'AITA for not letting my wife emotionally blackmail me to keep me in our marriage?'
"AITA for agreeing to separate from my wife when she brought it up for the 4th time, and then sticking to it when she subsequently changed her mind?"
Flashy_Bat_3443 writes:
Me (40M) and my wife (37F) have been together for 10 years, and we have two boys, 8 and 5. Recently, things have been tough. I think we had both withdrawn from each other gradually over time without really noticing that it had happened.
We were sleeping in separate bedrooms (primarily her choice). She was sleeping in late most days, particularly on weekends, and I was doing a lot of activities with the kids without her.
I work, and she doesn't. I've never had a problem with it and was happy to support her. But I was getting up every day to get the kids ready for school. Sometimes she would roll out of bed and take them while I got ready for work; other times, she wouldn’t, and I would just take them.
It was a similar routine at bedtime: I would put the kids to bed, read them stories, and get them to sleep. I was happy to do it. The three of us would do things together on the weekends without her, particularly in the mornings.
She wasn’t completely absent, but it got to the point where the kids were making comments about it, saying things like, "Why does Mum never want to come with us?" or "Why is she sleeping all the time?"
So, I suppose I was becoming more withdrawn and emotionally distant, and she was too. She would sit and scroll through her phone or watch TikTok in the evenings after the kids were in bed. We weren’t connecting as we used to.
Then came the angry outbursts over seemingly trivial things. An Amazon order turned up while I was out that she didn’t know about, and my phone blew up over it. I didn’t reply to a text quickly enough while I was at work, and she would rant about it for an hour or two. My family would come out to visit us (we live abroad), and she would ask at the last minute that they stay in a hotel instead of at our house.
To be fair, she suffers from anxiety, and I have tried repeatedly to get her to have therapy for it. She gets medication from the doctor, but that’s as far as she seems to want to go to try to resolve things.
So, I have been as supportive as I can be, listening to all the past traumas, etc., but knowing that they weren’t really being solved or dealt with. You can’t make someone go to therapy. I only encouraged her as much as I could.
The angry outbursts started getting more frequent, and historically, I would always try to placate her as much as possible to keep the peace. But I started getting a little defensive about it and standing up for myself, which really started escalating things.
Just pushing back a little bit (e.g., saying no, my family cannot book a hotel 24 hours before they are supposed to stay with us, which we agreed to months ago) led to several claims that she was going to leave me, that I had changed, and I wasn’t the person she married anymore.
After several episodes of this — where she even told our oldest son that we were divorcing about 60 seconds after she told me, upsetting him greatly — she did it again about a week ago. I decided that I would take a stand, and I agreed with her, saying that she was right and we should separate. She went to bed early, and we didn’t talk all night.
The next morning, she was hoping for my usual rapprochement, but I said that she had made it clear how she felt last night, and so I was sticking to it. The last week has been torture because now, apparently, I am responsible for throwing the whole marriage away.
It is 100% my decision, and I haven’t given her a chance to change anything. She doesn’t want to split and says she will love me forever, etc. I feel so guilty about it, but I honestly do not see how things will change at all. It feels like something broke inside me, and I just cannot get myself to feel anything anymore.
I definitely accept that we could and should have communicated more in the weeks and months leading up to this. But, on the other hand, it also feels that every time I tried to bring anything up, she would immediately get defensive or try to twist it around to be my fault anyway.
So now, I’m sticking to my guns. I don’t see a way forward from here but am still wracked with guilt about it all. She definitely thinks that I am the AH here.
Here are the top rated comments:
DazzlingElla_ says:
NTA. Sounds like you've been through the wringer trying to keep things together, but there's only so much one can do. Separation came up repeatedly from her side, and it's only fair you took it seriously. It's tough, but staying in a cycle of blame and resentment isn't fair to anyone, including the kids.
Con4America says:
NTA. Be careful what you wish for because someone might just grant your wish. She should have thought about that before she mouthed off. You will be happier in the long run.
Healthy_Chipmunk2266 says:
Woman who suffers from major depression here. I do believe she is depressed based on several things you’ve said. However, she is apparently unwilling to deal with it. You AND the kids are suffering because of that. She wants out? Let her go. No more emotional blackmail.
OP responded:
Thanks - I had supposed that she might be depressed as well as anxious. I'm not sure how much of it is down to me being more withdrawn, or whether there are other factors at play too. We don't have really any social life (another point of contention) despite my encouragement.
I think it would help her, but she is generally reluctant to engage. She has repeatedly told me over the years that she was worried I would leave her one day. I never thought I would, but she would have nightmares about it. Now it feels like it has become a self-fulfilling prophecy. I'm really sad.