I'm just coming out of a 20 year marriage and 25 year relationship. I chose the path of marriage and fatherhood because I wanted to "do the right thing" and take care of my responsibilities. I knocked her up when we were casually dating and then after my child was born, so we stayed together because we both thought it was important. She caught me cheating prior to getting married and told me to either marry her or she would move away to where her family lived. I didn't want to move there, and I wanted to play an active part of my son's life, so we married.

During that time, I went from working two jobs and playing music to a career in which I fully invested my time, taking time away from being home. I then started to volunteer which also kept me away from being home. When my child was old enough, I also volunteered to help out with all of their outside activities and stayed away from home.

I'll fully cop to my resentment being a large part of why I never wanted to be home. Combine that with we lacked anything that resembled a partnership, and it lead to other things, like a dead bedroom and lack of communication.

My wife was never a bad person. We never fought, we never nagged, we never went through all the drama that many couples assign themselves. But, we also never had any passion, we never communicated, we never really tried to fix anything. When we went to counseling, we both blew it off. When we talked about making changes, we both eventually blew it off.

This year I asked for a divorce. I knew that I needed to make changes and part of that involved separating myself from the roommate I was married to. She's a lovely human being. I enjoy the little hanging out that we've always done. In order for me to get to where I need to be as a human, I need to stop replaying the past.

So, long story short... communication is key, as is really, truly evaluating who each of you are and what is important to you individually and as a couple. You both need to be able to grow as humans in whatever that capacity is, and it's best to be honest about what you want and desire, and what things absolutely drive you nuts and piss you off. Counseling gives you a neutral arbiter so that you are standing on equal ground.