It was never addressed before marriage
Big mistake. Nothing changed. We got married and still lived in our same houses, 2 hrs apart. Yes, he is at my house all but 2 or 3 week nights, but it hate it. It is destroying our relationship. Yes, dh's office is close to HIS house, so it certainly works, and I still have a child in high school, so no moving for me.
Do we have an endpoint for this madness? Yes, when child goes off to college, less than 2 years away. Both of us will sell our homes, and I will move to his area, not town, in a new home. So on paper one would say heads up, the time is coming, soon.
The blueprint of our marriage has been he comes here week nights and I go there every other weekend. It is the home he started building with his ex, and her stuff is all around. Sheets, towels, drapes, colors of carpet, etc etc.....you can get the picture. I might add the house is totally unfinished inside, and this is key.....dh never ever works on it. He has spent hours over the years grooming the lawn, planting flowers, etc etc.
It concerns me greatly. Is this the behavior of someone planning to sell their home? There are no moldings anywhere? Flooring is unfinished! Yet he just putters outside obsessively. Me, I go shopping, read, be bored, and then we fight. And when he tells me he will sell, it is never said in a way that conveys it is a happy event, more like, "I have a commitment to you to sell this house" "You have my word"
And when he is here, it is always little comments, like if it is humid here, he will say, "I bet it is nice and cool in blank blank". I usually do not respond, but how could anyone not see he is totally in love with his house and town?
I feel like second fiddle, to a house!
His children are long gone, as is the ex.
So finally he tells me I no longer need to go there. He will work on house and come to me on sat eve and spend rest of weekends here. Yesterday, turns out he spent whole time on business work, on phone and computer. He easily could have been here. I was disgusted, aggravated and told him to stay there rest if weekend and start work on that house! So now I am alone and we are not in a good place again.
Is it passive aggressive on his part now, not starting work?
I have tried to tell myself to forget the house, let it go. He will come to you when he wants, but clearly I can't carry this off. I DO want a marriage 24 /7!! I can't live like this. And yet I do love hike, and honestly when we are anywhere but that damn house, we get along great!
So I want to go forward, but need help. Do I still go there on some weekends? I just do not know.....
That is what is the hardest.
That is what is the hardest. He doesn't feel like he is living apart, I do. I t bleeds into our relationship, even though I try not to.
Imagine waking up on your anniversary day, to a text message, telling you happy anniversary? I started the day in tears with that. Yes I did finally see him for dinner that night, but I felt awful on that day. And I think really because I don't feel married. I feel in limbo, and as I said, I hate going to his home now. I have told him it can not be my future, this going back and forth and wasting so much money on two big houses! Retirement is coming and it is all being pissed away.
How to get through the next 18 months? Is it just the issue of the house for me, or is it more? Clearly he has a fixation on this house, he designed it, but has not finished it. And so it drags on these years. The only way to adequately describe it is that it looks like a mansion on a Hollywood set. Beautiful outside, but nothing inside. Really. It is just a mess, and I do not understand why oh why he persists in the outside on mulch and other crap, when the house is in such disrepair?
It has been almost 7 years of
It has been almost 7 years of this. Honestly, I thought he was going to really consider my house with my kids his home, his address, but that has not been the case.
I guess what I do need to do
I guess what I do need to do is stop getting on his case over his lack of working on the inside of the house. That could be kicking in some passive aggressive behavior on his part.
So, I go there very infrequently, do not mention anymore his lack of progress and see what 18 months brings. I have made it this far!
And live my own life, not waiting around for him to join me on weekends. He wants to push mulch around, I will do my own thing, but not sitting there.
I have done this with him for
I have done this with him for years now. Told him to just start replacing a plywood top in the bathroom with a real countertop. All he has to do is go to Home Depot??!! Even got color paint catalogues .......
But no....and no surprise.......as I am typing this now, I get an email from him on various bill topics. Which means he is not working on anything there. I give up!!
This ^^^^^
This ^^^^^
I can tell you what I do to
I can tell you what I do to get DH to things around the house (I know it's mean but it works!) I usually give DH about a month to do/start after we talk about house/outside projects. For the past 13 years, I put up with all kinds of excuses of why "our" projects aren't even started let alone done. Last year I said enough! DH was out of town for 6 days to his daughter's wedding so I hired a contractor and had 12 large and medium trees cut down. When we went to visit my sister this summer, I hired the same contractor to cut down more trees while we were gone. DH finally got the message - if you can't start or finish the project WE discussed, then I will hire someone to do for me then.
Truthfully, I don't mind spending the money to get things done; I'm just happy I don't have to hear all the bitching and moaning before and during the project.
Another option would be to
Another option would be to let go of his house for the moment. Go zen in your own head. Then, when you can feel calm and he's no longer feeling defensive, ask him what he envisions for your house together. If you can get him focused on designing YOUR dream house TOGETHER, he may finally find it in himself to let go of that house.
When you have put a lot into a house, it really can be very hard to let go of it. Not necessarily anything to do with his ex wife, but the house itself. You really can love a house and all you've put into it.
But no house is perfect. Getting him focused on what he would do better for the next house may give him the lift he needs to drop this one.
I have bought this up, and I
I have bought this up, and I get no response. Never ever discusses sharing a home together. You know like where it will be, what kind, etc, etc.
I know the truth.....he loves his house and he loves me. Wants his cake and eat it too.
So do I sit back for the next 2 years and let him work it out? I feel that is the answer. No more nagging him, but I am not going there much either,
The crazy thing is he is
The crazy thing is he is always working. Just not on finishing that damn house!
I guess what swirls around in my head is likely the truth. He doesn't work on the house because he doesn't want to sell it. Plain and simple. I can live with him not wanting to, but if he won't sell it, that is a different story, a deal breaker.
He might be a commitment phobe....how did he get married? When his ex purposefully threw away the birth control pills. Lol.......too late for me to even consider that game, those days are past. And crazily, I am already married to him, just can't get him to live here.
Yes sue you are right. I
Yes sue you are right. I wanted it to work with him, and ironically, my first husband was off all the time, so maybe I am comfortable being alone. My life used to be my kids, that is why I could be alone so much. But now, my kids are basically gone, and I am truly alone. Sat here in this house all weekend.....alone. And yes I could have gone to dh's home and sat there. He basically does his own thing by working in yard and he puts down work so we have a Saturday night. Whoopie right?
Yes, you are right. He gets it all and I am the unhappy one.
"I still have a child in high
"I still have a child in high school, so no moving for me ..." --- OP
You may want to revisit this "fact." When a relationship isn't working as we would like, we all need to reevaluate the "facts," the absolutes, the things we swore we would never concede ... sometimes that sense of black & white blinds us to alternatives.
Of course to many parents it is in their child's best interest to not move high schools. Then there are the ones who choose not to move a child from middle school onward, or from elementary school, or from their first home. I have spoken to my son's counselor a great deal about this issue, and have conceded that Life is never absolute.
Nowadays it seems more unusual than usual for a family to be fractured because a child HAS TO STAY at XYZ school, or with their friends, or with their dance studio. Military families move all the time and commanders do not perform evaluations of each family member to see if it is the best interest of that member. My ex-DH moves regularly with his job. As in, "guess what ... we're moving to Oklahoma and need to start work in a week." People die, they divorce, they remarry, jobs change ... Life changes.
Inflexibility is killer. Maybe you only see 2 alternatives right now, but I bet there are 10 permutations of this situation which may have a happy outcome. No criticism is meant to you, btw, just an acknowledgement that each of us need help sometimes thinking outside of the box.
Yes, I understand but he has
Yes, I understand but he has no children in his home.
He basically is at that house 2 or 3 nights a week......lovely hotel right across street from his office. How much cheaper if he had sold this monstrous house and stayed there two night a week?
" It is the home he started
" It is the home he started building with his ex, and her stuff is all around. Sheets, towels, drapes, colors of carpet, etc etc.....you can get the picture. I might add the house is totally unfinished inside, and this is key.....dh never ever works on it."
Not sure I understand. The house your DH designed and built, yet the inside is incomplete or as you said 'totally unfinished'? So why is the ex's crap all over in this house? Towels and drapes? Can't those things be just tossed? Colors of carpet? Why not rip the carpet out and select new? If this house is as unfinished as you say, it still very much become your future home. You could easily make it your own by finishing the inside exactly as you want it and changing what little ex had already chosen.
Your DH loves this house. He doesn't love BM nor is he holding on to it longing for her and what was in the home...he loves the fact he designed it, labored over it. I can see why he's having trouble working on the house and finishing it now. His heart and soul went out of the project. Why put all his time and energy into something he will never live in. The landscape and the plant upkeep? I can see that. Those are things he enjoys and he see still put his love and labor into without feeling it's a waste or loss of time....gardening is therapeutic and he gets instant pleasure and a sense of satisfaction . It's different than spending his weekend on the inside of a house he'll never get to enjoy.
IMO (and I could be very wrong)is this man is committed to you. He works Monday -Friday at his office and then drives to spend the evenings with you. That has to count for something, no? You want him 24/7 yet harp he isn't in his town working on his house that you want finished and finished now to put a 'for sale' sign in front of.
Could you take a bit of personal time to settle down and really think about it? All by yourself. No one or thing influencing you? Could you begin to see yourself taking over and finishing the house to suit your needs and your tastes (removing what is ex's marks on it) and perhaps actually become excited about seeing yourself and your DH living in the house and make it the home that could be yours and his together?
Just something to think over.
No two viewpoints , I have
No two viewpoints , I have searched ny heart and soul, and it just would not work. I would resent it. We go out on rare dinners out and ex's friends have come up to dh to chastise him. I have come to hate the town. We need a neutral spot to call our own. And I did try replacing some things, but it gets expensive too.
We need our home.
And thank you for the thoughts.....you are right about dh being a good guy with all the driving. That us why I load up my car many Friday nights and make the drive. But after 7 years I have had enough.
I disagree with the
I disagree with the suggestion of moving your child during the last year of high school. If you are this uncertain about the future of your marriage it wouldn't be wise to uproot your child.
Does your husband have enough equity in the house to just hire the finish work done? Have the two of your talked to a Realtor about listing the home? From your description it is a large, unique home and it may take a long time to sell. You should probably be thinking of listing it soon and if it sells sooner rather than later, your DH could go into a small temporary rental if necessary. If husband won't agree to meet with a Realtor to get suggestions about how best to sell the home, that will tell you a lot.
Have you considered splitting the two hour difference in locations? Is there a town one hour away from each of your homes that you might consider establishing your new life? It would be far enough away from his old "friends" but one hour is still within commuting distance. Maybe not ideal, but people do it all the time. While you are waiting for his home to sell, you can start visiting churches and clubs in the new town so you can start putting down roots and have some shared activities. Watching him mulch does not a marriage make. If you both enjoyed gardening at your new home, that would be a different matter.
I suggest you not sell your home for a few years. Before others on here jump on this as being "unfair" because you would ask him to sell his house while hanging on to yours, I imagine you still want to provide a home for your child while he/she is in college. You say your DH's kids are "long gone". I take that to mean they are not only grown, but not part of his life. You, on the other hand, will still be parenting for a few more years. If things go south with the marriage, you can always go back to your home. You can rent it out after you get established in the new location.
Another approach, if you can both afford it, would be for both of you to rent out your current homes and the two of you rent a condo, small house, whatever you can afford in the new location to see how you like living there and whether the marriage is going to last.
One last thought - could he be suffering from depression?
Go with your instincts. Best of luck to you.
Thank you stepped on . I
Thank you stepped on . I have to say we did not communicate all weekend, there was tension. So last night, sun, I am climbing into bed to watch tv and who shows up? My dh, who said he left his house after working there a full day. He spoke with a relative who knows carpentry and is just starting out, about hiring him on the weekends to work on speeding the house along. Neither one of us was angry, and the weekend ended on a positive note.
So I feel I must keep focused on the two year plan.
Thanks all for your sage advice. You guys are lifesavers!
I agree saffron. I no longer
I agree saffron. I no longer spend whole weekends here while he putters around the outside. I arrive early Saturday evening, we go out, and then I go home Sunday after brunch. He then comes to my house Sunday nite. It seems to work for both of us. I no longer feel so resentful coming here. And I enjoy my Saturday now instead of being bored. Dh has passed a few comments that I should be doing more work here, but I pretend I do not hear him. In the long run, who likely will profit if he passes? Not me I am sure....I am not on the deed.