Done - now NEED him to move out...

[Girl Gromit]

M has problems. I'm no doctor, but after reading a lot over the last 18 years of being his SO (16 years of those a marriage that was never gonna work) I feel he has depression, low self-esteem, terrible anger, inability to handle stress, and denial about all of the above.

 

I am not perfect, of course, there is never one side to the story. However, it is these big issues that have kept us from progressing, getting closer and better, as you should (and expect to do) with each passing year together.

 

I tried to deal with pots of food being thrown at the cupboards, guilt about all the things I didn't do right that would evoke his anger, his dark moods in which he would be in another room mumbling and banging things around, the terrible name-calling, the need to attach guilt to someone when anything in life would go wrong (there is no ***** happens opinion with M - someone's going down).

 

He has always secluded himself in his office, wherever we've lived. He has always loved his friends and his video games. However, in the last 2 years he's become DEEPLY involved in World of Warcraft. This game has pretty much given him the escape from reality he has searched for. He can not only play it forever, because you don't conquer it and move on to something else... but he has also met many, many people playing it. Men AND women.

 

On April 13 of this year I returned to our office after running home for something to find him standing outside the back door on his phone. He acted nervous and put the phone against his leg to say hello to me. Uspet and suspicious, I looked at his phone that night when he went to sleep. There were many numbers I didn't recognize, but the same one appeared as many as 15 times a day.

 

The next day I asked him about it. He said it was a friend he met on the game. I asked why he needed to talk to someone he hardly knew that many times a day, when he hardly ever even talks to his close male friends that much in a month. He acted nervous, the way he did earlier in our marriage when I found out that he'd been flirting with and meeting after work a woman who assisted in his former job.

 

After a bunch of things, it came out that this person on his phone was a woman, married, plays the game all evening, has trouble with her teenaged son and is unhappy in her marriage because she has a verbally abusive husband.

 

First, she has no idea... that's the problem with meeting all these different people on the internet... M is the most verbally abusive person I've ever known. My friends cannot believe the things that he says to me and calls me. That she escapes her life with this game and meets my husband, who is obviously anyone he wants to be when speaking to her, and thinks she's found something better than she's presently got is PROOF that these games and sites are dangerous. They make people feel that there is no need to continue to try in their real life, because look at all these people on this specialized forum or game who REALLY understand them, who like them and don't fight with them.

 

What it boils down to is that he still claims she's "just a friend"... someone he can talk to and every conversation won't "end in an argument". I am naturally very offended by this. After years of verbal abuse and dealing with his peronality problems, depression, and nuclear anger, for the last year of feeling I really couldn't do this any more, I've started to stand up for myself and have told him that I cannot stay if he doesn't treat me with respect, be kind to me and patient with my mistakes, and actually act like he loves me at all. These "arguments" he's referring to is what happens with I ask him not to talk to me a like I'm a dog, or with sarcasm, or calling me horrible names, like his favorite, "c*nt". I've learned that the way not to fight is to let him act any way he wants and not have a problem with it.

 

So... after this whole thing with this woman who plays this game and lives in another state, talking to my husband who I've put up with all these years, and being told that I'm wrong that she's not just a friend, I told him I want out.

 

He, for once in our 18 years, did not say he'll hurt me or himself or whatever. He just said "fine, whatever you want". He has been quietly angry about it but not fighting against it since May. He says the reason he's not fighting it anymore is that he realizes that he cannot make the changes I would need him to make to stay married to him. He cannot be gentle and unselfish and loving. He has had his 19-year-old brother living with us for the last 2 years, and they just stay down in the basement all the time, every waking moment M's not working he's down there playing this game. Both of them.

 

I think he just realizes what I've known all along. He has nothing to give me or his 2 daughters (10 & 12). He doesn't really want to be a husband, a father... he wants to be a 14-year-old boy. He wants no one to ask anything of him, no one to depend on him or need him. And he refuses to go to therapy, because deep down, he thinks it is everyone ELSE who has the problems.

 

The thing that makes it all so awful at the end of everything is that he's in the house still. Money makes it very difficult for him to set up with his brother somewhere else. And even if we had the money, I really don't think he would leave. He acts like, why can't we just go on like this... me in the guest room, my brother downstairs, both of us making messes in the house, you can hear us in the house, you'll see me on the phone and wonder if I'm talking to some woman, but I'm comfortable here and I'm the most selfish person, so I don't care if you're at your wit's end, I'm just going to squat here for as long as I darn-well like, because I don't want the inconvenience or expense of leaving.

 

I just don't know what to do. I've got completed, ready-to-file papers from completecase.com. All we have to do is sign before a notary and take them to the courthouse. He has no problem with this and there are no troubles about money or the kids... he has his own money and I have mine, and he said I can have the kids and he'll see them whenever.

 

I have a feeling we'll be 4 years down the road, divorced for 3.5, and he'll STILL BE IN MY HOUSE.

 

Oh, help.

[Enema]

Did you buy the house? Is your name the only one on the deed? Are you the only one that makes the payments?

 

If not, it's not "your" house and you shouldn't be upset that he's still there.

 

Your most realistic option is to sell the property, take your 50% and move on.

[Girl Gromit]

We both are on the deed, but he refuses to sell, insisting that I and the kids keep it. He is adamant that the house not be sold, even though I have been willing to do so. From the very first conversation we had about realistically separating he has stated that he will not sell "the only property he is ever likely to own" in his life, and that he does want me to stay there.

 

So that is why I refer to it as my house. He has said I can have it. But it appears that the biggest condition of this (unspoken, of course) is turning out to be that NO ONE move, and that this ridiculous situation continue indefinitely.

 

I love the house and do not want to leave it. I don't think it's right that he's said I can have it and stay there, and that I don't even have to buy him out, and yet he makes it clear that he doesn't intend to leave and doesn't intend to sell.

 

All the while I have to know that he is meeting and talking with other women, while he and his brother continue to hang around making their hoome there and yet not contributing to cleaning it or caring for it at all.

 

It is also "my" house in the way that while he has sat at a desk in the basement for the 3 years we've owned it, playing computer games, I have had 100% of the responsibility for its upkeep, including taking out the garbage and mowing the 3 acres that surround it.

 

It's my house.

 

I may end up losing it before I will be rid of this man and our marriage, though.

 

 

Did you buy the house? Is your name the only one on the deed? Are you the only one that makes the payments?

 

If not, it's not "your" house and you shouldn't be upset that he's still there.

 

Your most realistic option is to sell the property, take your 50% and move on.

[Melovator]

Get a lawyer- the house isn't worth it. Seriously no house is worth your self-respect, which is your H's price for you keeping it. He wants to continue controlling you and your life as well as making his more convenient. I'd also suggest talking to your nearest domestic violence service if you do take action to get yourself and the kids or him and his brother out of the house- there is often an escalation in abuse once it becomes crystal clear that the victim isn't taking it anymore.

 

The house isn't worth it- if you really want another house you will get one- yes, interest rates, housing loan market collapses, real estate bubbles, housing affordability, are all scary things to think about but if you really want it you can do it.

 

I'm not denigrating the desire for home ownership (that would be blasphemy down here where the 'great Australian dream' is to own your own home- even with housing affordability being completely sucky)- but like I said its not worth the price your H is asking of you to achieve it.

[tinke]

wow..i couldn't get past the fact he calls you a c--t!!! how can this be acceptable?

or ANY harsh name for that matter. run...you may rejoice in your new found freedom!

 

PLUS..your children deserve a safe environment.

[Art_Critic]

Get a lawyer- the house isn't worth it.

 

Agreed...

 

A judge will either force the sale of the house and divide the proceeds or he will make one or the other buy the other out..

or you both could agree to one of those options and forgo going in front of a judge.. but since he wants to live there with you then you need to have something done..

You need to be able to live free and clear of him after the divorce is final..

Get a lawyer.. even if you just use him for advice and do the filing.. you need a person looking out for you in this case..

[Ladyjane14]

A do-it-yourself divorce pretty much relies on two people willing to work out a settlement agreement together. Unfortunately, that's NOT your situation.

 

I believe if I were you, I'd see an attorney. Many offer 'no cost' or 'low cost' initial consultations. Interview several. Then pick one and file on his ass.

 

Yeah... you're probably gonna lose the house, and if neither of you can afford to buy the other out, it'll need to be sold and the equity split. That's sad, but... it's just a house, right? What does it matter when you're talking about the quality of your life?

 

Anyway, see what the attorney has to say. If it were me, and my husband was unstable or prone to violence, I'd get my kids and myself to a safer location, maybe stay with another family member or something, before getting too deep into the divorce process. It can get pretty hairy.

 

You know, there's nothing in the world that gets a man's attention so much as realizing his wife really is DONE with him. All too often they just don't 'get it' until it's too late.

 

Once he understands that you mean what you say and you're going to divorce him, there's likely to be displays of anger, followed by promises to change and back-peddling. That's the usual M.O., and it can be cyclical. Best to be somewhere else while he's going through all that. Safety first.

[Girl Gromit]

Thank you for the good advice, everyone.

 

Something he said last night, that I realized at the time he's said a lot, is really giving me a big clue as to his attitude... he says things like "this is what YOU want", or "YOU'RE the one doing this".

 

I think he thinks as long as he denies denies denies that he's done anything wrong, from yell at me and call me names to talk on a non-friendship basis with others, then it's like he didn't do it. Like a little kid who thinks you can't see him when his eyes are covered.

 

He's falling back on that he's done nothing wrong, it's everyone around him... therefore he feels like he is in the right. I think he's in denial, even though he's said he's ready to sign papers, that this is really going to happen. I've always put up with him, no matter what, and I think deep down that he thinks I always will, so why should he move out when I'm probably just going to hit my knees some day soon and tell him I've changed my mind!

 

So perhaps getting those papers notarized and filed is the next step toward showing him that that's not ever going to happen, and maybe he'll understand that we're doing this and he cannot stay in the house with me when we're no longer husband and wife...