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View Full Version : Please listen to my story..........I need you all of your help


Timshade
29th March 2007, 10:45 PM
Hello Everyone. I stumbled upon this site and I am glad I found it. The truth of the matter is that I have had the worst shake up of my entire life in the past two weeks and I am looking for help, for support, and a friendly ear to help me get through this. It is hard to talk about and my life has been destroyed and I don't know where else to turn. Hopefully, I can find solice in the opinions of all of you and I can allow those opinions to help guide me toward brighter days. Right now, I feel surrounded by darkness and I can't seem to find a way out. That being said, this is my story.........

First, a little about me as a backdrop - I cannot be helped or understood unless you all can see and feel as though you know my soul, at least a little bit. I am a fighter. I always have been. I come from a small town with small town values and a family that shows love through their actions. We fight for each other. We believe in loyalty, strength in numbers, and character. I never quit - I don't believe in it. I don't allow the word "can't" to enter my vocabulary. Although I have not been formally diagnosed, I am very ADHD. I always have been. Through high school, I was a troubled youth. I was suspended over 40 times during my senior year for a myriad of reasons. Most teachers would tell me things like "you will end up in prison sooner or later." I was referred to as an idiot many times over by many individuals. I was a bottom of the barrel bad-boy that didn't have a lot of hope coming out of high school and didn't have a family that makes much money. After high school, I decided to change myself. I decided that ADHD was no deficit; it was a gift and so were the comments made by everyone around me. I decided that I could change my stars if I was willing to stick my neck out and never quit. I didn't quit and I never stopped believing in myself, even if those around me didn't. I used my ADHD to help multi-task everything and keep my brain firing all the time, from the time I woke up until I went to sleep each night. I used the comments and opinions of others as a fire to burn me up over and over again, almost like a fuel that drove me like a dart for years. Over the course of the next 6 or 7 years, I worked tirelessly day and night and I ended up becoming a psychologist. I decided that I wanted to share my story with others and devote my life to becoming a conduit to help others change, especially those that feel like they are hopeless, disordered, or are weak. As a psychologist, I can devote my life to this.

My wife and I met in graduate school about 4 years ago. She comes from a family with money that lives in an upscale neighborhood. They are decent people, but her mother and father have an affectionless marriage. He works 80 to 100 hours a week and there is a history of family depression. Her mother, grandmother, and aunt have all had major difficulties with depression, anxiety, medication, et. and my wife does not fall far from the tree. Her parents are unaffectioante to the point that her father does not even buy her mother a Chrsitmas present and she usually ends up crying on Christmas day each year as a result. In past years, my wife has even bought presents for her mother and written her dad's name on the tag to try to make things better for her mother. That being stated, we started dating about one month after we met and had a fantastic relationship. We had tons of common interests, could talk for hours on end about seemingly nothing (we are both psychologists, so some of the dumbest topics known to man can be intriguing to us!), and had a strong level of respect for one another and each other's opinions. As time went on, our relationship strengthened and everything was going great - we even talked of marriage after we completed school. A side note that I should make is that my wife has had many difficulties with depression over the course of her life, much like the rest of her female blood-line and she was taking medication for this when we started dating. As our relationship continued, she went off the medication because she said she was happy enough with her life that she no longer needed them (which was a good thing). After about 15- 16 months, the toll of being very busy due to grad school (in addition to the fact that I was working full-time, as well) started to take it's toll and things began going sour between the two of us. She began saying that I was not affectionate enough toward her in terms of kisses, hugs, and all that kind of stuff. We had quite a few arguments about this and I tried to explain to her that I was not that affectionate of a person to begin with (I don't come from a family that shows affection through kisses, hand holding, etc. - my family has always been more about showing the person affection through hard work, keeping a new house, going out of your way to help, listen, etc.) and I also tried to explain that I was very tired due to long hours of work each day (including weekends). I kept promising that I would try to be better with the affection thing and I meant it, but it wasn't easy due to our schedule and whatnot. After awhile, the relationship got to the point where she was sick of telling me that she wanted more affection and she decided to break up with me. I told her that we could work things out and that I would try harder, but she didn't want to listen. I pleaded with her to work things out with me, but she would have none of it. After we broke up, I still maintained contact with her through graduate school and small talk over IM and I found out a month after we broke up that she was engaged! I was devastated, thinking "wow, I must have been a real prize for her to walk away from us and then get engaged immediately like that!" This hurt me, alot, but I survived.

About two weeks after her "engagement," I received a tearful phone call from her - the guy she was engaged to slept with another woman a few days after their engagement and he got the girl pregnant! My wife quickly ended the relationship and was very apologetic toward me, claiming how "dumb she had been" and "how wrong she was about us." We talked through things and worked through things over the course of the next few weeks and we got back together. I loved her and was very happy to have been granted a miracle in terms of putting our relationship back together. Fast forwarding a little bit, my wife got a job a couple hours away just out of graduate school and was going to be making a good deal of money. She decided to buy a new house in the area, because it was going to be about the same price as buying one. Things in our relationship progressed nicely. She was back on her depression medication, sought counseling due to her last "break up," and we were very happy with one another. Over the summer, we decided that we would move in together in her new house once my lease was up. The weekend before we were to move in, I put an engagement ring on her finger, as I had decided that she was "the one." She gleefully accepted the engagement and a few days later, we moved in together.

Life was good, real good, in fact. We had a brand new house, all new furnishings for the house, we lived in an upscale neighborhood, and between the two of us, we were bringing in a considerable amount of money. The only apparent problems were that I wanted to keep the job I had during grad school (it pays pretty good), but we agreed it was best for me to keep it because it was stable and had a good rate on health insurance. I also really like where I work - the people are friendly and a re generally very good hearted people - there is no amount of pay in the world to me that can outweigh this. I commuted out a couple days a week and stayed at my folks house two nights each week after changing my work schedule to a four-day instead of five-day deal to make it feasible. Things went very well. We decided to get married the next summer and there was alot of planning (as I am sure you all know), but we generally had fun with it, as well as everything we had going on with our new house. After about 6 months or so, my wife started to not like her job much, despite the good pay (she also went off of her depression meds again). I told her to try to stick it out if possible, but i got to a point where she could not bear it any longer, so she found another job that payed almost as well in a related position for a different company, which was fine.

The months went by and things were good - we were happy, had many common interests and enjoyed doing the simple, routine things of life together - cleaning the house, shopping, caring for our little dog, and just discussing our jobs and whatnot. The wedding came and went, the honeymoon went awesome. After our honeymoon, I accepted a consult position with a local company that pays very well and retained my other job "back home." This made my schedule a little busier, but it was well worth the money. Over the next few months, my wife started to complain about the lack of affection again, saying that "we are newlyweds and you hardly ever kiss me or sleep with me." I told her that I was very tired and we would have arguments about it. Part of the problem was that my wife is not a great homemaker, she never was and I knew that going in - I was fine with that. When I was home on the weekend, I always made an effort to get the house cleaned up - I'm not an obsessive compulsive neat freak or anything - I just like the dishes to be done, dirty clothes in the hamper, and things generally picked up. When I would leave and come back home, the house would be all messed up again (I obviously didn't make the mess, because I was not home!). I wouldn't get openly mad at her about this, but I would get frustrated and this wouldn't make me feel too "affectionate" toward her, especially since I worked long days and was often very tired. I tried to tell her that these behaviors did not help the affection thing, so she would try for a few days to be better with it and then would be right back to the same old ways. On top of this, her job required her to do a considerable amount of work at home and she would often have to work for long hours on the weekends and evenings and this often strained our ability to do fun things. She would often ask me "do you find me attractive?" I would respond with yes, because she is attractive and that was not the problem. The problem was literally that I was tired and I always felt busy. She would often complain about her job and how much work it was - this didn't help either because that would make me angry - I worked very hard for long hours myself, but she never seemed to see it that way - her job was hard and I should be supportive.

Fast forward now to about three weeks ago. She was writing reports downstairs and I was upstairs doing some of my own work. While I was up there I decided to look at a couple adult websites. This is not a behavior that I do often, like once every couple weeks or so. In any sense, she caught me and flipped out about it. I calmed her down and told her that if it bothered her that bad and upset her that badly, I wouldn't look on them anymore. We worked through it and things were ok between us for the next few weeks. Apparently I didn't realize this, but she was very paranoid about the whole adult website thing and she consulted her brother and his friends and found out how to dig deep into my computer's history. She found out that I had signed up for a cheap webcam site before we were engaged and totally flipped her lid over this. I told her that it was before we were even engaged (literally like two years ago). I told her that it was stupid and I only even went on it a couple times and didn't really think it was very exciting (this is the truth - I only logged into the stupid thing I think three times total and never used it again). She was infuriated in any sense and wanted me to leave the house. It was late - like 8:00 or so and I was going to be leaving the next morning early and wouldn't be back for a couple days (I had also had a couple beers that night and didn't want to go driving) so I told her that this was stupid and if she was that mad I would go sleep in the guest bedroom (which I ended up doing). We argued for awhile about it and I told her that I promised that I would not look at that crap anymore and that was way in the past (this was a promisethat I absolutely kept and am still keeping - a promise that I kept from the time of our first argument). The next morning, we woke up around the same time and we had coffee together and made small talk. I told her that we would work this out and she seemed ok. We hugged and kissed before we left that morning and I left for my job.

I got to work and felt really horrible about the whole situation. I wanted to make everything up to her, so I asked my boss if I could take a couple of vacation days and go home. She said that i could and I took off for home. I got home about and hour and a half later and decided that I would take her out to a nice dinner when she got home and we could talk about things. She was scheduled to be home around 3 or so and the time came and went and she never showed up. She called a couple hours later and said "I see that you are home." I told her that I came home so we could talk because I felt really bad about everything. She replied by saying that she didn't want to talk about things and that she was going back to her parents house for the night since she had a doctor appointment the next day anyway. I told her that was fine and that we would talk the next day.

The next day, I was still feeling bad, so I called her father to tell him that her and I were having some difficulties and to ask his advice on what to do to get things back on track. He said that it wasn't his place and that we needed to talk to each other - that is all he would say: "you two need to talk about things and work them out." I thanked him for his time and waited for her to get home. This was on Friday, two weeks ago. I waited for her to get home all day and I even did something that I hadn't done that day in about 10 years. I went to church for a few hours to pray for our relationship to get back on track and to have the strength to put all of the stupidity behind us and be happy. I left the church feeling much better about things and I went home to wait for her.

About 5 o'clock I saw her car finally pull up. her mother was in the car with her, and her father pulled up in his truck behind her car. She walked in with her parents and I asked her "what is going on." She started yelling and screaming that I was a pig and a liar and that she wanted a divorce. She said that I will never change and she is sick of not being treated with the affection that she deserves. I told her that this is ridiculous and we need to sit down, the two of us, and talk about this. She said no and that she wanted me to get my crap and get the hell out of the house. She said she had made up her mind and it was final and that a divorce was imminent. She said that I was choosing adult crap over her and that I was a disgusting person. I tried to tell her that this was not the case and that she was blowing it all out of proportion. At this point I began to cry, telling her I was sorry about everything stupid that I had done in the past and that we needed to work this out. She said that she was sick of me saying I will change and getting no results and that she wouldn't live that way anymore. After about 20 minutes of pleading with her to see a counselor, a priest, whatever it takes to work this situation out, I realized I was going nowhere with the discussion and I called my parents to get me out. My parents are very good people, they always have been, so they dropped what they were doing and made the hour and a half drive. I called a friend too, which also showed up as quickly as he could. They all showed up and I piled as much stuff as I could in garbage bags and threw them in my car and the other vehicles. My parents tried to be respectful toward her parents and they were just cold in return. She was cold toward my family as well and this hurt my parents because they treated her like another daughter from day one and went out of their way whenever she was around to make her happy and to feel welcome in our family. We drove back to my parents house in complete shock. There was nothing that I could do, as the house was in her name (we never changed it and she payed the mortgage each month while I payed for all the utilities, car repairs, dates, and all the other stuff needed to run a household) so I could not even stay to make a stand because in her mind state that night, I am sure she would have called the police. Before we parted ways that night, she said that she wanted to make the divorce "easy" and didn't want it to be a big fight. I told her that I loved her and I could not fight her. She gave me a hug and a kiss on the lips and said "thank you."

The next day, I called her and tried to reason with her. She would have any of it and told me to get up there and get more of my garbage out of there. I told her I would and I called her about an hour before I left to tell her we were coming. I showed up with my mother and she was not here, nor was her mother, only her father. Not only was she not there, but her father had changed all the locks on the house! I couldn't believe it! He was cold the entire time to me and my mother as we boxed and bagged as much as we could fit in my car. I told him before we left that we would probably be back during the week to which he said "you don't need to come up here during the week - you don't have that much stuff here and you can get it out in a couple of hours." I told him that was not realistic (I have many books, stereo equipment, televisions, and other electronics hooked up all over the house and they take time to dismantle. He said he didn't care. We left and went back home.

I talked to her the next morning on the phone. She was upset because I had taken the television remotes and the phone (which were mine) and she need them. We talked for awhile and I explained that the stupid webcam site was just a dumb thing that I was curious about and it wasn't really a big deal, especially since it was so long ago. She seemed to start to think reasonably about it and kept saying that "she didn't know what to do." I told her that if this was the case and she was having any second thoughts, then we should really be sitting down together and talking about it or seeing a counselor, or whatever it takes and not throw everything else away. She always said that except for the affection thing, everything else in our relationship was perfect and I brought this up. The conversation went ok and we agreed to talk more about it later. I felt bad about her not having the remote or the phone so I got in my car and drove the hour and a half to give them to her (I had to dig through the garbage bags full of stuff in my parents garage to find them, but I left as soon as I found them). I called her right before I got thre and told her to come outside. I gave her the controller and the phone and she seemed happy. I told her we needed to think this over and try to work this out. She said she needed to think about things and we could talk later. We gave each other a hug and a quick kiss before I left. Later in the day, she called upset again because her printer was not hooked up correctly and she needed it for work. I talked her through the hookup and setup and after that she said that we could talk more the next day.

The next day, she was angry again and didn't want to talk about things. It wasn't a totally negative conversation, but it wasn't exactly positive, either. Later in the day we talked again and it was a productive conversation. It felt like we were starting to connect. We talked for about two hours and it got late. She was tired so I let her go. We agree to talk the next day. I called her the next morning and she was back to being angry and sure that she wanted a divorce. We argued back and forth for awhile and I told her that I needed to get the rest of my stuff out of the house and asked if I could come up during the week with my mother to box things up so when we had the Uhaul on Saturday it would be faster and easier. She said that I could and we left it at that. She emailed me an hour later and said that we need to be out by 1 or so because she didn't want to leave us there alone. I told her that was fine and I also told her that we really needed to think about this because I didnt feel that this was all the right decision. She got really upset and hung the phone up on me. An hour later, her father called my phone and told me that we were not allowed to come during the week, only on Saturday. I told him that I just talked to his daughter and she said otherwise. he said that he didn't care and that we were only allowed in there on Saturday. Instead of fighting about it, I just said "fine" and hung up.

Last Saturday, I showed up with the Uhaul and my parents/friends to get my stuff. She was again, not there and didn't even have the heart to leave our dog there so I could see him before I left.

At this point, she will not return my phone calls, e-mails, or test messages. She will not contact me in any way and she just ignores every attempt that I make to talk to her. I don't know what to do at this point, everyone. I love her and I would do whatever it takes to put things right. I really do love her and I really would do whatever it takes, but she won't respond to me at all, in any way. It is like I no longer exist.

I feel destroyed. I feel like I have been killed and now I have to live with it. When we were married, I took our vows very seriously and always told her that we would always work through every problem we ever encounter and she agreed. She doesn't care, now. She was supposed to be my best friend and we were supposed to always stand at each other's side, no matter what. I always told her that there is nothing that we could not solve and beat if we worked together on it and I meant it. She could cheat on me and I would still try to find a way to mend the relationship. I don't know what to think, what to do, what to say. I trusted her to always stick by me and as soon as the relationship got a little difficult, she has completely turned her back on me and won't even make a half hearted attempt to resolve these issues. I feel like I can't trust anyone. Everything in my life was destroyed in a matter of moments. I lost my wife, my best friend, my home, my dog, and my lifestyle at the drop of the dime. What does everyone think? I just don't know what to do right now, with myself, with this situation, everything. To all of you who read my story and respond: Thank You. I am lost right now and I don't know what to do or where to turn. I just don't know.............

"I am not afraid to keep on living,
I am not afraid to walk this world alone"
- My Chemical Romance

Timshade
29th March 2007, 11:24 PM
Does anyone have a clue what do do???? I feel like I am spinning my wheels and I can't get out of this rut.........

Connaught
29th March 2007, 11:26 PM
tim

The best advice I can give you is back off and leave her to deal with this. This is her issue not yours, What I do not get is - how anyone can walk away from a marriage because a Husband looks at adult sites on the net ???? is there a missing piece in the jigsaw ???? if you you let something go it will come back to you. You need to stay strong and let her come to you, she is confused and it looks like her parents etc are feeding her once the anger is gone she will be back. If she did'nt love you why would she kiss you it looks like a massieve tantrum to me.

Take care of you for the moment and be posative

Timshade
29th March 2007, 11:31 PM
Thank you for your advice Connaught. I appreciate your reply. I don't know how she can! that is why this is hurting me so bad - there is that particular situation and the lack of affection and that is it. There are no other missing pieces - that is why I wrote such a long post - I wanted the entire situation laid out for everyone - I feel like I am going crazy because I just don't get it!

Connaught
29th March 2007, 11:36 PM
Then you need to give her time to cool off and then when she is ready she will contact you. You need to ask her what this is all about, you need to communicate maybeon deeper level than you normally do ??? as she clealy has an issue that she wants to walk away, although from your story above it looks like attention seeking or cry in someway ??? as I said before stay strong and back off, she must not see you fall apart, she can know your hurting but do not fall apart. I have funny feeling this will work it's way through for your both. Hang in there.

Timshade
29th March 2007, 11:42 PM
I feel so confused right now.......I feel like in the large scope of marital issues, ours is very small and fixable. I just dont understand how such an amenable couple of matters can be so destructive that it destroys a marriage......I just dont get it.

Hopeful0788
30th March 2007, 04:33 AM
Good evening. I read your post and am very sorry to hear what you are going through. I am a woman who has dealt and is dealing with depression and the different medications for it. My parents are also in an affectionless marriage and do not love each other. I, like your wife, crave affection and love. My counselor has told me this comes from my needs not being met in childhood... who knows. I also have a husband who looked at porn on the internet. For a wife who is already insecure, needs constant affection and love to feel safe/secure and is suffering from depression, I can honestly tell you when I found out my husband was looking at porn, I felt like someone killed me. I could not figure out why in the world he would need that stuff when I was right there begging him for attention, sex or whatever he wanted. It made me feel so worthless and lonely. It was enough for me to sink back into my miserable depressed existence and hate my husband. I wanted him to leave too but since we had kids I didn't have the guts to ask him or for me to leave.

Your wife, (who sounds a lot like me), probably needs counseling to get herself better before she can really be a good wife to you. Her poor housecleaning skills could also be coming from her depression. I am an excellent housecleaner except when I am miserable....

Also, I can assure you that your long hard hours (being away from your wife a lot) also led her to feel even more unloved or unhappy. After all, for us affection cravers, an absent husband isn't exactly able to be there to give us any type of affection.

I am not accusing you of anything because I know all too well how hard it can be to live with a depressed person. I just wanted to give you a little insight into what she possibly could be feeling. I know long hours and a little porn might seem insignificant to some but to people like me (and possibly your wife) they can be detrimental to our mental psych and marriage.

One way you might possibly make it through this is to go to some counseling for you (even if she won't go), then if the two of you are able to recover your relationship, you could recommend that she go alone or the two of you go together....

I wish you luck and will be praying for you. :o

marriedbrunette30
30th March 2007, 07:30 AM
sounds like she needs to be back on medication.

Timshade
30th March 2007, 04:30 PM
Well, I'm here again - another "not so easy day." I will ge through it. It is hard to concentrate and hard to think clearly at all about things. I still haven't heard from her and I doubt that I am going to any time soon, if ever......

Timshade
30th March 2007, 05:20 PM
I just wish we could have some contact....

Raymond
30th March 2007, 10:38 PM
Sounds like there is hope for your marriage. I've got a feeling it's her father influencing her and cutting her off so that the two of you can't sort things out. It's sounds like you haven't dabbled in porn too deeply. Read the threads on here about it and learn to keep free of it so it doesn't affect the intimacy between your wife and you.

Let her know somehow that you are sorry and that you still love her as much as you can. Time will sort out the rest. She obviously has personal problems as well that are not helping. Hopefully you will have a chance to meet her and talk soon, but do try and get a message to her somehow. Don't let her father decide the outcome, let her.

Raymond

Timshade
30th March 2007, 11:08 PM
It doesn't feel like there is any hope right now, she won't respond to me no matter what.....

David H
31st March 2007, 09:28 AM
It doesn't feel like there is any hope right now, she won't respond to me no matter what.....

Stay kool! Pressurising is not the answer and will just push her away.

She needs time and space. Give her that!

And you need to work on yourself...

I advise you to do "a 180" for your own sanity (to allow yourself to heal):
http://survivinginfidelity.com/healing_library/divorce/no_contact.asp
http://survivinginfidelity.com/faq_bs.asp#FAQ11

You may also need to detach emotionally:
This is a good place to start understanding detachment:
http://www.coping.org/control/detach.htm

David

Raymond
31st March 2007, 10:36 AM
It doesn't feel like there is any hope right now, she won't respond to me no matter what.....

Just get that message to her that you love her and want to change. Give her time as David above says.

Raymond

Timshade
31st March 2007, 08:25 PM
ANother hard day - weekends are difficult for me.....I am so used to spending time with her over the weekend that I feel lost without her around. :( I am going to try to keep busy today, although it will not be easy.......

Timshade
7th April 2007, 03:08 AM
The days don't seem to get easier, just less hopefull.........

Eve
7th April 2007, 02:36 PM
timshade,

For me, what stands out, is your wife may have some untreated mental illness that she doesn't recognize yet - such as bipolar disorder. The mood changes, the anger, her parents' background and behavior, and her unwillingness to work with a man who sounds pretty logical, even keeled and ready to work on things all shows an inflexibility and poor judgment.

I know it is hard when things go wrong and you are separated; I am there right now -- but as a psychologist you must be familiar with Charles Whitfield's book, Codependence. If not, get it and read it. The cycle of codependce is so prevalent in our society and other addiction's need not be present to suffer from this one.

Think of things more positively--you are being very reasonable and trying to work on things, you did not commit adultery and you didn't try to lie about the soft porn, you haven't been married very long and luckily don't have children. If she can't come around to marriage counseling, then it is better to know now and move forward with your life. If it is meant to be, then it will be. But, the mental illness will be there forever and her family history speaks to that. Untreated, she won't stay better for long. Good luck.

Eve

Timshade
22nd April 2007, 10:29 PM
I haven't posted in awhile, but there has been some new occurrences that I feel I should post. Since everything went down, I found an ex-girlfriend on myspace whom I have chatted with on a few occasions. She has been very helpful to me in terms of understanding some of the mistakes that I have made in the past, has been a great friend through all of this, and I am very thankful to her for that. In any sense, she was going to be visiting her parents (which happen to live where I used to live with my wife) and she asked if I wanted to meet up and hang out for awhile. She is married and it truly is a harmless thing. I said yes and we met up at the pier (it was a nice day, so it made sense). We talked for awhile and sat down on one of the concrete blocks to continue our conversation. After about an hour, who walks by? My stbx with another guy!!! I was taken back and she walked right by, stopped in her tracks and slightly muttered a "hi" to me. I said "hi" back and she didn't know what to say. She introduced the guy as a "friend" and muttered his name before walking away. The funny part is that this "friend" is a person she has been e-mailing for awhile and I oversaw a message from "him" about two years ago, questioned her on it, and she said that it wasn't even a guy, that it was a girl (this guy has one of those names that can go either was, so I believed her). In this whole scenario, from the beginning until know, I have always felt that there was a "missing piece." She wanted me out all too easy and was way too resistant to any type of reconciliation. So, I guess I have my answer......I guess it makes alot more sense now. She has been lying and has been deceitful for a long time and I was just a stumbling block that needed to be removed. My counselor has heard the whole scenario and claims that she is a classic case of an individual with histrionic personality disorder - attention seeking, dramatic, overly emotional, easily influenced by others, very focused on physical appearance, etc. I guess this is just another event that fits that profile. Lucky me.