hello
I am wondering if any guys out there can help me.
My husband of 13 years told me about 3 weeks ago that he wasn't happy anymore and hadn't been in a long time. he told me that he "didn't feel the same way about me anymore" nut that he still really cares about me. He wanted a separation. he started staying at a friends house ( a female) and he said it was just platonic- sleeping on her couch. He had to come home every morning to work on the computer for work, but would leave at the end of the day. I found out that he had started a relationship that was not platonic with this woman ( he is her boss) a few days after we separated. When I found this out, I freaked, and told him that he could either stay and try to work things out ( no guarantees) or go and be with her and risk that his employers would find out what he was doing . The choice was his. He is in the army, and they don't look to kindly on things like that, and if he was caught, it could me that he would be demoted, fined, etc., and that really frightened me, as he is the "breadwinner" in our family. I told him that I would go to the base or unit padre myself if he didn't stop seeing this girl, and try and put the best spin on it that I could- end it now before it got even more out of hand.
He told me he wanted to try and work on things, but he doesn't have "those kind of feelings for me" but he did for her ( he was telling her he loved her, etc. in an email I found).
He has told me that this other girl wasn't the real issue, but that he thought I didn't trust him, never had, and that I tried to use money to control him ( we never seem to have any). We have three kids, two of whom are autistic, and they can sometimes be a handful. He says that part of his problem is that the house isn't clean enough, things we buy get trashed or broken etc., that I don't have the kids on a "schedule' ( or myself , for that matter). He said that he used to try and help out around the house, but gave up, and that he's too tired a lot of the time to help out. He's angry that there is not more money for "spending money" ( but our children's therapy costs $150.00/hr) , and that I spend too much time volunteering at the local family resource centre, which is , in his view, non-productive.
He has made a room for himself in the basement, and I am trying to talk with him and give due consideration to the points he is trying to make and act on them as much as I can. But today or son knocked a small lamp over which melted the corner of my husbands portable dvd player, which led to another round of "how everything is always messy' and " everything we have gets broken, etc." and that " I am using the kids autism as an excuse for their behavior".
I still do love the guy and want things to work out, but I don't know what else to do. I have been making an extra effort to keep the house as clean as I can but it still doesn't seem to make a difference. He keeps telling me that i don't understand what he is trying to get at, but I really am trying to. He's also told me that he does have a lot of fun when we are together, but it's not the same, and that he could have gone on the way he was, but taht would have been "living a lie".
Can anyone maybe give some input into what may be going on here?
Two other points of note: he is due to be deployed in November to Afghanistan, and he has also said that all of a sudden food that he used to hate now tastes good (?) and that he is noticing smells he hasn't been able to smell before (?) I don't know if that means anything or not, but it seems kind of strange.
