'My family is pressuring me to divorce my husband.' UPDATED
"My family is pressuring me to divorce my husband."
My husband, let’s call him Nate, and I have been together for 10 years, married for 4 years. We’ve been having a rough couple of years and basically everyone I am close to is telling me to get divorced. Nate and I have known each other since we were 14 and 15. We were best friends first and basically inseparable and started dating near the end of high school.
As far as our relationship everything was great. He treated me amazingly always with the most respect, going out on dates frequently, buying each other gifts, many vacations together etc.
When we first got engaged things were a bit rough but we spent many nights having long discussions and worked through those issues. However over the last couple of years we’ve been having a hard time.
Nate lost his job in 2022 and I think this set us on a collision course. Ever since then he’s had a hard time keeping a job. He frequently goes to temp agencies for in between periods but this has never been a problem for me as he tries his best to make sure bills are paid.
He always blames the jobs but I have a hard time believing he’s been through about 15 jobs since 2022 and EVERY SINGLE ONE is the problem. Maybe some of them but not all of them. Any time I try to talk about it he tells me not worry and he always find a new job so I’ve tried to stay out of it and let him figure it out.
As a result of this though we rarely ever go out anymore. I could pay for us to go out myself but he has expressed to me before that it makes him feel bad that I’m always paying. We celebrate our birthdays and anniversary and that’s it.
I’ve genuinely been okay with this because I understand that we are going through something but my family tends to make me feel bad. I’m very close with my family and they love to insert their opinions even when it’s not asked.
They love to comment on how he never gets me any gifts anymore, he doesn’t compliment me as much, and doesn’t really show up to family gatherings anymore. So much so that I’ve resulted in just lying about things I’ve bought for myself like books, jewelry, electronics etc. telling them he got them for me just to get them to shut up. If he doesn’t come to something where the whole family is there I just tell them he’s at work.
The divorce comments started coming in last year when I had car trouble. I have an older car, 2010, and my engine went out last year. I still had about 4 months left on my loan and interest rates were insane so I couldn’t afford to get a new car with having to also take care of so much of the bills at home.
I tried talking to a few different mechanics but I couldn’t work out any payment plans and honestly the lowest estimate I got was $9k to fix everything that was wrong with it so this seemed like a lost cause. I ended up getting my dad’s help for a new car.
He put down $5k to help me get a new car and this shook my family. The main question being why didn’t Nate help. I wasn’t about to flat out tell them he couldn’t afford it so I did my best to dodge the questions but it didn’t matter the damage was done. Now any time they could squeeze it in they’re telling me I need to divorce him.
Over the past year I’ve been able to get Nate back at family gatherings but they’ve all ended with him being super drunk. Nate doesn’t know when to stop. I know this about him. I try my best to cut him off but I’m his wife not his babysitter.
I’ve asked him over and over again to not drink at these functions or if he must to only have one. To which he tells me it’s fine he’s an adult and knows when to stop (he doesn’t). This has resulted in a lot of embarrassing nights for me and just adds to their list of reasons to leave him.
My family has never seen a healthy marriage. I have never seen a healthy marriage. At least not outside of a tv show. Any of my family that’s married they’re all bitter and cheating on each other. I can’t really take advice from this.
I believe you don’t get into a marriage just to jump ship as soon as things get hard. We are just going through something and we have to work on it together. However recently I’ve started questioning this and I’m not sure if this is the right stance here.
My cousin passed away recently and her funeral was this past week. I was and still am devastated. Nate doesn’t understand why. My cousin and I weren’t on speaking terms and he doesn’t get why I would be so upset since we weren’t even talking.
At the funeral he sat with me but he didn’t speak the entire time we were there not even to comfort me. I have no idea who he was that day but this was not the man I married. It was like having rose colored glasses taken off and now I’m questioning everything.
Now I’m starting to feel like my family may have been right all along and I’ve been too naive to see it. I can’t go to any of them about it because I already know what they’re going to say. I feel very alone right now. Where do I even go from here?
Here’s what people had to say to OP:
I'll be perfectly blunt. He doesn't need to "understand" he just needs to support you and your grief. If he's incapable of that then I think you know what you need to do.
Yeah OP it’s actually pretty understandable why your family dislikes your husband. He can’t hold down a job so you are financially responsible, has a problem with alcohol and doesn’t really seem to do anything to support you. If you were my sister or friend, I’d be advising you to really consider if this is the life you want as it is today. I doubt you do.
Your husband is an AH who can't keep a job. You're gonna lose everything and end up homeless because of him. His jobs aren't the problem he is. He couldn't even comfort after the loss of your cousin. It doesn't matter if you weren't talking anymore. Go to your family. They love you and want you to get out of a bad relationship. I'm sure they will help you.
Nearly two weeks later, the OP returned with an update.
I’ve never done an update so I hope I’m doing this right. A lot of people were asking the same questions so I’m going to try and address that first and clarify some things. Sorry this is kind of long.
“Nate” was a mixture of fired and quit from jobs. He was usually fired for attendance. The reasons of not going being having headaches or feeling sick. This was truly unrelated to drinking. If he quit it was various reasons but the main reason being having some type of issues with management.
The drinking started in March of this year and it is not daily not even weekly. However my main issue is getting black out drunk when he does drink. This is not exclusive to family gatherings but the embarrassing things usually happen in these cases. Embarrassing being the way he speaks to me. We discussed it many times and it’s always met with resistance.
I have definitely been in denial of this being an issue and the overwhelming comments have removed that denial. I mentioned it in the comments of my original post but I have alcoholics in my family but they drink daily and morning to night and he doesn’t so I thought I was being paranoid about this issue. I don’t think this had anything to do with losing jobs but was picked up as a result of it.
Many people said I don’t defend him to my family and this is why he doesn’t come to gatherings. I didn’t talk about it in my original post but I have defended him. They never say this in front of him only to me.
They don’t treat him differently or isolate him or anything like that. I don’t just let them talk crap but this usually results in us talking in circles and me feeling like crap. No I have never told him what they are saying.
I am in therapy solo but it’s new so we hadn’t gotten into my marriage at the time. This was honestly eating anyway at me since the funeral and my next session was 2 weeks away at the time which is what led to my post.
I do think he’s struggling mentally but I’m accepting it’s only so much I can do if he’s constantly insisting he’s fine. Someone asked if he’s of sound mind why don’t I believe him when he says he’s fine. I’ve dealt with depression and did not realize until I was out of it and reflected back on that period of time. Maybe it’s projecting but he may think it’s fine but it’s not.
Many people asked what he’s doing to fix things. I guess the simple answer is nothing. We have conversations about our marriage where he promises to do better and he does do better for a while and then he just stops.
Now for the update. I ended up turning my therapy session into a two hour session (double copay, yay America). We deep dived into my marriage and I actually told her about my original post and some of the comments that stuck with me. Obviously one long session is not a fix all but it definitely helped me come to some realizations.
A couple of comments we focused on. Me lying for him for starters. In the beginning I truly did not have a problem with not going on dates or getting gifts or even just the little things. But of course over time that kind of chipped away. I guess about the time I started lying about it is when I stopped being okay with it.
Someone said my marriage not working out does not mean I failed. Honestly this broke me. Out of all the comments this one really got me. I have felt like if I gave up this would be a failure. I didn’t get married to get divorced.
I thought I would be spending forever with him and I’ve definitely been trying to keep floating a sinking ship. Therapist says I’m a people pleaser and honestly after everything we’ve talked about yea that tracks.
As for Nate he’s on thin ice with his current job, go figure. Even knowing this he still did not go to work one day last week because “he had a headache”. No this was not a hangover he was not drinking that day before I am 100% positive of that. I start work 2 hours before him so I didn’t know he stayed home until I got home. I snapped.
I told him he doesn’t get to skip out on work every time he has a headache especially when he is already on multiple attendance warnings. I get frequent migraines and I don’t skip work unless it’s literally one that makes me super dizzy.
I take something for it and get to work because we’re adults with responsibilities and can’t just skip work every single time we feel bad. He told me I was overreacting and I told him of course he would see it that way because I sit back and let him do whatever he wants all the time.
Maybe I did overreact. Maybe he did have a bad headache. Either way I left to my sister’s house to cool off. I broke down at this point crying to her and telling her everything. To my surprise, although it shouldn’t have been a surprise at all, you guys were right. They all knew something I didn’t.
My brother and sister have secretly been giving him money to take me on dates for my birthday and our anniversary ever since him first losing his job. My sister even paid his portion for two family vacations we took.
I wasn’t going to go on either of these vacations because I couldn’t afford to pay for both of us but my sister said she could tell how sad I was about it. They both knew how badly I was trying to make it work and were trying to help. I called my brother and made him come over too. I thought they would give me I told you so’s or rub salt in the wound but they were very supportive.
I ended up staying with my sister a couple nights and returning home Friday night. I told Nate we needed to have a serious conversation. I laid out everything I was feeling. I cried and begged him to go to therapy.
If not to couples therapy at least to go solo. He refused. He says therapy is a waste of time and money just paying someone to talk to you. He says we don’t need anyone in our business like that and we can deal ourselves.
I told him obviously we can’t and having an outside unbiased opinion may help us understand each other better and be good for our future. He refused. He really doesn’t see how all of this is effecting me.
I did get him to open up the slightest bit about what’s going on in his head. In short he thinks the world owes him something. When he first lost his job he went to his parents for help. They refused to help, which honestly I’m not sure what he thought would happen because they’ve never been good to him or me for that matter.
He was going on and on about how his dad left his mom for half his life before they got back together and he needed to “make up for it”. I told him he’s not a child anymore he’s an adult his parents don’t owe him anything. To which he said it’s the least they could do.
We barely even touched the money/bills topic as usual as this lead to yelling and things were getting heated. I addressed him taking money from my siblings to pay for dates/vacations and he said “why does it matter where the money came from you wanted to go out and I made it happen”.
He doesn’t think there is an issue with this at all. He told me all I care about is money his love and loyalty is never enough. This really hurt me because it’s like everything was slipping through my fingers before my eyes. In trying to be a good wife and supportive partner I completely missed so many signs and lost myself.
We are separating for now. I was going to let him stay in our house but I changed my mind. I honestly don’t trust him to keep up any of the bills or cleaning. We rent our house and the lease is not up until May so I’ll be staying there and taking care of everything as usual.
He’s staying with family for now. I still didn’t jump straight to divorce as I’m trying to get through to him but I can see now this may be where it’s headed and I’m unpacking all that in therapy trust me.
Despite all of that I still love him very much and wish things were different. I’m hoping the separation inspires change but I did give him until our lease is up to show me with actions.
Honestly with his track record I’m not holding my breath but it’s tearing a hole in my chest just thinking about filing for divorce and well that’s another issue for therapy. Thank you to everyone who commented and made me really think about myself for once. Any advice for fixing a broken heart? Lol but kind of serious.
Here’s what people had to say to OP:
Your family - oh my word. They were giving him money to give you gifts and holidays? They knew and never let you know, hoping it'd get better. They are amazing people. And you are amazing. You did a 180 degree turn towards a healthier outlook quickly.
You are right to kick him out and keep the house. He likely wouldn't have taken care of the place leading to the loss of the deposit. Do you feel safe? Should you have the locks changed? Congratulations on shifting your perspective and seeking therapy. You did some hard work. Kudos.
jjreynolds3 (OP)
Yes I feel safe thank you for asking. He wasn’t apologetic if anything I think he believes I’ll get over it soon but I’m standing my ground. After talking with my siblings I can’t ignore how much I’ve taken on to make my marriage work. It was wild hearing my sister say she could see sadness in my eyes and although they assured me it was not a burden I just can’t believe they were giving him money all this time.
The family was right this time, that's a rare one.
Yeah, after reading all this you definitely need a divorce from this anchor that is only pulling you down. He is a lazy, entitled, alcoholic that thinks the world owes him something for nothing. He is the problem and always has been. Stop letting him drag you down.
he thinks you owe him too. he knows he’s hurting you. it’s definitely a divorce coming up but that’s for when you’re ready and it’s 100 percent not a failure. it’s just what it is at this point.