Hi and thank you in advanced for reading my post.
I am 24 years old, as is my wife, and a few months ago she told me she didn't love me anymore and wanted me out of the house. What led up to all this? I, now aware, was basically a terrible husband. We have two small children, our first when we were 18 years old, this expedited our marriage ideas and we were married before my daughter's birth. After my daughter's birth we moved into our first home, I was addicted to playing video games and often played them at every moment available. I was all-around terrible, ignoring my wife, my kids on occasion, terrible during my wife's pregnancies, and an all-around jerk if something was standing in my way of doing what -I- wanted.
We bought a house together, and my trends continued. After a terrible argument over something I can't remember, my wife told me she was done, that she wanted me out, that our relationship was over, and she didn't love me anymore. There's nothing there she says. Hearing this, despite all the hints of it before, I was awoken. What kind of person had I been? How SELFISH had I been? I felt terrible, I begged for her forgiveness, to see the person I was when we were dating, when I wasn't trying to escape responsibility by gaming and doing what -I- wanted. After a day or two of thinking she decided "okay, lets try this."
It has now been 5 months since our talk. Our sex life has gone up and down, down most recently. During our 5 month "try" period, I caught her messaging an older gentleman that she works with, several hundred texts and hours of calls while I'm at work (she works nights, I work day.) She hid him from me originally when I asked, but after a few minutes gave in and explained that it was an ear, someone she could vent to, someone that she enjoyed their attention. She had been sending this person MMS messages (of what I don't know) that she says are her face, which he would reply "cute." - I have never suffered anxiety before, but learning this had happened flipped some sort of switch in my brain that I didn't know was there. Since then, she occasionally sees this person at work, sometimes with my children (it's a store, she takes the children there once a week to shop), but their texts/calls have ceased (it has been roughly 2 months). I have been dealing with terrible anxiety as of late, who did you call, what did you say, who texted you, let me see your phone. I was struck with fear that my relationship was ending already, but now possibly someone else was stepping in to fix it! Finally, last month, we had a large meltdown. I again made a realization about myself that, my anxiety and worry was not helping anything. My wife was making it clear and begging me to believe her that noone else is being hidden, and noone else will, that she knows it was wrong. I still deal with the anxiety from this daily and ponder sometimes, but I have finally stopped checking various places for information that doesn't exist.
SO - I am still having anxiety issues with our relationship, if my wife is aggravated, comes off as even remotely in a bad mood, seems quiet, ETC... I panic, my mind races 100,000 words per second in thoughts of "what's wrong, does she love me? will she love me? will she see the person I actually am, how regretful I am?", eventually I get to the point where I'd prefer suicide over having these thoughts, and the only thing that helps remedy them is TALKING to her about them. Every 2-3 days i'd say there is some kind of conversation about how we are doing, what I should do, If i'm doing something wrong, why she doesn't love me. She continues to openly say that she isn't IN LOVE with me and wants to try to be, this literally bring me to tears, she tells me that she feels bad i'm upset but can't care because she was upset from my neglect for so long. A day or two will pass with no anxiety, and things will seem okay, she will seem like she is happy, occasionally requesting space I.E. sitting on the other couch or actually requesting me to go play a game alone... which I think I can understand. However, this cycle has continued now for months. I continue to relapse in fear and ask her about things because her mood seems to be off-putting, aggravated, distant. It is as if we are on repeat in a series of my anxiety wondering if this is ever going to be fixed, her response is always "it needs time, I don't know."
What should I do in my position? Despite her aggravated, distant signs occasionally - should I let them be? Not ask what is the matter, if I've done something, If she is resenting me more than usual today? I fear this is literally driving me insane and has taken its toll on me. Just typing this out feels like a thousand pounds lifted off my shoulder, only to be placed back on later when she is off work. Another thing we are struggling with is ME initiating any sexual act. We occasionally are still active sexually, most usually at 2-3AM in the middle of sleep oddly enough I will be awoken by her. However, I have tried on numerous occasion to initiate this myself, only to be declined. After so many times I asked why this was, after pestering and pestering she broke down and said she doesn't even want me to touch her and is disgusted by it knowing that I never wanted anything to do with her before except sex when I was ignoring her... I can also understand this but it bothers me to no end because I am trying to change, with what seems to be no result, which then restarts my worrying, and I ask about it, with a pissed off response.
If you make it all the way through the above, I thank you for your time. I'm in desperate need of some type of advice, I talk to noone because we decided to keep this between ourselves (despite her work friend who is now out of the picture primarily). What should I do?
I am 24 years old, as is my wife, and a few months ago she told me she didn't love me anymore and wanted me out of the house. What led up to all this? I, now aware, was basically a terrible husband. We have two small children, our first when we were 18 years old, this expedited our marriage ideas and we were married before my daughter's birth. After my daughter's birth we moved into our first home, I was addicted to playing video games and often played them at every moment available. I was all-around terrible, ignoring my wife, my kids on occasion, terrible during my wife's pregnancies, and an all-around jerk if something was standing in my way of doing what -I- wanted.
We bought a house together, and my trends continued. After a terrible argument over something I can't remember, my wife told me she was done, that she wanted me out, that our relationship was over, and she didn't love me anymore. There's nothing there she says. Hearing this, despite all the hints of it before, I was awoken. What kind of person had I been? How SELFISH had I been? I felt terrible, I begged for her forgiveness, to see the person I was when we were dating, when I wasn't trying to escape responsibility by gaming and doing what -I- wanted. After a day or two of thinking she decided "okay, lets try this."
It has now been 5 months since our talk. Our sex life has gone up and down, down most recently. During our 5 month "try" period, I caught her messaging an older gentleman that she works with, several hundred texts and hours of calls while I'm at work (she works nights, I work day.) She hid him from me originally when I asked, but after a few minutes gave in and explained that it was an ear, someone she could vent to, someone that she enjoyed their attention. She had been sending this person MMS messages (of what I don't know) that she says are her face, which he would reply "cute." - I have never suffered anxiety before, but learning this had happened flipped some sort of switch in my brain that I didn't know was there. Since then, she occasionally sees this person at work, sometimes with my children (it's a store, she takes the children there once a week to shop), but their texts/calls have ceased (it has been roughly 2 months). I have been dealing with terrible anxiety as of late, who did you call, what did you say, who texted you, let me see your phone. I was struck with fear that my relationship was ending already, but now possibly someone else was stepping in to fix it! Finally, last month, we had a large meltdown. I again made a realization about myself that, my anxiety and worry was not helping anything. My wife was making it clear and begging me to believe her that noone else is being hidden, and noone else will, that she knows it was wrong. I still deal with the anxiety from this daily and ponder sometimes, but I have finally stopped checking various places for information that doesn't exist.
SO - I am still having anxiety issues with our relationship, if my wife is aggravated, comes off as even remotely in a bad mood, seems quiet, ETC... I panic, my mind races 100,000 words per second in thoughts of "what's wrong, does she love me? will she love me? will she see the person I actually am, how regretful I am?", eventually I get to the point where I'd prefer suicide over having these thoughts, and the only thing that helps remedy them is TALKING to her about them. Every 2-3 days i'd say there is some kind of conversation about how we are doing, what I should do, If i'm doing something wrong, why she doesn't love me. She continues to openly say that she isn't IN LOVE with me and wants to try to be, this literally bring me to tears, she tells me that she feels bad i'm upset but can't care because she was upset from my neglect for so long. A day or two will pass with no anxiety, and things will seem okay, she will seem like she is happy, occasionally requesting space I.E. sitting on the other couch or actually requesting me to go play a game alone... which I think I can understand. However, this cycle has continued now for months. I continue to relapse in fear and ask her about things because her mood seems to be off-putting, aggravated, distant. It is as if we are on repeat in a series of my anxiety wondering if this is ever going to be fixed, her response is always "it needs time, I don't know."
What should I do in my position? Despite her aggravated, distant signs occasionally - should I let them be? Not ask what is the matter, if I've done something, If she is resenting me more than usual today? I fear this is literally driving me insane and has taken its toll on me. Just typing this out feels like a thousand pounds lifted off my shoulder, only to be placed back on later when she is off work. Another thing we are struggling with is ME initiating any sexual act. We occasionally are still active sexually, most usually at 2-3AM in the middle of sleep oddly enough I will be awoken by her. However, I have tried on numerous occasion to initiate this myself, only to be declined. After so many times I asked why this was, after pestering and pestering she broke down and said she doesn't even want me to touch her and is disgusted by it knowing that I never wanted anything to do with her before except sex when I was ignoring her... I can also understand this but it bothers me to no end because I am trying to change, with what seems to be no result, which then restarts my worrying, and I ask about it, with a pissed off response.
If you make it all the way through the above, I thank you for your time. I'm in desperate need of some type of advice, I talk to noone because we decided to keep this between ourselves (despite her work friend who is now out of the picture primarily). What should I do?