I am feeling like I am sliding down a muddy hill.......

Go Straight to your family doctor. Take your posting with you. You need PROFESSIONAL advice. There are people who can teach you to reconnect with the person you miss the most(the kid you used to be) I am losing a husband of 26 years as I type this. He refused to go to more than 1 counseling session, but has all of the feelings you described(and then some). He has not sought help from our family Dr. who could lead him to some help that I cannot. So sad is it that the person who loves you the most you will push away. Beware of well intended friends advice. Always seek help who is familiar with what you feel. You are in danger of imparting quite a bit of emotional harm upon your children if you do nothing. With love and hope for you....

I promise you that if you will search within you can and will find wonderful insights into yourself that can help carry you through to the next stage of your life. Even one might make a huge difference. I've learned about God, and a new way to define myself, and love. Who KNOWS what you can find.

I have made an appointment to see the counselor who helped me through my divorce. I plan on seeking her advice until I can get out of this sadness. Thank You for your thoughts and advice. I never believed that I would struggle like this, life can throw you many curves and I got hit by this one. I do want to be a support for my children and not a burden and that will help sustain my quest for more emotional stability.

Tom

Good luck to you. You sound like a great father. Life can be so tricky. I am struggling also, but have found strength in my counselor, family Dr., and a great friend who is a healer using energy work and brain balancing. A step beyond massage. You may want to try and find someone where you live who does this kind of work. I was skeptical at first but have found that tapping into a higher power (haha so cliche) is helping me to stay on the high road. I do this for myself as well as my children. The world seems to be a sad place right now, but I try to remember that my children deserve the best role model that I can provide in tough times. Sometimes it really sucks to be an idealist!

A few years ago my husbands father was killed in a car accident. At the same exact same time he was going through a career change that involved him working in a town that is about an hour away. His new job has been very high stress. He has had to get to know and associate with a lot of wealthy people who live lifestyles that appear to be luxurious. That is not our background...we are very much middle class. His job also requires him to be around a lot of college age kids whose lives seem to be footloose and fancy free. His job caused him to have to spend the night away from home more than he had before. Additionally, he came into a large sum of money recently. We are used to a lifestyle that is comfortable...but not a life of luxury by any stretch. We are in our mid to late thirties, have been married 14 years and have three children. Though our marriage has seen its share of usual couple stress that is brought on by bills, dual-careers, busyness and fatigue, I have considered it to be fairly healthy with a lot of potential to get better.

After my husbands father died, he started doing things that were out of character. These things started out small and not so often but grew to bigger things and began happening more and more. He started developing an attitude with me that seemed almost like that of a rebelious teenager. He developed relationships that did not seem healthy to me...texting one particular single female coworker ofted and late at night (discovered on phone bill). I discovered he was involved in viewing and downloading pornography on to his computer, ipod, phone. Though it seemed excessive to me as he had viewed one of the clips more than 200 times according to the counter on his media player on his computer, he laughed it off as goofy entertainment. He promised he would stop looking at it, but I continued to find it in places. He agreed to go to marital couseling with me which we did for several months, but I always got the picture that he was just going along and waiting on the counseling to fix me...like he had no real problems. I discovered by way of phonecall recieved by pocket-dialing that his friends had a very poor opinion of me. When I told my husband about what I heard his friends say about me on the phone, he did nothing about it. I expected him to come to my defense. He did not. He said he could not get to harsh on the friend who had been talking about me because he was actually just repeating things that had been told to him by my husband. So he started being very disloyal. About 10 months ago, I discovered that he was having an affair with a person who had worked with him prior to moving to another city. She had no children and was 10 years younger than me. I am sure it started at least on an emotional level while they worked together and then just continued on to something physical after she moved. To my surprise, I was gracious to him during this time...trying to justify and make excuses in my head for his bad and unfaithful behavior. About 2 months after the initial discovery, he broke it off with her and apologized to me and said he wanted to work things out and stay married. I was happy to hear this even though I was going through gut-wrenching pain. I believe in God's ability to perform miracles and that love covers a multitude of sins and was desperate to hold things together for my children who love their Daddy very much. Things seemed to be going smoothly...I was praying myself silly for healing and reconciliation and trying everything I could to be a more desireable woman for him. Things seemed to be rocking along as well as could be expected and then on our youngest son's first birthday he told me that he needed a separation to figure out what he wanted to do. I protested and did everything I could to get him to stay, but two weeks later he was gone. I later found out that he had been involved with another woman again. This time she was just five years younger. I was really stumped when I found out that she had three children that were actually younger than ours. He was already involved with her when he said he needed a separation...in fact, I later found out that he became involved with her less than two weeks after our 14th anniversary where he gave me a card telling me he loved me and that we would be together forever... Other things to mention is that in the last 11 months he has purchased three motorcycles and in the last 5 months he has gotten three tatoos. Additionally, two weeks before Christmas he told me he did not know how were were going to buy Christmas presents for the kids because he didn't have any money and also did not know how we would pay our taxes (he has a large securities account). I was puzzled when he came driving up to our house a week later in a new Mercedes. He did not get rid of his other vehicle which was only a year old and already paid for. So he has two cars now. After that, I found it necessary to file for divorce. I had been praying for a miricle and reconciliation...but felt a sudden urgency to separate myself from him legally as he seemed to be caught up in irrational decision making. During this time of rebellion against his family, he has become a perpetual liar and a total disappointment. He has withdrawn from all the people who love him most...me and the kids, his mom, his sister, my family...all of those who have been most supportive in his life.

I am not a perfect person. I have been trying everything I can to become better than I have ever been. I have developed a very close relationship with the Lord and have tried to make changes that matter on the inside. I have offered forgiveness and extended grace to my husband. However, my husband basically blames me for all of this. He says if I hadn't been the way I was that he wouldn't have done these things. He even told me in a text message one time that I was just as responsible for his actions as he was. He says I was controlling. I have apologized for coming across that way, but have assured that I only took charge of things out of love for him. He didn't like confrontation or dealing with the details of life...so that left me to do it. I have always been faithful and loyal to him and though I have been miserable at times because I felt ignored, unappreciated and invisible to him, I never gave up hope.

Prior to his father's death he was a totally different person. He was very respected by the people who knew him...not because of anything material, but because he was such a good person. He eximplified high standards, good character and good morals. He was trustworthy and honest and loved his family more than anything else. He hated confrontation and did everything he could to keep from hurting someones feelings. He was an awesome person. It seems that everything he once was, he is not any more and doesn't want to be again.

Do you think he is going through a mid life crisis? Thirty-seven seems a little young for that to me...but maybe. What do you think?

It sounds like he is not sure what he wants out of life and he is being quite selfish and irresponsible. I definately would stay away from him, and separate all finances legally. You do not want to get stuck paying for his irresponsible spending! He may be experiencing a MLC but I suspect he is just running from himself. Take care and god bless.

It sounds like a MLC is exactly what he is going through. I am 33 yrs old and my wife of 15 yrs is 35 yrs old and we are dealing with the exact samething. I've read countless numbers of hours trying to acquire as much knowledge as I possibly can about people dealing with MLC's. It's scary reading because themajority of the stories told my wife lives out word for word, almost as if there were a handbook somewhere telling her how others did and she follows it every step. My wife sounds alot like your husband was. She was the greatest person that I have ever known. Small in statue but huge with kindness, honesty, trustworth, so mild mannered, giving, loving, friendly, and so soft spoken. She was good in every imaginable way. We had normal marriage arguements and vent sessions but never anything major or wasn't made up on for more than an hour or two. We were the best of friends always and did everything together. We had no trust issues ever and gave both the freedom to do whatever the other wanted without question of any doubt ever. We had our own time and loads of time together. We were always so in love and happy. We have a 14 yr old son and a 2 1/2 yr old daughter. We found out about being pregnant with our daughter, whom we had been trying for for months, the same week that I was severely injured on a job I was designing. I damaged my spine and shattered my left knee in 2006. I had to have a knee replacement surgery and 3 different spine surgeries over the course of three years. After each spine surgery things progressively got worse each time. It was very traumatic. My wife was a real estate agent and I had went from making $135K a year to a workers comp salary of barely $25K a year, the economy was turning very sour as we all know and the market in our area dried up completely and fast. Towards the end of 2008 we had just about lost everything we had ever had. Struggling to hold on to our house and pay our bills with my now small weekly check and our new baby was coming into the terrible twos. Our first child was a breeze the whole way but our daughter is very demanding and cries alot, loudly screaming if she doesn't get her way. I had went through my 3rd spine surgery and was recovering, my wife took the load of both of us and had to do everything by herself. She did a great job with it all. After a few months of recovery my pain kept increasing almost to a level that I could not take even with the numerous pain meds I was on. We went back to our neuro-surgeon and was told my spine had collapsed. I couldn't walk and was in a wheel chair. We were told by him and every doctor on every opinion we got from the top spinal hospitals around that I would not walk again and there were no further surgeries that could be done. We were both devastated hearring this news. We cried for days and I sat wondering how I would ever get through this. She stayed positive and strong and doing all she could to make things easier and better for me and the kids. I would tell her everyday how great she was and how beautiful she is and try to get her to do things with her friends to get out, but she would hardly leave my side. I was already depressed from going through all of this, the pain, and all the meds, as I am sure she was depressed to. Everything I went through she did too and still ran our home on her own. I fell into one of the deepest and darkest places I have ever seen, my depression was so bad that I could not find my way to the surface. I prayed at night to die in my sleep, the pain was too much and the thought of never walking again was unbareable to me.My wife tried to stay so supportive and to cheer me up constantly. I fell so deep I would just stare out of my bedroom window for days without sleeping, eating, or saying a word to anyone at all. When she and the kids were gone I would lye in the bed with my pistol on my chest or in my hand and pray to God for the strength to pull the trigger, I never could get it. I wanted to die so bad, I couldn't stand it anymore. I could see her getting more and more depressed by the day and still trying to paint a happy face when she came to the bedroom. It would break my heart every time she had to leave the house, carrying diaper bags, purse, the baby,etc.. like a pack mule and I couldn't do a damn thing. Even being as bad as I was I managed to fight enough to get to a walker which was huge at the time. I kept trying but could not pull myself out of my depression. I look back now and can see my wife slipping off further, sleeping on the edge of the bed and doing and acting in ways she had never before, just becoming isolated from anyone. I kept trying but the pain was too much for me. One morning she woke up and got her shower and dressed than announced to me that she loved me but wasn't in love with me, that she didn't know how to explain it but she needed time to clear her head that she was so confused she couldn't even spell her own name filling out papers. She said she needed time to think and space and was going to one of our friends house and didn't know for how long. She said she didn't have any answers and didn't know why she was feeling this way or thinking these things. I was completely floored, until my accident we had a great marriage the type your friends would say they pray one day to have what we had. She would never walk out on me in that condition the way I knew her. But she talked to me in the coldest tone I had ever heard and said things to me that she would never had said in a million years. This could have very well pushed me over the edge of the cliff that I had been standing on already and she as her normal self would have never taken that chance of something killing me. We were down to one vehicle and she took that and every dime that we had. I was left like I was and she left both of our children here and took off on her own in tears. She wouldn't return anyones calls for days. Nobody knew where she was or even if she was OK. I cried like a baby for 2 days straight, my whole world was ripped out from under me. She was my very best friend and we were always so in love. I loved her and trusted her more than anyone I have ever known. I could not understand and I sat there with no answers at all, my mind racing non stop scared to death if she was safe or not. I finally stopped crying and wanted answers so badly, I started keying in the different phrases she used before leaving and every one of them led me to MLC sites. She was only 35 and it just didn't seem possible. I started reading all of the stories on every site and the things she said were word for word all of these stories being told. It was scary to say the least as to how the things she said were identical. I kept reading, esp. on this site, for days straight not sleeping. I started to understand what she was thinking and what she was going through and why. She was just as scared as I was and maybe more. We have never dealt with depression or anything like this and have been together since high school. I knew she had to be terrified. I just wanted to learn all that I could so maybe I could help her. Everything was so frightening to read though, telling me to detatch and let her go that this is something she has to go through on her own. DETATCH? From the one person I love more than life itself, my best friend in the world? I didn't think that I could not ever. I kept reading and the infidelity and suicide stories and the drugs and drinking had me mortified!! But I needed to learn all I could so I stayed here and read every story I could find. There were some with hope but way too far and few between. She finally came home after almost a week and I got her to open up and talk to me. It was so sad how confused she was, I've never seen her like this before. She told me she wanted to seperate for awhile to find herself and figure out what she wanted. She was moving in with our friends who were like second parents to us. I didn't fight it, I was relieved she was going to a safe place and knew they would make sure to look after her. She was sane and calm and said she was taking the baby with her, I couldn't tend to her like I was and agreed. She asked our son if he was going with her and he stood strong and told her it was her decision to leave not his and there was no way he would ever leave his father like this. I was so proud of him. She left and we were alone for the first time ever in our lives. She took two suitcases for her and the baby and nothing else. That night I was staring out my window and everything just went blank. I had been crying uncontrollably for hours before this. In that moment, I don't know if it was my mind or what, I heard something telling me " Get up,Get up right now, You have to get up now, Right now!" My eyes opened and I saw my son sitting at my desk top computer and my head had never been as clear as it was. About 1/2 my pain was gone and I wasn't crying at all. I knew I had to get up or I was jumping off the cliff in that instant. I got up with my walker and talked to my son and promised him no matter what came of any of this I would do all that I could to make our lives the very best that they could be. The following weeks were both bad and miraculous at the same time. She began to be very hateful and distant, colder than I have ever seen and saying the worst things imaginable to hear. Things I wouldn't ever say to my worst enemies! While she was that way I stayed as positive as I could, working harder than I ever had in my life. I got off of my walker and on to a cane in two weeks. I battled on and within two more weeks I had dropped my cane and was now walking on my own. All the surgeons said that I would never but I was. I started doing things more and more everyday until finally I wa as close to being normal as I could have ever dreamed possible. During this time she was still being as hateful and hurtful as she could be. She hadn't even called our son the first time and had pushed everyone that ever meant anything to her completely out of her life. I was now doing great and our son was talking to me alot and understanding, he too was doing great. As strange as it was he seemed happier than ever and his grades all came way up. He was doing so good and she was still not communicating with him at all. I started focusing on her a little more now that I had gotten us to a better place. After strenuous attempts and hearring all of the most hurtful things she could dish out, I finally got lines of communications opened with her other than her dropping the baby off or having a friend bring her to me 4-5 days a week. She didn't have any money and I really wanted to make sure she did and was able to do things for the baby. I kept working hard to stay in her life and be there to support her. All I could think was her going throough something that she had no control over and it was forced on by the trauma of my accident and all the stress and depression with it. We started doing great after a couple of weeks, we would still have good days and some of her awful days, but I figured I was the only source she ever had to vent to and let her get it out. I figured better me hear it than the ones that were letting her stay there and feeding them. I finally got it to where we were atleast acting as friends and she would accept the money and help I was offering.She still hasn't seen my son but a time or two but we are talking alot and she does atleast call him now. Things were def. a roller coaster for us still. I help her in every way possible. I even found out she was having an emotional affair with a guy she had met the day before moving out. It later turned physical only one time and he since hasn't seen her. They kept the emotional affair going but he got scared of me and wouldn't come around until our divorce was final. She started pushing for the divorce so hard after he said this to her. Not a brag at all but from my settlements I received several million dollars and niether of us would have ever had to work again. But she is so far out of her mind that she told me if I wouldn't contest the divorce than all she wanted was her Escalade, joint custody, and for us to divide our family photos equally. She has no money and no job but she would walk out on 40-50% of what I have for that. Just to see him and not feel as though she was cheating if the divorce was done. I didn't ever want to divorce her even after learning what she did. In 16 yrs of being together it was the only thing she has ever done. As bad as it hurt it was easy to truly forgive her and her actions, being how she had never done anything before and all that we were going through. I told her this and she couldn't understand how.She started getting really nasty as though it was she needed to hate me and me hate her. I wouldn't give her the satisfaction of hating her because I couldn't ever. I did not contest the divorce, in all honesty I was glad she would have to wait to do anything else so it didn't hurt so bad knowing we were divorced all but the one time. Plus I had to look at it in a financial stand point at this time. If there ever was a reconciliation on our parts it wouldn't matter if we were married or divorced, it's just a piece of paper and I wanted to protect what I had control over, not giving her time to realize what she was giving up by hurrying. She wanted to use my attorney and in less than 2 months we were finallized. The horror stories of her blowing every dime that we had wouldn't happen to me and that was a relief where we were not knowing how anything was going to turn out. We have been doing decent at being friends as I fight like hell to keep us atleast that. I do give her all the space in the world and don't really check up on her. But I did get a bit of satisfaction when I found out the other man wa in a very nasty custody battle with his ex wife 2 weeks before our divorce was final. I made a call to him and let him know if he talked to my wife, text her, or saw her again that I was going to court on his ex wifes side and telling how he had slept with my wife and had his kids there and around when he would see her. That scared the life out of him and he cut it off and refuses to even answer when she calls or text. So the deal she cut to rush our divorce through for their rendezvous was all for nothing!! I enjoyed that alot! He was so scared of me going to court with his ex he even told her he was seeing someone else and never mentioned talking to me and has not so much as spoke a word to her since. I don't find satisfaction from her hurting but she was devastated. It's been a total of 3 months now, one month since they broke it off, and she has been great with us. She wants to go places with us and is usually very kind although she has bad days still where she gets very depressed and confused as to why she is doing these things and having the thoughts she has. She called the other day and talked about wanting to come home and be with her family but never said anything before because she didn't think that I could ever trust her again and felt so embarrassed and ashamed when my son and I would look at her. We have been talking alot and I again told her that I truly forgive her, we aren't perfect and all make mistakes, that she needed to forgive herself. I always said I would never forgive being cheated on and she has always said the same our whole lives together. But I found myself able to and I would love to have our family back together and know that I can trust her completely if I did. MLC is a crazy thing and like she said it was like a switch went off in her head and it all happened in a flash. Being under all the stress and depression we were under and all we were going through I feel like she was as far gone as I was and I wanted to die and she handled hers in a different way not knowing really what she was doing either. It's not an excuse and doesn't make it right and would not be forgiven if it were to ever happen again if we did reconcile. But we are talking and she has asked me to help her get help for herself and for both of us to get help with marriage counselling and anything that will help. We talked about trying to start over with clean slates and forgiving each other for any wrongs and leave them in the past, moving forward, never mentioning them again as we have already talked about them and made peace with it. I am just scared as I have not read any where on any site of someone coming out of a MLC in a matter of 3 months. It worries me a bit. Has anyone ever heard or seen anyone come out of MLC healthy and make it work in that short of time. I told her I would get her help and we would also get help together but I wanted to take it very slow and date, while getting help, than see where it goes from there. I guess all that I can do is hope for the best but be prepared for the worst. It would be a comfort if I knew she truly could be on the other side of this that soon. I hope this helps some of you as a person can be pushed into an early MLC from having stress and/or depression already on them and dealing with a traumatic injury, death in the family, or an affair and the smallest thing can trigger it and force them into an early MLC, maybe even the pressures of a wild 2 1/2 yr olsd, at the age of 35 it can happen as young as 32 and keeps getting younger all the time. I don't think you are ever too young to go through this with circumstances severe enough. She meant the world to me and I did give her space but fought like hell to stay friends and a big part of her life being very understanding and helpful, being there for her when she needed her rock to lean on or to vent on and doing all I could not to fight back. If you love them enough you'll do what it takes to first better yourself and get you and your kids in the right place, than do whatever you feel is right for them, sometimes walking away is best and sometimes fighting like hell to be there for them and catch them when they innevitably fall flat on their face when they hi rock bottom. I was glad I was there for her and pray to God she really is at the other side this soon.