TL;DR
Its been three years(me 32f married to 34m) but we haven’t stayed together that long. I have been away for my career. I was coaxed into my wedding but thats another story for some other post. But now i am back i feel pressurized from my family and his not to leave him. He’s is a good guy not abusive at all but i dont feel comfortable with him. I dont consider him to be my friend or best friend. Cant discuss or talk to him about things. Its difficult to hold a conversation with him. We dont have any future plans on kids or owning a house or to settle down. i am on the worrying side who has toh have a plan on financial goals family plannings etc. I have given up asking him on those. He does things around the house when asked to. So he might be a good roommate but i dont think he would be a good friend or a husband.
We dont have kids although he has tried initiating it but i have declined as i am not sure about kids with him. I am afraid that he wouldn’t be taking care of my or the kid after its born and it would be a traumatising experience for me
Since these factors are not considered serious i am not sure whether to go for a separation or just hang on to it. Any advice?
Between it freaks me out to find another partner and frankly i have no hopes that i ever would. Although i am a family person who always wanted a big family of my own. I dont have any siblings and lost friends due to frequent country change. It freaks me out to leave him mostly i wont look for another relationship ever. I would just stay solo. I believe living in expectations is worse that living alone with no expectations from others
Sorry its such a long post
26 comments
How is not wanting to have kids with your husband but wanting them in general “not a serious factor” hahah? It’s extremely serious. It sounds like you really want to leave and the wedding was premature. Why waste any more of anyone’s time including yours? What’s the point being unhappy in your life with no prospect of that changing? We don’t live forever.
Why the hell did you marry this guy? Is this an arranged marriage situation?
You settled for him you clearly have never liked him
You will definitely not meet anyone whole you’re married. Deal with your lack of love, coaxed marriage, total apathy to your husband first, then address the other stuff. The issues add up to a lot. Leave him if he won’t communicate. Then address the rest.
I recommend personal counseling for self-discovery on why you feel the way you do. Whether it is past trauma, RAD from all the moves as a kid, or something else not in this post. Start a journey of self-reflection. Then decide if you want to do couple counseling for your marriage. He may think everything is fine and just used to you being somewhat stand-offish.
You will never be happy in a relationship or not in one if you don’t address what’s going on within you first. I mean you sound depressed but it is hard to say much going off one post.
I surmise you have issues that are not solely attributable to your husband? Have you tried counseling to work through problems?
Honestly, it sounds like you just aren’t that close. Are you still attracted to him/have feelings for him? Maybe before moving on spend some time truly bonding and also just say that having some of these conversations or lack of them is a dealbreaker for you. Not sure how to politely tell both your families to stop pressuring you and stay out of your business but that’s clearly causing more stress on the relationship.
If you’re gut, heart and mind are telling you it’s not a right fit… Then it’s not a right fit and that’s okay. I understand your family’s side of things but they’re not in your shoes. They don’t live what you’re living. Sounds like you know what you honestly want to do, you just need to make the jump. It’ll hurt on both ends as a break up always does but I’ll also seem like a relief after everything has settled. Try not to be so hard on yourself, life happens, sometimes people come into our lives as a blessing or a lesson. You got this,
I don’t think it’s fair to your husband that you want to leave so quickly without even taking the time to get to know him.
You talk about him like he’s a stranger you are forced to coexist with despite living together for three years. While that might have been true at one point if this is an arranged marriage, it shouldn’t be true now. Likewise, he is also in the same boat as you and going through similar thoughts and feelings.
You guys might be married now, but have you ever considered taking each other on dates and engaging in other romantic activities? How well do you even know your own husband? How much effort have you even put into this marriage?
If you’d rather avoid the romance, have you considered just trying to be his friend first? If you can afford it (therapy is super expensive these days), have you done couple’s counseling? What are you actively doing to preserve the marriage?
Truthfully, your husband sounds like an amazing dude. I think it would be an absolute shame to leave the marriage without even getting to know him on a deeper level. You’re parents matched you with a dude that’s willing to do housework with you, listen to you when you communicate your sexual boundaries to him, and respect you enough to go at your pace without demanding anything from you.
However, if you truly want to leave him then get a divorce. I don’t think it’s the best choice right now, but I’m not the one in this marriage. It’s your choice how you want to proceed.
divorce is not always a bad thing. If the marriage isn’t good, then it is time to end it.
What happens when you try to get to know him? When you start conversation? When you initiate the process of becoming closer? When you share with him why you don’t feel close to him? When you share that you’re uncomfortable? When you tell him that you don’t feel like the marriage is going well?
seems like a waste of time for both of you… probably should end this… and take your time before jumping into a new relationship, decide what you really want and what can be overlooked, and what can’t
Hey fam, no judgement here. Not wanting to have kids with him is exactly why you should leave. I was there. I felt external pressure and I thought I needed to go through with marrying my ex but getting divorced was the best decision I have ever made. You don’t owe anyone an explanation why you did get married. You just owe both yourself and your husband the honest truth now that you’ve found it.
Actually sounds like being alone is better. If you don’t think he will help you or the kids after they are born then he won’t help you if you do happen to get a major illness.
Fear of being alone is just a fear of being alone with yourself. You have to learn to love yourself before you get into any kind of relationship. Once you get that part down, not gonna lie life gets pretty awesome. You start looking for relationships that compliment you rather than just needing to be in one just for the sake of being in one.
Leave him, figure out who you are outside a relationship, go make friends and heal. Life is too short to be stuck with someone like that. Just because he isint abusive doesn’t mean he’s a great guy. Just because he’s not abusing you it doesn’t mean he deserves a medal, that is below the bare minimum.
If you are a family person wouldn’t you want a loving family and not a cold household raising kids with practically a stranger. Imagine the poor kids growing up and getting that instead of parents that can set a healthy example for a relationship. If you care about family and your finances then this is not a good situation and the longer you stay the more of an argument he has for splitting more of your assets and it’s also time wasted that you could spend meeting someone you are actually compatible with.
If you were to die tomorrow, would you feel you lived your life fully? Yeah, sounds like no.
Divorce him and go live your life.
Go see a therapist.
I think you might be getting a lot of pressure from people outside your relationship.
See a therapist and see if it’s possible to work this out. If he a nice person, then try the therapy.
Don’t ever do anything to please your parents trust me it never works and you will suffer immensely it seems like you’re not attracted to him and cannot connect with him which will never lead to you loving him and if you don’t feel like that now you will end up resenting him you’re better off divorcing don’t worry about your family thinks if they are good they will care about your mental health and let you do what’s best for you .. good luck
My advice would be separate, go to therapy to work on yourself and build your self-esteem and if/when you’re ready to date again go forward with it. I wouldn’t rush the last part, you should enjoy your own company and find some friends first.
You only get one life, don’t settle for this unpleasant scenario due to outside pressure from people who really don’t have your back. You’re certainly capable of finding someone to love and who loves you in a world of eight billion people. Just sounds like you need some help getting your head and heart back in the right place first (separation & therapy).
RUN I repeat, RUN! You will never be happy and will waste your life, go find your best friend and grow old with then
OP, I can relate since I went through something similar as I did go through an arranged marriage (indian) too and so I’ll share my anecdotal experience(for better or worse) based understanding of what happened to me. I too went into it as an immature and naive adult due to cultural and familial factors/demands/pressures. Arranged marriages are essentially family alliances in order to safeguard wealth transfers and long term legacy (aka grandchildren), everything else including your desires are secondary or in fact the least of their concern….what you are craving is some form of compatibility with your spouse which you essentially don’t get through(or very rare/hard) arranged marriage. We see this in most Indian couples who went through something similar or the same when they realize this lack of compatibility and redirect themselves to have children to distract themselves from this reality…I went through hell with my spouse on realization and it involved severe depression and lots of counseling to help us navigate/understand what we wanted (and not)….luckily it barely worked out for us primarily because despite our lack of compatibility, we became friends and the years of trauma helped us understand each other better…but it required many many years (i kid you not) and establishing rigid boundaries with family who don’t or care to understand because our culture lacks empathy…to conclude, try to be honest with yourself with where this is headed and what it is you really want? You are already asking this based on your post and keep going but be prepared that there is only few options here and all involves some sacrifice on your part…my own path was to stay married but we opted no children for which we became ostracized in our community and experienced loss of relationships with family and friends…but ultimately we were prepared for that when we made our decision…good luck
With all honesty, if you ever plan on still having that family, the time to act is now and leave the current situation you are in you are completely unhappy so what is the reason for staying if all the traits of the relationship are negative. Move on from this part and find your happiness. Don’t be afraid to do it. Just leave and accept everything that will come with life good and bad and keep moving forward in time you might meet someone what wants a family as well.
Being married to someone of whom the best thing you can say is “they might be a good roommate” sounds unbelievably bleak. It sounds like you do know what you want, it’s just scary as an unknown.
As someone who was in an extremely unhappy relationship for 9 years please learn from my mistakes and try to get out of this relationship as soon as possible. Things tend to get worse instead of better and you’ll just feel the same way the longer it’s dragged out.
Get divorced and have kids out of wedlock, with someone else.
Oh boy. I was at the same situation as you just couple of weeks ago. I was thinking ALL THE TIME: “I’m not happy, I need to be alone”. My mental heal was deteriorating everyday pass.
My solution? I told my partner how I feel, and hear me out. When I say: “I told my partner…” that means literally everything. Even the things you don’t wanna say to anybody.
I told her exactly how I feel. Crying while talking to her. By that time I just wanted to be alone. Oh boy, how wrong was I.
You’re not bored of your partner, you are just distracted. A least that what I feels reading your post.
So, in short terms. speaking the true with your partner will fix things or destroy it. It will depend on what you want at the end.