Stay or go? What on earth do I do now?

[CryingCanuck]

You're a human being right ?????

Quit using the crap that your W might not take it, hell man she's been taking your garbage for how long? She will take it and more than likely do OK and by the sounds of it you on the other hand I think is the one scared s***less to leave because you're more comfortable whining and pitying yourself about how your life sucks......

 

LOOK IN THE F***ING mirror, you''re the one scared buddy, scared s***less I might add and you're being a fool treating another human being this way. I hate to talk to you like this but people like you are what make divorce attorneys rich, they whine and cry and treat their spouses like garbage then get taken to the cleaners during the divorce then come up with " what did I do????? I loved the *****)

 

Well look at what you're doing buddy, your life apparently sucks and you're treating your W like garbage because YOUR LIFE SUCKS is that fair?

GEt a grip, get couselling get help and either move on or treat the lady with the respect you would show a complete stranger.....

 

I don;t know why I'm writting this but it's the last one..... If you don;t do something and get your act together soon, you're pathetic.

[eyeswideshut]

Ditherer,

 

you sound exactly like my MM.

If you like the affair babe so much why do you play hard to get with her?

She's probably hoping you'll leave the wife!!!!

 

God!

 

If my MM would just make a decision already!

But he remains married, so I can't do anything about it!

 

WTF do you expect your affair babe to do? Pursue you?

How can you say it wasn't meant to be?

 

How long have you been in NC with affair babe before you saw her again?

[Gunny376]

in the Marines together ~ in combat ~ I'd "fragg" your azz! You;'re without a doubt in my military mind the most in-decisive person I've ever come across in my entire life! You should change your "handle" to "Yea But,..........."

 

Giving you an opinion or adivce is a waste of time and effort ~ because you're always going to come back with ~ "Yea! But,......................"

 

The best thing you could do, IMHO is divorce your wife ~ she's too good for you ~ and deserves better than you ~ and living life with you must be pure Hell.

 

Where do you get off, playing with other people's feelings, emotions, ~ lifes? Yours, your wife's, your children, the OW? WTF?

 

Part of your problem, is that you've got it in your size M4PBrian Housing Group that you're so smart and intelligent, and that you read a lot ~ your a pointy~headed intellectual ~ I know! I'm one of those. Guess what? I am in awe at the wisdom, knowledge, experience of the people that I've meet that aren't HS grads. All the answers to all of the questions and all the solutions to the problems ~ can't be found in a book ~ Pal!

 

Single life isn't all its cracked up to be ~ because once you're past a certain age ~ what you run into are all the rejects. Used men/women are like used cars ~ if they were worth a damn to begin with ~ the orginal owner would have kept them to begin with.

 

Being married with kids ~ can be ~ often is a pain!

 

Being single, without kids ~ can be ~ often is a pain!

 

The grass may be greener on the otherside ~ but its only because there's more manure on that side!

 

Its HARD finding someone that loves you ~ truly loves you. If and when you do ~ don't screw it up!

 

When you point a finger at the wife ~ you need to look down and point at the three fingers pointing back at yourself~ first.

 

Relationships? Easy to get into ~ hard to maintain ~ hard to get out of!

 

If you're looking for sympathy ~ look it up in the dictironary ~ that's about the only place your going to find it ~ somewhere between sh*t and syndicate!

[Ditherer]

Thanks for the replies...

 

CryingCanuck: Yes, I think I'll be settling for just being pathetic, for some time to come. I remember months ago saying "if I don't sort this out by June I'll be very disappointed with myself" .. yet here we are and nothing's changed or is likely to. Knowing my wife though, she'd much rather I carried on taking my time trying to wrestle with this, rather than split us all up. That's all the justification I need to delay things for as long as it takes, however sad it is. She's always been so besotted with me that she'll take this. She's always known that I'm not as keen as she is, I think she likes the challenge or something. It's living proof of the old "treat 'em mean keep e'm keen" saying, not that I think it's anything to crow about.

 

eyeswideshut : You haven't been following it all, have you? 'Affair Babe' is history now, and I wouldn't get involved even if she ever got back in touch. It was great fun and we had certain things that worked, but we weren't really compatible, I'd want more than we had going. Now I know how she wasn't really honest with me, I can't forgive her for that.

I think I have finally learnt the difference between attraction and love, and we never had love. It was just attraction, and 'chemistry' doesn't necessarily mean anything.

Attraction is when you HOPE someone is your perfect partner forever;

Love is when you KNOW someone is as perfect a partner as you'll ever want.

I'm not sure I'm capable of finding real love, or doing it justice to be honest, and having felt so hurt recently I don't want to mess anyone else about. This means a lonely loveless sexless life, which makes it all the more attractive to just settle for my present 'living a lie' rut.

 

Gunny376 : Thanks for all that. I won't argue.. it's up to me to decide whether the grass really is greener on the other side or not.. it **really** may be.. but mostly I have to figure out if I can ever love my wife enough to justify continuing the marriage - even if I try. That's all there is to it. It's no good telling me to be grateful for someone loving me if I just don't feel it back in return, is it? You wouldn't be grateful for some stalker who followed you about, convinced that they loved you, would you? It has to be mutual... and that can't be forced or worked upon, no matter what some "love is a decision" believers say (including those who've never really been in this spot, although they may deceive themselves that they have been here). Quite frankly if this is as good as a longterm 'love' relationship gets (or my experiences in prior years when I was actually making the best of it), then I can take or leave it.. life on my own wouldn't really be much worse overall.

 

I'm still hoping the answer will just come to me in a flash of realisation. But if I can summon the enthusiasm to get all my stuff sorted out, then it'll be very easy to actually talk things over at last. Two other stumbling blocks remain at present.. my financial situation has changed and surviving a split would be much more difficult now.. and there's something else going on (with a month or two to run yet) that I'd rather was behind us before I take any action. Every little excuse makes the dithering even more comfortable!

[sophia34]

I don't know why I keep reading this point. But I swear this will be the last time I post to it...we all need to move on. But even so, this caught my eye in a book that I have and I thought I'd share:

 

"....we usually fall, quite unawares, into assuming that what we are thinking--the ideas and opinions that we harbor at any given time--are 'the truth' about what is 'out there' in the world and 'in here' in our minds. Most of the time, it just isn't so.

We pay a high price for this mistaken and unexamined assumption, for our almost willful ignoring of the richness of our present moments. The fallout accumulates silently, coloring our lives without our knowing or being able to do something about it. We may never quite be where we actually are, never quite touch the fullness of our possibilities. Instead, we lock ourselves into a personal fiction that we already know who we are, that we know where we are and where we are going, that we know what is happening--all the while remaining enshrouded in thoughts, fantasies, and impulses, mostly about the past and about the future, about what we want and like, and what we fear and don't like, which spin out continuously, veiling our direction and the very ground we're standing on.

The book you have in your hands is about waking up from such dreams and from the nightmares they often turn into. Not knowing that you are even in such a dream is what the Buddhists call 'ignorance,' or mindlessness. Being in touch with this not knowing is called 'mindfulness.' The work of waking up from these dreams is the work of meditation, the systematic cultivation of wakefulness, of present-moment awareness. This waking up goes hand in hand with what we might call 'wisdom,' a seeing more deeply into cause and effect and the interconnectedness of things, so that we are no longer caught in a dream-dictated reality of our own creation. To find our way, will need to pay more attention to the present moment. It is the only time that we have in which to live, grow, feel, and change. We will need to become more aware of and take precautions against the incredible pull of the Scylla and Charybdis of past and future, and the dreamworld they offer us in place of our lives."

--from the book "Wherever You Go, There You Are: Mindfulness Meditation in Everyday Life" by Jon Kabat-Zinn

 

If this sounds at all familiar or applicable to you, might I also recommend:

 

"Zen and the Art of Falling in Love" by Brenda Shoshanna

"Meditation: The First and Last Freedom" from OSHO

"Lovingkindness: The Revolutionary Art of Happiness" by Sharon Salzberg

 

All teach one to learn to be happy with themselves and their present moment first, then let the world take care of itself. If anyone needs to wake up, meditate, and get outside themselves, it's you Ditherer. Whether you stay with your wife or not, the world still turns, the sun still shines, people still live and people still die. It's not that big a deal, in the grand scheme of things. It's even less of a big deal when you realize that you have control over your own fate, and your life is what it is and it is what you make of it each moment, whatever it is you happen to do. In essence, it's all good if you make it so, moment by moment.

 

First and foremost, you're depressed and indecisive and need to get help with that first. Your marriage isn't your problem, not by a long shot. Not even close. Focus on the true problem (you and your mental distortions of the world you live in and the power you have over it), rather than the false problem (your wife and marriage).

 

That's it for me on this thread!

[Ditherer]

Well thanks for trying, but none of that really resonated with me, to be brutally honest.

 

I don't feel depressed. I've been depressed before (years ago), and then mildly depressed in spells throughout my marriage (due this continued underlying feeling that I'm just not getting what I want from life and living with my wife just isn't hitting the spot) so I know what it's like. This isn't like that. I'm still enjoying the rest of life, still able to laugh with my mates, I'm still in touch with reality as far as I know, I'm happy with everything .. except.. this question of my marriage. It's only the stress of not knowing what to do for the best (or not having the courage to do it) that's getting me worked up. It's a stressful depression on the one issue, rather than the bleak dark "what's the point of everything?" that I've faced before in years gone by.

 

But thanks anyway. You spent time here and I appreciate it.

Cheers

 

I'll be having a trial sep. of sorts next week when she goes away for a few days and leaves me here to look after the kids. It should be fun.. I'm not expecting to miss her.. but even if I do miss her presence I'll convince myself it's just because it's a change.. it's different... and something I'd adjust to if it was for longer. So I'm not expecting it to prove much.. but we'll see.

[dgiirl]

Ditherer, you're being selfish because you are a coward. You have NO right to decide the fate of your wife's life. You are arrogant because you think you know that your wife would rather live the life you two are living before you make up your mind. Why dont you let her decide? Why dont you respect her enough to know the truth? I dont understand how you could possibly justify to yourself the fate of HER life. It's almost a year since you first posted! s*** or get off the pot as my daddy use to say. You are wasting your WIFE'S years to find her true love. She deserves to be with someone who loves her and you clearly dont. Stop being selfish and let her know what's going on. This is no longer about you. It's about her! You're wasting her life and that's not right.

[Magister]

Well, let see what we have here.

 

Always been a loser with women. (None of the women he has been interested has really ever reciprocated. The most recent woman to be interested in him didn't REALLY know him. His wife quickly lost interest.)

 

Poor understanding of relationships. (As soon as women find out about the "real" him they loose interest. No one who did understand would ever beg a woman to love him.)

 

Obviously lacking in sexual skills. (His wife, in the horniest period in a woman's life, won't even touch him.)

 

Quite indecisive. Low self-esteem. Probably suffers from significant concerns about his manhood. (Has been considering a divorce for years, hasn't made a decision. Works in an IT field. Periods of euphoric "highs" and depression related to female validation. Considers the woman who accepted him sub-par.)

 

I think that about sums things up.

 

Prescription: Get drunk and get into a fist fight. Preferably one that lands you in lockup for a night or two. Your unhappy now. Whatever you do you will still be unhappy. You might as well be unhappy in a place with new scenery.

[Becoming]

The way I see it you can continue to live this marriage out all in your head and way of seeing things . . .

 

or you can begin to relate to a real, live W with her own thoughts, feelings that SHE--not you--is responsible for.

 

YOU'RE HIDING. As a result, you're a shadow of a person.

 

And you blame your wife . . . out of a desire to "protect" her.

 

Bulls***!!!

 

You just don't want to rock the boat of your fantasy world with reality. You fear reality more than you do your own self-loathing fantasy world. No one but you is responsible for this mess of your life because you've already decided what this marriage is WITHOUT HER INPUT. You've objectified her living reality into an image you can manipulate for your own purposes.

You basically have a pornographic marriage, only the porn you're addicted to is the LS pin-up of a fully-clothed, frumpy, needy, wife of your beloved children.

 

Get a life--a real one.

 

By responding to this thread, I'm just playing into your self-loathing fantasies.

 

Nevermore.

[Ditherer]

Oh great, I'm a total loser.. thanks a bunch.. I'll just top myself now, shall I?

 

Well I guess I deserve much of that.. I suppose... but..

 

I'm just glad I'm not relying on this site, with no other source of advice to help me. I've obviously got a problem I haven't yet been able to deal with, yet it's fine to have a go at me instead of coming up with anything constructive! Luckily my friends know how genuine I am, and how totally torn I am over all this. They don't judge me.

 

Thank God for that.

 

Looks like I really am done here. Thanks to those for who it's due. Seeya.

[Bex_23]

You dont even seem to be able to make your mind up about whether to stop posting on this thread or not!

 

I dont think you are ever going to to be able leave your wife , just too many factors to consider....

 

I suggest that you just try and enjoy your life as it is to the best of your ability .....

[sirjay]

Dither:

 

here is your only way out of this.

 

From the little I have read of your postings, it is 100% apparent that you are not in a state to make such a massive decision. It seems very, very clear to me that you are severely depressed. Please be aware that one of the symptoms of depression is not knowing that you ARE depressed. I have never in all my days seen anyone rant so much and for so long without getting anywhere. You are not in a healthy state mentally to be doing it to this degree and i really dont think its just about what you are writing about, there is something underpinning this. Have you thought about your earlier life and whether you might have unresolved pain that has led this situation?

 

What you need to do is change your focus away from women and divorces and focus on yourself and your personal development. Do you exercise? Start going to the gym every day and really cane it. And really... get some counselling. Not about all of this rant but about YOU. There is no person in the world who can MAKE someone else be happy. You can only be happy within yourself and then you and the person you love enhance that. You are not happy in yourself. You may think that you are or want to believe it but you clearly have unresolved issues and denying them is only going to hurt a lot of people.

 

If you decide to stay with your wife, you two should get marriage counselling and be frank about what is wrong in the relationship. Perhaps give it one year and draw up a plan WITH her on how to improve things. If you still feel the same after that, then you would at least know that you had tried. you have made no effort at all to address the issues, it seems? Have you discussed any of this with her? Have you suggested changes in your life, new shared experiences? Have you studied how to revive a failing marriage? Google it, there is loads of info. No relationship will stand the test of time without work. None. If you don't like the sound of that then you are destined to either be out of a relationship or to skip from one short one to the next. It doesnt sound lke you have the confidence to do that anyway.

 

I agree with the earlier poster - i am sure that she has a great deal she is not saying about you, for the sake of commitment. You don't feel any threat of losing her so you feel in control and take her for granted. You cant know until it happens, but you may very well completely freak out if she suddenly divorced you, and dont think that its not a daily possibility if things are so bad.

 

I was terribly scarred by my parent's divorce and it affects my relationships to this day. Do the above and then make the right choice for the kids, if not anyone else.

[Ditherer]

Thanks for taking the time to comment. I'm just adding extra comments here and there while I still can, just in case anyone's interested.

 

sirjay, I'm not depressed! I'm horribly confused about what to do, and reluctant to set in motion what currently seems to be the only sensible answer.. but in all other respects I'm perfectly happy and cheerful. This forum has provided a great opportunity to get all the bad stuff off my chest, but it's not totally representative of me.. it's the worst bits of my worst side.

 

I've been depressed before and I know how 'black' that is.. this is nothing like it.. and I'm afraid I'd argue about the issue of knowing whether I'm depressed or not. Yes, in some ways my mood is sometimes 'pushed down' or 'depressed' compared to my normal happy-go-lucky nature, but that's as far as it goes. I'm just a bit weighed down by a heavy issue that plays on my mind. Much of my time is spent thinking of other things, hobbies and interests etc.. I do get breaks from worrying about all this. But thanks for your concern.

 

I've had a couple of days (while my wife went away) just me and the kids, and I loved it. OK I cheated a little with the childcare as the inlaws looked after them one daytime, but overall I loved it. We bonded even more as I did all the little things that normally get left to my wife to do, and I was Great Dad for a bit. I can honestly say I didn't miss my wife AT ALL. I loved having the bed to myself, never even thought of her. No basis for a marriage, is it?!

 

I know I've got to talk to her about it.. it's just so hard to let go of a comfortable (but dull) rut which kind of works for all of us, for such a scary unknown (you may well scoff at 'kind of works' because I know how absurd that sounds). I'm not sure I'll ever face it, however much I know that morally I b***dy well OUGHT to.

 

I know the marriage is dead. As I nearly added to another thread here in this forum :

 

A marriage is a living thing, requiring a continuous committment from both partners. If you're no longer feeling the love and no longer want to, then the marriage is already dead. To continue going through the motions is NOT doing it justice by any stretch of the imagination. You don't continue a marriage by simply continuing to live with someone, it's already over. You might as well leave. Actually going ahead and leaving someone is just changing your living conditions and setting your partner free.

 

I'm still taking this at my own pace. I certainly feel I've learnt a hell of a lot in the last two years, I'm still 'growing' and I'll get there when I'm ready. And as selfish as it may sound, everyone else can wait for ME to be ready... it's not as it anyone's suffering horrendously in the meantime.

 

Thanks

[Ditherer]

No change.

 

Still not sure enough of what to do, though I know deep down.. it's just finding the courage to do it that's the problem.

 

The house and the kids are the main 'problem', the marriage aspect less so. The kids are what's keeping me here - I tell myself I'm justified to carry on with this bad situation because at the moment things are better for them, no-ones really voicing any complaints. Although.. my older child commented about some soap on the TV the other day that one character deserved to lose his partner because he "wasn't showing any interest".. strange phrase for a kid to come out with, must have heard Mummy using it when talking about us.

 

If I'm deciding whether to split I can ignore the house, that's a pain to deal with, and quite a loss (it's a nice house and the only one I'll ever own) but it's not really important to me in the Grand Scheme of Things. I can 'ignore' the kids issue perhaps.. not sure.. if I see them 1 - 3 (?) times a week I'd probably manage, but I know I'll miss them terribly. They really do make my life worth living. But I can't let them decide the fate of my marriage. I can ignore what people will say, stuff them - it's none of their business. I can ignore the marriage itself and all that vows and commitment nonsense, because if I'm no longer interested in it then it's over beyond repair as far as I'm concerned. I'm not living a lie any more and compounding it with some vain attempts to "work at it".

 

It all comes back to the same old : would I stay with her if it was just me and her in this rut, unmarried, no kids, renting a nice place? Just the two of us, with all the limited possibilities of that? No. I'd still be scared to leap into the unknown, but I can't let that decide things for me. If I'm going to weigh up one future against another, then to make things fair it has to be the following two on the Wobbly Scales of Decision : the best I could make it with my wife VERSUS a *reasonable* life without her (with or without anyone else). And that would be an EXTREMEMLY easy decision to make. I'd be off in a shot.

 

So what I need to ask myself now is, how much longer is it fair to keep things as they are, while I keep on waiting for things to become so clear I've no more hesitation? I need to reach rock bottom? I'm drinking almost every night now, not much but enough to blunt the despair and make things semi bearable. This is probably a mistake, because the easier I make it to stay, the longer I'm delaying the inevitable and I'm just avoiding the issue. I think I need to face the misery I'm feeling head on, feel the full force of the despair, hit 'rock bottom' and thus find the motivation to act.

 

I know I've got to tell her how iffy things are, how undecided I am, and ask for a separation so that I can work things out in my mind some more, but from a neutral distance. Maybe I would realise things are about as good as they ever are for any couple, after all? But look what's happened over the years, particularly last year, how can I seriously believe this relationship was working, or ever could do?

 

I'm fairly convinced it's pointless to stay.

 

But my kids are WONDERFUL.. how can I leave them yet?

[Billy Bob]

Really your never going to make a decision so why bother even posting here. You have been blabbing out this nonsense for almost one year. I feel sorry for your wife.

[Ditherer]

Really your never going to make a decision so why bother even posting here. You have been blabbing out this nonsense for almost one year. I feel sorry for your wife.

 

Well I see YOU have got nothing constructive to say on MY thread, so go take a hike, quite frankly.

 

Having said that, maybe there is absolutely no point keeping you readers informed, one way or the other? Does anyone care? I know I've followed threads on here and would be interested to know how they turn out, so I just assumed there must be SOME people out there who'd like to know. Curiosity and all that. Maybe you'll all given up on me making a move, so the story's already over, to you?

 

If no-one comments, I'll give up. Can't say fairer than that.

 

Dith.

[The slayer]

You dont even seem to be able to make your mind up about whether to stop posting on this thread or not!

 

I dont think you are ever going to to be able leave your wife , just too many factors to consider....

 

I suggest that you just try and enjoy your life as it is to the best of your ability .....

 

This seems like quite sensible advice to me

[Ditherer]

OK, I've exhausted everyone's patience and got all the advice I'm ever likely to get.

 

So goodbye, finally. Thanks for everything. It did help, but the final steps are up to me.

 

I guess I've made a decision of sorts, by opting to stay 'married' for now. It may not be fair, but it's the least hassle and heartache all around, for the time being. I'm still expecting to leave before too long, I want to, I feel it's the only answer. But I'm weak, and I'm not getting any support from parents and friends, they either can't face listening to me witter on about it anymore, or, as in the case of my father, he's actively discouraging me. I asked him "How much longer do you want me to put up with this misery?" and he just clams up and won't talk. Blood from a stone. Makes me feel trapped, more than ever. We had an anniversary recently and didn't even kiss or hug. Swapped cards with no great sentiments and that was it. Quite pathetic.

 

What'll happen, I've no idea. I'd love to suddenly find someone else, an inspiration to move on, but that would complicate the split and wouldn't be fair on anyone. Yet without a motivation to go, it's going to have to get REALLY bad before I make a move. Who knows. What'll be will be. I'll just coast through life reacting to events, rather than initiating them... as usual.

 

Good luck to fellow ditherer MLC, hope you manage to get what YOU feel is right for you both.

 

Bye then. Make the most of your lives...

[Ditherer]

Hello again, I just thought I'd update the thread after a few years' absence

 

Got depressed, had nervous breakdown, now on pills, Wife got fed up and found someone else, currently going through divorce.

 

Currently have no faith in relationships whatsoever, haven't felt anything for anyone since that failed "affair" a few years ago, can't imagine ever being with anyone again.

 

If it wasn't for the kids keeping me going, I'd have been sorely tempted to end it all.

 

Hopefully it will all turn out OK in the end.

[imagine]

Hi Ditherer, that was quite a few years gap between posts. Thanks for the update.

 

It seemed that you were happier without her for a time. Why are you again depressed. Please read the articles at "Marriage Builders" to find out what a happily married family must do.

 

Call us back if you have any questions!

[Ditherer]

I thought I'd pop by and update things, 3 years later

No change, really.

 

Full-time single parent, no social life, getting by somehow, utterly anti-romance as it seems like a load of BS

 

Bye for now, might check in again in 2016

 

But seriously, thanks for the forum that was a great outlet for me, really helped.