Struggling

Posted: Feb 26, 2016

Sorry in advance for this being so long, but I could really use some impartial advice. My husband and I have been married for almost 20 years, together for 6 years before that, since I was 16. We have always had a pretty chaotic relationship. We lived together before we were married and fought a lot even then. I would go back to my mom's for a few days or couple weeks, and then he would call and I would go back. After we were married, things didn’t get any better. He was in an accident less than a year after the wedding and has not worked since because he says his neck and back hurt too much, so my income has been the only one the entire marriage. There was one point where I was working two full-time jobs and many times where I have worked a full-time and part-time job at the same time. He never helped around the house, didn’t cook, and pretty much didn’t do much of anything other than play video games and order me around as his personal servant. He would insist that I come home on my 30 minute lunch break from work to feed him lunch even though it took 10 minutes each way just to drive home. When we moved even farther than that, he would just starve all day and then blame me because he wasn’t eating anything. When my mother was sick, he was so unsupportive. I was taking her to chemo and doctor's appointments in the city, and he would constantly call and be pissed off because I was taking too long to get home and he was hungry. When she really started getting worse, I came in the bedroom one night really upset and crying. I just wanted someone to comfort me, and all he said was, "She's had cancer for 5 years. What did you think was going to happen? You would think you would be more prepared for this". He has left me various places, left me at work to walk 7 miles home at 1:00 in the morning in a skirt and heels. He locked me out of the house in the middle of winter, knowing I had no money to go anywhere and had to sleep on the deck in the cold. Things have gotten physical occasionally in the past, the last time to the point where he strangled me. His fingermarks were actually bruised into my neck. I left that night, but went back when he threatened to throw my mother's ashes away. He has told pretty much all of our friends that I am crazy and have been diagnosed bipolar, which isn’t even true. At one point, I wasn’t allowed to carry any money or bank cards. I had to ask him for money if I needed anything even though the money was from my pay. Last year, I left him. My dad had given me a little money and I used it to secure an apartment. I left while he was out with a friend. He had no clue I was leaving. I should have blocked all contact, but I didn’t. He called me constantly saying he had had a revelation and knew how wrong he had been and wanted another chance. I kept telling him no, until he said he was going to sue me for alimony in the divorce, and the lawyer I had said there was a good chance he would get it, possibly even lifetime alimony, since I had been supporting him the entire marriage and we had been married so long. My husband said that if I gave him another chance, he would sign a contract stating he would not sue me for alimony if I ended up deciding I still wanted the divorce. The other terms of the contract were supposed to be that he would do 100% of the housework if he was not contributing to any of the income. So, I let him come back. The lawyer drew up the contract, but he said the contract that was drawn up wasn’t what he agreed to sign on the phone, so it either had to be completely changed or he wasn’t signing. I was so tired of arguing about it at that point, I just said forget it. He is nicer than he was. He does do some, but not all, of the housework. We have been together for so long, I do care about him, but I'm not in love with him. I'm not physically attracted to him. He has very poor hygiene. He will go for weeks at a time without taking a shower. I'm not sure what he does to clean himself up in between, if anything, but he smells and very rarely uses deodorant. We still fight a lot. There are occasionally times when we have fun together, but most of the time he annoys me almost every time he opens his mouth. I have told him I still want a divorce. He says he just wants a fair chance to show me he can be the man I fell in love with, and if after that fair chance, I still wanted a divorce, he would sign the papers without suing for alimony if I paid off the credit cards that are in his name. I had no idea how I would come up with the money to do that, but I just got some news that I will be getting some money in a few months, enough to pay off those credit cards, and have a few thousand left over, so what seemed impossible is now very possible as long as he doesn’t go back on what he said and sue me for the alimony anyway. He is desperate to keep me, so it is hard to say what he would do if I leave. I'm struggling with what to do. I'm not exactly happy in this marriage, but I know he will never leave me or cheat on me. He has no interest in any woman but me, and I really believe this to be true, but I don’t think he could get another woman even if he did try. He is familiar. I don’t have to work at trying to impress him. Like I said, I have never been in the dating scene since we have been together since I was 16. He's the only serious relationship I have ever had, but I had slept with a couple other men when we had broken up before we were married, but that was 20 years ago, and the thought of being with someone new now is pretty scary. My husband always tells me that he is sure I won't have any trouble finding a man to sleep with, but once they get to know me, they are either going to just walk away or beat the crap out of me because if I can drive him to do the things he does and he loves me so much, imagine what someone who doesn’t love me would do. My mom got divorced at 38, and she was alone for the rest of her life. I don't mind being alone, but it would be nice to be in love with someone again. He says that I'm just going through a midlife crisis and my hormones are just out of whack so I want to go sleep with other guys and that is why I want to leave him. He says that I just want that feeling of a new relationship where it is exciting and that is not what real love is about. I realize that love doesn’t stay with that fresh and new feeling forever, but it has to be better than what I'm feeling now, doesn't it?? I also have never lived alone other than the month when I left last year. It was hard, especially moving in and having to carry stuff up the apartment stairs. I'm not that physically strong, but I did it, and I didn’t really mind living alone. It was actually pretty peaceful to be able to do whatever I wanted when I wanted. I'm not saying I have been a saint in this relationship. I can be really mean and spiteful and I have a bad temper, but it is usually in response to the way he has treated me. My mom always hated him. My dad has met him once and can't stand him. My best friend hates him. Pretty much every friend I have ever had doesn’t like him, and I have actually had friends not come around me anymore because of him. Even his friends have asked me why I stay with him, even though he has always told me that his friends don’t like me. They must be pretty good at acting because it's never really seemed that way to me. It's not even just me that he treats this way. He has a very patronizing attitude towards everyone. He is one of those people that has something to say on every topic, and he always thinks he is right and half the time he is wrong. He says he can't survive without me, and I will be essentially killing him by divorcing him. I just don’t know what to do. I know what my friends will say. They will tell me to leave. I just wanted some advice from people who aren’t biased towards me. If you’ve made it this far, thanks for listening. ;