So many issues


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We have so many issues it's not even funny.

My main complaint is over our 10+ year marriage, husband has constantly accused me of having affairs - I have had NONE, no online flirtations, and irl I am actually very shy and I don't flirt at all. Not in front of him and not behind his back.

If I am gone to the store for an hour or two, I will get at least 5-6 calls as well as text messages from him. His first question is always, "Where are you?" or "What are you doing?" He also tracks my cell phone by GPS. He used to "make" me take one of the kids with me if I went anywhere. I get called during playdates with other women and children and he will get upset when I don't want to be rude to my company and talk on the phone to him. We went on a little family trip. I took my daughter to the bathroom and she had to go #2. We were gone 20 minutes and when we came back, he was throwing eye daggers at me and acting mad. Finally, when I pressured him to tell me what was up, I was accused of "playing him for a fool" and having an affair with someone we knew that was there at the same time we were.

I used to try to reassure him and avoid doing things that made him nervous (like having friends) - but felt my resentment grow to the point that I no longer care. Now I just tell him off. I'm seriously ticked off at him. My anger was only compounded when I found evidence of him flirting with women online (I have no evidence it went further than that. Although there was a secret email address he refused to give me the password for) I thought he wouldn't cheat because he was paranoid about ME cheating. Boy was I dumb.

My husband is also an addicted gambler - he's pawned things and borrowed money, and the kids and I have gone without so he can gamble.

I have very little desire to have sexual relations with this man - I am literally grossed out by him. He watches porn and says degrading things to me during the act. He's taken naked pictures of me without my knowledge or permission. When I found them and confronted him (after deleting), he didn't say so much as a sorry. Just half hearted excuses. I am NOT a prude, either! I have willingly given him pictures, just without my face in them.

I honestly don't know what to do. I' have no family where we live, and I'm a stay at home mom. If it weren't for the kids, I would have left last year when the online flirting stuff came up.

We are both converts and thank goodness I have not been sealed to this man. I think I can muddle through for "time only," but NOT "eternity!" Some days, it seems things are better and will be better, then he does something and it brings back every bad feeling I've had over the years. It's been one of those days. I am tired of pretending. I don't know how to get past the anger. Can I? Should I? He went to one counseling appointment by himself to appease me and never went back.

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I would speak to a priesthood authority. It sounds like its giving you enough grief. A Bishop can take it from there and either talk to you two together and figure if there is something that can be done, or he can send you to therapy if you feel that its necessary.

It takes two people to make a marriage work, and obviously there are some responsibilities not being met. Honestly before you go to a Bishop, I would talk to him first and see what you can solve by yourselves. Communication is KEY in a marriage, and if you bottle your feelings in yourself and only vent them here, you're not really giving him a chance to defend/ make things right for himself.

Once you've tried to have this talk with him on "what can be do to be happier with each other", If he is unwilling to cooperate, thats when i would take it forward to a Bishop and tell him you've done everything you can.

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You sound very much like a friend of mine, only her kids are grown and she's still putting up with the constant phone calls from her husband. He won't let her go grocery shopping without him and if she's going on a trip by herself, he'll act angry towards her for weeks, asking repeatedly, "When are you going on your trip?" I bumped into her at Deseret Book and her husband called her repeatedly while we were visiting. She looked really annoyed.

First I would tell him that the cell phone is for emergencies, not for keeping tabs on me constantly, and if he abuses his phone privileges, I'll just turn it off or not take it with me. Maybe answer the phone like this, "Do you have something important to talk about or are you calling to accuse me of adultery again?" You can't even take a child to the bathroom without being accused? That's messed up. I would demand he go to therapy. I just couldn't deal with that kind of behavior. A new voice mail message might be fun too, "Hi, you've reached Blue. I'm either away from my phone or having another tawdry affair. Shhhhhh!!! Don't tell my husband!"

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Your husband is abusive and manipulative, and this is not a healthy relationship. Don't stay "because" of the kids -- leave for the kids' sake!

Oh, and I wouldn't worry about being stuck with him for eternity -- he's not keeping his temple covenants anyway.

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I try to stay very neutral in matters such as these. The fact is that we are usually only getting one side of the story and that we often don't hear the faults of the person doing the complaining. So let me first start by saying that I hope you'll take full responsibility for the problems in your marriage that are related to your choices.

That being said, you're husband is a first rate jerk. You are in an abusive relationship and you deserve better than that. Also--this is going to be very mean--but if your husband is a compulsive gambler, he needs to either get psychiatric help, or he's an idiot.

My advice is to pack up your stuff and your kids and take a trip to your parents, a sister, brother...somebody. Take the time to figure out how you can make things work without any support from him (you'll likely see very little child support from him if he's gambling away the food money). Most of all, start documenting everything. Make a note about every phone call and every dime that gets spent on gambling.

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We are only hearing one side of the story, I'm sure that you are the perfect wife....... But let's assume that you are upholding you side of the bargin..... If what you say is accurate it's time to pack the bags and go. He won't change and you and you kids will be miserable. If not for you do it for the kids. He may not want to pay child support or alimony but if he has a real job they will attach his wages, pursue it and he will pay if he goes underground and starts working construction or something he can never have a real life ever again.

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You are right, you are only hearing my side. And what is a perfect wife? I can't look in the mirror and see one, for sure. In that vein, I never expected my husband to be perfect. The only thing I ever wanted was to be treated like a person. To be married to my best friend. Friends don't treat each other this way. To his credit, he admits his problem but seems unwilling or unable to change at this time.

To address some other questions: We joined the church together after marriage. When we met, he was older, handsome, seemed responsible, strong, manly. He seemed to know what he wanted - confident. Very attractive to a young lady.

Eleven, we have talked and talked about this, but haven't really talked about HOW to make each other happy - so that is an interesting take on it. I'd be closer to happy if he just cut out the controlling behaviors.

Thanks for the suggestions about talking to the Bishop - do a lot of people do that? Like I said, I am a convert and still pretty clueless on how some things in the church work.

Morning STar. You made me laugh. Thanks. I love your sense of humor.

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I was on your end of the rope only it was my ex who was gone a lot. I never asked where she had been unless it had been a really long time.

I was the stay at home dad, we had challenged kids and normal kids so I was busy getting them to doctor's appointments etc.

Well I found out when our divorce was going on, well just say she wasn't holding up her end of the marriage. It left me feeling pretty low and you know something I realized I can only control me and at times that is a big enough challenge.

I am a divorced and single guy, get to see my kids some, have to drive a long distance to do so but they are worth the trip, have my temple recommend, attend church often, working on getting my master's degree so I can go back to work, looking for a farm and you know life is so much better now I don't have to wonder what the ex is doing.

Oh she is in her middle 50's pregnant and not working now. She is doing all the things I wanted her to do when we were married but she just didn't want to with me. Oh and she remarried the day our divorce was final that should tell you a lot of what was going on.

What all this boils down too is that as we as a people move forward Satan is going to use every tool he has to pull us apart in relationships, life work, even in how we think of our selves so we quit doing what we know we should be doing.

We have only one side of the issue that is true but in this view we can also see that there maybe some issues in the original posters life that could be changed. What I have no clue as there is just too little to go on but none of us are perfect so there is always room to improve.

We all know some relationships are a train wreck waiting to happen and sometimes it does and sometimes it does not.

I know someone who has been married for around 30 years, kids are mostly grown and they are heading for a divorce because they have just grown apart. I see this all to often anymore and wonder where does this falling out of love with your partner come from and have no solid answer yet but I know it is there.

Has anyone noticed that we are becoming a church of singles in a family oriented church?

As an older single I can tell you that going in and setting in church alone is no fun but my ward has gone out of their way to make me feel accepted, liked and most of all that they are happy I came to church. A huge part of this is because of the bishop and his counselors they work really hard to keep everyone active and moving forward. My bishop and I have become good friends since my life fell apart and even his wife has been a source of encouragement and most of the time she doesn't even know she has done it. Case in point I went to SLC once on a saturday to have dinner with some friends and drove home that same day. Well it got me back home with just enough time to change and go to church. To say I was a little tired is an understatement. She walked up and asked me if I was ok and what was wrong and I explained a 30 hour day was slowing me down and I explained why my day so long and she said," you poor man do you have anything to eat at home?" Yes I was divorced and her first concern was that I had something to eat that I didn't have to fix and that I would go home and sleep after church. My ex never once treated me with such kindness.

Do I have negative feelings towards my ex not really anymore more sadness as I can see the road she is on and taking my kids on is going to be a hard one for them all.

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You can talk to your bishop but they are not trained professionals...if you are looking for spiritual guidance I say give it a shot. Bottom line though if you husband admits his issues and has no desire to change his ways it might be time to move on. 10+ years of this? Really.....

The Bishop can help you get the counseling you and your husband need. Your husband might not go but you need to just for some support and ideas in dealing with his inappropriate behavior.

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  • 1 month later...

Before you exercise the nuclear option of divorce, you might try giving him more intercourse, and seeing whether that helps. It's worth a shot, no?

Are you saying that she should have sex more with her husband? And that will help his gambling habit/addiction, degrading actions/words and fix the marriage? Is THAT what you are saying?

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Before you exercise the nuclear option of divorce, you might try giving him more intercourse, and seeing whether that helps. It's worth a shot, no?

That's right. Just give him more sex. Don't require him to grow up and be a real man or anything. Don't require him to take responsibility for his life and his impact on others.

No...just make yourself into a prostitute and all your problems will be gone.

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Oh. My. Gosh.

Your husband could be my EX. After 25 years I had his infidelities dumped in my lap.

I was totally blind to the fact that he was the one who was the adulterer. But then he messed around with a couple of young things- in early twenties, whose shoe sizes were in bigger numbers than their IQ's and they called him at home, constantly!

Of course I was the one who answered the phone!

Not only was he manipulative, he was also abusive. At first it was verbal, emotional, mental and then escalated to physical, including rape. When he finally came home after drinking all night and being with one of his 'sweeties', he would drag me out of bed, demand that I cook for him, and then rape me.

When I finally left him, I did fear for my life. But I knew that the pain would be short- death ends the pain.

He was all talk- he never came after me to hurt me. It took the name change papers included with the divorce papers to finally hit home that I was serious and not "Going through thatwoman phase".

We didn't have children- if we had I would have left him the first time he knocked me down.

There is no amount of loving them that will turn them into a non-accusing, non-bullying person.

Get out of the situation, get out of the marriage.

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Before you exercise the nuclear option of divorce, you might try giving him more intercourse, and seeing whether that helps. It's worth a shot, no?

*double-face palm* I'm sorry, but is this for real? I mean, really? I mean, what is the first lesson learned in marriage... all together now... "You don't get married for sex!"

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That's right. Just give him more sex. Don't require him to grow up and be a real man or anything. Don't require him to take responsibility for his life and his impact on others.

No...just make yourself into a prostitute and all your problems will be gone.

Um, having relations with your spouse isn't prostitution. It's kind of part of the marriage agreement.

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Are you saying that she should have sex more with her husband? And that will help his gambling habit/addiction, degrading actions/words and fix the marriage? Is THAT what you are saying?

To answer the first question: Yes. It might bring them closer together.

To answer the other questions: No, I didn't say that. Please don't put words in my mouth.

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Then what are you saying? More sex does not equal closer relationship but will erode and destroy a relationship further if sex is given for the purpose of trying to make things better. Sex is a product of love and acceptance, not a tool to fix things.

And please don't start with that strawman stuff.

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That's right. Just give him more sex. Don't require him to grow up and be a real man or anything. Don't require him to take responsibility for his life and his impact on others.

No...just make yourself into a prostitute and all your problems will be gone.

Sex within marriage is not prostitution, especially when given as a gift of love.

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