marriage on the rocks
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| Wed, 08-06-2008 - 1:10am |
Our 5 year marriage appears to be on the rocks. The main reason is because we are infertile due to low sperm motility and early onset menopause. I was able to get pregnant once and we lost our baby at 6 months because my body couldn't hold onto the pregnancy.
We have an adoption file open but nothing has happenned yet. My husband was offered a good job in another province but if he takes it, we would have to close our file and re-open in another province where all the adoption files are open and we're not entirely sure that we're comfortable with it. I am at the point where I want to give up. DH is too, but is mostly angry about the situation and feels sorry for himself and angry at me because I am able to transfer some of my maternal energy onto pets whereas he cannot.
We cannot afford to pay a surrogate, nor can we afford to adopt from a foreign country. Many countries are closed off to us because of our ages (39 and 40) and because of a previous divorce in dh's past.
It is at the point where we have been arguing, me crying, him sulking, everyday for the last 2 months. Mostly because he is unhappy in his life, his job and seems angry at me. I don't feel attracted to him anymore because I feel anger at him for feeling responsible for his happiness, and sometimes I feel he only married me to use my uterus to make him a father and to get regular sex. He is also somewhat passive aggressive, and seems to like to "bug" me although he claims I am just imagining this.
On the positive side, I want to stay married, I want to commit to the vows I made. He is a good guy who makes me laugh and I want to make this work again, even though we may never be parents.
What tools can I use to make this work? it seems that we are on a downward spiral. We both try to get along, but at the end of the day, after a few hours together, one of us will inevitably say something to set the other one off. We never yell at each other, but I am tired of all the "talks" that never seem to get us anywhere. I become very sad late at night when yet again, he has gone to bed early. I don't know what to do and am at a loss. Unfortunately he doesnt' want to see a counselor because we already have to see a social worker a few times a year to keep our adoption file open and he has a negative view of this because it costs money and he thinks it means we have a troubled marriage. (I guess we do, but it's hard for him to admit it)

He may not want to see a counselor, but this is what is needed to get your own emotional and marital lives back on track. Negative feelings, disappointment, anger, frustration are accumulating and neither of you know how to handle them. If you do not learn how to release these feelings, communicate in a healthy way and work constructively with this problem, the marriage will not have much of a chance. Things back up and intensify and it may become too difficult to get past this.
If he refuses to go for therapy, you can. Get to a good therapist and work on these issues, so you can see a way through all this upset to get yourself and your marriage back on track.
All good wishes,
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Welcome to the board anacat,
I hope you can take Dr Shoshanna's advice about going to counseling even without him if need be.
Thank you for your responses. I will take your advice. I have Dr.Phils book relationship rescue and will start reading it this weekend.
I also have already looked for a counselor and the only thing holding me back was money, but I decided that seeing a counselor is cheaper than a divorce.
I know DH would go if I insisted, but he just goes on and on about how bad our relationship must be that we need to see a counselor AGAIN (we did after we lost our baby) and it makes me feel guilty and insecure.
Today we had a good evening, so that's a start.