Big Love
Professional woman - Married for second time (6 yrs). I came into the second marriage completely self-sufficient with grown children and a pollyanna view of the world. I bought a large house (myself) so he could be close to his kids. He lived in it rent free for years which was fine until things started getting tight with the economy. My husband's family stuck by the ex wife and contemplated not coming to our wedding. She called his family all through our reception. I didn't know about that for years. The ex wife tried to organize a lunch on the day of my wedding with his family. His mother kept pictures up of them all over the house until I said I wasn't going over there any more. She shows up at every family event as if she owns the place. The family is hard core mormon and I always say that "this isn't Big Love" and I am not going to participate as if I am the second place wife. It all makes me sick and now I am unhappy and just want out of the marriage. The ex wife made sure that I could never have a relationship with the children and even now after they are grown and out of the house, they are less than considerate. I have a tremendous amount of resentment built up over the years toward the kids and the ex and even his family. I avoid conversation about any of them because he backs them up and not me. At one point, he said that he contemplated leaving me because I refused to live with his grown daughter in our house. He said the only reason he didn't leave was that he couldn't afford it. The 22 yr old is self-diagnosed bi-polar that has lied about going to school and put me at risk with my job when she lied about her status for medical insurance. She also refuses to work because she can't be told what to do. I reached a breaking point with her and asked him to get her an apartment. I was not the other woman and I have carried so much of the financial load that it has really hurt me. My husband doesn't like conflict and the ex along with his kids heaped on the guilt so that he agreed to pay much more in support than the courts would have ordered. Despite the $6K per month that went to his ex who brought in a new guy and 3 more kids (she doesn't work), the children from the marriage knocked on our door any time they needed money. Last year, my husband attempted suicide after being out of work for a year. I stuck by him in the hospital and never missed a beat. Now he is working and on meds and doing well. It is me that's not doing well. I am just tired from all of it. I hate being married and I can't stand to even hear about anyone in his family anymore. I feel abused and neglected and I don't think I can ever get over the fact he would have left me if he had the money comment. Am I being too tough?
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Thanks for your comment and
Thanks for your comment and book suggestion. I am getting my ducks in a row. Luckily, the house is in my name alone. Since he paid child support and we live in California, my attorney told me to not put anything in his name. If he defaulted, it would be a gift of equity and become my problem. We do not have anything together, not even a checking acct.
I was married for 20 yrs the first time and I never used my children as a weapon. As a result, I have a pretty decent relationship with my ex husband. He remarried for a short time and I did not stick my nose into their business at all.
I know I am a strong personality and I'm sure there are things that I did that may have annoyed them too. I am also very confident that it didn't matter who he married. They were going to be self centered and spoiled because that's who they are. Their mother was a terrible role model in how to manage relationships. Everything was about what she was "entitled" to. I was never selfish and feel I was more than generous with gifts, cars, insurance, you name it.
I don't want an ugly divorce either. I'm willing to make sure that we split things fairly. We both have high income jobs so no one is going to starve. I am not sure I could ever work things out. I told him recently that I was just broken now. I don't have the energy to fix it. My kids like him and my grand daughter loves him. I don't have any plans to interfere in those relationships if he chooses to keep it going. They are his kids and they are going to always come first. Two of them don't even live in the state anymore but their influence is felt very strongly. I'm sure going to be a lot more nervous about a guy with kids in the future. You won't see me going out of my way to "make them like me." It's going to be up to them to want to know me first. I have a life and don't have the grief.
There are days that I just
There are days that I just don't have any more words. Things are so strained. I try to be pleasant but I don't feel confident in the relationship and it keeps me from wanting to share anything in my life or any level of intimacy. I am just broken and trying to avoid conflict. I am an artist (besides a full time job to pay for things) so that really keeps me sane. I know he resents me spending time on that instead of him. What do you do when your husband spends a year asleep or in a hospital for depression? I am good in a crisis and was right there driving him to the hospital several times a week for electro shock therapy. Still kept a full time job and had no support from anyone.
After the blow up a few weeks ago where he said "it's over" and the other things, he said something about counseling. I didn't hear another word about it for a long time. Last night he told me he set us up a session. He also said that he knows that I don't believe him when he says he loves me. It's something I have said to him for a long time. He's right. I don't believe him.
I resent that he didn't care when I was begging him to engage with me. He didn't want to do anything social. Our friends are very separate. I tried to join in with his "bro's before ho's" crowd. That got wrecked a couple years ago at a Christmas party when he got loaded and hit on one of his friend's wives right in front of me. I didn't make a scene but everyone was uncomfortable and now it's weird to be around them. I was told that I should "get over it" and not hold that against him. It's always my responsibility to be the big person and don't take anything personally. He thinks my friends are snobs. I drug him to all kinds of things early on. Things many people don't get to do in their lives. We went scuba diving in exotic locations. We took hot air balloons in the wine country of Napa.
The other thing that has been a big source of contention that will come up in couseling.... division of labor. I work 50 hours a week and everything that has to be done always fell on me. It didn't matter if it was yard work or fixing broken screen windows. It was my problem and he always made me feel like crap when I asked for help. I was interrupting sleep or a movie or something. His time off was his time off. I used to make huge family dinners in the attempt to get everyone together. Now I don't do that anymore. What good does it do? He acted like it was a big inconvenience even when it was mostly his family.
Anyhow.. just venting. It will be a long weekend. Just going to try to do something creative that brings me some joy.
So my frustration level is high and I have asked him, "why now?" Why does he care what I think now? Why didn't he respond to me instead of sleeping 18 hours a day or sitting in a dark home theater for most of the day and night? Is it because he noticed that I just stopped caring? You run it off in the ditch and you want to use depression as an excuse. His ex wife also claimed mental illness when she didn't get her way. His daughter says she's bi-polar and cannot be held accountable for anything she does. Do we see a pattern here?
Wow sounds like my story.
Wow sounds like my story. DH's disfunctional parenting created a son 22 who is a total loser. He gets kicked out of every roommate situation at which point he expects us to put him up for months until he finds another fool to move in with him for a few months. I am so sick of this $hit that I am contemplating throwing 14 years of marriage away.
Went to counseling for the
Went to counseling for the first time. I was a bit skeptical about it but the therapist was pretty good. She asked me at one point why I stayed in the marriage. I really didn't have an answer. She asked him why he defended his ex wife so much and defended the kids actions toward me rather than confront it. We came away with some homework. I have to write a letter to my husband's depression and tell it what it did to me. He has to come up with some reasons why he defends them instead of backing me up. I know that my husband wants us to all be one big happy family but defaults back to the old position of "just try harder with them." These are grown children that clearly want me to be invisible. I don't want him to have to choose between me and the kids. I just don't want to be put into positions that make me uncomfortable. He can spend time with them without me there. He is resistant to that. I told him in therapy that even if we can't fix things, I was not ever going to be unkind or mean with my children and the relationship he built with them. I know he's worried he'll lose the grandchild. That is probably true because I am the glue that pulls everyone together. I don't think he'll put the effort into those family things that I do. In any case, I'm hoping that this therapy validates some things that I can't do on my own. I want him to be happy but not at the sake of my own happiness. I am 3 years away from being 50 years old. I recognize that I have a limited time on the earth. I won't live forever. I want to be happy and enjoy my life. I am looking forward to the weekend. I am going to some galleries today with a new Scottish Artist friend that I made at the dog park. I have art school on Saturday, a black tie event in Laguna at the Festival of the Arts that evening. I am making a choice to be happy even if I am in the middle of a bad situation.