Unregistered
15th April 2003, 06:15 PM
At my wits' end, don't know where to turn. Met my husband in 1995 when I was 35. He was besotted with me and told everyone so. 6 months later I sold my flat and bought another house but with no thoughts of marriage in mind. He moved in with me straight away and asked me almost every week to marry him (his second time) I kept saying no but eventually decided that I could be happy with this man for the rest of my life and we married in 1998. When we met I had a flat, car, good job etc and he lived in rented accommodation, no car, no qualifications, no job and was in and out of work for the next few years, always with me helping to find him a new job. We've had disagreements, like every married couple and things have been said in arguments which shouldn't have been said, me casting up the fact that if it wasn't for me he'd still have nothing etc. but we've always made up afterwards and got through it. He's always bottled up his feelings about anything and I've had to chip away until I managed to find out what was bothering him and he has said to family members that it was better for him to talk after all. His mother died last year and although she lived about 200 miles away from us and we didn't see her very often, it hit him very hard. I tried my best to help him through it and although I know he still misses his mum, if he's been down a cuddle and a cry has helped. Last summer we were house hunting for a house with a bit more room but couldn't find anything in our budget so we decided to do an attic conversion which meant cutting down on spending so we could afford it. But instead of cutting down, his spending was spiralling out of control and our account was a joint one. Towards the end of last year he became fed up with his current job and wanted to do something else, but didn't know what. I just thought it was one of the rough times but we would get through it like all marrieds . On Valentines' day this year he booked a romantic dinner at a nearby hotel and we had a wonderful evening and then on our anniversary on 7 March he gave me a card which had a picture on it which he chose because it reminded him of my favourite painting. Three days later, he announced that he was bored, had been feeling this way for months and he wanted to run away. He had been speaking to his best friend who lives 250 miles away who had said there was a job available where he works where my husband could make lots of money and he was seriously thinking of going. In a defensive answer I said, on you go (as you do in an argument) because he hadn't even spoken about any problem before this but he's always been a bit moody and usually comes out of it in a few hours. I noticed he stopped wearing his wedding ring and his mobile phone was glued to his hand receiving text messages all day long. I've always believed in never letting the sun set on an argument and no matter what I've always insisted on a kiss before bedtime and a kiss before leaving in the morning. There was a kind of uneasy truce over the next 2 weeks but sometimes I had to ask for a kiss and he would reply do I have to and wouldn't let me cuddle him at all. He went to visit the friend in question at the end of that 2 week period and he called while he was away each day and asked me to pick him up at the airport, which I did. He enjoyed the weekend but on the Monday as I was going to work he asked if I wanted a lift to work (his day off) but I was ready to go at that point so I said he didn't need to. He then came through and asked for a kiss before he went into the shower as I was leaving then. You can imagine, I thought things were turning a corner. However, all that day everything was preying on my mind and I felt I had to confront it all and get it out in the open so that night I said I knew he hadn't been happy lately but needed to know firstly if there was someone else. He said there's not and never has been but the mobile phone situation has made me suspicious especially when I once went to open it for him while we were in the car and pass it to him to speak and he snatched it out of my hand faster than you could ever believe. The trust starts to erode away when things like that happen. He said he had made up his mind that day he's bored, doesn't want to be married any more, is giving up his job here and going down to where his friend lives to work there. He refused to listen to me when I tried to find out where it had all gone wrong, just kept saying it's not me he just doesn't want to be here any more, he doesn't love me. He then left the house and phoned my mum and dad to tell them what had happened and that they should call me as I was upset. 10 minutes later by chance his own brother phoned for him and when he heard me crying asked what was wrong and could not believe it. He offered to come down to be with me but I knew that my husband would go there first. Both families are stunned as he has always told them how much he loves me, he tells everyone he works with how much he loves me and they then tell me whenever we meet, which is quite embarrasing sometimes! I have always been quiet and shy and find it difficult to speak to people I don't really know in a social situation, while he's always been the outgoing loud one who, as the years have gone past, has quietened down a bit with maturity but he thinks that he's become boring. He says I never join in with anything with his friends but I'm no different now than I was when he was desperate to marry me. I suggested marriage counselling but he wouldn't hear of it and wouldn't discuss it any further. He moved into the living room and when I said if he didn't want to be in the marriage any more then he should leave he said he had nowhere to go and would leave when he was ready when his next pay came through. A week later I wrote him a lengthy letter putting all my feelings into words and I asked him to read it. He did, while I was out of the room, and when I asked if he could speak about it he said it made no difference, he'd made up his mind. I managed to get him to speak for about half an hour with me asking all the questions about why when the going gets tough he runs (he's done it in previous relationships and jobs) and he says he doesn't know. I had found infor on depression which I asked him to read as all his recent symptoms seemed to point to that and suggested he speak to his doctor about counselling. He said maybe he would but that wouldn't help us. I know he went to his doctor a few days later because I saw the prescription bag lying on the chair beside him. He's made no effort to hide it and it is lying open in the kitchen now. The doctor has put him on an anti depressant but as he's not told me, I don't know how to broach the subject as every time I try to speak to him about us he tells me to stop trying to analyse it and there's nothing more to say. It's destroying me and I've lost so much weight over these four weeks because I can hardly eat, sleep or think straight. My doctor wanted me to stay off work for another 2 weeks but that just makes things worse sitting in the house with nothing else to think of. She's also put me on a low dose of diazepam but I don't feel they've helped as I am bursting into tears every five minutes. Since then he's been blowing hot and cold. There's only one TV in the house so if we're watching something he'll chat about the programme or the actors or whatever and then when I get up to go to bed I make a point of saying goodnight and he has just been ignoring me as if I wasn't even there and leaves without saying anything in the morning. Last week on his mid week day off he painted the front gate and when I asked what made him do that he said he was fed up looking at it like that! But if he's leaving, then what difference does it make to him? I had news on Wednesday night that a close friend's husband died very suddenly and I was very upset. He left the room while I made a couple of phone calls to other people to let them know and then offered to make me a cup of tea when he came back into the room and came through to say goodnight after I went through to bed and asked if I'd slept ok in the morning. He stopped outside the bathroom door on the way to work to say goodbye, see you later. Then he phoned me at work to see if I was ok. He thought I should take the day off and if I was going to go home early would I phone him at work just to let him know! He was going out with his brother on Saturday night and I was going out with some girlfriends and his brother met him at our house first and spoke to me briefly and said goodbye when I was going out the door but my husband never said a word. His brother phoned me later on his way home and had a long chat about how he thinks my husband is doing the wrong thing and also thinks he is suffering from depression and was trying to encourage him into counselling. When my husband came in I was still awake reading and he came in to ask how the night out went (see what I mean about hot and cold) and then said goodnight, see you tomorrow. The Council appear to be creating speed bumps in our street and the next day I asked him if he had noticed it and he said he was thinking of asking the council to drop the pavement at the end of our path as that is where he takes his motorbike in and out of the garden! Once again, if he's not staying, what is he thinking of! I feel like I am going off my head and although my family will all stick by me no matter what happens, I can't go on living like this. I've told him that this is destroying me but it is falling on deaf ears. I asked him what makes him think he'll be any happier on his own and he said he doesn't think he will be but he's miserable here. He says he doesn't have anyone else, doesn't want anyone else but doesn't want me either.