A
male
age
30-35,
st1975
writes:I was wondering if someone could help.I am a 32 year old man who has been with his wife for 10 years, and married for almost 4 of those. My wife is 37 years old. We have a 6 month old baby.Over the last few weeks, I have found myself reassessing my relationship with my wife, and have found that I have hit a brick wall with regards to wanting to continue my relationship with her for the long term.There are a number of factors that I feel have caused me to go down this route:1) I have recently lost a significant amount of weight - an issue that had been the main cause of disatisfaction in our sex life and my confidence for many years (alhtough my wife has always loved me, our differences in our abilities to express ourselves was blamed on the fact that I was over weight)2) I have recently become professionally qualified in my chosen career and see life as a new and open adventure full of wonderful opportunities3) Our wonderful son is now 6 months old and we have therefore started to get our life back together for ourselves - thus highlighting old issues that were parked whilst we went through pregnancy.4) Our relationship has been plagued by a fair amount of turmoil over the years caused by over protective parents (no resolved but difficult to forget5) My wife and I appear to have different outlooks on the simple things in life and what we like to do to relax and enjoy ourselves - leading to numerous debates as to what we can do.6) I have recently met another woman, who I have not had a physical relationship with. However, our chance conversation on a train one evening highlighted the fact that fundamentlaly, I was with a woman who is very different to me in many ways...I feel that I struggle to relate to my wife andwhat she wants to get out of life.In short, I feel that I although I am only 32 years old, I am exhausted and plagued by an overwhleming feeling of apathy. I am a very open individual, and have attempted on numerous occassions to discuss concerns that there is a lack of spark in our marriage and our relationship. Our sex issues have been regularly discussed over the years - we have never succeeded in rectifying those issues and I feel we have gone round in circles.I love my wife as a mother to our son and for someone who has stuck by me over the years, but I have fundamentally lost any urge to love her any more than this. We are talking about this, but my wife quite rightly feels betrayed for sticking with me all this time only for me to turn around and tell her that I no longer feel the same way about her. The fact is that I know that these are long term issues that I have addressed to myself in the past, but maybe I have never really had the courage to face them before hand and have only allowed them to come out now that my life is at this cross roads following the profound changes that I have experienced.Has anyone else gone through this at all?
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male
reader, Uncle Sneaker + ♥, writes (25 May 2008):
 To answer the last point in your update first, I think there are always other people around most of us with whom we could spend our lives. It's not that they surface when things are going badly, it's just that we notice them more readily when things are going badly.
It's perhaps a slightly cynical view, but I believe there are tens of thousands of potential partners for almost every one of us - partners we could love and be "in love" with. But although this means that we can move on if and when a relationship fails, it also means that fewer relationships should be "failing" than the high number that do. One failed relationship most frequently, although not always, means that a second or third is likely to fail. Quite simply, most of us who reach that point do so because we have not succeeded with the skills needed to make a partnership work, skills which are essential as our lives change and adapt and as, inevitably, our love is not the same as it was when we started the relationship. With the pressure of society to remain together and not to divorce much less forceful than it was in the past, it becomes less necessary to make the effort to acquire such relationship "expertise", and assistance from family about dealing with relationships and problems within them is almost non-existent.
And, going back to your first point, you will never have "sacrificed a relationship with someone else". You will have sacrificed a relationship with all those thousands of women you could have spent some of your life with. It's what most of us do.
Very few people are completely incompatible. Even fewer who once thought they were right for each other really become incompatible. I completely agree that there are some relationships that are simply not worth continuing - but I would question whether yours is one of those.
As you say, the issue is you. I don't think from anything you have said that you really know just what you want. It sounds very much as though your wife wants you - really, really wants you, and may be prepared to make a tremendous effort for you. That's a gem that you really want to think very, very hard about before throwing it away, but in the end it is your life and your decision. Don't rush to go off in a direction that you later regret.
A
male
reader, st1975 +, writes (25 May 2008):
st1975 is verified as being by the original poster of the questionI have had some fantastic feedback from everyone here (good and bad) so thanks.We attended our first counseling session on Thursday evening. It was traumatic to say the least. It was the first time that my wife had heard me speaking about her in the third person to somebody else and needless to say, she was devastated.I too, felt awful. I do at the end of the day love my wife and have therefore struggled with the feelings that I am going through and with the fact that I am causing so much pain.On the Friday evening, I left the house and spent a night alone. We were both adamant that I needed to go, but clearly my wife was very shook up - for me it was something that just needed to be done.On the Saturday, my wife's friend called me up, told me that she was taking our son out to lunch and that I should come over and chat to her about things - the two of us alone. We went out for the afternoon and had what was for the first time, a positive chat about where we stood. For the first time, my wife did start to understand what my issues were and at the end of the day, we felt that we had at least started on the same page, which is something that we had not done for two weeks. Things are a little strange right now to be honest. I have no doubts at all about my wife's desire to make things work. The issue however is me. My wife is desparate for me to tell her that all I want to do is to make things work, however I'm struggling to give her that answer.We do have a lot in our relationship to appreciate, but I am plagued by few things still:1) I am struggling to believe that these things can be rectified given the amount of time this has been going on for and the number of times that we have already discussed these issues. Things feel uncertain and I really don't want to wake up in the future feeling that I may have sacrificed something/someone else.2) I am very aware that I may have been trying to mould my wife into something that she is not because of our differences. It is something that I am not proud of, and I am aware that I don't want to cause her any more hurt3) I freely admit that I am still hung up by this other woman. I know that there is no easy answer for this. Yes the grass always appears greener, especially at a time when so many fairly important changes in my life all seem to hit at the same time. But, (and maybe I need to accept this), we DO meet other potential partners who would be just as good for us and we just have to let them go. It just seems ironic that they tend to show up when the relationship is in pieces.
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A
female
reader, anonymous, writes (24 May 2008): You and your wife may indeed be growing apart. Or maybe you just don't know how to grow back together... certainly you owe it to yourself, your wife, and your new child to do your very best to fall back in love with your wife. You are certainly not the first or the only person to feel this way. Don't try to reinvent the wheel in fixing your marriage-- do go for professional help or at least do some research in how to improve your relationship with your wife.As a starter, try googling "Marriagebuilders" and read what they have to say about "Emotional Needs"... great site, improved my marriage and helped us get through a rough spot. Keeping it fresh is hard work but well worth the effort. As for this new woman you met-- well, it's also growing up to realize that there's more than one person who might be a match to you. About every 3 years or so I will run into a man not my husband with whom I feel a spark, and know that if I weren't married, I might end up with him... the admiration and flirting are tempting, as are the revival of parts of my potential that I neglect in order to stay in sync with my husband. The first time this happened I was very shaken, blown away, felt trapped. But I managed to stay strong, and since then have run into several other "true loves" from parallel universes. One gets a little wistful, it's a real wrench to pull away from this fascinating new world that suddenly seems to open up -- but when I see good old hubby I'm glad. Each of those guys seems to offer a shiny new future, but I've got a HISTORY with my husband that can't be replaced. It does sound like you and your wife need to do spend some time doing activities (not necessarily sex) that bring you to enjoy one another's company. When you begin to associate your spouse's company with fun and good things, the sexual attraction will follow.Good luck!
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A
reader, anonymous, writes (23 May 2008): I'm a female who has lived this... I was with a partner who was not ambitious, when I say ambitious he didn't have to be a Doctor or Lawyer, but just excel in his chosen career. I wouldn't say I'm ambitious I love money and am prepared to work for it and if it means updating my skills I'd do it. Well it ended with us not having anything in common and I now realize that just because your partner doesn't have the same goals as you doesn't mean they're a bad person - but just that you're no longer compatible. Sounds cold but you could spend years trying to make her the person she's not and that's not fear on her either. If you can find a common ground that's great, but if you can't dont torture yourelf and her - they say opposites attract but you still need to be with someone whose singing from the same hymn sheet. Good luck.
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A
female
reader, ariel +, writes (22 May 2008):
 Without sounding patronizing, only you can make yourself happy. I am sorry if I offend you in what I am about to say,but you need to stop whining and complaining and forget yourself for a minute. Don’t you find it strange that you have made all these improvements in yourself and your career yet you are still unhappy? Is that not saying something to you? And all you can do is blame your wife for your state of unhappiness. All you do is complain what about appreciating every waking hour of your life.
No I am sorry but you are not thinking clearly, you have what sounds like a very supportive wife who has loved you through all your attempts to find happiness for yourself. What are you hoping to gain? What are you hoping to find?
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A
male
reader, st1975 +, writes (22 May 2008):
st1975 is verified as being by the original poster of the questionThank you both for you input. There are of course plenty of questions to answer and we are not going to be exploring them on our own and our first counseling session is due soon.I have omitted a lot from my initial question for the purposes of brevity, but in a combined update to both responses many of the questions you have raised have been explored over the last few weeks since I decided to air my feelings to my wife. The key frustration for me is that these events appear to occur on a cyclical basis, I'm sure that I'm equally to blame for these things happening, but with everything that has been going on, maybe neither of us have been courageous enough to face up to the issue and tackle the harder questions. I've taken my role as a father very seriously, and as such, there were probably times when those key relationship issues had to be put on the back burner as I assumed a new role and a new level of love and respect for my wife. It is important (maybe) to note that although our child was planned, I particularly struggled whilst trying for our baby and this was the first time that I noted a change in feeling towards my wife. I think that part of it was that we had had numerous disagreements beforehand on the problems with our sex life and as such 8 years into our relationship, I had struggled to switch things back on - maybe I had already lost that battle? THe pregnancy and birth were fantastic experienced, but I suppose that things have cropped up again since we have started to get a routine with our son and we suddenly find ourselves looking at our relationship againThe one area, that I do need to explore is to look back at my relationship and remember the better times- something which at the moment I am genuinely struggling to do.We've always led a very structured relationship, in that major events such as marriage, house, family etc, were planned. However, our relationship started under very difficult conditions and although I learnt in those early days that my family had an excessive influence on me, I did feel the need to try to 'mould' my wife into something that she was not. Furthermore, it is fair to say that the first 2-3 years of our relationship also focused a lot on the fact that when we met at our respective ages of 22 and 26, my wife was already adamant that she wanted to be married with children by 30. This was something that I was not ready to do and I remember a number of fairly traumatic conversations where we simply hit each other head on (metaphorically of course) It is testament to her that she managed to find a balance - put simply, my memories appear to be littered with bad examples rather than the ones that made me happy.I have always had a more adventurous (although not irresponsible) approach to life and this is reflected in my general outlook. I always wanted to be sure that my wife would have equal levels of enthusiasm for the things I wanted to do and I have always been career driven to a point that I have wanted to ensure that I can provide similar things that I was fortunate to receive when I was younger. I am not however, someone who sacrifices family for career as I did suffer from this to a degree and have been adamant to ensure that I do not make the same mistakes with my children.Thanks again for your general input
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A
female
reader, malvern +, writes (22 May 2008):
I don't think your weight or career opportunities should come into this. How does your wife feel about you? Does she want to make an effort to change things? You both seem to be in rut. You now have a baby to consider as well. That in itself is a difficult thing to cope with. It's hard for any parent to relax and enjoy themselves with a baby in tow.Try to do things as a family - eventually you will get to know loads of other parents through playgroup, school etc and that will bring a new phase into your life, new faces,new activities. It may be worth going to counselling as well. Your wife really needs you right now and so does your son and the grass isn't always greener on the other side.
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A
male
reader, Uncle Sneaker + ♥, writes (22 May 2008):
Oh yes. I know exactly where you are coming from with all of this.
You have a late "seven year itch" combined with an early "mid-life crisis". It may be difficult to accept that, but I'm sure that's what it is.
You are at the point where many men do make a major change, sparked now not just by your age or the length of time you have been with your wife, but also by you losing weight and becoming qualified.
The fact that you are fundamentally a different character from your wife is not the root of the problem. Opposites attract, and can find common ground with aims that are complementary rather than opposing. But you want something new and different. I would suggest that it doesn't necessarily have to be a new partner. You need something to aim at in your domestic life as well as your career life.
Before you make any drastic decisions, look back a bit. When you met your wife and decided she was the one you wanted to be with, what were your thoughts and aims then? When you decided to marry her after being with her for six years, what were your thoughts and aims at that point, and what were hers? Did you decide to have a baby, or was it an accident? If it was no accident, then how did you feel towards your wife and your relationship then?
These are questions you need to ask yourself, not to answer here. Fundamentally, you don't want to find yourself jumping "out of the frying pan into the fire". You clearly feel you can't go on as you are. Any realtionship needs to change, to grow, and it sounds as though yours has stagnated. If there was ever a spark between you, and surely after staying with her for ten years there must have been some sort of spark, you need to look back and remember what it was. You can probably never rekindle that same spark, but love is a very strange creature and the sparks that we need in our lives are not always the bright, obvious things that they were when we were younger. It may be that you can never find any sort of spark with her, but even if that is the case then you need to be sure that you know what you are looking for elsewhere.
I can't find a solution for you. No one can. It may be time to move on. Or it may be time to do something completely different like, for example, making a new start with your wife and baby in a new place or even in a new country. Your domestic situation has to change for you to be happy. I'm just questioning WHAT that change should actually be.
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