Is it time to leave my marriage? How to break the cycle and find clarity. #marriageadvice #relationshiphelp #whenisleavinghealthy
Are you finding yourself stuck in a cycle with your partner? As a 38-year-old woman, I understand the pressures of marriage and the difficult decisions that come with it. If you’re unsure whether it’s time to leave, here are some signs to look out for:
Signs it may be time to leave:
- Consistent communication breakdowns
- Emotional or physical abuse
- Repeated patterns of betrayal or infidelity
- Feeling unhappy or unfulfilled
Steps to consider before making a decision:
- Seek therapy or counseling to work through issues
- Communicate openly and honestly with your partner
- Take time to reflect on your own wants and needs
- Consult trusted friends or family members for advice
Remember, every relationship is unique, and only you can determine what is best for your happiness and well-being. Don’t be afraid to seek help and support during this challenging time. #selfcare #relationshipadvice #loveyourself
If you’re still unsure, it may be helpful to speak with a therapist or counselor who can provide guidance and support as you navigate this difficult decision. You deserve to be in a loving and healthy relationship, so don’t hesitate to take the steps necessary to find happiness and peace.
I think that your husband used this other woman for sex and excitement and all of the things that he was not getting in the marriage. I think also that it created some drama in the marriage and possibly gave you both something to talk about and to work through together. As nasty as that is.
And I think that you having another partner meant that your husband might finally be more desired and more loved in the ways that he was wanting.
So we think what your husband was trying to do was to use these other relationships as a way to get the things that he was missing in the relationship originally. Now that both of these people are on their way and heading out, all of the original problems in your marriage remain. These other relationships didn’t fix anything, it just distracted both of you and created roundabout ways that your husband could try to get small portions of what he was trying to get before.
I don’t know who told you that sleeping with other people in a marriage would fix everything in your own marriage but clearly it hasn’t worked. Probably your husband thought that. But it hasn’t worked.
I think that both of you should stop playing around with this fire and to get into couples counseling asap. That you survived this well unscathed from something of this magnitude is absolutely amazing in speaks a lot to both of you as a couple.
But now all of the original problems remain as well as new hurts revolving around these relationships.
You are not addressing and fixing the behaviors that are causing the issues. Counseling is good but it doesn’t sounds like moved beyond surface level to make real change. Opening a marriage to save it is about the dumbest thing I have heard. I think any real poly could agree with me. It’s time to separate if you seeing the same cycle over and over and no behaviors are changing.
So first he suggested an open relationship because he had already lined someone up, which is really just a license to cheat. As soon as they met someone else, he asked to close the relationship back off. Also, all throughout he encouraged you to have a partner but was frequently jealous when it actually happened.
He never wanted an open relationship, he wanted a license to cheat.
> and I don’t want to disappoint my children
Ultimately you will not disappoint your children as long as you are a parent to them, and as long as you and your husband competently co-parent. I honestly believe it’s worse to teach your children to stay in marriages they should no longer be in.
To be clear, this is how your story feels to me. I’m not claiming to be 100% right, but it sure feels like the sequence of events to me. Fixing a broken relationship by adding another partner will only make things worse, it does nothing whatsoever to address the problems in the relationship.
Typically the only successful open relationships are relationships that are already in a good spot. Then, on top of that, it’s typically something both partners are open to at the inception of the relationship/marriage.
OP, from what I’ve seen, opening up a relationship that started monogamous is the kiss of death for that relationship. Your husband proposed the open relationship because he wanted to be with this other woman, while maintaining a marriage to you.
Now that you’re in a relationship with someone else and his relationship with her ended, he wants to close the relationship. Meanwhile you have fallen in love with another man, which is NOT supposed to happen in open relationships.
The biggest consideration for you and your husband should be the well being of your children. If you think you can no longer work through the issues you have with your husband, and fights and arguments will continue even if you decide to end things with your other partner, then perhaps divorce is the only option. Neither you or your husband have put forth any effort toward your relationship with each other, and that is where you have to start to repair the damage caused by opening your marriage.
If you still love your husband (and you say you do), and you believe it is possible to restore your relationship with each other, then I would recommend staying in your marriage. Divorce will be brutal and hard on your children. If you don’t think your marriage can be restored, then you need to separate, file for divorce, and move out to stay with your affair partner.
Just break up. You should never beg someone to stay with you. You’re not a dog.
Sweetheart, you are so far PAST the time to separate. You honestly think that after everything from the past 18 months, you can just go back to being happily married to him? You think he’ll go back to being happily married to you? He only wants that because he doesn’t want you to be with someone else in a “real” relationship and his girlfriend dumped him. And what do you think will happen the next time feels like you’re “in a rut”?
Just end it. You will be happier and your kids will be fine, I promise.
Unfortunately he only wants to close the relationship (the same relationship he said he would never close because he is polyamorous) because he doesn’t have any prospects not because he loves you or because he has changed his polyamory.
There is no relationship if it is open. It’s a screen door on a submarine.
Find someone who will love you and build a life with you. Someone to grow old with.
No, you need to let him go. His biggest mistake is resorting to an open marriage instead of finding ways to make time for you two. You need to look past your wanting to stay for the kids (that’s what it really is).
His reason was because you two were too busy….yet he had all this extra time to see someone else? That is a clear indicator this wasn’t about not having enough time, he chose to make time for someone else, just not you.
Then it was because he had gotten close to this other woman. So he clearly had intent even prior to asking you to open it up. This was his cop out to having sex with someone else while stringing you along.
Lastly, he got mad everytime you spent time with your guy and got jealous when you talked about him. Then wants to close it when he got dumped.
This was all clearly so he can live the best of both worlds. You need to let him go
All I have to say is way to set a good example for the kids 🤦🏼♀️
I vote for getting a divorce.
If you insist on staying, you need couples counseling.
You should have done that the second he said “open marriage”.
You owe it to your kids to at least try.
Good luck.
You need a heart to heart with the new guy, how serious is he?. Your husband could easily end it as soon as he finds the next new person. Meanwhile you already kicked this guy to the curb.
This always seems to end in destroying relationships, open marriage shouldn’t mean a fuckbuddy for life in reality you should have multiple partners to avoid this situation accusing.
Opening a marriage to save it is like putting salt on a wound.
The time to separate came when your dear husband asked for an open relationship (and at 99.999999% he cheated before asking you).
Just fucking divorce
That sounds very unhealthy, this is one of those situations where you already know the answer to your question. Trust yourself
Even his affair partner has dumped him and moved on. He’s just a selfish, little person.I hate the way he has treated you.
Time for a divorce. This is to much monkey business
separate and explore this relationship with this other person.
Your husband is selfish and sucks at communicating.
>At first he wanted to separate, but I was devastated and talked him out of it. Then came the open relationship
This is when your marriage ended, your just dragging out the inevitable. You should have just split when this was even on the table.
Time to make the right decision this go round
Leave your marriage. He forced you into an open marriage using emotional blackmail. For the sole purpose of f*cking another woman, who he was clearly already having an affair with.
He forced you to start seeing other people to assuage his guilt for forcing you into a situation you clearly did not want to be a part of.
When you found someone he tried to force you to end your relationship with to w other person by threatening to divorce.
Now, that his girlfriend has seen his true colours and has decided to move on he all of a sudden wants to close the relationship.
This man is selfish to the extreme. He does not care about your wants, your need, or your feelings at all. Next time he wants to cheat it’ll be the same bullshit all over again.
This marriage has run its course.
One of the things that polyamorous relationships can well do is highlight areas in which your current partner is not treating you well.
Seeing your partner treat a new person with more dignity and respect and affection can show you that they were always capable of treating you that way, they just didn’t see a need to or want to.
Having a new person treat you with kindness and decency also shows you that it’s possible for you too. Your standards go up.
Polyamorous relationships can also show how attractive a person and their partner are. Many men think they will be pulling in relationships left and right and find they do moderately well, while women think that no one will love them, while they do moderately well. Non-binary folks have their own thing going on.
Opening or closing your relationship will not fix the problems in it. Honesty, respect, and love are needed in all types of healthy relationships that are designed to last. Do you feel your husband has that for you? Do you feel your new partner does? Or do you feel a desire to be single and learn about yourself.
This is so similar to another post that I call bs
What you have is not a real marriage. I would never stay married to someone that wanted to be with someone else. Why even be married?
He was okay staying with you as long as he could fuck that other woman. As soon as she dumped him, now he wants you to stop fucking the other guy?
Your husband is the most selfish asshole I’ve heard of. I truly don’t mean any disrespect to you, but please get some therapy, so you can find a sense of self-worth – and stop letting someone use you like a doormat.
It’s time to leave. Your husband is a fucking cunt.
This was a terrible idea from the start. You were in a rut and had a very busy life with kids, but he, then you, had time for entirely new relationships. That was time that could have been spent working or your relationship or doing everything you could to fight for your marriage so when it was over, you could be sure you gave it all you had.
It doesn’t seem like your relationship has gotten better over this time so your basically back to square one. Ask yourself if you’re happy and if and if there’s any indication they your marriage will get better. If the answer to both is no, you know it’s time to leave.
Sounds like it was time to separate when we wanted that open marriage instead of working through your current one.
Confirmed when he got jealous and wanted you back when you had someone else.
Leave him for your other guy. Hubby made his bed.
Assuming this is some fiction but…
Time to leave was about a year and a half ago. Opening up your marriage didn’t improve your marriage. It gave you both distractions, so you didn’t have to solve your issues. In reality, it just complicated things more.
You should divorce your husband AND break things off with the boyfriend. You are using one or both men as a crutch. Take some time to abstain from relationships altogether. Focus on yourself, your kids, and make some healthy friendships. Get some therapy. Get some hobbies. Do this for a year or more. When you feel confident and independent, you will be in a place to make better relationship decisions.
Have you guys even tried marital counseling before opening up the marriage?
It sounded like you were pressured to open the marriage so that he’d stay then now you find another person, your husband’s side of the open marriage not working out, he wants to close it back.
It reminds me of some netflix show I watched awhile ago by the way. I still wonder why people would just open their marriage up instead of trying to ‘fix’ or ‘resolve’ their issue first.
By the way, I vote for divorce too.
Sorry but he want to find someone after you end it
Ugh … this makes me sick. OP Why are you even married? Is anyone thinking about the children or just satisfying their pleasures? How in the world is an open “ marriage “ going to fix your marital issues??
Oh it’s the tale as old as time. Let’s summarize:
After having kids, he felt like intimacy & sex was lacking and missing. You felt guilty and tried, but with being touched out with the kids and mentally & physically drained because you did all the things- along with dealing with a changing body- you just couldn’t.
So instead of fixing the problem, he wants to separate because he’s sex starved. I’m going to go out on a limb here- physical touch is his love language. This drives you further into guilt & now desperation, so he says, let’s open the marriage, and you agree because you don’t want to lose your family.
Then he convinces you to go out and date and you find someone who you actually click with. BOOM- now he is feeling what you’ve been feeling and it’s not ok. Nope, let’s close the relationship now he says. Why? What’s changed? Except he got a year & a half of sex, your marriage is in further shambles and now you’re torn between two men.
You may love your husband, but he is a selfish idiot who cared more about his physical affection than figuring out how to transition from just a couple to a couple with kids, and the sacrifices it takes on both ends to handle that. If the marriage closes, what will change? How will you both come back from the damage HE did to the relationship?
You deserve to be treated so much better than that.
Darling, he only wants to close the marriage again because he got dumped. Not because he wants more time with you and doesn’t need to see other people.
Sounds like he didn’t actually think you’d find someone you liked.
He’s not choosing or respecting you
You should have separated years ago. If you are already struggling to connect and find time for each other, opening the marriage will only further limit that time and connection.
Also, an open relationship only has a shot of working out if it’s something that both people really want.
Stay with your new man, pull the trigger. Do you fight with him as much as you do with your husband? If his girlfriend didn’t leave him, he’d still want to be poly. But it’s what he wanted, and he was disrespectful and confrontational. It was ok for him but not for you. Start fresh and move on. Down the road I believe living without will e better. But you have to make that decision. If you drag your feet too long, your other may you behind!
He’s only wanting to close it now that he’s not benefitting from it. He was cheating on you and forced you into an open relationship. Just fuckin leave him. It’s not going to get better with your husband, because he doesn’t want things to be better with you.
When you open a marriage it is over. Please get those babies out of there, so they don’t think this is an expression of healthy self esteem. It is toxic swill. He wants sex with others, maybe you do too. Don’t be married. Marriage is supposed to mean something, it is why you take vows.
Open marriages do not survive, the great love never develops it is like living on iceberg lettuce. Sure you are thin, but you are starving to death. The boundaries are not sustainable. Never stay with someone that tries to open a marriage. The lifestyle is full of drama, hypersexuality and high rates of drug and alcohol abuse. Please get your babies out. Then all of you get counseling. I would suggest going to an attorney and figuring out your finances and your divorce.
Updateme!
My god, have some self-respect.
Yikes I only read the first for sentences and they alone contained so many indicators that it’s well past time to leave. I’m sorry but your marriage is over. Please prioritize your self respect and your children. Good luck OP
Let’s recap.
Your husband threatened to leave you.
You talked him into staying, but he only did so with the caveat that he could have a whole ass relationship with another woman.
Then when you did the same, he got jealous and it created even MORE conflict in your marriage.
Now, conveniently that his girlfriend has moved on, he wants you to cut things off with your side piece, too.
Not because he wants to be married to you alone. But because he got dumped and can’t handle you still having someone else.
You haven’t meaningfully addressed any of the actual underlying issues in your dumpster fire of a marriage.
Put it out of its misery already. Go be with the other guy you also love, who didn’t threaten to leave you, insist on being with another woman, and doesn’t constantly fight with you. You love two men and you can only choose one. You have two relationships but only one is reasonably healthy. Why on earth would you prioritize the one who hasn’t prioritized you or your marriage in ages, and is only ready to do so now because he got dumped? How long until the next new girlfriend comes along? Is this really the future you want?
When you ask questions like these..
Your husband is a piece of crap and I say this as someone who opened a marriage. He’s manipulative and honestly a real jerk who gives Poly a bad name. Dump him yesterday.