Hey ESB,
I've seen you facilitate some killer support and advice for real life shit in the past, so here I am writing to you. I'm 90% sure I need to leave my husband, and I could really use a cheer squad/push.
I won't bore you with the details, but we do have a young child. My husband is my best friend, and I want him in our lives forever, but we don't feel like a couple anymore. We've had some horrible times, and have been in counselling for months, and have made good progress. But, I'm exhausted, and I feel like half a person around him, and I just want to get out. It's hard to, because lots if what we have together is great. There's a lot of love, and I know how much harder my life would be as a single mum, how long I might have to put my ambitions on hold. In light if this, it feels like I'm being selfish or immature to want to leave.
But, last night I found myself confessing to an almost perfect stranger that I wanted to leave my husband, and I don't think I deserve to be unhappy enough to do that. It wasn't a drunken confession either, by the way. Neither of us had a single drop.
Can somebody just tell me that I'll make the right choice and find the right words, and that it will all work out ok in the end? Please?
- Desperate Housewife
*****
You deserve to feel like a whole person. And: Your kid needs a mom who feels like a whole person.
Tell your husband what you just told us.
Inversion Series by Anton Bundenko
do it. it will be scary and difficult but the feeling of lightness and joy and excitement with life will make it all worth the struggles. your new found happiness will spill over to your child and they will one day appreciate your courage and strength. i say this as a mom of two young ones who left stability and discomfort of the soul for single mama tough times but pure & amazing independence. cooperative co-parenting is great. be honest with each other and your kid. focus on your child's happiness and stability as a way to make it through the rough "break up" time. take care of yourself mama! you can do it!
ReplyDeleteAs a child of divorced parents who split up for their own respective personal needs during a down-and-out time in their marriage, I don't thank them. I don't appreciate, even as an adult and parent myself, their decision. The scars of divorce run deep--especially on a young child's heart. My advice for the OP is to keep fighting tooth and nail for your family and for your child's well-being. Seek your friends and family, internally control your self-talk, take personal time. Stop asking for permission to walk away. And I don't mean that in an attacking way...I mean it in the most encouraging way. My parents, both personally successful and remarried, have told me nearly 25 years later that they regret not fighting harder to stay married...not because they are still in love with each other today (no Parent Trap here) but because they see now that they could have made it. Like you, they still had love, and I certainly think there is potential for you to salvage from brokenness the husband you're looking for. I don't know your situation ...only you know what's right, but I just wanted to offer an alternative perspective and some encouragement. However you decide I hope you find joy and peace
DeleteI don't mean to be aggressive but to this NO. I think it's very irresponsible to extrapolate from your parents unique situation to this poster. When one person is unhappy in a marriage it is a toxic environment for children. Period. Staying together for your child is the most damaging thing you can do.
DeleteDang. I think you're really brave to admit that you want to leave your husband, even though it isn't a 100% terrible relationship. That's a really hard thing to come to terms with, and I understand why you might feel you're being selfish (I think we are conditioned to think divorce is basically only for people in absolutely HORRIBLE AWFUL TERRIBLE marriages. In reality, not every couple is meant to spend their whole lives together. And people fall out of love.) You're not selfish, you're brave. Like ESB said, you deserve to feel like a whole person, and your child deserves to see you for what you really are: an independent, strong woman who is brave enough to do what she needs to do even when it's hard. If I had to guess, he/she will admire you for it someday, and your example will give him/her the strength to do the hard-but-necessary things in their own life.
ReplyDeleteAll that being said, I don't think you should go full-on divorce mode right away. It sounds like a trial separation would be helpful to you guys. It would give you both the space to clear your heads and think for yourselves, and would give you a real taste of what single-mom life would be like in your case.
Lastly, I would highly recommend Cheryl Strayed's book Dear Sugar...so many women wrote in to her with questions like this, and her answers come from a really practical, helpful perspective, seeing as she left her first husband and re-married years later.
Good luck, I'm rooting for you whatever you decide. <3
Ditto on reading Dear Sugar. That book changed the way I think about things.
DeleteThanks for the book recommendation, and for the thoughtful encouragement. I think you're right about the social norms of divorce. I've been feeling like I need to be in a relationship that's actually abusive (instead of just mismatched) in order to legitimately think about it. I like the idea of a trial separation. It's something that I've held of suggesting because my guy can be very black and white about things, and may just jump straight from there to it being over.
Delete-op
I dont know guys, she said they've been making good progress. Maybe a little longer wouldn't hurt. If you need an advice columnist to convince you to do it maybe it's still worth considering. I know a lot of people go through years of tough times, but make it to the other side and are glad they toughed it out. Some of the greastest things take a ton of work.
ReplyDeleteare you looking for permission? yes, you have permission.
ReplyDeleteI wanted to add a little detail about what this might look like, from the perspective of your child.
ReplyDeleteMy mom left my dad when I was 4. According to her, it wasn't that their marriage was awful - they just didn't work together and weren't happy being married. It took a few years, but they became good friends, and today we have the loveliest alternative family - we all have dinner together weekly, my parents go to book readings and movies together, and are in some ways a support system for one another. But they are much happier being friends than spouses.
As a child, I learned really important lessons about trusting your gut, being true to yourself, and persevering through the challenges to create the kind of family you really want. People often think my family is weird, but we're actually among the happiest families I know. And I don't think that's just because my parents became friends - it's because they both stayed true to themselves and created the kind of life they each knew they needed. I hope for the same for you and your child.
-EL
This is the kind of thing I need to hear. In order to stay hopeful.
DeleteSplitting our family up is the last thing I want to do. I just think maybe it needs to be a slightly different family.
I agree with Anonymous at 8:19am. You don't even really say a reason you want to leave him... what if you feel like half a person because you're depressed, not because of him?
ReplyDeleteI'm playing Devil's advocate, but you have a young child, and you say there's a lot of love. I wouldn't go as drastic as divorce right. now.
I'm definitely not depressed. I've worked with a therapist on my own, and worked really hard on manufacturing my own happiness. What I meant by 'I feel like half a person around him' is that I feel like there are parts of me that I have to tuck away. I'm frequently biting my tongue, or not finishing conversations with him, just to avoid a fight. And, we don't really seem to want the same things in the long term, so it often feels like we're tugging in different directions. Obviously compromise is part of a successful relationship, but to what extent?
Delete-OP
Aw man, this is so sticky.
ReplyDeleteHow young is your young child? Like, less than a year? Are you still doing the dance of the postpartum hormones? I'm not trying to invalidate your feelings, but I'm wondering if there's a chemical reason you might be so exhausted and un-yourself.
Try a separation. Live apart. Keep going to therapy and trying to make progress. In my experience, people who are your best friend don't also make you feel like half a person, so which one is it? Are you happier and fuller alone, or with him? You can't know until you try it on for a few months.
Wholeness doesn't come from a relationship. If you don't feel whole now, no other man is going to make you feel whole. What's really best for your kid? You brought someone into the world so you have to make sure your decisions are primarily about that person that you chose to subject to the insanity of life. It's not just about you anymore. So, what's best for your kid? If it's you as a single mother finding herself and being whole, then get a divorce.
ReplyDeletehttp://askmoxie.org/divorce/
ReplyDeletegood resource
If you can hold on until you are 99.9% sure you need to leave him do it. For a year and a half I was 93% sure I needed to leave me husband. I was never 100% sure though, there was always a little tiny, itty-bitty, micro-scopic piece of me that wasn't sure. We finally got through it with an awesome no bull-shit counselor, advice from Dad, and just talking to each other and learning to appreciate each other again.
ReplyDeleteNow I cry when I think about how close I came to throwing it all away and what I would be missing now if I had gone through with it. You never know what the future could be.
But if your gut can get to an absolute sure place then there is probably no recovery.
You are asking for a push to help you make this huge decision and lady I can totally empathize. However, you got married and had a baby - if you aren't 100% sure that you are ready to leave, work on it. Marriage is tough. Single Motherhood is tough. If you are positive you can't work through it or that you don't want to, and you positive you aren't feeling hormonal or off since the pregnancy... then you already have your answer. ALSO stop talking to strangers about how you feel - talk to your husband!
ReplyDeleteI am in the process of going through a divorce myself. I am young, we never had any kids, we don't have any property, so in a lot of ways this is easy. But my husband is the best man I've ever met, truly, and everybody in my life told me I needed to work on it, that marriage is hard.
ReplyDeleteYou know what? Life is fucking hard. There are so many things you need to work on-- a career, being a good mother (in your case), fulfilling your own needs. You don't actually need to work on being a relationship because you don't have to be in one if you don't want to be.
And you don't. At least not this man. I can see it in every word you've written here.
To all of those who are saying it is up to the poster to make herself feel like a whole person, you are right! And that's exactly why you need to leave your husband. In doing that you are taking action towards healing yourself.
I'm writing from my personal ground zero. I'm currently on a mattress on the ground in my new apartment behind a barber shop. It smells like that awful blue barber shop liquid in my room and I can hear the guy that own the fruit shop next door trying to sell his moldy apples. But I have a smile on my face. It is a hard thing to leave someone. It is an even harder thing to leave a good man. Be brave. Your child will thank you for it one day.
A final note: What about the child, you say! Well, I do not need to go into the details of my personal life but my parents stayed together for the children until I was 17. My mother hated my father for almost all of those years. It wasn't because he was a bad man, a bad provider, a bad father. She just didn't love him. She was miserable, unhappy, depressed. And so was he. And so were my brother and I. Unhappy families are unhappy, regardless if they have two parents or not. My mother never forgave my brother and I for being the reasons she stayed with my father. The even crazier thing is that if she'd asked us we would have told her happiness is more important to us than their marriage.
So yes, please, work at being a good mother. And do that immediately by making yourself happy and whole.
You can do it.
I've been here (minus the kid, but in the 90% sure it's over even though he was my best friend place) and I know it's super tough. I eventually left, and I'm so, so much happier. For me, it took a long time to get to where I was ready to leave him. I sometimes look back and wonder what the hell took me so long to pull that trigger. BUT, because I really took my time making that decision I'm also able to tell myself that I tried everything I could to stay together and I really am completely certain it was the right decision. I wonder if I had left too early if I ever would have been sure.
ReplyDeleteIn truth, I was never completely, totally sure it was the right thing to do until a few months after we split and I was able to see what I was like without him.
And on the not feeling like you're a whole person thing - yes, I think that sometimes a relationship can keep you from being your full self. Even a not terrible, truly loving relationship. I met my husband when I was pretty young (20) and got serious right away. Now I'm 35, divorced, and feel like myself in a way I haven't in years.
I was young when we met too. Feels a bit like I gave my 'forever' away a bit too quickly.
DeleteI'm so happy to hear that things have worked out for you. Thank you for sharing your story with me.
-OP
Seconding the person who said, try living apart and see how you feel.
ReplyDeleteLiving apart from my husband woke me up fully to the fact that I needed to leave. I couldn't breathe properly in that relationship, and I do not mean that metaphorically (though that's true too) - I mean that being around him meant that my whole body tightened and I stopped being able to breathe properly, to hear my own thoughts in my head. When I left, it was like the sky opened up again. If you are feeling anything like that, and I suspect you are, then try being apart and see how you feel. See if you miss him. See if it gives you more hope for you apart, or for you together.
Seconding also reading posts by Dear Sugar. This one helped me more than I can express. http://therumpus.net/2011/06/dear-sugar-the-rumpus-advice-column-77-the-truth-that-lives-there/
Also I would recommend a book called Too Good To Leave, Too Bad To Stay. It's really REALLY helpful.
At first I was torn on this one, but I think I'm going to give you the advice I want myself right now, because I've been struggling with this too.
ReplyDeleteWe're currently in therapy and for the first time, I can see a light at the end of the tunnel. But that light is so far away and I am so unhappy now and have been for so long. It sounds like maybe you might be in the same boat.
I happen to believe that there is no one and only perfect person for us. There are a million perfect people for us if we're willing to work at it. Because as we all know, being with one person for a long time, is neither easy nor fun every day and no life partner, comes without a hot mess of bullshit, just like you come with a hot mess of bullshit for them.
You don't feel whole. As other posters have mentioned, that's on you. I think instead of asking strangers (both in person and on the internet) what you should do, you should be in therapy by yourself. Getting divorced, separating or staying together - none of those options are going to fix you, friend. Because you need to fix you and I can't recommend professional therapy enough, as a facilitator to making you who you want to be.
At this point, I don't honestly think you're capable of making an informed decision (and surely the decision to divorce should be informed) because you sound like your twisting in the wind right now. Be truly selfish, and spend some time figuring out your own shit. Even if your marriage ends up not working out, you'll be in such a better place to move forward in life.
I am divorced and remarried. Different demographics - it was a 20-year marriage with teenaged kids. Without more information about your situation - how old is the child, why don't you love your husband, why did you originally, what is your family history - I can't give advice. Or permission. Here are the things I know.
ReplyDelete1. Divorce is horrible. The worst, saddest, most miserable process ever.
2. A happy marriage, with true, deep, honest love, is one of the greatest creations of the human species.
3. Kids whose parents have brought them up together in a cohesive and functional home, even with an underlying unhappiness in the marriage, will not benefit from divorce.
4. However, parents who are truly happy and self-aware in love with their new partners made great learning role models.
There is no global answer. Divorce is not OK. But it is not impossible. And occasionally it's the right thing.
My Personal Experience: I went through a rough patch with my husband last year. I think that divorce is sometimes the easiest option, but it's important to decide if the person that you have loved (who is not abusive and treats you well- bc if he is abusive I feel it deserves an immediate divorce) and is your best friend is worth sticking it out for a while longer. My husband and I are back in sync and I am so happy that I didn't give in to some of the cheating impulses that I had while feeling disconnected. Our life together is worth fighting for.
ReplyDeleteHow old are you? Are you aware of how difficult it is to find a decent, hardworking man with the humility to even go to counseling when you are above a certain age and have a child? Is this relationship so bad that potentially being single for a long, long time would be preferable? Are you aware that all men can be uninspiring and difficult at times? That all relationships take work and cycle through ups and downs? That the next man wouldn't be every good thing your current man is, minus all the flaws and plus some of the things your current man lacks--he'd be a completely different person, with completely different flaws?
ReplyDeleteAre you aware that discussing your relationship with a total stranger and blurting out that you think you need to leave isn't really indicative of anything beyond your frustration and lack of discretion? It isn't necessarily a sign from God.
There are different paradigms in contemporary society when it comes to acceptable grounds for divorce. But as someone who was single for a long, long time before she got married, I can tell you that it is very easy to look at green grass on the other side of the fence. And now that I've been on both sides, I know that the grass actually tends to be what you make it.
Are you aware that this comment is supremely condescending?
DeleteThanks for having my back, ESB. This comment made my brain hurt a bit.
Delete-OP
Hi, it's me!
ReplyDeleteA big, heartfelt thank you to everyone who offered their advice, and shared their stories. Especially sharing the stories, as this feels like a pretty lonely place to be in right now.
We've had a bit of a break from counselling, but we've got a session booked in a few weeks. I might suggest that we use it to talk about what it would actually look like if we were to separate, and what that would mean for a our child (a pre-schooler, for those that were asking).
I kind of feel like writing an anonymous letter to a bunch of strangers on the internet is the heart's way of flipping a coin just to see how it feels about the result. But, in response to some of the comments, this certainly hasn't been my first port of call. This has been ongoing for around 2 years. The worst time was a year and half ago, when we were fighting all the time.
I want things to work out, and I've been working really hard for that to happen but, I don't know, maybe I'll only know for sure with some space.
Whatever happens, thank you. Especially you, ESB.
-OP