Newly separated, confused and lonely

[authorchick]

HEy everyone, im new here. Im 25, with two little girls aged 4 and two. My husband and I were married age 19 and 20, been married 6 years now. We have always had a rough marriage, i came with some hefty baggage from my childhood and he is no picnic. He has bounced between volatile and angry, addicted to some weird fettish porn and forums about it. He has spent 6 years controlling me, treating me like a doormat, neglecting the kinds and i was completely not in love with him anymore. Last year an old friend of mine from way back told me he had loved me for a long time and wanted to help me leave my husband, i was flattered and tempted, but my marriage came first so i asked him not to talk to me anymore and i was honest with my husband. All had seemed fine this past year, things getting better and i felt like i could ignore that im not in love with him because he was being better, but then he tells me (while we are on holiday no less!) that he has been falling for this girl at work that he has been dragging into our lives on the pretense of bringing her to know God, he has been kissing her and she loves him. I am done, completely, i wont do it any more but now suddenly he wants to fight to keep me as his wife. I never wanted this, but now its here im sure God is telling me its ok to leave, but im so hurt, so confused and so numb that i just need someone with perspective to help chat it out. All of our friends are either too involved to be subjective or choose a side and stay loyal, or my pastor and his wife who wont say much other than theyre disappointed. My husband was the youth pastor and im on worship band.
Anyway, thanks if you read this to the end!

 

[dayhiker]

Hi authorchick,
Welcome to CF.
Sorry you have had such a hard life. Also sorry your marriage hasn't been a place where you could heal.
I'm divorced so I know sometimes things can't be worked out. Sometimes its very hard, or even impossible to learn to love again.
So you indicate that your husband has made some kinda of change for the good this past year. Do you understand what is going on there? Why is how now changing? I see hope in that change.
Before you go the route of divorce, I think it would be good to get some counseling to understand your own baggage, understand the dynamic of your marriage and it would be good to think thru how your raising the kids. Even if you get a divorce learning about those things will be important to you. Is your husband also willing to get counseling also?
I'm guessing you both need to learn to communicate better. Learn to create boundaries that you both honor.
Lastly, there is learning how to be intimate with each other and I'm not talking sex. That is a lot of things to learn, but we all need to learn them and I'm thinking of you two learn them together you will fall in love with each other again.

Keep us informed about how things are going.

 

[Avniel]

You're not in love with him, he cheated why are you so hurt? You don't love your husband of course things don't go good in a marriage that lacks love.

 

[authorchick]

Avniel, I dont understand what youre saying, that i shouldnt be hurt that the man i planned to spend my life with has been betraying me for a year? That its my fault it all went downhill because he was so abusive that i fell out of love with him???

I stayed because i had said until death, and until this time, he had not betrayed me though he had come close.

Thank you dayhiker, yes i had seen change he had been attentive and more caring bringing gifts home or doing jobs in the house to surprise me, but it turns out he was doing those things out of guilt this last year. I dont feel angry, but it does hurt that he has been lying a year. i had been willing to put my own feelings about him aside and work at being the best wife i could, even down to having sex more than i was ever comfortable with just to keep him happy, but nothing i did was enough to keep him from running to another woman's arms. i just dont know anyone else who has been through a similar situation or divorce as a christian and i need support. Sorry Avniel if my situation offended you, i dont know what else i could have done after dealing with a man who is so volatile he will throw a wooden chair at his 7 months pregnant wife?? is it my fault he had an affair?!

 

[Ana the Ist]

HEy everyone, im new here. Im 25, with two little girls aged 4 and two. My husband and I were married age 19 and 20, been married 6 years now. We have always had a rough marriage, i came with some hefty baggage from my childhood and he is no picnic. He has bounced between volatile and angry, addicted to some weird fettish porn and forums about it. He has spent 6 years controlling me, treating me like a doormat, neglecting the kinds and i was completely not in love with him anymore. Last year an old friend of mine from way back told me he had loved me for a long time and wanted to help me leave my husband, i was flattered and tempted, but my marriage came first so i asked him not to talk to me anymore and i was honest with my husband. All had seemed fine this past year, things getting better and i felt like i could ignore that im not in love with him because he was being better, but then he tells me (while we are on holiday no less!) that he has been falling for this girl at work that he has been dragging into our lives on the pretense of bringing her to know God, he has been kissing her and she loves him. I am done, completely, i wont do it any more but now suddenly he wants to fight to keep me as his wife. I never wanted this, but now its here im sure God is telling me its ok to leave, but im so hurt, so confused and so numb that i just need someone with perspective to help chat it out. All of our friends are either too involved to be subjective or choose a side and stay loyal, or my pastor and his wife who wont say much other than theyre disappointed. My husband was the youth pastor and im on worship band.
Anyway, thanks if you read this to the end!

I don't think I could answer this without first knowing why it was that you married him. So please, if you don't mind sharing a bit more....why did you marry this man? A simple "I loved him" doesn't explain much either. Say what it was about him that you loved. If it was something else....explain what that is.

This goes to the core of your problem.

 

[dayhiker]

authorchick ... thanks for coming back to share more about what is going on.

Its sounds like you may not know what his real motive is. I comment you for giving that much to try and help your husband come back to you. Sounds to me like your getting to the place where your going to have to make a decision about whether to separate or not for your own mental health. But first I think it would be good to press him for what he really wants from life. Let him now that the current situation is causing you pain and your not going to be able to handle it longer. Of course if you say that would have to be willing to follow thru with what that implies. He might be in a place where he thinks he can handle both women. It might be insightful to know what he sees in the other woman, but that could be really painful for you to know.

So I``m thinking a deeper level of communication might help clarify what is going on in his mind.

 

[authorchick]

thank you, basically we met when i was 17 and a new christian just rescued by God from an attempted suicide after being put in care because i had spent my childhood living with my mother, a prostitute and drug dealer. When he proposed, we had only been dating a year and he did it in front of about 100 people from our church family. I felt like i was being given a choice, either marry him, someome who i liked but didnt feel ready to marry, and get to keep the new life and only family i had ever had, ready to start a new life and make my own family. Or say no and leave church, becasue i would have had to leave for my own reasons if i declined. i chose to marry him because my hand was forced, and i did love him, i just wasnt ready and was very uncertain about it. He changed when i married him, he became controlling, had a raging temper and would explode, was uncaring when i fell pregnant not even batting an eyelid when i found out, and treating me like a second class citezen when i was extremely sick, telling me to stop exaggerating. He got worse and worse and quite frankly, this is a painful key to freedom. i am ready to leave him and start a fresh, willing to be civil and friends for our daughters' sakes, but i dont want him back, ill never trust him again.