Y’all this is going to be long because we have a lot to cover. I’m just trying to get some insight if you’ve got the time. Many advance thanks.
My partner (33M) and I (32F) have been together for 11 years, married for 5. No kids, just a single one-year-old pup. We’ve always had a very balanced, very peaceful relationship. In recent years, I’ve been wondering if this harmonious existence is really just a product of both of us being people pleasers and unable to set boundaries or critique our partner for fear of hurting them. My husband rarely gets angry and rarely shows true displeasure. Of course, because he doesn’t really work through it when it happens, he pushes it down and when there is a real fight, it’s 10x worse because there seems to be so much pent up resentment. This has become incredibly clear in the last couple of years as we’ve seemed to drift apart. I’m hoping to get some insight into what’s happening and why…
We moved across the country a couple of years ago for my husband’s work. My family sold our house and moved away after my mom passed in 2020, so it’s just his family in the areas where we used to live. Since my mom passed, I’ve been struggling mentally. I’ve had therapists, taken medication, switched my diet and my lifestyle, to the best of my ability. I learned I probably also have undiagnosed ADHD for which I realized that talking things through with my mom was always a coping strategy. As someone who was always smiling and sunny, I’ve trying HARD to move on with my life and be the person I once was. I can tell that this grief hasn’t been sitting with my partner well. He’s for sure been supportive over the last few years and very patient with the depression and anxiety that developed, but I think he thinks there’s a time/emotion limit on grief. Recently, when I was crying in the bathroom, I told him what I was feeling and he shifted toward the door and said, “I’m not leaving; I just feel like we’ve had this conversation 12 times.” So since then, I’ve stopped talking about my mental health and my grief with him. A few weeks ago, his dad died and the two were incredibly close; like my mom and I were. When it happened, he looked me dead in the eyes and said “I’m so sorry, I didn’t realize it hurt this much.” And of course I didn’t say any of the following, but I did appreciate hearing that because it felt like I was finally validated in how hard it’s been to feel normal, but I was also pretty freaking angry that it was clear that he hadn’t thought that what I’ve been saying matched how he thought I should have been feeling this whole time, and only now that he’s going through it, he understands that it’s insanely painful. Shouldn’t a person just believe his partner? I always did, to a fault sometimes.
We’ve both been guilty of being emotionally distant and avoidant, although I’m much more comfortable talking about what’s going on in my own head and heart. I’ve seen him cry only three times in the last eleven years. It’s always hurt that he doesn’t open up to me and it’s been increasingly clear that he needs to talk to someone; he’s been saying it himself. He’s admitted he definitely has anxiety and it’s gotten worse and that he’s pretty sure he has some sort of bipolar disorder. He’s never been physically or verbally violent, but his back and forth can give me some serious whiplash. Occasionally, I can’t tell what side of him I’m getting or why. I’m not perfect either by any stretch. Just after my mom died, I struggled with anger BAD. I’d go 0-60 in about three minutes. But I recognized my problem and how it was hurting him and my family and I went into therapy and haven’t slammed a single door since. The fact that I’ve done the work and made the commitment, seen the doctors and am straightening myself out is making this all the more difficult because I feel like he’s been talking the talk this whole time with nothing to show for it. I’ll talk more about this later.
Our sex life is super mismatched. I’d be so happy with some sort of intimacy like 5 outta 7 days. I get busy in the shower almost daily. On the flip side, we are intimate together maybe once every few months. And because we aren’t intimate often, we’re missing opportunities to grow together and explore what we each might like, so the sex is just… fine. I’m also feeling like my primo years are passing me by and as much as I want to be intimate with my husband because I love the heck outta that red-bearded fox, the rejection has really crushed my self-confidence and I wonder OFTEN what it’d be like to have some actually \*want\* you. I’ve considered suggesting an open marriage but I’ve read the horror stories on here and I’m afraid he’ll take it that way. How it’s just an excuse to cheat or that I’m abandoning him. I don’t actually really want to be with anyone else; I have no one \*lined up\*. I just want to desire and appreciate and be desired and appreciated and I feel like sex is in incredibly important part of someone’s life.
We’ve talked about this divide on our own and attempted couple’s therapy. After two therapists didn’t work out (The first one’s response to my husband after us talking about our mismatched love life was “What? But why! You have such a beautiful wife!” which was SO supremely demeaning to him and what he’s actually struggling with. We promptly found someone else). After a couple sessions with the last one, my partner suggested that we do a couple of individual sessions first, which I thought was a great idea and our therapist agreed. I did mine… and he never did his. And never showed up to another session. I asked him what the deal was and he just said he wasn’t comfortable, that he wanted to do his own work on himself first. Ok sure. So I kept seeing the therapist and every so often, would tell him a session was coming up and invite him and he always declined. He’d even tell me that we don’t have the money for him to see someone- to which I’d tell him we already have a therapist available for no extra funds. Then he’d say he doesn’t like her and wants one in-person and round and round we go again. He’s never gotten his own therapist. He’s never even seen a doctor for the several physical ailments that have plagued him over the years. Anyway, all that to say: we’ve tried therapy together to no avail.
The thing is, we do have talks together about important things; like our mental health, our relationship, our careers, losing family, really hard things. And we have good conversations. Anytime we badly fight, we always come back together and talk it out and apologize if needed. We’ve even talked about this distance between us now and he admitted that he finds me “selfish” and that I don’t live the way other people do and that it’s not fair. That somehow I don’t understand the struggles other people do, which read a little bit like I’m not suffering enough for him. He was talking about my career in the arts, which has allowed me the freedom to take on other projects or take opportunities to plan last-minute things, like with my recently reconnected cousin I went on some roadtrips with this summer. He’s always been invited and encouraged to attend and even the ones we’re trying to plan for next year, my husband is already giving excuses for why he won’t go. He didn’t even come out to have a drink with my cousin when he was in town. I know work is hard and takes a lot out of him, but he also willingly GIVES a lot of himself to his work and I know it’s taking away from his actual life. It’s already taken away from our relationship because he literally said it has.
At this point, I’m just confused about where we’re at. I know a huge part of our issue is communication, hence why we decided to get a therapist. But since he’s checked out of that and we can’t seem to come to any sort of middle ground when we talk on our own, I’m just lost on how to move forward and grow. He doesn’t seem to want to work on himself, even though he’s been saying he needs to for years, and doesn’t seem to want to put any effort into our relationship or me or even spending more time together. The last few dates we’ve been on, concerts or hikes, have been actually stressful and I think we both felt disconnected from the other. The jab about my career hurt especially because since moving out here, my career has actually taken a serious hit. My industry is few and far between where we live now and it’s been impossible to find reliable work. So I’ve had to take shitty shift work to make ends meet since my marketable skills haven’t seemed to translate to potential jobs in other fields. And I really thought that might help him see that I \*do\* understand the way people have to hustle (which is hilarious he thinks I don’t know that since that’s basically all freelancers do to keep consistent work). Since my industry took a hit during Covid, I’ve been traveling for more contracted work as well, which makes me super happy, but he hates it because he misses me too much. So I’ve stopped doing that. I’m literally just trying to figure out what will make this man seem to want to be invested in me and in us. And I’m running out of answers. The LAST thing I want to do is leave, but I’m also plagued by the thought of having a roommate for the next 50 years and not a spouse.
Thanks if you made it all the way here.
TL,DR: Husband and I are disconnected emotionally and physically. He checked out of our couple’s therapy, doesn’t seem to respect or appreciate my career or how I work, and doesn’t seem to want to put effort into our relationship or even himself. What do I do?
6 comments
He needs to go to therapy. He needs to work on himself. You can do nothing as long as he refuses to take care of himself.
You can’t make him do the things you need unless he wants to do them. He has to CARE enough. You say the last thing you want to do is leave, but I’m pretty sure the last thing you want to do is spend another ten years like this. Forget the rest of your life. He is self-diagnosing some hard issues to deal with but refuses to get help even when you are literally making the appointments. He has made you feel like his support has a time limit when grief absolutely doesn’t. He admits that you guys have issues, that he has resentment that you don’t suffer at work (?!), that he knows he’s giving more to his job than your relationship. A relationship IS communication. What is the POINT of staying with someone who won’t talk to you (or anyone else) and won’t sleep with you and isn’t proud of what you DO bring to the table? Who cares if he’s “foxy” if he won’t touch you? Who cares if he’s a “good man” if he isn’t talking to you or showing you how great you are? If he won’t communicate, YOU communicate. Tell him that you’re thinking about your future with him in a negative light. Tell him he’s done nothing to fix this. I mean really, how many times do you have to drag him to therapy before he knows you’re unhappy?? If he is not an absolute idiot, he probably knows.
Ladies, gays, and theys, please: STOP TRYING TO FORCE-FIX GROWN MEN.
I am in a very similar situation, to the point where I don’t view our relationship as healthy anymore. I’ve been with my partner for a decade and we have become so emotionally and physically disconnected as well.
Like you, I have a high libido and prioritize sex as very important in my relationship, whereas he doesn’t prioritize it at all, says he doesn’t need it. We have sex maybe once every couple months…but it’s gone as long as six months without physical intimacy. It absolutely kills me. I feel so undesirable, unattractive, unwanted… I would love to feel desired and honestly don’t even know what that feels like anymore. It’s such a sensitive subject for us that I can’t even discuss it with him without him exploding on me. So, also like you, I help myself in the shower because I don’t know what else to do. It just makes the whole situation feel even more depressing and lonely, to be honest.
Your therapy story is also so similar to mine. We went to three sessions of couples counseling before he refused to continue going. He said he didn’t like the therapist after she asked him why he was being so mean to her. He said he would go to therapy by himself, with a therapist he chooses, but that was a year ago and he never did it. Then he said he had concerns about the cost of therapy, so I offered to pay for them, which he declined. Said he was going to work on himself instead. I haven’t seen any change though.
I completely empathize with your concerns about your relationship and see a lot of overlapping similarities with my relationship.
I wish I had good advice for you but because I’m in the same boat, unfortunately, I don’t. But I do want to say that I understand what you’re going through and I know it’s difficult and lonely and confusing. So if there’s anything to take from this, it’s that you’re not alone in feeling this way.
Wishing you the best.
You said yourself, you’ve put in the work. But he has not and won’t…just makes excuses. Where do you really go from there?
There’s a lot to unpack here.
I’m so sorry about your mother dying. That must be rough. I would be disgusted if my husband ever acted like I should just “be over it”. I did notice at the end that he’s been talking about getting help for years. Funny, something you have zero control over – a death in the family, is glossed over and not to be talked about, but he’s allowed to continually tell you he wants to change and then does nothing about it? Why is he allowed to keep spouting the same thing and expect you to listen and care?
It sounds like he really struggles to communicate. He doesn’t actually want therapy, hence all the excuses.
I think it’s ultimatum time. You’re putting in all this energy, moved for him, got yourself in therapy, tried couples counselling… your husband on the other hand seems fine with never changing and you doing all the work.
What is the house work like? Does he do chores? Are you allowed to have hobbies? It seems like you are probably so tired from everything going on, and you mention the arts, which makes me wonder if you have time to get creative?
No, the two of you are no longer compatible.