Has anyone been here?

[HeartBrokn]

I am wondering if anyone has experienced this and which side were you on. As some of you know my history, my wife and I have been married for ten years. We have had some highs and lows. We have kids and we were going through some very serious issues that almost led to a divorce last year when I deployed.

 

After I came back I completely changed things about me and now we get along very well and never fight. The problem is that my wife does not know if she wants to be in this relationship. She says she doesn't really feel it anymore. I love her very much and I am truly committed to her and even though we have our differences I want to spend the rest of my life with her.

 

I am really not sure what the problem is and why is she basically turning her back to me and quitting on the relationship. I also, admitted to her a few days ago that I was having feelings 5 years ago for a coworker. I told her I never pursued anything, which I didn't but I think it hurt her for me to say that. I did this not to cause her to jump into my arms because of jealousy, but more as a comparison as to not having feeling and getting them back.

 

She told me that she cried that night because it confirmed her suspicions. I don't think this is the reason she doesn't have feeling for me but maybe it has some small effects on how she feels for me. I told her during that time because of our tough times we dealt with I also did not have feeling for her during that time. I have come around and realized that I love her so much.

 

I know that all relationships starts as fun, exciting, close relationships that over time change into mediocre, boring and distant. But what is that fine balance? I mean my theory is you should stay in a marriage forever unless (Physical, Emotional Abuse or other factors that are this significant) and not just walk away when you don't have that feeling for the other person.

 

Is "that feeling" something that you have to work on and maintain or something that just happens and after it stops you walk away from relationship. I really don't think it is, but for her it doesn’t matter what I tell her. Sorry for the long post, I hope someone can give me some insight. Let me know if you were either in my wife’s situation or mine and tell me what you did and what your decision lead to. Thank you so much for your time.

[beingleft]

Well, I am feeling for you but I am probably wouldn't be any help. I was just left yesterday from over a 10 year relationship and he cheated on me but I am still begging him to stay. Although some of the things I have read are truly helping me.

 

I would just say to you that you can't make her love you. I know I can't make him love me. I was still trying today. But deep on my heart I know that I can't.

[HeartBrokn]

I am very sorry that you are going through this. Do you guys have kids? I know you can't make someone love you and I am not trying to convince her to love me, but I know feelings can be there and then disappear and then come back again. It happened to me. This is so frustrating, and having kids and always having the thought of losing them scars me so much. I am also, moving in two months accross to the other side of the country and she would stay here in Idaho if we end up splitting up.

 

When I think about it (other than having my beautiful daughters) I should have never gotten married to her. I got married at 20 she was 26. Now we have always had this discussion because she has mentioned to me that I got married young and that I wasn't ready for marriage. I think the reality is that I didn't know how to pick the right person for me (from my lack of experience) and not because I wasn't ready. I honestly could never explain that before it just came to me a few days ago.

 

Anyways, what was the circumstance of your husband/bf cheating?

[kalikat]

I read something today that made a lot of sense. I think it applies to this also...

It said "Is love truly enough to make a relationship survive?"

I had always thought "Yes - of course it is!"

wrong answer.

Because love without action will fade.

Action: show them you love them. Go above & beyond the humdrum-everyday life you lead together. The smallest gestures can make the biggest difference.

Talk is just talk....

[jettison]

Don't beat yourself up that way. It WAS the right person. You were together a decade, and now the relationship has run its course. Had you married someone else, you'd likely still be in the same place you're in now, or by contrast, divorced much sooner.

 

This is simply what happens, and it's no one's fault really when it does short of some obvious nefarious activity. People fall out of love. When that happened to me and my 11 year, I was wiped out completely. I shook in my bed for two months. I could barely speak and couldn't smile. And a few months later, I fell in love again. I'm not saying that's the right path for everyone, or even that it was the right path for me at the time, but wondrous things can happen when you allow doors to close. New ones can open. And remember, you can't ever open a new door until the other one is shut.

 

Since you have kids, it's so much more complicated then my situation. But just remember that there is no blame, that you did what you could do, and that it's not about someone messing up. It's just nature at her finest.

[beingleft]

No we don't have kids and I thought about that in my first response because you obviously have more to deal with than me. You have to think about your daughters and you and your wife because you care about what happens to all of them. You have way more responsibility resting on you and your actions. Mine aren't going to affect anyone's but my one. Think about trying to do something that would make her smile. It goes a long way.

[HeartBrokn]

I read something today that made a lot of sense. I think it applies to this also...

It said "Is love truly enough to make a relationship survive?"

I had always thought "Yes - of course it is!"

wrong answer.

Because love without action will fade.

Action: show them you love them. Go above & beyond the humdrum-everyday life you lead together. The smallest gestures can make the biggest difference.

Talk is just talk....

 

I agree kalikat, I do show her love, after I came back from my deployment not only were we not arguing but I id so much for her from taking care of the kids, washing the dishes every day, taking the time for us to hang out together, it was a very good atmosphere between us, it's just that she allowed herself to drift away from me. I can completely understand why, for a long time she was on unstable ground, with me constantly being inpatient with her, fighting over the smallest things and all done because of issues I was having in my own life.

 

This I think really plunged her into the state she is in now. Love is not temporary, I think feelings sometimes we call love (infatuation, lust blah blah) all other typical words to describe initial attraction is not true love. I think she is leaning too much of how she feels.

 

I also, think that she is going through a lot in her life. She is a mother to young kids, she works part time 20hrs per week, she is taking a class and hears my constant demands for intimacy and to spend more time with me. She is also an introvert. I can see where I might be driving her into this position.

[HeartBrokn]

Jett I think you are a great poster, very smart and thoughtful. I actually responded to another thread you replied to 3 people in a row. I was moved; anyways I agree with you in many ways, marriage to me is for life. I think we can all fall in and out of love, we can all recover from a brake up even though it has been after a long period. The problem I see is that marriage is an investment. If I didn't see it that way I would have left her long time ago. I had certain needs that weren't being met, I actually lost feeling for her and really if it wasn't for the kids I would have left her.

 

However, I am sort of the living proof that my love for her evolved into something more than what I used to have with her in the first few years of our relationship (before the issues). I went from not loving her to loving her again and my love for her is much stronger than it used to be.

[beingleft]

i actually thought this was real for a minute. peace.

[beingleft]

but you did make me laugh

[Ms Darcy]

I hope I don't sound like I am diminishing your feelings, but it really sounds like this relationship was in some serious trouble for a long long time. Unfortunately, I think your wife saying that she doesn't "feel it" anymore has led to a dimunition of the really big issue. It's not a simple matter of her walking away when the second the spark left. It is that all the pain, all the hurt, all the resentment, all the anger has grown and grown and grown into its own monster and she simply doesn't have the emotional energy to continue the fight.

 

I saw your post from last year. You said a lot of things that make the break up much more understandable:

 

"It's weird that you most people act exactly like their parents, I am no different. My dad basically runs things in his relationship with my mom. I have sort of transitioned to that in my relationship, even though my wife is a very independent, self thinking person whom is very opinionated. She is an introvert who enjoys working and spending a lot of time by herself. I think that I have suppressed how she is as a person."

 

"She basically supported us and since I was in a slight depression, she would come home after a long day of work and have to take care of my kid and me. She built up a lot of resentment towards me and after I came back into the military and started to support my family again she just could not forgive the fact that I wasn't there for her while she was going through that struggle."

 

"We pretty much did not seek any marriage counseling to help us transition from that into a normal healthy relationship, so we had a lot of fights where a lot of negative stuff was said, things like: I don't love you anymore, I wish you were like someone else, you are a bad mother, all damaging things that I sad not because I meant them but because I was hurt from the fact that she didn't care that I was sacrificing for my family and she did not appreciate it."

 

"Last five years of our marriage, have been very difficult ... Even though I am providing material support I am often not there when it comes to helping her with the kids. She feeds them, bathes them, reads to them, helps them due their homework, takes them to various after school events and I just work."

 

"I want to emphasize that I don't feel like I am a bad guy I just think the events in our lives have made things very difficult on our relationship. I do everything for my family I just think I miss the little things. While I was in the routine of my life back home I did not realize that I wasn't there like my wife and my kids wanted me to be."

 

"To make things worse, since my wife has been sort of detached emotionally from me for a while now, as I left she started to have feelings for some guy at work who apparently has been taking walks with her around her work and the other day hugged her."

 

Though you are not the bad guy, that is a lot. In a nutshell, it sounds like in the course of 10 years she had the dual role of supporting the entire family, taking care of the children, getting no appreciation, and having her personality crushed. What amazed me, and demonstrated that she was STARVED for love, was how much it impacted her for her coworker to hug her.

 

So, my dear, after such a long time with little emotional support and building resentment it seems that she also sensed that you were giving the love she so desperately waned from you to someone else. Unfortunately that might have been a nail in coffin situation.

 

My sister was in a similar situation except her husband was never deployed. Together ten years, two kids, a house, she was emotionally exhausted from doing everything for the kids, he was emotionally absent, they tried counseling, he made promises he couldn't keep, he cheated emotionally for a brief time, etc etc. She decided to end the marriage. She's single and while it hurt for a while, she's very happy now.

 

On the other side of it, my bf was left by his ex-wife in a similar situation 10 years ago. He never emotionally cheated, she was the one who cheated, but she said he was emotionally abusive yet unsupportive (like that soul-crushing, take charge thing whilst not being loving and caring you mentioned). It has hurt him a lot. Still to this day in some ways. But it has made him a better man. He's a lot less conservative, a lot more emotionally open or at least willing to listen to other people's emotions and concerns. He is very present in our relationship and loving - he's also very present and loving and patient with his kids. He even calls me everyday to 'connect.' My point is that there are two sides of this and neither one of you is the bad guy. He backslides sometimes and that's ok. I continually, caringly challenge him quite a bit - to open his heart, to trust me, to let go of some anger, to heal emotionally and spiritually. And, importantly, I communicate my wants and needs. We never let our needs go unspoken and unnourished.

 

If she is like my sister, she will feel some serious sadness at first and then find a lot of freedom in singlehood, the ability to breathe, be herself, discover her interests, pursue her dreams with less fear. She will move on. If you are like my bf, you will go through a depression. You will seek therapy and have some successes and failures with relationships. You will eventually find a wonderful partner for you as you will have grown into a more loving father and person. You will learn immensely about showing and empathizing with emotions. You will seek a more equal relationship and find a woman who can at once push you firmly and love you gently. You will move on too.

[Queen1607308152]

I think that sometimes people forget the pain they cause in the relationship and when they want things better, they expect it to just happen. One must understand that everyone gets tired and when one is tired, they're tired. Remember it doesn't take as long to fall in love, as it does to fall out. When we're in love, one usually loves hard, but if your mate treats you like mess and neglects you and you stay in the relationship...you just better hope you leave them before they put into that tiredness is put into action.

[Crazyaboutdogs]

I think that sometimes people forget the pain they cause in the relationship and when they want things better, they expect it to just happen. One must understand that everyone gets tired and when one is tired, they're tired. Remember it doesn't take as long to fall in love, as it does to fall out. When we're in love, one usually loves hard, but if your mate treats you like mess and neglects you and you stay in the relationship...you just better hope you leave them before they put into that tiredness is put into action.

 

I completely agree with you. A person who is dealing with a partner who continually shows lack of concern for their feelings and takes them for granted assuming they will always be there to put up with it often doesn't realize that as the days, months and years go by with the same treatment, the other person is slowly but surely pulling away until one day their emotions for the partner are dead because they are so tired of being treated as second class.

[kalikat]

HeartBrokn - this actually explains a lot to me. If she is anything like me (also an introvert), she needs time and space to process all these feelings.

Whenever my ex and I would argue, he would push and push to come to some sort of conclusion/agreement right on the spot. I could never do that. I would simply fold up and shut down.

As an introvert, I needed to take the time to process everything that was coming at me. Often, I would leave the house, just to walk around the block. Clear my head, focus on what the real issue was, stuff like that. When I'd get back to the house, I would feel better. Ready to face whatever the situation was. He, however, would feel that I had "walked out on him", that I had abandoned him. And as such, I couldn't possibly care about his feelings,etc. You get the picture.

It sounds like when you were deployed, things were left on shaky ground btwn the two of you. She probably prepped herself for the argument to continue when you got back. But now the situation has changed. And I am guessing that she feels thrown off balance by the whole thing.

[kalikat]

Think about this, too...

Could it be that the reason you feel that your love for her now is stronger, is because you now realize that she may not be be there for you anymore? Fear is a powerful motivator. I am not trying to diminish what you feel. But sometimes it helps to look at things from a lot of different angles.

[HeartBrokn]

Think about this, too...

Could it be that the reason you feel that your love for her now is stronger, is because you now realize that she may not be be there for you anymore? Fear is a powerful motivator. I am not trying to diminish what you feel. But sometimes it helps to look at things from a lot of different angles.

 

Well Kat, I think while I was deployed the fear of her leaving was a great motivator in my feelings. Throughout our marriage my heart hardened very much. I blame her mostly for that and I can explain later or in another post but after I left for my deployment and was away from all the distractions in life (Bills, Kids, TV, Internet, all the conveniences we are used to here in US) my shell that I had on my heart melted away, and I was actually able to feel those feelings for her that I had long time ago. Before that I was going through motions myself.

 

We would often have arguments in our marriage and threatened to leave each other, then I didn't care because in today’s world we can preoccupy the feelings of sadness and move on much easier. Bottom line is that although we went through chaos in our relationship I love her very much and I have realized that we can make this thing work, only if we both are willing participants. I don't have a good feeling she really is. I think she needs her Afghanistan to maybe realize her feelings without all the baggage she might be using to make up her mind.

[HeartBrokn]

I hope I don't sound like I am diminishing your feelings, but it really sounds like this relationship was in some serious trouble for a long long time. Unfortunately, I think your wife saying that she doesn't "feel it" anymore has led to a dimunition of the really big issue. It's not a simple matter of her walking away when the second the spark left. It is that all the pain, all the hurt, all the resentment, all the anger has grown and grown and grown into its own monster and she simply doesn't have the emotional energy to continue the fight.

 

 

I think you are right, it really was. We are both very different people. She is an introvert, not very outgoing, controlling, (almost like a dude when it comes to emotion) and I am sort of opposite, I am an extrovert, very outgoing, I love people and very emotional (not Gay, just passionate about life and people ) accommodating, and border line co-dependent so from my experience when looking outside at other relationships is pretty much the standard in relationships. Opposites attract.

 

However, unlike me who came from a great family. My dad was the driver as far as who the boss was in my family but my mom was ok with that it worked for them. Just trying to point out that I had a great family upbringing, not perfect but it was good. For her I could not say the same thing. She came from a family where her dad was also the tough guy but he was much more and he was very strict to her, her mom was not very emotional towards her and was never available for her. She has a lot of bad things to say about her mom even though she passed away couple years ago. She really brought some baggage into our relationship so while I was a great guy at first few years, her baggage turned me into a jerk. If it wasn't enough trying to iron out our own personnel differences with our personalities, and other stuff I had to deal with all that baggage, and at a very young age mind you.

 

So, yes our marriage was very rocky from the start and the fact I wasn't there for her after we had the kids was not because I just didn't give a crap, it was because I was dealing from depression from being in that turmoil myself. After a few years I came around and became fully devoted to my wife and kids, I took on a job that really didn't fit well with my personality, but I didn't quit I kept on doing it because it was for my family.

 

My frustration really deepened because she never recognized my effort for her, she always blew it off like I was doing that for myself and not so much her. This is where I really became a jerk and then started to have feeling for someone else. It's been that back and forth with us. I really think her baggage was the catalyst for our issues. Of course life happened and we just didn’t have a great way to deal with all those problems. It really saddens me because kids are involved. I know kids that grow up in divorce households are always impacted in a negative way. There is no denying that, I am so crushed because I am moving to the other side of the country and will not be able to be a good father 3 thousand miles away.

[Ms Darcy]

It is my humble belief that when you commit to marriage with someone, then you commit to making them your family. And in doing so, then you commit yourself to their baggage - to loving and accepting their baggage, challenging their baggage, helping them heal their baggage, getting space from their baggage. So it doesn't fly with me to say she turned you into a jerk. Rather, perhaps her actions made you feel justified in acting like a jerk. That's a different sentence construction: in the first 'she changed you' whereas in the second you willingly changed. I think the latter is most likely true.

 

Neither one of you is at total fault alone. You are both responsible for the place you are in today. What strikes me about your relationship is how young you both were. Certainly not old enough to really know yourselves in relationships and not experienced enough to navigate the murky waters of relationship communication. It's clear from your posts that needs were not being met for a long long time and neither of you seemed to know how to ask without bitterness ... if you asked at all.

 

Another word about family history. Give me 45 minutes and your mother's phone number and I'll probably have quite a bit to add about your family history. That's not to say that I think you have all of these family secrets or anything, BUT we end up with the people we end up with for a reason. Just makes me wonder what your mother's actual thoughts about her life are.

 

I find it very interesting how we sort of gloss over the first few years of the marriage. After years of not being devoted when you started to be devoted she didn't appreciate it like you wanted to and your response was to become a jerk? I can't help but wonder if perhaps if her response to your actions in the first few years was to become a jerk in her own way?

 

I'm really trying to encourage a little parity on the responsibility front. And I think your point about introversion and extroversion is a relevant one. My bf and I are both introverts. My roommate, Dave, is very extroverted. So, my bf and I can happily cuddle on the couch for an hour - him staring at the fish and me reading - while Dave keeps coming by asking us if we want to head out with him for the evening. He can't understand that we're happy where we are; it's foreign to him. And perhaps that underlies the fundamental incompatibility between you two. Your energies are not only different but foreign to each other. It seems like the parting of you two makes the most sense at this time.

[HeartBrokn]

 

I find it very interesting how we sort of gloss over the first few years of the marriage. After years of not being devoted when you started to be devoted she didn't appreciate it like you wanted to and your response was to become a jerk? I can't help but wonder if perhaps if her response to your actions in the first few years was to become a jerk in her own way?

 

 

Listen, it's nice that you are trying to find stuff that people don't always admit on these pages, the stuff that might may THEM responsible for their failure, but you did not live with us through our marriage and I don't have the time to say everything that I want to say that is relevant in my story.

These are the Cliff Notes:

Chapter one: I was the nicest guy when we started dating. She in the beginning took advantage of that and it brought up some resentment between us. Chapter two: We had kids, I could not find a job, I was depressed due to that and because of past we had prior to that. She did not understand me, and rightfully so. It's hard to empathize with people that experience things you never have. I did not realize how it impacted her and it caused issues. Chapter three: I went back to the military, took on a job to support the family, found out it was not a job for me but stuck around to not let my family down. Dealing with the weight of doing a job that I wasn't too thrilled to do and always worrying that I was going to lose it was more than I could handle without my wife there to support me.

 

There is more to this book, this was only 5 years worth and all those were merely titles to the chapters. So again it's one thing to try to give feedback to someone in such a detailed way when you don't really know all the pieces to the story.

[Ms Darcy]

Everything is perspective isn't it? There are always multiple sides to any story and we are only hearing the selected pieces that you share.

 

We'll never know the entire truth.