Wife grew distant, moved out, I don't love you anymore

[bandydad4]

After 14 years of blissfull marriage, I became very grumpy, irritable, bitchy, and depressed. I had been feeling these symptoms inside for a couple of years but my wife said she only really noticed the last 6 months where it became more than she could take and finally she and our 4 sons moved out. This is after a couple of months were she completely withdrew from me, all her friends, and family to whom she is very close. The friends she did hang around with have all been having marital issues for years and what they tell their husbands is like reading a direct script of what she has told me. She is a great friend to her friends and spent months listening to them talk about their unhappiness and I feel their negativity effected her. 2 days before moving out, we seemed very happy. Now she is ice cold to me, says she isn't in love with me anymore, she is tired of me treating her like crap, and doesn't know if she even cares to try to work things out.

Before she moved out, I had asked her to make me a Drs. appointment because I had literally gotten to the point I could barely function. I went after she was gone. The Dr. listened to me and explained about mid-life crisis (I am 45) and suggested we do a hormone check. I've heard about women's hormones getting off and making them go nuts but did not know it happened to men also. My T level was almost 10% of what it should have been. Within a few days of hormone therapy, I felt good. Like myself again and now 2 weeks later I feel literally 20 years younger. She says she doesn't buy it. That if you love someone you don't treat them the way I treated her regardless of hormones being off or not. I was bitchy and irritable yes but never laid a finger on her. Also she says that

nobody can make such a 180 degree turn around as I claim to have in only a few weeks. If I weren't inside my own body feeling the difference, I wouldn't believe it myself.

I am glad I found the problem and fixed it but it appears to be too late. She moved out 5 weeks ago now and at first she still said she loved me, then it became, "I love you but am not in love with you", now it is basically, I really don't care at all.

I am seeing a marriage counselor by myself, she says she isn't interested. She says she doesn't know if she wants to work on us or not. She says she needs and wants time and space. I am spending this time to improve myself in every facet possible as a person and a father.

I feel 15 years together, 14 married and 4 children would be something worth fighting for but she says, "I will be fine, you will be fine, the kids aren't the first ones to go thru this and won't be the last, they will get used to it." That seems so heartless.........HELP

[hopesndreams]

That seems so heartless.........HELP

 

I am going to say something here that is going to be very hard to swallow.

 

When you first started going through depression she couldn't handle it. Why? Because she NEEDED you and you weren't around for her NEEDS because you were struggling just to breathe. She had no character, integrity, or heart to put your NEEDS before her own, even just a short while to see that you got a diagnosis and treatment for what made you not you.

 

When this sort of experience happens to someone who is selfish, the 1st thing they do, is look for a replacement. A replacement of you. This is where the heartlessness really shows, when they have found a replacement.

 

She has made her feelings shown by saying ILYBNILWY (code for "I got somebody else") and then moving out. Get your head wrapped around those 2 things and distance yourself from her and file for D.

[Miky]

I am going to re iterate what hopesanddreams wrote to you

 

THERE IS ANOTHER MAN in the picture, start digging all this Bu;; about I love you but not in love with you is bu;; crap and she is seeing another man under your nose

 

Start digging

[andyg99]

That seems so heartless.........HELP

 

I am going to say something here that is going to be very hard to swallow.

 

When you first started going through depression she couldn't handle it. Why? Because she NEEDED you and you weren't around for her NEEDS because you were struggling just to breathe. She had no character, integrity, or heart to put your NEEDS before her own, even just a short while to see that you got a diagnosis and treatment for what made you not you.

 

.

 

great post - I would guess that when either spouse experiences a bout of serious depression (and I would guess over the course of a marriage that's a 99% possibility) that is when the "for better or worse" is first tested... as you have already pointed out it looks like his wife failed that test. In a perfect world both spouses are there for each other when the other is down, and knowing that the person you love the most "has your back" is what it is all about...

[Tiberius]

Well looks like she will be all set with 4 child support checks coming her way.

[BrettLost]

What Tiberius said makes me sick, but unfontunately he is most likely right.

 

I can't get my head around the fact there are virtually NO consequences at all to be endured from a woman doing this to her husband/family.

 

If she can exuse/dismiss/hide the guilt of doing it, and gets main custody (most do) then its seemingly all win win.

 

Marriage is just as disposable as the rest of life's crap now.

[Tiberius]

What Tiberius said makes me sick, but unfontunately he is most likely right.

 

I can't get my head around the fact there are virtually NO consequences at all to be endured from a woman doing this to her husband/family.

 

If she can exuse/dismiss/hide the guilt of doing it, and gets main custody (most do) then its seemingly all win win.

 

Marriage is just as disposable as the rest of life's crap now.

 

Thats not entierly true especially in this day and age, if the mother of a girl did not file for divorce, I would consider the girl to be marriage material. Unless there are other huge red flags around.

 

However somebody shouldnt marry for the sake of getting married and when in doubt, its better to cohabit. Its about doing whats right for you and not doing what is en vouge.