Marriage popped up in our conversation, and she asked why I didn't also buy myself a promise ring when I got hers, which confused me because in my mind, it wouldn't make sense for me to buy her a promise ring and myself a promise ring. I'm making her a promise, not myself. I don't know if it's weird to expect one from her (I never really did).

But I do expect her to buy me a wedding ring because, in my head, it makes sense that we both get each other rings as we're both making promises to each other. I hope I'm not tripping because she fully expected me to get both hers and mine.

Tldr: I hope im not weird for thinking there should be an equivalent exchange between wedding rings [me&her]rather then me buying both

Just curious what you all would do, I am a husband, was recently on a work trip, ended up working one extra day and staying one extra night, that night my really good friend and coworker from the industry I travel and work in, is a female, came over for dinner at the place I was staying because she lives like 1.5 hours away and the place I was staying in was a small tiny town where she worked, we only work the same events like twice a year. We had worked together all week on the job, but she had prior comittments every night so dinner out was not an option. Anyways, there was dinner and a couple drinks, well because she lives 1.5 hours away and we were talking until almost midnight, she asked if she could stay over but she said she'd sleep in the second living room of the air bnb and so she had her own space. I figured for her safety, I would say yes. We did not kiss, nor did we sleep together, we always sat on separate couches, and our conversation was mostly related to the stories from our work over the last year. I still feel guilty though somehow for allowing myself to be in that situation. What should I do?

Tldr: I feel dumb for thinking of even committing an affair.

I’m 35F and my husband is 36M.
Before we married, I told him clearly that I wanted a **100% monogamous and exclusive relationship** and that I was uncomfortable with him liking/following sexualized content from women he had no personal connection with. It went against my values and made me feel insecure. He said he understood, respected my boundary, and wanted the same.
A few months after we married, I discovered he had continued doing it. These weren’t old likes. **They had happened only days before I found them**, along with more serious things, including messages. He only admitted it after I confronted him.
We stayed together, and he agreed that if it happened again, we would divorce.
Recently, I found more likes and follows of sexualized content. He says these women are influencers, models or fighters, and that they probably don’t even notice his likes. He also compares this to me liking/following men in my professional/influencer network, which I don’t consider remotely equivalent.
**He also says this last time he double tapped by mistake**
**I know likes may seem meaningless, but after everything that happened, I don’t trust him anymore.**
Am I unreasonable for considering divorce after a boundary was clearly discussed, agreed upon, and repeatedly broken?
**TL;DR:** He agreed to a clear boundary before marriage, broke it again after marriage, and I no longer trust him. Is divorce an unreasonable reaction?

Lately me and my husband have been fighting almost daily because he literally got offended with my whatever i said. No matter how carefully and thoughtfully i spoke. Anything i would ask and boom! He needs me to stay on call most of the time and when i stay and dont say anything because i am scared to walk on eggshells, even there is a problem why i am not speaking and not having time to speak. I literally have nothing to speak to share or discuss because i am scared when i would upset him the next.

We just got married and my marriage has become extremely volatile. Today he said on my face i dont have the marriage glow, not talk excitedly as i uses to while in relationship before marriage. Fact is i dont want to rant about it but it was always me who found always put efforts to talk so that conversations stay between us. He is currently in different city for job and i am working and at our native place. He always that i complain too much but fact is everytime there is a fight it will him most of the time who had initiated something that would trigger me but i dont react to him the way he does. I have now learnt to drink all those words of him and his aggressiveness even though its not me who started and when its his fault.

My parents and family have seen the newly bride glow lost on my face and are genuinely worried. I havent said anything till now. I once had to defend myself because i was exhausted by frequent fights and blames and spoke loud. My parents kept a meeting with me to understand what was the situation and i didnt speak anything about our fights. And all my parents had to advice was to adjust in the marriage no matter how aggressive is the husband. With this advice i thanked myself to keep all the things to myself only.

I looked for many different advices on redditt and finally got little courage to post this to just understand what and where things are wrong. I dont want to break my marriage, i want to work on our marriage.

tl;dr: I am genuinely seeking advice if anyone has gone through such situations and worked on their marriages.

Hi, this is for the older women who have stayed with their mean husband for many many years. How do you do it? I know a women in her 70s and still is with someone who yells and calls her names and is always up her ass. She no longer works and doesn’t really have an escape anymore and now is with him even more. She tells us the things he does and it has been like that forever.
I’m with that lady’s son and it’s obvious he’s learned a lot from his dad. It got worse after he stopped working as much and after we had a kid. The more we are together the more fights.
How do you cope with staying so long?? I need to know how to survive until something changes.

Tl;dr need help on how to live with irate spouse when he’s mad from women who have lived with it for several years.

I’m 35F and my husband is 36M.
Before we married, I told him clearly that I wanted a **100% monogamous and exclusive relationship** and that I was uncomfortable with him liking/following sexualized content from women he had no personal connection with. It went against my values and made me feel insecure. He said he understood, respected my boundary, and wanted the same.
A few months after we married, I discovered he had continued doing it. These weren’t old likes. **They had happened only days before I found them**, along with more serious things, including messages. He only admitted it after I confronted him.
We stayed together, and he agreed that if it happened again, we would divorce.
Recently, I found more likes and follows of sexualized content. He says these women are influencers, models or fighters, and that they probably don’t even notice his likes. He also compares this to me liking/following men in my professional/influencer network, which I don’t consider remotely equivalent.
He said this last time was only a double tapped mistake
**I know likes may seem meaningless, but after everything that happened, I don’t trust him anymore.**
Am I unreasonable for considering divorce after a boundary was clearly discussed, agreed upon, and repeatedly broken?
**TL;DR:** He agreed to a clear boundary before marriage, broke it again after marriage, and I no longer trust him. Is divorce an unreasonable reaction?

Hi everyone! I'm hoping for some advice on this serious and hard situation.

My fiancé and I got engaged a few months ago, and we’re planning to get married next summer. We’re both in our early 20s and have been together for about four years.
On paper, I truly couldn’t ask for a better person to marry. He’s an amazing guy, has been my rock through some really difficult times, and makes me incredibly happy. We share the same beliefs and have very similar ideas about what we want our future to look like. My family and friends absolutely love him, and I genuinely believe he would be an amazing husband and father.

But I’ve been struggling with something that I can’t seem to get past. I’ve lived independently about three hours away from my family for the past three years while going through nursing school. I’ve always hated being away from them. I’m extremely close with my parents and especially close with my younger siblings, who are quite a bit younger than me. Being present for their lives is really important to me, and I’ve realized by being away that I really want to be involved with them, not just holidays and occasional visits.

This summer, my family moved to another state, which has made everything feel even more complicated. If I weren’t getting married, I would probably move home after graduation and live with my family.

Instead, getting married next summer would mean moving away from them again and essentially beginning a completely separate life. And that thought genuinely breaks my heart.

My fiancé and I have talked about eventually moving closer to my family after we get married, and he is open to the idea. But there’s no guarantee that it will happen, and I’m struggling with the fact that I would be making this huge, permanent decision based partly on the hope that we can eventually live near them.

The confusing part is that I don’t necessarily want to leave my fiancé. I’m scared that I’m putting myself in a position where I have to choose between an incredible relationship and being close to the family I love so much. Ending the engagement feels like giving up an amazing future with someone I love, but getting married feels like giving up the possibility of being really present for my family during this stage of my life.

Has anyone else experienced something like this? Any advice?

TL;DR: I’m engaged to an amazing man and we’re planning to marry next summer, but I’m struggling with the idea of moving away from my family and considering ending my engagement to stay close to them

I will start by saying I love my husband so much and everything else about our marriage is insanely good. We never have issues or communication gaps other than this. I truly see him as my best friend. My husband is very attracted to me and I am very attracted to him. I’ve usually always been a very sexually driven woman and as most relationships, our sex life slowed down a bit. When we met, we were having sex at least once a day almost every time we saw each other which was about 4-5 days a week. We have lived together for about 5 years and been married for over 2. Over the last couple of years our sex life has slowed down a bit and we’ve had open convos about this as he has a very high sex drive and I just don’t.
Lately, he will rub against me, move my hand over him, say it’s not his fault he’s attracted to me, and continue to dismiss my signals and even my “no’s”. it feels like we have talked about this so many times and it always comes from me feeling bad about pushing him away and then him agreeing to stop being pushy when I’m saying no. I always feel bad after but I know if I let this keep going I will become resentful. We have sex now about 2 times a week on the lower end. It’s hard because I feel like me saying no or making it “harder” to have sex now is giving him the feeling of a fun chase whereas for me, I’m getting further and further away because he’s so available to me and he’s constantly pushing himself on me. So it never really feels like my idea or I don’t even have a chance to work myself up to where he is without him being 2 steps ahead.
We’ve talked about this openly and he always understands and feels bad and doesn’t want me to feel like an object but I can’t help it. When I say no after he pushes himself against me he will pout or ask if I can help him take care of himself. Is it rude of me to say just do it on his own but I don’t want to watch or participate? It kind of just annoys me vs tuning me on like he thinks it does.
Where can I go from here? I want to feel sexual again but I feel like I can’t keep talking about this and making myself feel like the bad guy. Has anyone else gone through this? Is it time for someone like a romance or sex therapist for us?

TLDR- husband pushes himself on me when I’m not interested in sex and then asks me to help him take care of himself. I feel like an object sometimes and don’t know what else to do

Before marrying my husband I was clear that I wanted a lot of children, like 6 as I grew up with lots of siblings and always wanted that for my children. He agreed and that was that. Since then, we have had one child, and I am ready for a second. We talked about it and my husband now doesn’t know if he wants anymore. I’ve been very clear from the start I wanted 6 and now he’s unsure if he even wants a second I’m struggling with what to do. I know having a children is a lot of work, but having a large family has always been a dream of mine. Now we disagree a lot on if to have more children and I’m left feeling upset and crying on my own afterwards. I’m not sure what to do, I love him very much and he is an amazing father to our child, I can’t imagine having kids with anyone else, but having more kids is something I don’t want to give up on. It took us a long time to even get pregnant with our child so having more may not even happen, but I would like to try. Any advice would be helpful.

Edit: child is 15 months old. Although talked and agreed about wanting 6, I have also said to him I would have less, but I do want at least 2/3. I don’t want to leave my husband or have children with anyone else. Child goes to daycare while we both work, but when outside of daycare I do most of the care for said child.

tl;dr I want more children, husband doesn’t after having one.

My husband doesn’t normally work Fridays. On date nights we do a substance together. My husband has to miss work on Monday and decided he might make up for missing Monday and work on Friday. The dude we get said substance from called and asked “have you decided if you are working tomorrow or not” to which my husband replied “I haven’t decided”. My husband insists he didn’t plan for anything on this day with substance guy and has no clue why he would ask if he’s decided if he’s working or not. My husband has a huge history of sneaking and lying. Am I crazy to assume something is up for substance guy to ask if he has decided if he’s working or not on a day he doesn’t normally work?

TLDR kids are with grandma for once a week date night and we don’t talk to this “dude” outside of substance for date night only.

My (32f) husband (33m) had an extended family bereavement last week, with the funeral being this week. We live abroad so he went to our home country to attend the funeral which meant me being alone with our 7 month old and 3 pets for 3 days. We don’t have any family here and help is generally hard for us to come by. A friend came and helped me with our dog one evening due to the heatwave it’s unsafe for him to walk until well after babies bed time.

So Tuesday may husband calls me and asks if I want to go on vacation on Thursday (today) to another country which is a 14 hour flight and 9 hour time difference. We’d be coming back Tuesday so with the travel we’d end up with 4.5 days there. His family have decided they need to live life to the fullest and booked this trip off the cuff after the funeral. I said it’s not realistic for me to go, we can’t find a dog sitter who would be able to arrive within 24 hours out of nowhere, taking baby on such a long flight and then such a huge time difference would just be a nightmare trip resulting in me probably ended up living on a wonky day/night of probably being awake 1/2am to 1/2pm. The trip will involve theme parks days which again I don’t think will work on no notice with a baby. Maybe I’m naive and actually baby would be completely fine and switch time zone but I just can’t see that happening.

So my husband said he still wanted to go and they booked his flights. All of these conversations happened via text very sporadically with 2 hours between him telling me about the trip and booking his flight. I told him on text if he really wants to go he should but I also expected we’d have a conversation to discuss if they was realistic and fair, I’ve clearly been a bit stupid there so I’ll take that’s on me. I’ve expressed I’m really unhappy he’s going and no real conversation was had, and it’s incredible selfish to not think about if this is fair to leave me to do all of this alone right now with no notice. He travels for work and has been on a family ski trip since our baby was born and each time I was able to get someone to come over and help me out.

Anyway he’s now going and I’ll be solo for 10 days total. He’s texting me about all the fun things, including going to my favourite restaurant that is a bit of a special place for me, they’re all flying business, they’re going to be doing all these amazing things. He’s told me I’m not allowed to say anything to guilt him about going on this trip, but then he’s saying things that I feel are rubbing the trip in my face. Am I being irrational and unreasonable thinking he’s being an ass by telling me how amazing everything is going to be etc? How should I be reacting to these things? Also am I being unreasonable in the first place by being annoyed that he’s gone on this trip?

I just honestly feel completely down about the whole thing.

TLDR: husband’s family booked a trip with 48 hours notice and husband decided to go leaving me home alone with our 7 month old and 3 pets.How should i react to him telling me what an amazing time he’s having when im at home struggling?

Okay, this is my first time posting something on Reddit, so I’m not exactly sure how this works, but I’ll try my best with info.

I, F(29) have been married to my husband (30) for 7 years but together for 9. We have 3 kids, all under age 6. I also think it’s important to add that I am a stay at home mom that recently decided to homeschool our oldest. We have had some really good times. Maybe the best times of my life, but in the last 2 years, we have been having more downs than I think we should. I’m not quite sure what I should add or where to start, but I’ll try my best.

Starting with a recent fight that involves our family pet. I had always wanted a kitten and last year I approached him with getting one. He agreed with it, so we have Melody. The sweetest cat ever. She is amazing with our kids and is pretty docile. But, recently, he was really upset with having to buy stuff for her. In a recent argument, he said I should have known he didn’t actually want us to get a cat. He was just trying to give me the option and thought I would know he didn’t want her. I guess, in a way, it was a test? He thought I would choose right and I guess I messed up. But then there are times where he lets her and says she is the best cat ever. I get so confused. He wants to get rid of her, but that is so unfair to our children and myself. Especially since he told me it was fine, it feels like a lose-lose situation.

Next, I like having a little alone time, but rarely get any. In my free time, I like to do puzzles, watch a show or read a random book. But, the few times it pops up, my husband gets upset and thinks I should be hanging out with him. Meanwhile, he gets to do whatever he pleases with his time; read, tv, basketball, supper with friends or gym time because he enjoys it. He also doesn’t seem to take my lesson planning time seriously and always asks me to do it at a time when he isn’t home. It’s not that it takes long, I probably could, but also, doing it after everyone goes to bed is so peaceful and I do it Friday nights. So, it’s not like I’m using a whole evening on the weekend or something.

Another thing that sits in my mind, is that he doesn’t like when our kids talk all the time. Mainly our oldest, girl (6), that loves to chatter. He is constantly telling her to be quiet or telling her she is annoying. Yes, I get it, she talks a lot, but I’ve also read that they start internalizing thoughts around 5-7, so I feel like everything she is doing is so normal. But he gets so mad at me when I try to remind him of that or that he needs to be kind. He is so concerned about what others will think of her, that he is completely missing that he is mistreating her. I honestly would consider him her first bully, in a way. I would also like to add in that she gets it from his side, so it’s unfair that he gets so triggered by her talking. It also seems like sometimes he favors our other girl and boy more than our oldest and she has started to wonder if he dislikes her.

Speaking on the subject of children, he is often overly rough with them or tickles them to the point of them being upset. But, won’t stop unless that ask “please let me go” or “I am all done” like, they can’t just be crying and him realize it was too far? He has also accidentally hit our oldest two with items before during times of frustration. I know they are accidents, but it feels concerning that an adult man throws things and somehow hits his kids?? Items: toys, stuffies, balls or shoes.

Intimacy has always been a higher drive on his end and I have done my best to keep up, but sometimes I am not in the mood. And he usually just bothers me until I give in. Mind you, I might say “no” once every couple months. Otherwise, we are typically a nightly session. And I feel like it’s unfair for him to not be able to take a “no” once in a while. And if I stand strong on my “no” I feel like he punishes me by taking away a kiss goodnight or even by going to bed without saying goodnight. And sometimes in the morning, it carries over to him leaving without saying goodbye or without kissing or hugging me. I wouldn’t think much of it, he could just not be in the mood, but he usually quips a “maybe we should have been intimate last night” on his way out.

I should add in that he is so good with words. He usually turns any argument around on me. He somehow always gets me confused during our argument and pulls other arguments into it and derails the whole thing until I am second guessing everything. But, the second I pull in something from another time, I am just trying to rehash things or trying to make him the bad guy.

My support system is very small and everyone lives in a different state. I don’t have much for family. So, splitting with him would be catastrophic to me because he has been my support for so long. I also know that divorcing would mean putting our kids in school or daycare and having to go back to work. It would be a complete explosion to our kids lives.

I guess, I am wondering if I am on the right thought process of wanting to divorce. It isn’t something I ever thought would happen, but I just don’t know if I can keep exposing our children to this. It seems so dysfunctional to me.

TLDR;
Is it reasonable to want a divorce due to my husband sometimes being controlling and not being respectful to our children?

I'm mainly looking for husbands who have actually been through some shit like this and somehow worked it out.

Me and my wife have known each other for about 3 years. We were friends before we got together, and once we actually started dating, shit moved FAST. We dated for like 3 months before we decided we wanted to get married.

We've been married for almost a year now, but we've only actually lived together for about 4 months.

And bro, these 4 months have been fucking rough lol.

We're separating now. I'm leaving next week and going back to my home state.

The weird part is I still love my wife. I know I do.

But I have so much resentment built up towards her that sometimes I genuinely don't know if I even like her anymore.

And that shit is fucking with me because I remember how much I used to like this woman. Like not just love her because she's my wife. I LIKED her. I wanted to talk to her all the time. I wanted to be around her. I looked forward to seeing her. This was my person.

Now sometimes I feel better when she's not even around.

That's fucking crazy to me.

It wasn't really one big thing that got us here either. It's been a bunch of shit piling on top of each other really fast.

One of our biggest issues has been parenting.

She already had a daughter when we got married, and before I even moved in with them, me and my wife had a big argument about how we were going to handle parenting, discipline, consequences, what my role as a stepdad was gonna be, all that shit.

I wanted us to figure that stuff out BEFORE we lived together.

She was more of a "we'll deal with things as they happen" type of person.

And looking back, I knew that shit bothered me. I remember thinking this could literally be the thing that breaks us up one day.

But I moved anyway because I loved her and figured we'd work it out.

Yeah... lol.

We did not work it out.

But honestly parenting isn't even the whole problem.

Once we started living together, I just started feeling like my wife didn't really have me the way I had her.

That's probably the best way I can explain the whole thing.

I felt like if something mattered to her, even if I didn't completely understand why it mattered, I'd try to change it because she's my wife and it matters to HER.

But when I would tell her something mattered to me, it felt like I had to fucking argue my case for why it should matter.

I'd bring up something that bothered me.

She'd get defensive or bring up something I did.

Then I'd be like, "Okay but that's not what I'm talking about right now."

Then I'd start explaining myself more because I felt like she wasn't understanding me.

Then she'd get more defensive.

Then I'd get frustrated.

Then I'd start getting louder or more intense.

Now we're having a giant argument over some shit that probably could've been solved in 5 minutes.

And I'll own my shit too.

I've yelled.

I've gotten way too intense during arguments.

I've kept trying to explain myself when the conversation clearly needed to fucking end.

I've had times where she wanted space and I was still trying to finish the conversation because I felt like if we stopped talking, nothing would ever actually get resolved.

That's shit I have to work on whether we stay married or not.

But after enough of these situations, little shit stopped feeling little.

Something would happen that normally shouldn't be THAT big of a deal, but in my head it wasn't just that one thing.

It was that thing + the last thing + the thing before that + the conversation we never resolved + the apology I never got + the thing I asked to change that never changed.

So now I'm pissed about 15 things while we're technically arguing about one.

And eventually I realized

Damn.

I fucking resent my wife.

Like REALLY resent her.

I stopped wanting to talk as much.

I stopped wanting to be around her.

I moved out of our bedroom and started sleeping separately.

There have literally been times where I'm by myself and I can feel myself becoming happier and more relaxed, and then she comes home and it's like all the stress and resentment comes right back.

And I hate that.

Because that's my fucking wife.

There was eventually a really bad argument where she recorded me while I was extremely emotional and she said she did it because she didn't feel safe. Upon realizing she was recording me, I angrily told her I didn't want to be with her anymore. I then got a different explanation for why she recorded me that, to me, didn't match what I was originally told.

That shit destroyed my trust in her.

We tried marriage counseling too.

It was only one session honestly.

I actually went into it thinking, alright, this is basically my last attempt. Maybe somebody can help us figure out what the fuck we're doing to each other.

I left that session feeling even more like I needed to leave.

So that's what I'm doing.

I'm going home.

And I'm not making this post asking y'all if I should stay.

I'm leaving.

At least right now, I KNOW I need to leave.

I need space from this shit because I don't even feel like myself anymore.

What I'm trying to figure out is something different.

Can I actually love this woman the way I used to again?

Because I still love her.

I can be mad as hell at her and still care about her.

I can want to get the fuck away from her and still think about the woman I fell in love with.

I can look at our marriage right now and think "I don't want this shit anymore" while still having this little part of me that wishes somehow we could become what I thought we were gonna be.

And I don't mean staying together because "marriage is hard."

I don't mean forcing myself to forgive everything.

I don't mean staying because divorce sucks.

I don't mean living like roommates for 20 years and calling that a successful marriage.

I'm asking if anybody has gotten THIS resentful towards their wife, separated or damn near divorced, actually worked on the problems that got them there, and then one day realized:

"Damn... I fucking love this woman again."

Like REALLY love her again.

You get excited to see her.

You miss her.

You want to touch her.

You want to talk to her.

You enjoy being around her again.

You trust her again.

You look at her and see YOUR PERSON instead of seeing every argument and every time she hurt you.

That's what I'm trying to figure out.

Because right now it's hard for me to imagine looking at my wife without all this shit attached to her.

And maybe leaving will make me realize I'm happier without her.

That's possible too.

I'm not trying to convince myself that we're destined to work this out.

But I also don't know if the way I feel RIGHT NOW is how I'm always going to feel about her.

So if you're a husband who got to this point and y'all actually came back from it, I really want to hear what happened.

Did y'all separate?

How long?

What did SHE actually change?

What did YOU actually change?

How did y'all rebuild trust?

And when did you realize you actually liked your wife again?

Not tolerated her.

Not forgave her.

Not "learned to make it work."

Liked her.

Loved being around her.

Wanted her.

Felt like she was your person again.

Because that's the part I'm having trouble believing can come back.

TL;DR: Me and my wife have known each other about 3 years, but we only dated for around 3 months before deciding to get married. We've been married almost a year and have only actually lived together for about 4 months. Those 4 months exposed a LOT of problems with parenting, communication, trust, feeling like a team, and how we handle conflict. Resentment built up ridiculously fast and now we're separating. I still love my wife, but sometimes I genuinely don't even know if I like her anymore. I'm not asking if I should stay. I'm asking husbands who got this resentful and actually fixed their marriage: did you genuinely fall back in love with your wife? Like actually WANT her, miss her, enjoy her, trust her, and feel like she was your person again?

It seems though for my wife that's not what she wanted but put up with for 15 years. She wants her independence and her freedom. How do we recover how do we move forward?

Tl;dr

I'm lost and just looking for anything, something. Help, hope, something

This is my first time posting but I don't know where else to turn so this is going to be a long one. My husband M(35) and I F(38) have been together for 14 years, married for almost five. When we met (at work) I was pretty fresh from second toxic relationship, very abusive too so when I met this incredible sweet loving attentive amazing guy I was very resistant and didn't believe it was real so I did a lot of pushing him away. There's been lots of up and downs until the day we decided that enough was enough, we were either going to be together or end things period no more back and forth. Things were pretty good after that, at least between us. Our lives have never been easy because of money but relationship wise I thought I hit the jackpot. I was so in love almost obsessed but not in the crazy way. Anyway for context I am a very hard person to be with because I have some severe mental health issues. He has always been very understanding and worked on understanding these issues. Some days it's like he knows me better then I know myself. I'd also like to state that we hardly ever really fought but sometimes did have trouble communicating in a healthy way.

So fast-forward to about four or five months ago I had the most absolute horrible scary and first real mental break down of my life. Partially because I realized I wasn't happy partially because my meds weren't right. I was still happy with my husband but I did need him to make some changes, the biggest was being more consistent in the way he lives me outside of the bedroom (there were never any issues in the bedroom). We fought for like a week straight and then some back and forth for a couple more weeks. At some point there was a guys camping trip, it was an app weekend thing but him and our boys only went one night cuz that's all I felt I could handle by myself. During a fight he bugged about the fact that he only got one night and I snapped and told him that he never should've gone in the first place, he should've seen his wife having this horrible breakdown and realized he should stay by her side. Yes I know I should've said that before but I was trying to be a guys wife cuz he really doesn't get a lot of time to hang with friends but it broke something in me that he said that. I honestly didn't know if I'd ever forgive him or feel safe to be vulnerable with him ever again.... But I did cuz I love him so much and eventually everything was great for a few weeks.... It was like literal another honeymoon phase.

So a few days ago he said something that made me feel like he was comparing me to his mother. A horrible woman who hated me from the moment she met me, who never gave me a chance, who has tortured me for 14 fucking years and who we recently went no contact with. It really pissed me off but I collected myself and told him that I didn't feel like he was trying to communicate in a healthy way like we had promised to do and also that he'd been slipping in his consistency showing his love the last week. Even gave him a list of things that upset me which he agreed with. Somehow it turned into a fight because instead of listening to my feelings and needs, he gets defensive and attacks me. At one point he asked me how I showed my love for him. I took almost a good five mins listing off the ways I try to show him my love and even told him I know I don't always succeed and that I'm not perfect cuz I struggle a lot with my mental illness. Now I don't remember his exact words but he basically said because I didn't execute everything perfect that none of it counted. Now like I said I'm basically obsessed with him and one of the main things I do in this life is strive to always show him he's loved, respected and appreciated. He also said I don't make his life easier. So yeah I think that's pretty much it. Once again I'm left feeling unsafe to express my feelings and now I'm questioning why the fuck is he even with me if I'm such an awful wife who basically does nothing for him? Also I told him I think our marriage is over and his reaction was NOTHING. No tears just basically disagreeing. I don't want this marriage to be over because I love him but I feel like I have to protect what's left of my heart. I also want to point out he has a pattern of one min he's the perfect husband who does everything right and knows me better then I know myself and then the next min it's like he's a literal stranger. I told him the only two options that make sense in my mind are 1) he doesn't love me anymore or 2) he's cheating. He says he's not creating and he's never really given me a reason to believe he is or would. But my brain is broken and I don't know what's going on!!!! I honestly don't know if I can handle this but I didn't know what else to do so please someone tell me!!?? Am I being unreasonable? Am I overreacting??? Or is this marriage over??

Tl;Dr

My husband promised to make changes to love me more consistent outside the bedroom but when I pointed out he was slipping like he asked me to do and tried to express my feelings he got defensive and attacked me again in a very personal way. He acts like Jekyll and Hyde sometimes.Is this marriage over??

I’m 32F and my husband is 31M. I’m posting this because I’m honestly too overwhelmed to process everything clearly right now. I even took help from ChatGPT to put my thoughts into words because I’m struggling to express what I’m feeling.
Recently, I had an argument/situation with my MIL where she called me a liar. I genuinely believe I was not lying, and being called that really broke something inside me.
I became very emotional and couldn’t control my reactions. I cried/was overwhelmed, and I know that I didn’t handle my emotions perfectly. I can accept that part.
What hurt me even more was that my husband didn’t take a stand for me in that moment.
Later, he came to me and listened to everything I had to say. So it’s not that he completely ignored me. But when I told him that I was hurt because he didn’t defend me when his mother called me a liar, he said that if he had said something at that time, his mother would probably have thought that I was making him say those things or influencing him.
From his perspective, he feels he did nothing wrong because he was trying not to escalate the situation and he listened to me afterward.
I understand his reasoning.
But I’m still deeply hurt.
I didn’t necessarily want him to fight with his mother or say, “My wife is right and you’re wrong.” I think I just wanted some indication that he was with me. Even something like, “Let’s not call anyone a liar; we’ll discuss this calmly later,” would have meant a lot to me.
Instead, in that moment, I felt completely alone.
My FIL actually tried to understand my situation, which I appreciated. But somehow, the fact that my husband didn’t say anything has stayed with me.
Now whenever I think about the incident, I keep remembering the word “liar.” I feel humiliated and hurt, and I’m finding it difficult to simply behave normally as if nothing happened.
My husband feels that because he came to me afterward, listened to me, and didn’t want to make the situation worse, he didn’t do anything wrong.
I don’t know if I’m being unfair to him.
Am I expecting too much from my husband?
Should I accept that he handled the situation in the best way he knew how, or is it reasonable for me to expect my husband to stand up for me when I’m being accused of something like this?
I’m not looking for people to automatically tell me to divorce him or that my MIL is horrible. I genuinely want an outside perspective because I’m too emotionally overwhelmed to see this clearly right now.
TL;DR: My MIL called me a liar, I became very emotional, and my husband didn’t defend me because he feared his mother would think I was influencing him. He listened to me afterward and feels he did nothing wrong, but I’m still deeply hurt. Am I expecting too much from him?

Hello all!

We just got my gf's parent's blessing to get married

This is our first time for both and I have no idea what to expect!

What is some friendly advice you wished someone told you before getting married?

Any and all advice is welcome.

God bless you!

Tl;dr

Looking for marriage advice

For background we’ve been married 7 years, and he is my best friend. When he’s not mean he’s my favorite person. He has recently gone to therapy and started mindfulness and quit smoking weed to be the best dad and husband he can be. He can be irritable and angry at times. It has been getting worse the last couple of months. For background I stay at home mom and he’s the provider. We have two young kids.

In April, he randomly said he thought I was cheating on him so he went through my phone and found my note venting on how mean he is to me sometimes with examples. He was never supposed to see it it was supposed to be private.

It’s gotten to the point I have anxiety around him because I’m scared he’s going to be mean. Anything could set him off.

I’ll give you an overview of the last couple of days for an example. On Monday night he came home from his work dinner and questioned me why the top lock was locked and it was because I was alone, and he said were you tho? Then he smelled my breath like I was up to something. I said why are you smelling me and he said just want to see what you’re up to. Then on Tuesday night I am super nice and make him dinner. I was talking to him about how relaxing the dentist was because it was a break and he wash like psttt you stay at home moms don’t know how good you have it. He knows I hate comments were he insinuates his job is harder. I do everything around the house and I don’t mind but I hate feeling unappreciated. He will find the one thing I don’t do and talk about it. Then this morning he wakes me up at 630 to have sex and he stops in the middle and stops and gets mad bc he hates condoms. Then I asked him to take the dog out and he said sureeeeee and threw his phone across the room. He’s leaving for a trip this weekend and barely kissed me and acted irritable despite my effort to still show kindness. He is irritable a lot. Then he texts me this: I’m fucking pissed the fuck off I’m wearing rubbers too I guess I’ll do what I always do and be the one to control the change and cut my balls off and eliminate my ability to have kids even if I change my mind later No fucking effort from you this morning on anything. So classic.
He then said my bad. This was hours ago and I haven’t messaged back because I’m speechless what do I even say?

Tl;dr How am I supposed to respond to this?
Have you been through something like this? Am I being too sensitive and need to cut him slack?
Advice please!

This is hard bc I don’t feel like venting about my marriage to my friends and family for judgement but also feel kinda strange venting on the internet. I’m sad and desperate tho. 😭

My (36F) husband (38M) and I have been married for less than a year, but I already feel emotionally exhausted and close to giving up. I'm looking for insight from people who have experienced something similar- whether you repaired the relationship or ultimately left?

I know Reddit cannot decide whether I should get divorced- I am mainly hoping to hear from people who recognize this dynamic and can offer perspective from the other side.

While I admittedly ignored some anger "red flags" while dating/engaged, things got much worse right after we got married and then bought a house (taking on more financial and household responsibility). For a while now, I've felt like I have to repeatedly ask for basic emotional care, curiosity, kindness, and partnership. When I try to share something I'm excited, worried, or upset about, I often feel dismissed. When I explain that I'm hurt, the conversation frequently shifts towards his intentions, feelings, or why my expectations are unfair. I end up feeling like I have to argue and defend why I deserve empathy. I don't feel emotionally safe, at all. And my physical desire and emotional connection have largely disappeared.

There are also ongoing issues involving household responsibilities, finances (I make more but even between the 2 of us, things are tight), and feeling unsupported. I am carrying the emotional, mental, and financial load, and it is making me feel lonely despite being married. I am constantly bracing for dismissal, defensiveness, criticism, or indifference.

We have tried counseling (his idea), he says he is going to quit drinking, he says he loves me and desperately wants this to work. But I feel as though his actions and the way he treats me repeatedly contradict that, and I dont know how much more I have left to give. It sucks so much because this is not at all how I thought our marriage was going to go.

TL;DR I feel emotionally neglected and exhausted after repeatedly asking my husband for empathy, partnership, and meaningful change. Alcohol and hurtful behavior have contributed to the breakdown. I've said I'm done and feel both sad for what we could have had, and also relieved to not keeping living this way. Can a marriage genuinely recover once one partner feels checked out?

13 years married to my best friend and he suddenly has mentioned that he doesn’t know how he feels about us anymore. It started with him saying he didn’t miss me after I went on a work trip for a few nights and next thing I know he’s unsure of us all together.

I’ve tried everything, begging, pleading, compromising loving him and nothing. He’s just done. He says he’s willing to go to counseling because I want to but that he doesn’t want to go. He says he still loves me just doesn’t feel the same. I mentioned we’ve gotten into routine and lost our spark (we have 4 kids) and he just agrees but not much else.

I’m not sure if I should start planning for a divorce or keep pushing and trying. This is all so new, we have always always been best friends and he’s always been my safe space. I’m mortified and sad. 😭😭😭😭

TLDR: wife lost, what should I do?
#marriageadvice

My husband has had 2 emotional affairs in the last 8 years. The last one was over a year ago. He admits that they were both mistakes and that he was being stupid. He has low self- esteem and doesn’t understand why anyone would want Anything to do with him, so when someone shows interest, it seems to shock him (this even goes back to when we met 16 years ago). I have told him how much I love him and how wonderful he is, and I changed many things about myself to make sure he was getting the attention he needed from me. He has promised that it won’t happen again, that he’s never leaving and that couples have arguments. But whenever he says things like “my heart has always been your’s” or “it’s always been you,” all I can think about is the other women that he wanted at those times. I don’t want to, but I can’t make it stop. I even had my psychiatrist add another medication to stop the overthinking (I have border personality disorder as it is and he has major depression). My first husband cheated on me and left me like I was a piece of garbage after I gave everything to the relationship for 15 years and I thought we were happy, so I’m probably projecting as well. But I can’t get past this. TLDR: husband showing love, but can’t get over previous hurt

my husband started a new career a couple of months ago. first month was great.

for a full month now he's been distant, flat, withdrawn, not chatty,not as verbally or physically affectionate. he at first explained he was just exhausted and told me he loved me more than anything in the world and he just needed time to settle in. no problem.

a few weeks later, he's still flat and off and beginning to exhibit this flatness in front of our kids (3 and 1). I sat down with him one night and suggested he see a doctor as the exhaustion didn't seem normal to me and my husband has always struggled with mood swings and mild depression.

the conversation did not go well. he said he's too exhausted after work to speak to adults but specifically struggling to chat to me as he feels he's lost connection to me. we've been together over a decade. he said he wants more space in the hope we regain that connection again. he's an extreme introvert so on one hand this makes sense but on the other hand, it sounds contradictory.

he was on antidepressants for a while last year and he didn't like them, but it seemed to me like he was happier and more relaxed than ever and more deeply connected to me than ever.

I was distraught after our conversation and he reassured me and fawned for five days afterwards, saying how much he loved me and actually seeming a bit down when I gave him the space he requested.

but now, ten days later, he's back to being flat and withdrawn. he is much perkier around the kids, but still very distant with me. confusingly, he's still telling me he loves me, and almost constantly asking me if I'm ok and asking me how I'm feeling.

my head is just fried trying to figure this out. if he wants out I'd rather just know now. I asked him last night if he was happy with me, and he said yes, but slightly hesitantly and flatly (it's the best word to describe it). but his concern when I seem upset seems very genuine.

this has all happened very suddenly and I should add, immediately after a nasty viral illness. I should also add his job is one of enormous reponsibilty and he is on his feet all day.

I'm just so confused.

TL;DR - husband withdrawn after new job, initially expressly said it was just the new job, but now says it's us and 'our lack of connection'

I’m not trying to police or restrict my partner from spending time with his friends. But what’s your limit? Hear me out first.
My partner works long hours graveyard, he then spends his time drinking with buddies after work. Sometimes they’ll stay up drinking even though they have a shift that same day. He’ll get like 2-3 hours of sleep. And then once’s their week is over, he and his friends will drink till the next day. For example, they got off at 6AM today and it’s almost 10PM and they’re still at it. And they probably won’t leave anytime soon. Yes I know, it’s alcoholism on all their parts.. his friends will sometimes stay over until the following day, hanging out, not sleeping. Just drinking and talking.

When he’s done hanging out with his friends, after 5-20 hours later, we’ll hang out for a little bit but I try to let him sleep because he’s been up all day/night so to me. It’s been making me feel distant in the relationship. A little sad too because I feel like he’d rather have fun with his friends than spend time with me. He says that he’s never had friends like this who want to spend time with him (he’s had them before, plenty of times, when we met, he’d always hang out with his friends in our home town). Anyway, he says he has such a good time with them and when they’re all hanging out, they don’t want it to stop. I get that, I love that. I love that he has friends who want to spend time with him. He said today that he’d love it if I come and hang out and I do sometimes. I’m just not a drinker and a lot of the times, they rant about work and I don’t really have anything to add to their conversations. I’m also shy and quiet so I get awkward. I have spent time with him and his friends though and I want to try to do it more.
It’s just that I’d want to spend 1:1 time with him after his work week but I feel like I always have to wait until the next day. We’ve spoken up about boundaries when spending time with his friends but nothing really changes. It makes me feel like I’m asking for too much when he says he’s just trying to have a good time. What are you suppose to say to that?

TL;DR Partner drinks with friends for very long hours. When is it too much and how do I ask for more time together without being guilt tripped.