# Since we talked about separating..we're nice to each other



## thisSux (Jan 8, 2013)

We've been married nearly 13 years and have 3 wonderful kids, for the past 10 years my wife has been suffering from depression which has led to emotional withdrawal, terrible money problems, which I have had to carry the can for and a total lack of care for our home and surroundings. I unconsciously began to withdraw from the emotional relationship and just tried to focus on the practical stuff, making enough money,looking after kids etc etc.

We began to see a counsellor who has helped me really understand how I feel and I realised that for me it had been over for a long time. One evening my wife pressed me on how I felt so I told her, There have been a few tears and tantrums but mostly we've been nice, respectful and kind to each other, I'm searching for somewhere we can both uses as a bolt hole so we can spend time with the kids at our house and give then as little disruption as possible.

I'm not really searching for an answer but i know there must be people living this story too and would just like to hear their stories


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## thisSux (Jan 8, 2013)

so it's been a couple of weeks and i thought i'd update a bit, we started out with pretty amicable talks about how we'd handle things and how we'd break it to the kids and then one night she let the booze get the better of her and started throwing things around, upending furniture and hurling some abuse in the mix. another week of relative calmness followed and then the same thing happened again way too much booze shouting abuse about how i was leaving my children because she has been ill and would i do the same thing if she had cancer, really nasty barbs, this time though i refused to bite, i simply told her i wasnt going to fight with her, it wouldn't help anything. then the next phase came, she decided to sleep on the sofa and began howling, i tried to comfort her and was pushed away, this went on for an hour until she eventually reached a point where she was having a panic attack,I had laid there listening to her partly because I was scared that she might do something stupid and partly because i didnt want to wake up with a carving knife in my back. ( don't know if she would do either of these things, but she seemed in a bad way) it took me over an hour to calm her down and get her to sleep, next morning she admitted she had a problem with drinking and had no idea what she'd said to me last night.

we went to our MC that day and told the MC i wanted to move out and get some space and she thought it was a good idea and that my wife had to work on herself while we have the space, she also told her that her behaviour was classic manipulation and she needed to address what ever issues in her past had caused her to be this disfunctional and only then would she be able to truly overcome her depression and her attitude towards me.

finally someone understands what i've been going through..it was like a light bulb going on, sometimes in the middle of it all i've felt that i'm somehow causing all this angst and bitterness and now i know i'm not!!

feeling very calm today


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## Nsweet (Mar 3, 2012)

Of course she's treats you better when you threaten to leave! She's got some real issues herself and abandonment is so terrifying she flips back to being sweet to keep you around for just a few minutes longer. But at the same time she is abusing you, alcohol isn't an excuse for her behavior! 

The only way she's going to get some help is if IF she hits rock bottom and decides she's going to get help herself. Other than that I think YOU KNOW YOU DESERVE BETTER. How about someone who doesn't tear you to shreds and then cry when you decide you don't have to be her emotional punching bag, or that you have to apologize and keep the peace after every fight. She wants to be depressed, so let her be depressed with the mess she's made on her own. If she keeps acting like she she can depressed and single again.


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## thisSux (Jan 8, 2013)

trust me Nsweet if it wasn't for my kids my arse would have been gone long ago


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## Nsweet (Mar 3, 2012)

Is that really fair to you or your kids? 

What if you divorced this woman. At the very least your kids would have a safe haven every other weekend. And the way your wife drinks she could have trouble with custody.


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## thisSux (Jan 8, 2013)

difficult question, theres never any nastiness towards the kids just me and she has agreed to work on the drinking, the plan for time apart is to rent a small appt and each stay there a few days while the other stays with the kids


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## Nsweet (Mar 3, 2012)

Uh uh, work on drinking? Nobody works on problematic drinking like that without going through rehab, because that addiction is still there and no issues have been resolved. I'm willing to bet she's going to keep drinking like before as soon as you leave...... HOWEVER if you're not around to blame she may burn herself out eventually and decide to seek treatment on her own. But no matter what you can't save her from herself or make her stop drinking. She going to be the one to decide that on her own. And your kids are going to love you now the way they always have..... you're still going to be supporting and nurturing right?


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## thisSux (Jan 8, 2013)

Nsweet said:


> .... you're still going to be supporting and nurturing right?


of course, i'm not doing this out of some kind of personal midlife crisis thing i've just gone way beyond what a reasonable man can do


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## thisSux (Jan 8, 2013)

i'll apologise now for the ranting nature that may follow....
we started this week with the 'escape house' me there 4 nights her 3 so we both get good time with the kids and time alone. I went first set the place up, buy a bed tv that sort of thing, evry day im there i phone my kids to say goodnight, find out about their day and then have to talk to stbxw and hear how tough it is for her, ff too my 3 days, oh no i only get 2 as she wants to coome back early, and in my 2 days out of 7 i need to cover the kids school books, fill her freezer, tidy the house, remove the ton of grease from the oven, buy the kids stuff for school, give her more money, wash and iron all the kids school clothes, buy them stuff for lunches and then on sunday as i'm cooking them a roast she turns up and announces to anyone who'll listen shes having tinned ravioli for her dinner.

i can't go this far with people who know her or in front of the kids because she's their mother but jeez i could really use some advice b4 i totaly lose my ****


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## thisSux (Jan 8, 2013)

this whole thing has been a total roller coaster, im happy to be away from the day to day things that have been driving me mad for such a long time and to be honest my only real annoyances seem to be when i need to deal with my stbxw and she wants to change arrangements with the kids. I've managed to ride out the times of abuse with dignity and without getting drawn in to tit for tat insults, i've been upfront with the kids and i'm feeling pretty good about stuff right now


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## thisSux (Jan 8, 2013)

funny how this thing just doesn't seem to settle, took the kids home an hour late on Sunday and she went off, she started by phoning me while i was in the car wit the kids and told me what a selfish prick i was to be bringing the kids home late, i told her we weren't going to fight and she hung up, when i got back she started on me, I told her i didn't want to fight in front of the kids and that i wouldn't be staying for dinner, she yelled at me to get out and never come back, kids are all upset now so i go round and hug the kids tell them everything's ok and i'll see them tuesday as planned, as i'm leaving she follows me and starts telling me how i'm so selfish and that my weekends with the kids are all about me and not them, she's sick of me coming round to "her" house and she wants the key back. all this time i'm trying to stay calm, but she knows that telling me i'm doing the wrong thing with my kids is the worst thing she can say, eventually i manage to get her off my car and drive off.

I hated leaving my kids knowing they were upset and i hated eventually snapping while she pushed and pushed me, next day she sends a text apologising for yelling and that she doesn't want us to be like this....will she ever stop being so f....in mental??????


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## Conrad (Aug 6, 2010)

What was her childhood like?


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## thisSux (Jan 8, 2013)

her parents had a pretty screwed relationship, she would do pretty much everything for him, right down to washing his hair.he is a pretty dominating type, at least around his wife and kids and everything absoloutely must be done his way


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## Conrad (Aug 6, 2010)

thisSux said:


> her parents had a pretty screwed relationship, she would do pretty much everything for him, right down to washing his hair.he is a pretty dominating type, at least around his wife and kids and everything absoloutely must be done his way


And you wonder why she hates men?


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## K.C. (Dec 1, 2012)

thisSux said:


> funny how this thing just doesn't seem to settle, took the kids home an hour late on Sunday and she went off, she started by phoning me while i was in the car wit the kids and told me what a selfish prick i was to be bringing the kids home late, i told her we weren't going to fight and she hung up, when i got back she started on me, I told her i didn't want to fight in front of the kids and that i wouldn't be staying for dinner, she yelled at me to get out and never come back, kids are all upset now so i go round and hug the kids tell them everything's ok and i'll see them tuesday as planned, as i'm leaving she follows me and starts telling me how i'm so selfish and that my weekends with the kids are all about me and not them, she's sick of me coming round to "her" house and she wants the key back. all this time i'm trying to stay calm, but she knows that telling me i'm doing the wrong thing with my kids is the worst thing she can say, eventually i manage to get her off my car and drive off.
> 
> I hated leaving my kids knowing they were upset and i hated eventually snapping while she pushed and pushed me, next day she sends a text apologising for yelling and that she doesn't want us to be like this....will she ever stop being so f....in mental??????


Hi, I am the male version of your wife. Well kinda.

I get where she is at and it is a horrible dark place. Chances of her thinking straight are pretty slim.

Is she getting help for the Depression. Her saying I am ill is positive but only if she then does something about it. It took me years to accept I needed help dealing with depression. As with you, by the time i woke up and started becoming myself again, it was too late and my wife was done.

I almost find the 'will she stop being mental' offensive but you know what, I get it. I know how much hurt I caused my wife and that anger is quite justified in most respects.

All I will say in her defence is she most likely isn't herself and depression, especially protracted bouts really does skew your thinking and can easily lead to mood swings and anger.

None of this is to justify her behaviour or say you are wrong to want out though.

Does she have IC or meds or is she doing what I did for so long and thinking she can handle it on her own?


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## thisSux (Jan 8, 2013)

she did spend a long time thinking she could do it alone but for the last few years she's been on meds and about 18 months of ic, at our last mc session the mc suggested to her that her issues were not all due to depression and she should pursue this with ic.
there have been improvements but the relationship and the dependancy was just too draining and i put up huge barriers to protect myself, and then at some point realised i was no longer in love.
I recently stumbled on an article in shrink4men.com about hostile dependancy and it could have so easily been written about her.

and in this weekends row it seemed so obvious that i couldnt believe i hadnt seen it before


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## thisSux (Jan 8, 2013)

dunno if it's just cos i'm feeling unwell or tired but today i feel incredibly sad, it seems that everyone of our mutual friends is reaching out to my stbxw, (i went round there yesterday to see that she'd been sent flowers from some of our friends) her parents come up to see her regularly, take her out for lunch, shopping etc, my phone is pretty much silent. add to that the youngest 2 kids seem to be starting to struggle with the whole thing and i'm really starting to feel like i'm a villain


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## Conrad (Aug 6, 2010)

thisSux said:


> dunno if it's just cos i'm feeling unwell or tired but today i feel incredibly sad, it seems that everyone of our mutual friends is reaching out to my stbxw, (i went round there yesterday to see that she'd been sent flowers from some of our friends) her parents come up to see her regularly, take her out for lunch, shopping etc, my phone is pretty much silent. add to that the youngest 2 kids seem to be starting to struggle with the whole thing and i'm really starting to feel like i'm a villain


Does she want to reconcile?


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## thisSux (Jan 8, 2013)

no. last conversation we had about it she told me she couldnt trust me with her emotions and that too much damage had been done, i know that i walked away but i'm 12,000 miles away from my family and i feel pretty alone sometimes


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## Conrad (Aug 6, 2010)

thisSux said:


> no. last conversation we had about it she told me she couldnt trust me with her emotions and that too much damage had been done, i know that i walked away but i'm 12,000 miles away from my family and i feel pretty alone sometimes


Would you want to reconcile?


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## thisSux (Jan 8, 2013)

no way too much pain and heartache to consider that..

WA yesterday, i know through friends that she had a tough day but i didn't even think about it till pretty late on


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