Married and alone

[InvisibleD]

Hi, I'm 47 year old male and have been married for 12 years and have a 6 year old child.

Problem is my wife is creating a horrible environment for our family. She is constantly overwhelmed; always stressed and somewhat angry. She talks about divorce in front of our son. If there is ever conflict quickly resorts to calling me names and worst of all is constantly arguing with our child as if they are an adult. She will tell our child that she is disappointed in them or how frustrated she is with them. Her face is constantly buried in her phone and never in the moment.

We have been to counseling and she didn't comply with any guidance. I've tried to contribute more to make her less stressed but nothing helps.

There is zero respect love or friendship left. For example I had surgery to address a problem from an accident that I was in. Surgery was 6 hours to put it in perspective. 3 weeks after she was complaining about I was not feeling good and asked me to not complain about post op recovery.

If I try to talk to her she doesn't reply and just shuts down. If we didn't have a child together I would be gone in less than a second.... but I'm more worried about losing custody and my poor kid being stuck with her 100% of the time so I sleep alone; keep my feelings to myself and try to keep peace to ensure my child is as happy as can be.

Personally I feel invisible ans alone. I secretly ache to have love in my life and go through my day wishing someone would even notify me; not sexually but just to have friendship.

Feel like I'm in prison but will do my time to protect my kid

[Richard@DecisionSkills]

You are not protecting your child by staying with her. That is your imagination. You imagine a future where she has full custody, you imagine a future where XYZ happens. You use this imagined future as a rationalization, a reason, a justification to not take a different path than the one you are on.

You don't know the future. You don't know what will happen.

Read the works of Dan Gilbert, psychologist out of I believe Stanford. Read Stumbling onto Happiness. There is plenty of scientific research, studies that show you are just making crap up about some imagined, horrible, negative future for your child if you don't stay with your wife.

There are so many alternate ways the future could play out. Your child could actually have worse experiences by you two staying together in an unloving, argumentative relationship than apart. Your child will grow up thinking he is suppose to stay with a woman that treats him bad. Is that what you want him to learn from you, that you are suppose to take abuse? You are the role model!!!

What would happen if you divorced, found a wonderful woman, found love and your child was exposed to a loving relationship? Well, that can't happen because his father has decided already that he knows the future, so he must stay in a loveless, abusive relationship.

Bottom line, you don't know the future, but you are making up a negative future and using that as your excuse not to leave.

[Livetowin]

To invoke change you must want change. What I see are two depressed people feeling confined within the trappings of their relationship looking outward, leaving the child unguarded to capture and probably later mimic the outbursts and emotional cues he sees around him. These are his most impressionable years. How he copes with his emotions are directly tied to what he is seeing right now. If the two of you argue in front of him or if she takes out her frustration directly on him, he is absorbing those moments as a form of communication which he will duplicate probably by having his own short fuse qualities. The damage is setting in my friend and unfortunately you're keeping him in the shrapnel field instead of taking him out of it. The time to take action is NOW.

There are no rewards awaiting your undying patience in this beat down. You're deference to her breakdowns only encourages and empowers her to do more of them. You need to get back in the driver's seat of your life. YOU ONLY CONTROL YOURSELF. Whatever her problems are, she must manage them. They are not yours to manage. Her weaknesses are not your weight to carry. Those are excuses she uses to empower her emotional outbursts so she can keep you in your place and control the narrative.

You need to take stock of what you have, what resources exist, and what you can do to move out if you determine the marriage is over. I would have a consultation with an attorney about what your best moves are. Who owns the house? Do you live in a house? Did you buy it before the marriage? Are the directives from the counseling sessions documented? Is your son exhibiting signs of stress which can be linked to the environment your wife creates?

You need to get yourself prepared and armed with facts and an actionable plan BEFORE you do anything else. Have your options laid out first before you address her, because once the emotions start pumping, you won't be in good shape to make rational decisions. Layout your blueprint to follow, so the decision making is predetermined. This will also give you confidence to follow through once this event starts, because you'll likely have your hands full of guilt trips she'll lob your way to support her victim mentality. Ignore them because she owns them.

There's another reason why you need to take these actions before talking to her. You need to make it real to make sure YOU'RE keeping it real with yourself. Are you just emoting frustration or is this a fixable world you want to salvage? When you sit down and start talking to an attorney, you find out pretty fast where your resolve sits. But the one good thing it does is empower you to make choices. That way when the time comes to talk to her, you are no longer this battered human being confronting her with a feeble attempt to invoke change. You will have become an agent of change and you will follow it through.

So go do your homework. Talk to an attorney and layout your blueprint that can be followed if this marriage is in fact over. Then confront her, without giving away everything you have done, and tell her these changes have to happen or you are leaving...immediately. Don't tell her you've talked to an attorney. Just explain you are ready to move on if she does not get her sh*t together and come back to you as your wife and be a responsible mother to the son the two of you are trying to raise. The time for excuses is over. Take charge.

Notice I didn't tell you to go right into divorce proceedings? I didn't because I believe you need to follow this through to see for yourself what she is made of as well as what you really want for yourself. I don't think you have answers to that yet. There's allot of emotion distracting you from getting a clear perspective on this. Follow this process and clarity will come. Do it for yourself, but more importantly for your son. When push comes to shove, you will find out what both you and your wife really desire here. I wish you the very best.