Husband wants out of 24-year marriage

Dear Counsellor,

I have been having relationship issues for a long time and it just keeps getting worse. I am at a point now where I find myself constantly thinking about divorce. I am totally not interested in marriage repair (we have had counselling) and just want to be out of this marriage so I can have an opportunity to meet someone and possibly be happy before I’m too old to actively enjoy life. I cannot honestly tell you the last time I’ve been genuinely happy, and my wife appears to be very comfortable with things even though I’m quite sure she could not be happy.

We are currently just existing within the same space, but there has been nothing physical between us for so long, I can’t even remember. There is no intimacy, no expression of love, and very little communication.

We have been together for 35 years, married for 24, but for several years I have not been enjoying the marriage and it’s not from a lack of effort on my part.

I am sure that I’m at fault for the way our relationship has turned out; however, it appears that she cannot come to forgive me — and after 18 years of kissing and sucking up, as I was wrong, I am now at my breaking point.

The truth is, I want to be out of this marriage, and I feel like I don’t know how to say it but I know I cannot live the rest of my life like this.

There are times in marriages and committed relationships when one partner makes a blunder that costs him/her a lifetime of heartache. Sometimes the offender is remorseful and sincerely regrets the error, but the offended person is so hurt that forgiveness is never an option. The offender must live with this burden that may eventually wear him/her down, leading to them descending into a state of depression.

So you have accepted responsibility for your actions, but your wife is obviously not prepared to have you forget the mental and psychological pain and suffering she has had to endure. Whatever the transgression was, it must have caused her embarrassment and shame and shattered the faith she had in you. With a couple who has been together for as long as you both have been, trust would have been one of the key elements that would have kept the relationship intact. When trust is eroded it is most difficult to replenish and so the offender must build again from the ground up — and it will take many years for a glimmer of hope to appear.

So as you do everything possible and sometimes even “kissing up” and your wife is not budging, the message she is evidently sending is, “I will not forget, nor will I forgive you…and by my actions you will know”. In other words, she wants to make your life miserable as long as you live — a repayment for the misery you caused her.

But whereas you can’t put a timeline on restoring trust, neither can you demand that your wife forgive you. You must appreciate that a turnaround in the relationship can only take place at her pace and not yours. If she does not intend to make the change, there is not much you can do.

If after you have explored all counselling options your wife still does not budge, you then have to decide what will be in your best interest and determine what steps you will need to take. As you indicated, you are unhappy with the present state of affairs, and it does appear that your wife is not perturbed by the lack of intimacy that exists. You need to have a conversation with her about your discomfort and ascertain her honest assessment of the status of the marriage. If she sees no problem and is comfortable with the status quo while you are seeing and feeling the disharmony then certainly this disconnect will only get worse, leading to frustration and depression.

Your mental health is important and so you must carefully assess the situation and determine if staying in the relationship will help or hinder your mental, emotional, and psychological well-being.

Wayne Powell is a relationship counsellor. Write to agapemft@gmail.com. Check his Facebook page at www.facebook.com/MFTCounselor/.