cottoncandy1 Posted November 28, 2008 Posted November 28, 2008 BACKGROUND I've been married for about 8 years. Life has not been a bowl of cherries. We own a home that i put my heart and soul into. We have to both work full time in order to pay the bills for this home, transportation, cable,etc. I am in my late thirties and time is running out to have kids. If I did I would have to work full time and take kid to daycare (which i wouldn't want) or rely on good faith efforts of MIL & my mother to take care of a kid from super early in the am til i get home from work. I don't want to owe my MIL either nor would i want to see people right after work each day. i like my peace and tranquility. PROBLEM I wanted kids when we first got married, before responsibilites of bills. I was happy to tour baby stores and fantasize over baby names in books, etc. Had many problems w/ in laws and turned me off to tying the knot to their family forever. I need a way out and a kid would lock me to them forever. The SIL calls my MIL every day to become her favorite. I say u can have each other and don't bother competing anymore. I tried, but she always wins. So screw them both. My husband- his SIL (married to his brother) is spoiled. My in laws put her on a pedestal even though SHE DOES NOTHING but sit at home all day with her cute baby and go shopping (ps. she's in a nice country home) and we sit there at events feeling like losers cuz they have money coming out of their ears, still get hand outs from inlaws, which they try to hide from us, and my husband is oblivious to it cuz he sees the good in everyone . gimme a break. this girl rubs it in my face all the time, his brother does it to him to but only i see it. he doesn't see it. my husb. is too nice and it's annoying sometimes. I can't stand them anymore. If i leave i might end up alone. I don't want any regrets cuz i regret getting married in the first place sometimes , i regret breaking up w/ 2 good boyfriends and ending up in this situation. if i leave i also will lose my home and end up in an apartment. which i could NOT live with. i love owning a home and never complain about the bills. i only have to deal w/ these stupid people a few times a year i can count on one or 2 hands so my family tells me to think of it that way, but it gets to me how she ended up w/ my life and i got the short end of the stick and i work so hard, never get a break, and i have zilch. no family, no spoiling, i pay 50%, i'm not "provided for" and have my butt wiped. I should be put on a freakin' pedestal after all these years, not her. It's not fair. I sound childish maybe but this is how i feel. She got it all. When I cry to my husband about how unfair it is and annoying he just listens and for the last 8 years+ does nothing. nothing ever changes. he is NOT a go getter like his brother. he works and does not complain. he would be a good father too. but he does not understand time is running out for me and i would want to raise kids like other women do, at home and be provided for. plus, i don't feel maternal instincts, so i'm not sure if i'm IN LOVe w/my husband. i care about him, but i don't feel those feelings like i had for my first love/boyfriend. that was different. i was shaking for months each morning after that break up. (19 yrs old). I feel like i wish i had a rich boyfriend and imagine running into his SIL and say meet my husband blah blah and show them i am not in their web anymore. when i go there they know they can get under my skin by rubbing it in my face that we're the underdogs. i worry that i would end up alone, or regret leaving my husband, or hate my new life and regret that, etc. it sucks we're not rich cuz then they couldn't rub it in our faces anymore. What would u guys do? :mad:p.s. my husband not only is NOT a go getter, he has no voice to speak up for me or himself (ie neighbors, etc) I have to do ALL the speaking up in uncomfortable situations. I feel like I'm not taken care of at all - not safe, like a man should make u feel. Plus I fear i won't enjoy the teenage years of having a child(ren) - i just like til 6 years old or so. i don't want the rat race of school stuff and problems... i want to go away when i want, not being tied down. is this the reason or is it all the other stuff?
Geishawhelk Posted November 28, 2008 Posted November 28, 2008 I'd go for a trial separation on the condition you both attend MC together.
Zolar Posted November 28, 2008 Posted November 28, 2008 I think you're just using your head. I never considered having a child with anyone before until my DH. I was married for years to a man who I found sort of repulsive, but we were friends and I trusted him. I think if you are truly in love with someone that a side effect might be that you could see yourself having a child with that person. I'm sure that that's not always the case for everyone. But, I don't want a child again until (1) I feel I am in a safe place and where we are now, I'm afraid to leave the house... (nothing like being held at gunpoint in the Big City while pregnant to make you realize the importance of that one! On the bright side, I guess you never have to worry about child molestors if they kill your daughter while she's still in your womb.) We are working on a move back to my hometown, which is a safe place. (2) The current financial crisis will have to end so that we can make a decent living. This year has been worse than I could have predicted. (3) I have to be assured that I and the prospective child are safe from his insane family. Until things are different, it wouldn't be fair to any of us to bring a child into the world. I'm not sure how fair it is to bring a child into this nightmare, anyway, but he or she needs to be safe, loved and entirely provided for and given every good chance to make it in the future. I would never trust my child's health or education to another person. I don't believe in public schools (having worked in them) and I don't believe in allopathic medicine. I feel I have a lot to protect a child from - there are a lot of cruel, ignorant people in this world. I need to feel safe first. So, things are going to have to change a lot before I would consider having a child again. But, I also worry that I'm getting too old. I'm worried a lot about my health. I'm afraid I might never be the same, physically, since what happened. I don't want to die. I think it would be better to have no children than to be dead or to be so sick that you can't care for them.
Kamille Posted November 28, 2008 Posted November 28, 2008 You do sound very unhappy - and perhaps this is just because you are ranting in your post. And yes, LS is a safe place to rant. Some things about your family situation ring true to my work situation, where I was left feeling isolated and unfairly treated by competetive colleagues. You sound like an unhappy person looking for solutions outside of herself: this also means you are looking for reasons outside of yourself for your own unhappiness: your husband's meakness, your sister in law, your mother in law. I think the first step to better your situation is to ask yourself what little steps you can do to improve your own mood. In my case, it has involved accepting that there were some dynamics that I didn't fully understand and that I wasn't going to be able to control or change. That there were some colleagues I was just going to have to stop to pay attention to. That I was going to focus on what I like about my life and believe that if my attitude was right it would all turn out for the best. It has meant letting go of trying to work things out with one colleague of mine who's friendship I really valued. I also started going to the gym regularly and force myself to reach out to new people. In other words, I stopped measuring my happiness by the "success scale" I had attached to work. You don't need to be provided for, or to be your MIL's favorite to be happy. I know it may seem to you that your sister in law is purposefully flaunting her good fortune in front you - but I've come to find out from being both the envied and the envious that people rarely consciously target each other that way. The best way to ensure falsifying relationships is to perceive them as competetion. You start viewving people as a means to an end, not as complex human beings with their own lives going on. So what I've started doing is make sure to rejoice in my friend's and colleagues' good fortune.s It's much easier to change my mindset then to try to change my relationships with colleagues, especially when they are just going about the business of leading their lives. As to children, I feel that your reservations are perhaps more linked to your unhappiness then to anything factual you have stated. Most "normal" women I know do have to rely on family members and the childcare system to help them through the first few years - with no major ill effects on the children (isolation and overprotection is as bad a practice for children as absenteism. I think there is a balance to be reached there.) I could go on. You have a home and, apparently, a family that could help you through. I also wonder how much of these anxieties are the result of hollyday season, with its emphasis on family? Are you usually compelled to compare yourself to your SIL? If so, why? It's obviously not doing you any good.
michelangelo Posted November 28, 2008 Posted November 28, 2008 You have no respect for him, hate his family, feel entitled to a life of leisure, and pine away for "better" choices in husbands that you could have made. That somehow, an apartment that you pay for is beneath you? You are kind of immature and unrealistic about your life. Why not realize that to be a mother you are going to need to be unselfish and working hard all the time. If you are not up to that task, then do not have children. So you have to keep a job and use daycare. Welcome to the experience of most of the world. Get over it. But mainly, I think your assessment of your husband is kind of offensive. You want him to be something he is not, yet you chose him as a husband as he is. Classic, you want to change him. I think you should leave him and find out how much of a good catch he really is. Then complain to the next guy how you should have stayed with the last guy. It would fit the pattern of your life.
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