Hi all,
This is my first post here. I was active on another website forum (divoce busting) and while the support was great, I wasn't so sure the advice I was getting wasn't too harsh. Most of the people on that forum are dealing with affairs and infidelity, that's not the case with my wife and I.
So, to try and sum up my story real quick. My wife and I have been married 16 years, together 19 years. She had a 6 year old son when I met her who I adopted and raised like my own (father not in the picture at all). About a year after we started dating and 6 months into living together (I moved in with her to keep her son at the same school etc) a knock came at the door which I answered. It was my then girlfriends ex boyfriend just previous to me. He asked if she was home and I said no (although she was) and for a split second I took my off of him and before I knew it he had stabbed me with a steak knife half way through my stomach. He ran, I fell, cops pursued and arrested him, I had emergency surgery to repair a severed stomach, pancreas and lost my spleen and spent 3 weeks in the hospital and 10 months of recovery at home with a nurse visiting everyday (I had complications with the spleen not healing and had a colostamy bag on for almost a year). I mention this because this set off a lot of my family taking sides and opinions about my then girlfriend and she at the time couldn't handle all the guilt etc and went on anti-depressants for 9 months which was understandable. She was just about to go back to school but had to push it back 6 months under the circumstances but she did go back and finish with honours. Fast forward about a year we both end up going back to school for the careers we wanted and got jobs, moved back into the city near where I grew up - was my wife's idea - she loved the area.
We married in our late 20's, had two boys along with her son who are ages 26, 14 and 11 at the moment. After living in a couple of apartments we bought a nice little 3 bedroom bungalow home in a great neighbourhood in 2003 that we love and 5 years later in 2007 we tore the house down and did a huge reno with a 2nd storey, room over the garage etc. Beautiful home for our family. During all of this time I have been working on contract in the IT field which was fine back then but over the past 4 years or so has gotten stressful financially as these contracts got shorter and shorter so I was always looking for work and would be off a few weeks unexpectedly etc. My wife and I had always fought and argued. She is from divorced parents who are both looney and do nothing but create problems for her, always fighting until about 10 yrs ago my wife cut off communication with her mother but still maintains a distant relationship with her father. We've had financial issues for years. I work steady and get paid well, my wife always worked part-time which was fine when the kids where younger but there hasn't been a need for her to be home for them in years but she still insists on working part-time which doesn't help our financial situation. I didn't complain too much so long as we could handle the finances.
So let me try and get to the point here. Over the past few years I could feel her drift from me, always angry towards me, never anything positive to say making me feel like I'm to blame for everything that's wrong in our marriage. As of this past Christmas she said she's not happy so we try a marriage counsellor for 3 sessions before we give up because the marriage counsellor was awful - we would come out in worse shape than when we went in. We tried another one and she was great but by that time we had no money left for counselling so stopped going. Meantime, I was on the divoce busting forum taking advice from others saying to do a 180 and back-off, give her space etc which I did for 4 months when my wife said to me one of us needs to move out - so this tactice didn't work well for me. We instead agreed to an in-house separation and I tried sleeping in the basement for about 3 days but upon taking the advice from the divorce busting forum I went and told my wife that sleeping in the basement wasn't working for me and that I was moving back into our bedroom. The idea behind this is that it is the marital bedroom and since I'm not the one asking for separation and space, she should be the one that seeks it out, not me making it easy for her. In premise, I get it and agree but in practice this didn't go over well with my W. We lasted about 2 days in the same room and she moved out to her office/bedroom down the hall and she has been sleeping there for the past 3 months. She told me then she doesn't respect me, isn't attracted to me, doesn't want to be around me, doesn't want me to touch her etc. During that time I was following the divorce busting 'rules' to not ask questions, not pressure, give her space, not pursue, give validation etc but my wife and I talked a few days ago and she said 'this isn't working, it's time for one of us to move out'. She's says she's done and can't live like this. My heart dropped but I didn't freak out or beg etc. One of the other things I learned from the other forum is don't cry, beg etc or you will most certainly lose her respect and push her away . Anyway, I just reinfored that I love her and am committed to making this work but that I would have to think about this. I also got the dreaded I'll always love you but not in that way. What she was saying is that I love you but I'm not in love with you anymore. She's lost those feelings for me. She walks around cold shouldering me, picking on little things, seemingly angry and resentful although she says she's past that but she was more than willing to argue with me during our talk a few days ago. Oddly I thought if she is willing to argue perhaps there is still some piece of her that wants this to work. She has sat in that room by herself for the past 3 months and I think has convinced herself that the marriage is done and her 'switch' has turned off as she has said. And once the switch is off she says it probably won't come back on again. She is extreme always. Strangely though she is fine having our best friend couple over for dinner or us going to their place like we always have. We hang with them as if there aren't any problems (we don't talk much between us but we act fine in front of our friends). She also accepted tickets to a dinner fund raiser for us both to go to through friends of ours which is later this week. Surprised she accepted for us both to go. Maybe she is giving me a chance but just won't say it - at least that is what I'm hoping. She is a hard and tough lady, loves to give guilt trips and is generally pretty hard on me, very demanding and opinionated but says what she feels and isn't afraid to make her position known to anyone.
My wife is upset that I didn't write an exam yet for professional designation I am pursuing but it's a massive amount of work and frankly under all of this stress it's been next to impossible to focus but I can't tell her that. As for work, I may be offered full-time work where I am currently working on contract so that would bring some stability to the finances but overall less money coming in so we'll see what happens. She hates that I argue with her but to be honest, she argues with everyone, not just me but she doesn't see it so that makes things difficult but for now I'm not arguing with her about anything - just saying yes basically for the moment. She brings up some nasty things I've said in arguments which I understand but they were one time things and she has done far worse - she spit in my face once! We have never been physical with each other during fights, just verbally abusive at times. She has a very short fuse and yells over small things let alone bug arguments. Granted, I am somewhat defensive, at least during my relationship with her I've became very defensive, you sort of had to be to survive.
She had complained I didn't do anything to help around the house so I took over paying the bills, doing the laundry, splitting making the kids lunches and generally keeping the kitchen clean. But, how do I get her attraced to me again!
My current situation is this:
First, she is waiting for me to finish our conversation on how we are going handle one of us moving out (she is inferring me moving out of course). I told her I don't think this is a good idea but she says she can't go on like this. I think my response will be for the sake of our kids and our marriage lets give it 6 months. If we aren't headed in the right direction by then we either physically separate then or just sell the house and move on. Oh, and she won't go to the marriage counsellor either - she says she doesn't see the point (she's already made up her mind).
Second, what do I do to breakdown that ice wall she has put up? I know I can't pursue her per se but having tried giving her space and keeping busy outside the house and that has not worked either. She previously said she needed time and space and I told her I respected those wishes but she was mad at me saying I had all that time to try and fix things and I did nothing (I thought she wanted space!!!). Damned if I do, damned if I don't. This is my dilemna now, how do I handle things with her moving forward. The first thing I have done is just started talking with her nicely and normally in-spite of her short and cold responses. I don't get defensive. I have always gone to the gym and ran so I'm in great shape for a 47 year old and decently good looking for my age, just ran a 5k run downtown last week and did very well, coach my kids softball and hockey teams etc. I'm not a lazy guy etc, I'm always busy with something. I know actions speak louder than words and I am really hoping this full-time work offer comes through - that would give us some stability no matter what happens. But I need help to understand how I should be interacting with my wife day to day, what sort of things should I be saying to her without pressuring her, what can I do or say to try and help break down the walls? Words alone won't cut it it - I need a plan to follow and stick to and I'm at a loss at the moment. Following the divorce busting rules would have been fine had I have been pursuing and trying to get her back but I got on there early and immediately pulled back (didn't beg and pursue etc). The idea being that you create space and she would eventually miss you and become attracted to you. This didn't work for me - she just seemed to get more resentful. She's been pissed off that she had to move out of our room and blames me for making her have to do it to get her space, that she always has to make the sacrifices etc. That she has sacrificed everything for this family. She may be having a bit of a mid life crisis as well as she did mention in our last talk that she almost 50 and has nothing to show for it. I think she feels getting away from me and the financial stresses would give her what she needs in life. She's not ditching the kids or anything like that but she has pulled back on attending the kids softball games etc and only goes when she is up to it which is about 10% of the time or less. She is doing some serious soul searching and doesn't see how I fit into her life right now without bringing her down it seems.
Any advice is welcome.
This is my first post here. I was active on another website forum (divoce busting) and while the support was great, I wasn't so sure the advice I was getting wasn't too harsh. Most of the people on that forum are dealing with affairs and infidelity, that's not the case with my wife and I.
So, to try and sum up my story real quick. My wife and I have been married 16 years, together 19 years. She had a 6 year old son when I met her who I adopted and raised like my own (father not in the picture at all). About a year after we started dating and 6 months into living together (I moved in with her to keep her son at the same school etc) a knock came at the door which I answered. It was my then girlfriends ex boyfriend just previous to me. He asked if she was home and I said no (although she was) and for a split second I took my off of him and before I knew it he had stabbed me with a steak knife half way through my stomach. He ran, I fell, cops pursued and arrested him, I had emergency surgery to repair a severed stomach, pancreas and lost my spleen and spent 3 weeks in the hospital and 10 months of recovery at home with a nurse visiting everyday (I had complications with the spleen not healing and had a colostamy bag on for almost a year). I mention this because this set off a lot of my family taking sides and opinions about my then girlfriend and she at the time couldn't handle all the guilt etc and went on anti-depressants for 9 months which was understandable. She was just about to go back to school but had to push it back 6 months under the circumstances but she did go back and finish with honours. Fast forward about a year we both end up going back to school for the careers we wanted and got jobs, moved back into the city near where I grew up - was my wife's idea - she loved the area.
We married in our late 20's, had two boys along with her son who are ages 26, 14 and 11 at the moment. After living in a couple of apartments we bought a nice little 3 bedroom bungalow home in a great neighbourhood in 2003 that we love and 5 years later in 2007 we tore the house down and did a huge reno with a 2nd storey, room over the garage etc. Beautiful home for our family. During all of this time I have been working on contract in the IT field which was fine back then but over the past 4 years or so has gotten stressful financially as these contracts got shorter and shorter so I was always looking for work and would be off a few weeks unexpectedly etc. My wife and I had always fought and argued. She is from divorced parents who are both looney and do nothing but create problems for her, always fighting until about 10 yrs ago my wife cut off communication with her mother but still maintains a distant relationship with her father. We've had financial issues for years. I work steady and get paid well, my wife always worked part-time which was fine when the kids where younger but there hasn't been a need for her to be home for them in years but she still insists on working part-time which doesn't help our financial situation. I didn't complain too much so long as we could handle the finances.
So let me try and get to the point here. Over the past few years I could feel her drift from me, always angry towards me, never anything positive to say making me feel like I'm to blame for everything that's wrong in our marriage. As of this past Christmas she said she's not happy so we try a marriage counsellor for 3 sessions before we give up because the marriage counsellor was awful - we would come out in worse shape than when we went in. We tried another one and she was great but by that time we had no money left for counselling so stopped going. Meantime, I was on the divoce busting forum taking advice from others saying to do a 180 and back-off, give her space etc which I did for 4 months when my wife said to me one of us needs to move out - so this tactice didn't work well for me. We instead agreed to an in-house separation and I tried sleeping in the basement for about 3 days but upon taking the advice from the divorce busting forum I went and told my wife that sleeping in the basement wasn't working for me and that I was moving back into our bedroom. The idea behind this is that it is the marital bedroom and since I'm not the one asking for separation and space, she should be the one that seeks it out, not me making it easy for her. In premise, I get it and agree but in practice this didn't go over well with my W. We lasted about 2 days in the same room and she moved out to her office/bedroom down the hall and she has been sleeping there for the past 3 months. She told me then she doesn't respect me, isn't attracted to me, doesn't want to be around me, doesn't want me to touch her etc. During that time I was following the divorce busting 'rules' to not ask questions, not pressure, give her space, not pursue, give validation etc but my wife and I talked a few days ago and she said 'this isn't working, it's time for one of us to move out'. She's says she's done and can't live like this. My heart dropped but I didn't freak out or beg etc. One of the other things I learned from the other forum is don't cry, beg etc or you will most certainly lose her respect and push her away . Anyway, I just reinfored that I love her and am committed to making this work but that I would have to think about this. I also got the dreaded I'll always love you but not in that way. What she was saying is that I love you but I'm not in love with you anymore. She's lost those feelings for me. She walks around cold shouldering me, picking on little things, seemingly angry and resentful although she says she's past that but she was more than willing to argue with me during our talk a few days ago. Oddly I thought if she is willing to argue perhaps there is still some piece of her that wants this to work. She has sat in that room by herself for the past 3 months and I think has convinced herself that the marriage is done and her 'switch' has turned off as she has said. And once the switch is off she says it probably won't come back on again. She is extreme always. Strangely though she is fine having our best friend couple over for dinner or us going to their place like we always have. We hang with them as if there aren't any problems (we don't talk much between us but we act fine in front of our friends). She also accepted tickets to a dinner fund raiser for us both to go to through friends of ours which is later this week. Surprised she accepted for us both to go. Maybe she is giving me a chance but just won't say it - at least that is what I'm hoping. She is a hard and tough lady, loves to give guilt trips and is generally pretty hard on me, very demanding and opinionated but says what she feels and isn't afraid to make her position known to anyone.
My wife is upset that I didn't write an exam yet for professional designation I am pursuing but it's a massive amount of work and frankly under all of this stress it's been next to impossible to focus but I can't tell her that. As for work, I may be offered full-time work where I am currently working on contract so that would bring some stability to the finances but overall less money coming in so we'll see what happens. She hates that I argue with her but to be honest, she argues with everyone, not just me but she doesn't see it so that makes things difficult but for now I'm not arguing with her about anything - just saying yes basically for the moment. She brings up some nasty things I've said in arguments which I understand but they were one time things and she has done far worse - she spit in my face once! We have never been physical with each other during fights, just verbally abusive at times. She has a very short fuse and yells over small things let alone bug arguments. Granted, I am somewhat defensive, at least during my relationship with her I've became very defensive, you sort of had to be to survive.
She had complained I didn't do anything to help around the house so I took over paying the bills, doing the laundry, splitting making the kids lunches and generally keeping the kitchen clean. But, how do I get her attraced to me again!
My current situation is this:
First, she is waiting for me to finish our conversation on how we are going handle one of us moving out (she is inferring me moving out of course). I told her I don't think this is a good idea but she says she can't go on like this. I think my response will be for the sake of our kids and our marriage lets give it 6 months. If we aren't headed in the right direction by then we either physically separate then or just sell the house and move on. Oh, and she won't go to the marriage counsellor either - she says she doesn't see the point (she's already made up her mind).
Second, what do I do to breakdown that ice wall she has put up? I know I can't pursue her per se but having tried giving her space and keeping busy outside the house and that has not worked either. She previously said she needed time and space and I told her I respected those wishes but she was mad at me saying I had all that time to try and fix things and I did nothing (I thought she wanted space!!!). Damned if I do, damned if I don't. This is my dilemna now, how do I handle things with her moving forward. The first thing I have done is just started talking with her nicely and normally in-spite of her short and cold responses. I don't get defensive. I have always gone to the gym and ran so I'm in great shape for a 47 year old and decently good looking for my age, just ran a 5k run downtown last week and did very well, coach my kids softball and hockey teams etc. I'm not a lazy guy etc, I'm always busy with something. I know actions speak louder than words and I am really hoping this full-time work offer comes through - that would give us some stability no matter what happens. But I need help to understand how I should be interacting with my wife day to day, what sort of things should I be saying to her without pressuring her, what can I do or say to try and help break down the walls? Words alone won't cut it it - I need a plan to follow and stick to and I'm at a loss at the moment. Following the divorce busting rules would have been fine had I have been pursuing and trying to get her back but I got on there early and immediately pulled back (didn't beg and pursue etc). The idea being that you create space and she would eventually miss you and become attracted to you. This didn't work for me - she just seemed to get more resentful. She's been pissed off that she had to move out of our room and blames me for making her have to do it to get her space, that she always has to make the sacrifices etc. That she has sacrificed everything for this family. She may be having a bit of a mid life crisis as well as she did mention in our last talk that she almost 50 and has nothing to show for it. I think she feels getting away from me and the financial stresses would give her what she needs in life. She's not ditching the kids or anything like that but she has pulled back on attending the kids softball games etc and only goes when she is up to it which is about 10% of the time or less. She is doing some serious soul searching and doesn't see how I fit into her life right now without bringing her down it seems.
Any advice is welcome.