting. I assume she came out and he didn't want her to see.

However, I do agree that he didn't respond at all to the posts giving him constructive advice (mine was right at the beginning ), whether he disagreed with the advice or not, there was zero response to it.

This has happened before.

Bloke posts (ostensibly) for advice.

Thread then goes one of two ways -

Like the majority of people genuinely posting for advice/help he listens to what people are saying, takes advice on board and responds.

The thread continues with people offering advice, agreeing, diasgreeing, bickering - ie what happens every minute of every day on MN.

OR:-

Bloke ignores advice completely. Some posters call him on it and wonder what his motivation is, since he is not acknowledging or responding any of the advice offered.

Other posters pile in to support and coo over the poor, hard done by chap (who is only asking for help after all), because he is apparently being ripped to pieces by all the dreadful man hating witches/harpies that hang round on MN.

What has happened here, I wonder.

the latter...and he is a poor male who unfortunately just doesn't understand decent respectful behaviour women...boo fucking hoo

Yep. I don't buy the 'I'm a bloke and therefore excused from behaving like a decent human being line' either.

Oh, I forgot vipers..that's another popular one.

harridans, I'll have you know

that is a step-up from viper

especially a MN-addicted harridan

we are among the elite of bitches

I am just wondering how notalways knows me in RL

AnyF and Janos,

I think you are being harsh and taking his comments out of context? I agree with you that in RL if this was the attitude I would not be having any of it eitehr but people can't put everything on here can they.

Most guys are prety good and he's on here asking for help, surely we could give him some tips - wish my H would get onto MN!

Lucy85, I doubt it would make much difference. DH reads MN, he would never dare post though, because he has read enough to know that we are indeed all men hating mn addicted harridens

Btw I don't hate all men, just the ones who behave like pricks.

Well, what bothered me about his post is that it's still all about what he wants. He doesn't say he loves his wife an doesn't want to lose her. He just says he doesn't want to be divorced. It doesn't say a lot about the degree of his affection for his wife tbh.
I would be more inclined to be supportive if he gave ANY sign that he genuinely doesn't want to lose his wife.

he's had some tips, lucy...he chose to not even ackowledge those before he sodded off

If BTB returns and does want advice, I'd say that you're either going to be single and doing everything yourself, or becoming part of the family again and doing lots more to support them.
So it's time to become a father by taking over a fair share of the chores as well, shopping & cooking after work, clearing and caring. And letting your wife go out in the evening while you look after the kids, so that she gets a break. And as said before, going out together as a family and listening to what she wants and giving it to her.
That way she may change her mind before the lawyers dig too deep.

Lucy - there was a lot of good advice on here that he didn't acknowledge/respond to.

Posted before I meant to!

If someone posts for advice (so they say) and then completely ignore any advice given, well you wonder why they bothered to post in the first place.

By sodding off the way he has done, he's proved that he's either a controlling, manipulative knob who just wants his wife to read his thread and be intimidated/sympathetic...whatever.

Or, he genuinely came looking for advice but is categorically unable to listen, accept or acknowledge good advice when it's given, which is probably why his wife wants to divorce him.

I'm not a big poster on MN , but am staggered that people can't see this about him. It's not an anti-men thing at all!

I reckon it is only a matter of time until the DM runs Ben's article "I tried to get some advice from MN but the evil harridan man-haters ripped me to shreds." I wonder what they'll do about Anyfucker's name if they want to quote her...

He's gone to watch for the post.

He posted this with an unashamed mention of opening her private letter to warn her that he will fight to the death, and dirty too, over money.

i keep trying to ignore this thread and keep going back like i'm picking a scab. i'm not taking the 'poor man' pov at all, but i am strongly reminded of my first post on mn. not knowing how it worked, i started a thread on something fairly innocuous, but because i didn't know where to post, and how things can be interpreted on here, i was quickly flamed to death, accused of being a troll, had my every sentence picked to pieces and found the whole situation very stressful - i can feel my blood pressure rising now just thinking about it.

i say this because i had a handful of posters responding to me sensibly, but the overwhelming majority were assuming i was in a much more sinister situation than the one i was describing. any effort i made to further explain was derided as me being 'in denial'. i got the thread deleted and swore never to return. of course i did! but i am not surprised that btb hasn't returned, hasn't acknowledged the great advice he's been offered. i genuinely think he didn't know what he was walking into.

Ben, I'm a guy. So I should be able to empathise with you.

Sadly you sound like a fucking div.

Demanded sex even in bad mood...that's fucking too rapey for my liking you plank.

Demand sex? Ewww.

Wrong 'un.

ami....not all of us were taken in by his "little boy lost" bullshit

Hali...funnily enough I have never been quoted by the DM on here , even though I am sure many of my variety of comments across the boards are eminently quote-worthy

staines...many of us had that "baptism of fire" you describe when first joining MN. My first couple of incarnations got an absolute pasting (I am somewhat outspoken at times) but I learned and have managed to hang onto this name for a long while now

it doesn't make it right and it's not very nice to flame just because you yourself have been...and that is not why I (and others)gave this bloke a rough ride. I stand by everything I have said on this thread.

Sorry I'd like to take that back as the OP never said demanded.

He said expecting meals on table, sex when I am in mood.

Really fucking grim shit all the same. Grim. Bad. Awful.

I'd love to be wrong, but now I find myself taking AF's side, tbh.

Hell, he asked me a direct question, I respond directly pointing him to several pieces of excellent advice by others, and nothing. Rather as if anyone not saying what he hoped to hear would be ignored.

He admitted faults, but was blind to how bad they were.

Even in the midst of my first flaming thread, I managed to acknowledge and thank those who gave advice.

And as CF says: "'sex when I am in the mood' that's fucking too rapey."