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Where do I go from here?

User-anonymous
Posted by: Anonymous
Flag
Fri 18, Jun 2010 at 10:19pm
Categories:
Making a Commitment

I have been seeing my lovely partner for over 2 years and I'm not sure where to go next. We have never talked about any further committment, although I think I stopped that conversation materiallising a while back when he hinted he wanted to talk to me about 'future' and I told him I was really happy as things were and I didn't want to spoil it. Ever since then neither of us have brought the subject up. I'm now at a point where I feel the subject has become taboo and it seems weird not talking about a future together (further than the next few weekends or holiday) and it is almost stunting normal conversation. The trouble is I do not know how I feel about further comittment i.e living together and I'm scared to broach the subject, in case he does want to and faced with a decision, I decide I dont want to, maybe having raised his hopes. I'm not entirely sure how I would feel if he doesn't actually want to live with me and he wants to continue as we are.
I guess I have monster issues following a hideous end to my marraige of 10 years and very messy divorce. To explain, after 8 happy years,we had a longed for son, then my ex refused to get involved with any childcare, housework, finances and his alcohol and spending problems started to worsen. By the time our son was 2, my ex's had started spending more and more of the family finances on his drinking binges, nights out and weekends away and had gone from gradually worsening verbal abuse following his drinking to physical abuse, at which point I filed for a divorce. He then went seriously off the rails, running up over £40k of personal debt in a year (luckily I managed to extricate myself from this early on) leaving me with all the bills to pay and subjecting me to a year of mental and physical abuse several tims per week after his drinking binges. I had to bar my bedroom door with a piece of floorboard, to keep him out, but this didn't stop him harassing me for hours sometimes, or I used to take my little boy and stay with friends as much as possible. Sadly this continued for a year due to shocking legal advice from a lawyer supposedly specialising in this sort of case. It was only it was only when a police officer who came out to arrest my husband, realised he had been there for the same reason a year previously, told to sack my lawyer and get a DIY injunction, that I managed to get him out of the property! Shortly after this I met my partner. He was kind and supportive and helped me through my depressive stages and my messy divorce, whilst my ex tried for a year to get his hands on a house left to me by my father to repay his huge debt. Anyway sorry to ramble on but I hope this explains where I am at.
My partner is divorced with 2 children, a lovely father, a caring, loving partner to me, has a good job, financially stable, doesn't drink much, couldn't be more different to my ex and I know he adores me and I him. We see each other several times per week, stay over most weekends, take all the kids out together when they are with us who get along famously..Which is all great, but all this tooing and frooing is hard work, I miss him when we are not together,feel sad that I'm back to being single mum for a few days, my son (now 5) has told me he wants me to marry him so he can be a his Stepfather...so I dont really know what is stopping me from moving things on and why I don't know my own mind Am I mad?? I am 43 and I know from many single friends that men like this in my age bracket are few and far between. How do raise the subject, when I don't know what I want without raising expectations? How do I understand what it is what I want? I can only think that I had such an unstable traumatic time, including death threats, the police and social services were regular visitors, I was nearly bankrupted and I'm now past it all, safe, secure and financially independent, that I have a mental block about making any significant changes.

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Comments

  • User-anonymous Anonymous Flag

    Dear OB11,  Given the history you describe it is not surprising that you have reservations about commiting to another relationship.  It sounds like your current partner understands this and is giving you space.   I suppose the question is what are, or what could you be doing with that space?   One option would be to get help to deal with the aftermath of a good relationship which deteriorated  dramatically after the birth of your longed for son.   Dealing with that might free you to make a decision about future intimate relationships.  Relate and Marriage Care counsellors can be contacted by clicking on external links on the right of this page.  It sounds like you went through two nightmare years , my heart goes out to you: I hope you find peace and happiness. 

    Mon 21, Jun 2010 at 7:34pm
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