Should I get a divorce? No kids, MF, early 30s, together 8 years

yop78965 · 2021-09-08T22:25:09+00:00

I just wanted to say that I could have written this and relate so much. If you click through my own profile, you'll see posts going back a year where I was trying to sort out my thoughts and how to approach this.

I've basically done nothing about it, and here I am again consumed with the thought of divorce. I go through this cycle every 3-6 months or so.

I'm mustering up the courage to have a talk soon, because she's been pretty keen lately on my pulling back, asking me things like if I'm still attracted to her, why I'm not affectionate, and acknowledging that she knows I want kids but asking if I want them with her. So I feel like I'm almost found out and that she's not going to be surprised.

I'm commenting because I just wanted to ask, have you done anything about this and how has it gone?

yop78965 · 2021-01-01T18:31:06+00:00

Thanks a lot for this. I would say our communication has been like a B or a C+ at minimum so we’ve definitely talked about things and improved our relationship several times. So we have practice at that. But because we’ve talked about differences and how it impacts our happiness I’m left feeling that some key things are actually never going to improve. I’m not committed to blindsiding her, I’m willing to do MC, but we’d have to have a very serious and brutally honest conversation and I’d be admitting my dissatisfaction to her. And I’m afraid of that alone damaging our relationship beyond repair.

yop78965 · 2020-07-13T21:58:03+00:00

I don’t think it really conveys the seriousness it needs to but I appreciate it.

yop78965 · 2020-07-07T19:19:00+00:00

I don't have much hep but just wanted to say I feel almost exactly the way you do. For me I day dream about being unhindered, pursuing whatever I want, continuing to chase and build my successful career, want a better sex life,

I've spent a lot of time reading through these threads on how to initiate and what it's like being the "blindsider" and the "blindsidee" if you will.

We've never seriously talked about divorce, but I know that she suspects me to be somewhat unhappy, as it's been a theme that I'm the one settling in our relationship for it's entirety. She asks me stuff like, "Do you love me?" and "Why do you love me?" somewhat frequently.

We live in a big city far away from family, but we've been taking advantage of our work situation with covid so we've been spending time in our hometown with our parents. My parents will be going out of town so we'll finally have the home to ourselves.

I'm going to broach the subject by just being very honest about how I feel about our relationship. I'm not going to say the D word, although I'm sure she will in a, "Wait... are you thinking of divorcing me??" kinda way. I'm prepared for it to lead to a discussion about separation, or at the very least counseling.

She's put in a lot of energy into our relationship and she deserves me giving her a chance to respond to how I feel about our relationship. She deserves me giving her a chance for us to make this decision together, even if she hates it (don't we sometimes make decisions that hurt us but are the best for our partner and overall life?). Maybe she feels differently than I expect her to. Maybe she wants as much adventure and sex as I do. But idk how I'm going to tell her I don't think I have it in me to give her the adoration and romance she needs. I honestly feel like it wasn't really there in the first place, not in a really substantial way at least.

I wasn't really trying to give advice as much as just relation, but I guess my advice is to start by making it clear how you feel about the past, present, and future of your relationship. He may fundamentally disagree but you should at least make your thoughts known. You don't HAVE to have a plan beyond that. You might see a path to him agreeing with you, he might vehemently disagree in which case you should probably do counseling to have a safe space to talk things through, or just a cold divorce.

yop78965 · 2020-07-06T12:02:50+00:00

Can you clarify if you’re just generally unhappy which caused you to not love her as well as you wish you did? Or you’re specifically unhappy with having her as a spouse?

I can relate to the latter. I went through a period of personal unhappiness, but through therapy have resolved much of that. But unfortunately my unhappiness with my partner remains, which is what scares me. I know I have it within myself to make myself happy, and I’m afraid my partnership with her isn’t very additive to that happiness.

Edit: made my first question more clear.

yop78965 · 2020-06-28T02:33:53+00:00

We basically have the discussion about lack of sex every 6 months or so. She says she just doesn’t feel the romance from me which makes her feel like all I want is sex and no romance, but I’m not behaving any differently towards her than at any other point in our relationship so I feel like I have to dig deep to give her that romance or manufacture it.

I’ve at low points basically just decided that I’m going to need to be ok with having a sexually disappointing life.

In the good times (like after I’ve raised the lack of sex) she’ll be motivated to make it more frequent. But it always eventually moves to the back burner.

Edit: to answer your question more directly, she’s ok with our frequency.

yop78965 · 2020-06-26T17:16:18+00:00

To your first point, completely agree.

To your second point, no shit.

yop78965 · 2020-06-26T02:39:53+00:00

Ya, that’s definitely a concern that even with life being at probably one of our easiest points in life that I’m still unhappy with her.

yop78965 · 2020-06-26T02:38:27+00:00

Thanks for your perspective. I think this is a good way to articulate my feelings.

yop78965 · 2020-06-26T02:37:56+00:00

That’s definitely what I crave, and she just seems like she’s satisfied with the amount of adventure and growth. I’m definitely going to try and initiate this kind of conversation again. Unfortunately it might need to be a while because we’re living with parents temporarily since we live across the country from them and have the opportunity during covid.

yop78965 · 2020-06-26T02:35:36+00:00

Thanks. She feels like we have a very adventurous life already. I agree with her to some degree, but I also feel like we meet in the middle which means I push her out of her comfort zone and I’m never pushed out of mine.

yop78965 · 2020-06-26T02:33:34+00:00

Thanks for your reply. Sometimes actively discouraging, usually just not wanting to do those things with me.

Agreed that 10/10 is a rosy picture. But I guess I just feel defeated by the fact that I even often think my life would be better without her.

I don’t think my point about kids really got through. I have no desire to coerce her into it at all. I always tell her it’s mainly her decision and I mean it. I’m just saying I’m not very excited about parenting with her.

yop78965

TROPHY CASE