I didn’t really want to say it because I didn’t want to derail this thread or make it about me, but I’m a bit too shattered today because I was in a car accident yesterday morning that totaled my car then 12 hours later found out my terminally-ill stepmom had been transferred to hospice and probably has a month left. Which I think is enough emotional trauma for just about anyone, healthy or no.
Many folks who have contributed in this thread have suggested counseling. I have no doubt that it can help, but sometimes you just know that no amount of counseling is going to fix things, or even just better them.
I knew. I was absolutely sure that I wanted out. It took me a while to come to that realization, but when I did, there was no turning back.
People say, “But you married this person…” People change. Sometimes in grand ways. We both changed in the 17+ years together. Some of those changes were fundamental and it affected the way that we interacted with each other. Our conversations, our worldviews, values, wants and needs. Not all of us are cut out to come to terms with our partner’s shifts and new ways of thinking.
There’s the build up of that and all the rest that contributes to many breakups. And we all have our own tipping point, no? That is one reason why I will not judge people’s personal actions and decisions.
I like what Leaffan posted: “So, the long and short of it is: don’t be so morally condemning on the internet. You have to walk a mile in the other person’s shoes to know what it’s like. Life isn’t black and white.”
Yep. Exactly.
Yours. And the grown-ups in the house together.
Where is she going if she has no friends or hobbies? Aren’t you really just ‘babysitting’ while she grocery shops?
Evey now and then you give her some time off? How sweet of you.
How does she go out on one of those rare group things if she has no friends- “I mean none?”
How have you ‘helped’ her address her introversion? Did you just tell her she’s an introvert and wander away?
An example or two of her negative attitude, please…
OP, you can’t blame people for not taking your explanations as the 100% literal unbiased FACTS of the matter. For one thing, you can’t be unbiased because you’re one of the parties involved in an emotional matter. For another thing, by your story, you’ve been absolutely perfect and contributed to the unhappiness of your marriage in no way whatsoever–she’s absolutely without question 100% of the problem, nothing at all you could or should have done differently. There are sometimes cases like that, but they’re incredibly rare.
Problems and relationships and problems with relationships are often like Impressionist paintings–when you’re right up on them, it can be really hard to perceive what’s obvious from even a few steps away. That’s why people are recommending you see a counselor, someone who is standing that little distance away and can tell you about things he or she is seeing from that distance that you’re not seeing because you’re so close up.
Out of curiosity, all these days that her mom is there full time or you have a baby-sitter…are those by any chance the days she’s working? Because “Of course she’s not overwhelmed, she doesn’t have to deal with the kids at all when she’s at her job” is…well, I have no words fit for this forum for what that is.
From what you’ve said, I think the issue isn’t that your wife is introverted. (Introversion is NOT a character flaw or emotional problem, and nothing will create a rift between one of us and an extrovert faster than trying to “help us address” the very essence of who we are.) The problem is likely that your wife is depressed. The lowered libido, the increased reclusiveness, the weight gain, the indifference to suggested plans you’d think she would enjoy (assuming you’re actually suggesting things you have reason to think she’d enjoy), the lack of follow-through, the feeling that what sounds like a pretty minor amount of effort is a huge deal…it’s all pretty classic. A kiss, even a big old sloppy one,* seems like a negligible amount of effort to a healthy person. But to a depressed person, it often takes everything they’ve got just to get through the day doing the bare minimum. Think about times you’ve been physically sick–not sick enough to stay in bed, but sick enough that basic stuff like showering and feeding yourself and picking up after yourself just about wipes you out. Adding in even small stuff seems like a huge, huge effort, right? For many people with untreated depression, that’s the day-to-day normal.
*No woman who has just heard a man say “I’m totally unattracted to you, but hardly any of that is because you’re so fat, it’s mainly that you’re a big old boring slug who never wants to fuck me,” is going to be suffused with lust and want to stick her tongue down his throat the second he walks in the door. That is not how human beings work.
Not if you’re spouse has been less than stellar toward you (i.e., complaining about your weight, sex life, etc.). Aside from that some people just don’t like kissing. My DH for example, but he’s great at back rubs, so it works out find. The OP should also consider what his wife wants in terms of affection rather than merely his own needs. Hint, a partner who expresses themselves only in terms of what they like is a major turn-off to most woman.
Posts like this, containing ridiculously stupid questions, make it painfully obvious that some posters are just here to take pot shots the OP. Maybe you should bow out of the thread if you’re going to take the OP’s problems so personally.
I’m thinking it’s either depression - or that she wants out of the relationship herself and doesn’t have the cojones to up and say it. I’ve seen that happen with people I know - one person wants out of the relationship, but they can’t bring themselves to be the ‘bad guy,’ so they withdraw, or act like a jerk, and eventually the other partner gets fed up enough to call things off.
The only way to know is to try and get professional help, and if she doesn’t want it, that right there could be a real key piece of information on what to do next.
I’ve been depressed, and this is right on. I wasn’t depressed when my kids were little, but something else happened - when my kids were little by the end of the day I was “touched out.” It is often exhausting for someone who is a natural introvert to be touched all day - and that is what little kids do - and that is what they need. You are picking them up, cuddling with them on the couch, holding their hand across a parking lot, lie down with them to get them to nap or rest. And if they are clingy, you do dishes while they hang on your leg. For several years, you don’t get to pee alone. I just wanted my body to be my own at the end of the day. Combined with depression, and a negative body self image, I can imagine my husband going through a several year long affection drought.
I doubt that - not with the little kids involved. If she is at all rational, she knows how exhausting single parenting would be - unless his own behavior is so childish that divorce would mean one less child and reduce her work. But it doesn’t sound like that.
Teenagers - yeah, I could see that. And certainly I’ve seen that behavior with couples who don’t have children - let me treat you like dirt, then you leave, and I get rid of you, plus all the sympathy because you left. But kids still at home really tips that equation into not being a good deal.
But it could be, and a counselor would help figure that out.
So a couple things.
Don’t divorce y
So a couple things.
Don’t divorce your wife, and let your girlfriend divorce her husband. You’re going to leave her husband. You’re going to leave two devastated families and the kids don’t deserve it.
It’s good that she’s married with kids. She won’t be pushing you to leave your wife, ho
Hey, that’s not very nice. 
Sorry, trying to post from a cell phone, and it sucked. Anyway:
So a couple things.
Don’t divorce your wife, or let your girlfriend divorce her husband. You’re going to leave two devastated families, and the kids don’t deserve it.
It’s good that she’s married with kids. Most likely she won’t be pushing you to leave your wife.
Be very careful. More careful than you think you should be. What if she calls you on your cell, and your wife is there? Think about it ahead of time.
You’re going to have to live with the guilt. Maybe not right now, but probably someday. You’re never going to tell your wife about this. It’s a secret you’re going to die with.
The good news is you’re not pestering your wife for sex anymore, and so she’s going to be happier. And you’re probably happier too, and easier to be around. Be extra nice at home. After all, you’re cheating; the least you can do is stop complaining about her. Maybe you could take the kids off her hands and tell her to get a pedicure, or whatever she likes to do. Maybe she has a friend or a relative she’d like to visit, and you could make that happen. (Sounds like she needs friends.)
You could also try marriage counseling. It’s expensive, and a crap-shoot, but worth a shot, if you’re not too strapped financially.
You’ll likely get a lot of grief on this thread - some women don’t want their husbands, but don’t want them to be wanted by anyone else either. I don’t quite get it: if you don’t want him, why do you care?
One reason the wife probably hasn’t poured on the affection despite the OP’s request is that she doesn’t believe he really wants affection from her. And in turn, this makes her less affectionate.
I don’t doubt the OP desires affection. But it strains credibility to think he actually wants it from someone whose weight and disposition repels him. If she’s reasonably intelligent and even remotely attuned to nonverbal communication, she will know that his feelings are not consistent with his stated wishes.
So she doesn’t kiss him or hold his hand or any of that. Why? Because what’s more demeaning than kissing someone when you know they don’t want you? It would be a charade. She could kiss him, sure. But then what? Is that going to make her less introverted? More svelte? More new? More like the woman he’s having the affair with?
Affection is rather hard to summon on command. A forced hug is worse than no hug at all, because it’s the feelings behind the hug that matter more than the actual contact.
So how does one get the feelings back? I have no clue. Not married, and have never had to go through anything like this. But I don’t think it’s impossible if two people are committed to staying together no matter what.
One study I read about noted the the team found that the highest indicator of divorce is contempt for the spouse.
You frequently hear that 50% of marriages end in divorce. My guess is that this one is as well.
Thanks for all the feedback, positive and negative.
I will try to get around to some of the outstanding comments when I can.
IMO
1: Stop the affair. You marriage has issues to be dealt with and the affair will detract attention from you.
2: Have a serious heart to heart with your wife. Let her know honestly how you feel. Listen to what she says, not hear, listen. Try to determine a course of action if she wants to help the relationship.
To me it seems that your inaction is due to not knowing what the other half of your marriage is thinking and feeling. Once you get rid of some of the unknowns it will be easier to plan a course of action.
My sister was involved in a very similar situation. She was in a marriage to a nice guy, with 2 kids and a dog and white picket fence. Trouble is, over the years she’d fallen out of love with him. The spark that we all crave was missing. Because she wanted to leave him without a socially acceptable “good” reason, spurred on by her conscience and guilt, she began demonizing him.
The campaign she waged against him, via “marriage counseling” was cruel and relentless. Let’s see: He wasn’t social enough. He’d pressured her into getting married when she was on the rebound. He’d gained weight. He was a spender and she was a saver. He didn’t like to travel. He liked to watch too much t.v. He didn’t spend enough time with his male friends. He never offered to watch the kids so she could have a “life,” too. His family wasn’t supportive enough. The list went on and on, Her unhappiness was clear to everyone. What was also clear to everyone is that HE hadn’t changed at all. He was the same guy she’d married. However, SHE had changed.
After it was discovered that she was having an affair, it all began to make so much more sense. Had he just been a drug addict or a wife beater, he’d have come out of that marriage less scarred, I believe. Her quest to find fault with him, so that she could rationalize leaving him, caused far more wounds to his psyche than her ultimate decision to leave him. By the time she left, he was a beat dog.
When she FINALLY cut all the bullshit she was trying to pull over on everyone, and 'fessed up that she was in love with someone else, it was the first honest thing she’d done in months, possibly years. And the relief she felt afterward was immense.
I had a conversation with her, soon after I learned of the affair. She was in the same purgatory that the OPer is in, and all she did was cry. She just couldn’t rationalize leaving a perfectly nice husband, father and provider because she’d been taught that divorce was wrong. She loathed the idea of breaking up her little family, but she loathed the idea of staying in a loveless marriage, too. And then there was the social fallout. She was a people pleaser, and didn’t want people to think ill of her. She saw herself as being “too nice” to hurt a really decent, honorable man.
In that conversation, I asked her to envision an ideal outcome to the situation she was in. She said, “I want to get married to my (soul mate lover) and remain friends with (her husband).” I told her that she should move mountains to make that happen, then. Because being in no-man’s-zone was making everyone miserable. It’s far less cruel to divorce someone than it is to demonize them, and make them feel like shit about themselves, because you’re too “nice” to hurt them.
To the OP: There’s no way to extract yourself out of marriage, or even a friendship, without drawing some blood. So get over the idea that you can leave without someone getting hurt. It ain’t going to happen. My advice to you is to get out of no-man’s-zone asap and pick a damn side. And then when you do, act as humanely and decently as possible, and stop the cruel campaign against your wife, which is only serving to make yourself feel better, so that the collateral damage will be minimized.
I saw a foreign film yesterday that made me think of this thread and the OP’s all-too common predicament. One of the characters cheats on his wife and mother of his 3 kids. His mistress is a early 20-something woman. The only thing this new chick clearly has over his wife is that she is young and pretty and free of dependents. Being involved with her allows him to enjoy the edgier aspects of youthful living again. Eating pizza on the floor at midnight after spontaneous sex. Going to a furniture store and playing with the merchandise lke giggling kids. Being dramatic and emotionally insecure and irresponsible like young infactuated lovers typically are.
The OP sounds like someone who missed out on this stage of life, or he had it and desperately wants it back. Maybe he’s feeling that any marriage that doesn’t start with these heady rollercoaster moments is inferior or doomed. Maybe he feels severely shortchanged that he didn’t get to experience the fun of being in lust with someone (like it seems like everyone else on the planet has…because that’s what movies suggest), and this sense of deprivation has driven him to look outside his marriage. Maybe he feels that with a wife and multiple kids chained to him, his days of youth are forever gone and wasted. Maybe he feels like he never took any real chances in life, and the woman he’s currently seeing is that once-in-a-lifetime chance.
I don’t think putting the OP through massive guilt-trips is the answer, but I do think he should be honest with himself. Is this really about his wife? Or is this really about his dissatisfaction with life in general and the choices he’s made?
What would be the harm in separating for a while and seeing what life is like as a quasi-bachelor? I think that would be a wiser choice that immediately jumping to divorce, and it would also allow you figure out what you really want. Maybe some distance would good for your wife too. You’ll get to see how less contact with your kids can suck in ways you might not really appreciate now.