Feeling like I can’t do this anymore…but also like I have to.

Anyone else in this boat? Married 20 years, kids, big mortgage, the lot. We have spent years drifting apart.

He is avoidant, very likely on the spectrum, and for the last 10 years we have had a relationship in which there is little to no intimacy, no emotional intimacy, no affection, no shared friends or interests to now where we have nothing in common except the kids. I feel invisible to him. Everything I love in life holds no interest for him, except the kids. I hold no interest for him. But, I still felt like somehow we could come back.

But we’ve had a few conversations lately and from a few things he’s said, it’s now clear to me that he has dismissed my pain, doesn’t actually like or value who I am as a person and has absolved himself from any responsibility for what’s gone wrong. It’s all a ‘me’ issue. I’m unreasonable, and he’s just going to keep going how he is. And in a few weeks I’ll settle down again and it will all go away.

We’ve been here so many times but somehow this time, I feel done. 10 years ago I would have forced a conversation or confrontation that somehow reconnected us and made it ok. I stopped doing that as it just hurt too much to be always the one needing, always the one who reached out. I give up. I’m so lonely.

He doesn’t love me, the person. But he will go through the bare motions of family life for ‘wife and mother’.

But. I promised myself years ago that I’d give my kids the stable childhood I never had and they’ve a fabulous life. They are so happy. He’s a great dad and we co-parent beautifully. Neither of us can pay this mortgage alone and it’s family land I can’t lose. I feel so trapped. How can I resign myself to living this life?

I found myself feeling jealous of my kids tonight. They’ve their whole lives ahead of them. How messed up is that.

It’s self pity Friday here!!!

Feels good to vent .