We have known each other for 8 years, married for 6. We have a 3 year old and a just under 1 year old and we both work full time. He works 10 to 12 hours shifts 4 days a week and I work 8 to 4pm M- F. His work isn't really physically demanding but mine is moderately physically demanding. I teach a preschool class at an expensive private school. I have a bunch of two year olds on me all day. Because of my schedule I am also the primary caregiver to our children. I take the kids school in the morning ( we can't afford tuition at my private school so they go to one down the street), get them after work. Then home for play, dinner, bath and bed. I get hung on all day. Someone is constantly touching me or needing me to touch them all day -- guiding hands, shaking hands, other people's fluids on me, hugs, etc. It gets exhausting. It starts at 5/5:30am when the kids start waking up and doesn't end until my husband goes to sleep and I wiggle out of his arms and finally get to lay untouched on my side of the bed.
My body doesn't feel like it belongs to me and it gets to me. Now I can't tell the kids not to hug mommy. And I don't want them to ever think I don't want to hug them because I always do. My problem lays with my husband who seems to demand to constantly have access to my body or needs to be touch from the time he gets home until he goes to bed.
Example: I will be blow drying my hair after a shower and one comes in (usually my husband) and followed after him come the kids. And they all want my attention and my touches and to lay on my body. I just want a minute to finish my hair.
It is the same when I take a shower or am sitting on the couch. The minute my arms are free here come three bodies wanting to lay on me.
It has gotten to the point where it is physically hurting me. I have to take medication for all the pain. My husband is not a small man and I am a small girl.
I enjoy cuddles as much as the next person but to have someone constantly on you is exhausting.
I can't even pee without three people rushing in. And my husband know better. I get my 1 year old doing it but I need my husband to help keep them away when I need to do things but he says they all just want to cuddle me. " Can it not wait until after my shower, Jon?"
Anytime I say that he gets really hurt. He literally pouts but this is ridiculous. I cuddle them all the time. All the time. I just want to cook or use the restroom or blow dry my hair or watch a show without a grown man throwing himself on me all the time.
I might be being a bit mean and I really need some perspective. I love that they love me so much but he (not the kids) has to give me some personal space here. He could cuddle the kids alone for a minute. I know he use to just having me to himself to cuddle whenever he wants but now he has to share my space with 2 other people and I only have so much space.
I am also running into the problem of him not helping out with the kids. It ties into the cuddling thing. He can't be alone with them. If he is, they all 3 come find me. They can't sit and just watch a movie together while I make dinner. They have to be around me in the kitchen. He will come find me in the shower and the kids will follow. He will follow me to a room I am trying to clean and the kids will follow. I have to be with him with the kids at all time. I am trying to think of a time he spent time with the kids alone and the one time was when I was really really sick and the baby couldn't be around me so he put me in a room for 2 days and everyone left me alone.
He refers to me when they want something too. "Can I have a cookie?" - says my 3 year old. " Oh go ask mommy?" Can he not make an executive decision regarding their care while I am indisposed?
I am scared he is extremely co-dependent or maybe just scared to be alone with the kids? I don't know. He pretty much just looks defeated and deflated every time I bring it up.
Don't get me started on the sexual affection he gives me. He grabs my breasts when he knows they hurt ( I just recently stopped breastfeeding/pumping), constantly touches my butt even when I doing something important. He once grabbed me at a park with kids around and bunch of other parents. I get he was trying to be playful but come on. Parks, disneyland, the grocery store. I can't escape his hands. He says he just wants me to feel appreciated but it doesn't make me feel appreciated at all. I feel like a toy for him or a pillow. It isn't attractive when you are holding a little baby trying to wrangle a toddler for a grown ass man who isn't helping you to grab your butt in public.
A nightly routine will go like this:
I have kids on me all day
We come home at 5 and make dinner and play
He comes home at 6:30 and needs his "decompression time" until 7:30. ( I never get that)
Kids go to bed
I clean and pack lunches
I sit on the couch for a minute to just breathe and he lumps over to me to "cuddle" with me (and usually fall asleep on me) for an hour
Then bed where he has to cuddle me again until he falls asleep
If I ask for any space to sleep whatsoever he gets his feelings hurt because I use to love to fall asleep holding each other. Then I feel the need to apologize and he makes pout faces all night because I must not love him.
He also wants praise for every little thing he does around the house and with the kids. I asked him to call and make an appointment and he did which is great. In a response text I wrote thanks because I don't get a ton of time at work to text. He was so hurt that I hadn't thanked him more. When he takes out the trash it is like he needs a medal. Getting him to do anything around the house is like pulling teeth.
He was never like this before the kids. He was tidy and kept his own place, he wasn't so physically needy, he helped out, he didn't assault me in public spaces, he never pout faced like a child at me.
I have tried talking to him about it but like I said he just pouts. How do you approach a grown man with a serious issue who pouts? His response is always" you don't want me to love you."
I am physically exhausted. I am very close to leaving him because my body just cannot take it. I need my body back. If my husband would just back off a little bit and take some of the burden off me I could breathe and we could have real cuddle and intimate time where we could BOTH enjoy it.
Can I explain that without sounding selfish? Also, should I keep praising him for doing stuff around the house? No one thanks me.
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