912jws
21st March 2008, 10:11 AM
Hi all,
I have read a few threads on this forum trying to find people in a similar situation to me and to find answers, I guess we all have a lot in common but each case is slightly different.
Basically the background to my relationship is I have been married since 2001 and have 2 lovely children aged 4 and 6.
I have always loved my wife and found her attractive, fancied her etc and even now despite being separated(I'll get to that in a min).
We had a whirlwind romance as such, living apart for a year but commuting every weekend back and forth in europe to be together, it was great and I proposed a year later, in between proposal and wedding day my wife fell pregnant with our little girl and everything was falling into place. My wife was and still is a very career motivated person so the birth and family commitment took its toll ie.all the excitement had been taken away and her career had been put on a back burner. She took 3 months leave and then went back to work, I still thought the world of her and thought I was being a great dad and husband. Unfortunately one of the guys at work put her on a pedestal and made her feel special again and I knew something was wrong and basically intercepted a text which confirmed something was going on. I threatened to leave and take our daughter with me back to the UK out of anger/fear and she called it a day, i got all the 'I love you like a brother stuff' and as you would expect this really badly hurt me and blew the trust out of the water.
We never really talked about the problem and why it happened and what type of affair she had, she made an effort to put things back on track and our son was born just over a year later and things seemed to be getting back on track.
Fast forward a few years and we have moved back to the UK and both careers are going ok but I felt the level of affection/intimacy from my wife has dropped, I am a passionate and spontaneous person and have always tried to please my wife in all ways, I accepted that we both have busy lives and tried to ignore things but I guess my insecurities from the past were niggling at me thinking why is she not interested and making an effort anymore? I told her about a year after having these feelings that I felt unhappy(because I love her) and how could we improve things, I got the tired and too much going as my wife was being a mother/career woman and doing a full time degree(she would not accept she was doing too much!), but she said give it a few months. Anyway a few months pass and not much has changed, she has changed jobs and has a big works do to go on, she says she will probably come home but she doesn't and I get no text and can't get hold of her a 5a.m so basically my old insecurities are re-opened, I try to fathom out why she couldn't send a courtesy text at any point during the night to put my mind at rest, even when she gets my voicemail saying where are you she just sends a text back which wound me up even more, so much so that when I got back from work I accused her of sleeping around which was probably wrong. So we go through a tough few months and it takes me several weeks to get intimate with her again as she is very stubborn and was obviously peeved that I accused her?
So the start of 2007 was not great and although trying to move forward nothing really changed in the relationship, we kept plodding along as such not arguing or anything but just accepting things although I was still unhappy with the level of affection. I know things were not great and thought if we could just put the spark back in to the relationship then that would make us both feel better.
The trouble is during the last quarter of 2007 my wife’s social calendar started increasing after work and I had a few instances when dinner turned into a come home after midnight and no communication that she would be back later, I told her it was not acceptable based on my feelings but I think this wound her up because she said I didn’t trust her, she is right in a way but I needed her to know that what happened in the past badly affected me and those feelings had arose because of her actions.
So one night before we were going on a romantic night away she has another late night out without any I will be home later than expected, also our son was ill that eve and I couldn’t get to sleep because he had woken up coughing and so midnight passes again and I end up phoning her and she has decided to go to a club as that is the only place the drinkers can get a late night drink. The next day I tell how I feel which basically annoys her again and ruins the weekend and then all the intimacy/closeness stops from her side so I am feeling **** and rejected. I suggest counselling which we only make one session before Christmas as she cancels the one before as she can’t fit in the time(scared of the truth). During the month of December she is going out more and my paranoia is going sky high, I phoned a mutual female friend of ours asking how my wife has been acting and explained that I am getting no feedback etc, our friend told me I needed to talk to my wife which I obviously tried, the friend unfortunately told my wife straight after the phone call as she had felt uncomfortable with the call and my wife hit the roof. We had a heated row which we don’t normally do and although I apologized my birthday celebrations were cancelled on my wifes part which made me feel great! I suggested that I move out for a bit to stop winding her up as she is winding me up, I didn’t really want to but I needed to stop this, even around this time she bought herself some sexy underwear to make me feel worse. As Christmas was upon us we are very distant and she has suggested we have a temporary split in the New Year which I agree too , the thing is we continue with counseling and for the few weeks I feel we are growing apart and I feel in limbo as we have not told the kids and I am living out of a b&b and going backwards and forwards to home getting clothes etc.
After our third session I say I need to know where we are going and the counselor asks my wife if she loves me and she says no, so I ask her if it’s over and that this split is permanent and she confirm yes despite the mixed signals she has sent out over the last few weeks offering some hope. Naturally I am shocked and upset and so is my wife but she is also so relieved from her perspective. She says during this that things may change between us but she can’t guarantee that, another mixed signal?
Anyway a few months have now passed and I am still trying to come to terms with how someone who supposedly loved you several months ago can change their minds over a period of a couple of months?
I know I am a good father and a good husband, I know I am not perfect(nobody is!) but I believed in our marriage and working out our problems, it is so frustrating and painful being where I am now and trying to move forward.
I am talking to friends and family but it’s the usual 1 step forward 2 steps backward, I guess time is the only healer in this situation.
Thanks for listening and I hoped I have not bored you with the long post!
Jon
I have read a few threads on this forum trying to find people in a similar situation to me and to find answers, I guess we all have a lot in common but each case is slightly different.
Basically the background to my relationship is I have been married since 2001 and have 2 lovely children aged 4 and 6.
I have always loved my wife and found her attractive, fancied her etc and even now despite being separated(I'll get to that in a min).
We had a whirlwind romance as such, living apart for a year but commuting every weekend back and forth in europe to be together, it was great and I proposed a year later, in between proposal and wedding day my wife fell pregnant with our little girl and everything was falling into place. My wife was and still is a very career motivated person so the birth and family commitment took its toll ie.all the excitement had been taken away and her career had been put on a back burner. She took 3 months leave and then went back to work, I still thought the world of her and thought I was being a great dad and husband. Unfortunately one of the guys at work put her on a pedestal and made her feel special again and I knew something was wrong and basically intercepted a text which confirmed something was going on. I threatened to leave and take our daughter with me back to the UK out of anger/fear and she called it a day, i got all the 'I love you like a brother stuff' and as you would expect this really badly hurt me and blew the trust out of the water.
We never really talked about the problem and why it happened and what type of affair she had, she made an effort to put things back on track and our son was born just over a year later and things seemed to be getting back on track.
Fast forward a few years and we have moved back to the UK and both careers are going ok but I felt the level of affection/intimacy from my wife has dropped, I am a passionate and spontaneous person and have always tried to please my wife in all ways, I accepted that we both have busy lives and tried to ignore things but I guess my insecurities from the past were niggling at me thinking why is she not interested and making an effort anymore? I told her about a year after having these feelings that I felt unhappy(because I love her) and how could we improve things, I got the tired and too much going as my wife was being a mother/career woman and doing a full time degree(she would not accept she was doing too much!), but she said give it a few months. Anyway a few months pass and not much has changed, she has changed jobs and has a big works do to go on, she says she will probably come home but she doesn't and I get no text and can't get hold of her a 5a.m so basically my old insecurities are re-opened, I try to fathom out why she couldn't send a courtesy text at any point during the night to put my mind at rest, even when she gets my voicemail saying where are you she just sends a text back which wound me up even more, so much so that when I got back from work I accused her of sleeping around which was probably wrong. So we go through a tough few months and it takes me several weeks to get intimate with her again as she is very stubborn and was obviously peeved that I accused her?
So the start of 2007 was not great and although trying to move forward nothing really changed in the relationship, we kept plodding along as such not arguing or anything but just accepting things although I was still unhappy with the level of affection. I know things were not great and thought if we could just put the spark back in to the relationship then that would make us both feel better.
The trouble is during the last quarter of 2007 my wife’s social calendar started increasing after work and I had a few instances when dinner turned into a come home after midnight and no communication that she would be back later, I told her it was not acceptable based on my feelings but I think this wound her up because she said I didn’t trust her, she is right in a way but I needed her to know that what happened in the past badly affected me and those feelings had arose because of her actions.
So one night before we were going on a romantic night away she has another late night out without any I will be home later than expected, also our son was ill that eve and I couldn’t get to sleep because he had woken up coughing and so midnight passes again and I end up phoning her and she has decided to go to a club as that is the only place the drinkers can get a late night drink. The next day I tell how I feel which basically annoys her again and ruins the weekend and then all the intimacy/closeness stops from her side so I am feeling **** and rejected. I suggest counselling which we only make one session before Christmas as she cancels the one before as she can’t fit in the time(scared of the truth). During the month of December she is going out more and my paranoia is going sky high, I phoned a mutual female friend of ours asking how my wife has been acting and explained that I am getting no feedback etc, our friend told me I needed to talk to my wife which I obviously tried, the friend unfortunately told my wife straight after the phone call as she had felt uncomfortable with the call and my wife hit the roof. We had a heated row which we don’t normally do and although I apologized my birthday celebrations were cancelled on my wifes part which made me feel great! I suggested that I move out for a bit to stop winding her up as she is winding me up, I didn’t really want to but I needed to stop this, even around this time she bought herself some sexy underwear to make me feel worse. As Christmas was upon us we are very distant and she has suggested we have a temporary split in the New Year which I agree too , the thing is we continue with counseling and for the few weeks I feel we are growing apart and I feel in limbo as we have not told the kids and I am living out of a b&b and going backwards and forwards to home getting clothes etc.
After our third session I say I need to know where we are going and the counselor asks my wife if she loves me and she says no, so I ask her if it’s over and that this split is permanent and she confirm yes despite the mixed signals she has sent out over the last few weeks offering some hope. Naturally I am shocked and upset and so is my wife but she is also so relieved from her perspective. She says during this that things may change between us but she can’t guarantee that, another mixed signal?
Anyway a few months have now passed and I am still trying to come to terms with how someone who supposedly loved you several months ago can change their minds over a period of a couple of months?
I know I am a good father and a good husband, I know I am not perfect(nobody is!) but I believed in our marriage and working out our problems, it is so frustrating and painful being where I am now and trying to move forward.
I am talking to friends and family but it’s the usual 1 step forward 2 steps backward, I guess time is the only healer in this situation.
Thanks for listening and I hoped I have not bored you with the long post!
Jon