# Not sure he loves me any more



## lili (May 13, 2012)

I've been with my partner 5 years and we bought a house and moved in together last November. At the end of January he got a new job with ridiculous working hours, every day 12 hours shifts except for Monday and Tuesday. I do a conventional 9-5 job so this means that we rarely have the sort of quality time we want/need. We don't get to spend a single minute of the weekend together, for example. He says he can't find another 'good' job but I say how 'good' a job is it with those hours. He's a hard worker and I try to keep a lid on how I feel, but I can't always. I feel that we bought a house and moved in together to move the relationship forward and the opposite is happening. But I don't think he's very sympathetic to that view. He doesn't know how much I just want to spend time with him, do normal stuff like pottering in the house, cuddling on the sofa in the evening, instead I just rattle round our new house feeling a bit empty. Yes by the way I do have a good circle of friends and a good social life but I don't want to HAVE to go out or call on mates all the time. 

So we do argue about it at times and I think I become a bit pathetic and tearful (which is not really me). We rowed about it this week, now he is sleeping in the spare room and this morning told me he doesn't know if he loves me any more. 

Maybe this is making me sound selfish. There are far worse things than a man who works too hard. He's a good, decent man and I love him dearly. He says he has colleagues at work who've been doing those hours for years while being married but for the life of me I don't know how. The weird thing is that if I didn't love him, or wanted to play away, I wouldn't care about his working hours.

We went on holiday a few weeks ago. It was bliss, just being able to spend time together, talk to each other, resume the old spark, and I saw no sign that he was falling out of love with me then. But maybe the signs have been there. He's never said it before so sorry this is a bit long-winded as I feel a bit shocked and confused. The last thing I want is for our relationship to end but I don't know how to go forward.


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## 2nd_t!me iz_best (Feb 28, 2011)

he is putting his job ahead of you.

one of you needs to cut something loose. he needs to cut his job loose or you need to cut him loose.

his colleagues may be doing these hours and be married but most likely they are not really 'in' the marriage and there are problems.

if im in a relationship and love my partner i would rather just get by if i had to rather than spend no time with her and always at work but have butt loads of money. she would have to be my first priority.


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## tacoma (May 1, 2011)

You may have trouble convincing him.

New house, wife, kids in the plans?

He probably like most men sees himself as needing to build up financial security.
Like most, it's probably his first priority.
_Posted via Mobile Device_


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## lili (May 13, 2012)

He has twice lost all his savings on bad financial moves so maybe he does. I bought this house out of an inheritance and maybe he feels bad about that. But it's hardly as though I am 'more successful' than him, just that my folks have died. It was exactly what I wanted to spend it on. Just didn't want to live here on my own. 

I didn't force him to come and ive with me either. We planned it together and it was him who found the house (after a long search). But after 5 minutes of living together he gets a job where he is never here. I don't think he did it to avoid me, just that I know decent jobs are genuinely thin on the ground and I admire him forthe hard work he does. But..BUT...

There's no need for him to earn as much as he does. We have very low outgoings, I am 45 and he's 50 so we aren't at the stage of life of planning and building a family or anything. 

He doesn't seem to get how I feel either. The most he ever says is 'have patience', which would be fine except I don't see him doing much to change the situation. 

We had a discussion which turned into a row during which I told him that I didn't want to live my life like this and that I had to question the future of the relationship. It's probably as drastic a thing as I have ever said to him. Of course it was supposed to spur him to apply for jobs with more sociable hours, instead it's resulted in him moving to the spare bedroom and saying he's not sure he loves me any more.


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## lili (May 13, 2012)

Thanks for the replies, guys, by the way. Much appreciated.


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## keko (Mar 21, 2012)

So he works his butt off to provide you with the security of a marriage and you're considering divorce because he isn't intimate enough?


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## lili (May 13, 2012)

We're not married fwiw. I don't need providing with security, we almost own the house and our overheads are quite low. I also have a job and it's his company I need, not his money. The only times I ever get to see him are on Monday or Tuesday nights between about 6 and 10pm and we live in the same house! When we met he worked strange hours but nowhere near as anti-social as these. We at least got some of the weekend together and more time in the week. This is pretty much like being single. 

And basically if that situation doesn't change, I don't know if I can continue to stand it. I miss him.


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## keko (Mar 21, 2012)

From his bad financial experience and you buying the house, is likely effecting his manliness(for lack of a better term).


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## lili (May 13, 2012)

That might be true although in have done my best never to present it like that. Like I said earlier, I'm not some successful business type who can just afford to buy houses, my folks died and I inherited the money. That's just circumstance. 

I've told him that I don't want or need him to have lots of money. I haven't got a lot myself in cash terms and I'm not materialistic. For me the greatest pleasures in life come in the simple things you share. 

If it came to him being offered a different job with sociable hours but at half the pay, there would be no decision to make as far as I'm concerned. I understand that the same might not be true for him, though. But I don't out-earn him and I'm not in a higher status job than him. 

We do have different attitudes to money. I'm a plodder and a saver and an organiser of standing orders and insurance and household bills and stuff. He's a dreamer, hence the twice crashing on the stockmarket. The first time it happened I didn't know him, but the second time, I saw him getting carried away with what in my opinion is the false hope of a quick buck and pinning his hopes on a distant dream of riches and freedom and escaping the rat race. I know he did feel disappointment in himself for getting it wrong but truly, I don't care about being rich. I don't and won't love him any the less for never being rich I never expected him to be and that's not why I fell in love with him.


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## muttgirl (Mar 23, 2012)

Sounds like get might get a thrill at work, why he is there and likes it or else defines himself in some other way. If he has always worked odd hours and is a workaholic, it does not matter how you view things, he might just like the way he views things and there is some payoff to his hours at work. I live with the same situation and go back and forth between he is cheating to he prefers work over me and I only get him during vacation 10 days a year.


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