My Marriage is Falling Apart

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My story is long and involved, but I will try to summarize as much as possible. My husband and I have been married for 5 years and have three children, ages 4, 2 and 9 months. I am a stay-at-home mom and he is a police officer. During our dating years, we were very involved in the church (I was the youth minister for a few years), Eucharistic ministers, and always attended Mass. With the birth of our children and his schedule, getting to Mass had not been consistent since the beginning of our marriage, but the desire to go was always there and we attended as we could. He has always been a happy-go-lucky, joking, loving, involved husband and father. In May of 2012, he returned home from a business trip…different. At first, he just seemed quiet. I questioned him quite frequently about what was wrong, and his response was always that it was nothing. As June went on, he became withdrawn, irritable, little appetite, had trouble sleeping, and no desire for sex. I thought perhaps it was the shift he was working, because he continually said that nothing was wrong. He started to go out drinking. A lot, sometimes 3 times a week, returning home at 3am or even later. He used to ask me if I minded him going out, but he simply didn’t consult me anymore. He was no longer affectionate with me, no longer seemed to want to spend time with me or talk to me at all, no more phone calls or texts just to say hi or even to tell me he was running late. He continued to maintain that nothing was wrong, and he was acting the same way he always had, even though I knew something was very different. He said that no one else, at work or in his group of friends, noticed anything different about him. One day in July, we had a huge fight about the way he was acting, and out of the blue he mentioned divorce, because it was obvious to him that he was no longer making me happy. I couldn’t believe that he was talking about divorce. I asked if he had prayed about our situation, and he said that he couldn’t remember the last time he prayed. He said that our situation was all my fault, the separateness and division between us, because I had made him feel so awkward by constantly asking what was wrong and why was he so different, that he didn’t know how to act. Ok, so I stopped asking questions. Instead, I got myself a therapist because I felt like I was losing my mind. There was and still has been no evidence of an affair, drugs, homosexuality- I’ve exhausted every possibility for this personality change. In October, I convinced him to go to therapy with me, but that did not go well at all, because he just kept saying that he hadn’t changed and that I was the crazy one. Still, no interaction with me, very little with the children, and hasn’t touched me in 8 months. He spends his free time at the gym or playing video games. He angrily denies that he is depressed. We used to have a normal, happy, loving, joking relationship. There is no relationship anymore. He does not smile, does not laugh. He does not share stories about his job as he used to. I feel unloved, unwanted, self-conscious, when there is no reason, as I am a reasonably attractive 30-year old. There is no affection, no talking, no…relationship. My breaking point came a few weeks ago when he came home from work and said that he had just bought a motorcycle, without talking to me about it first. My question really is, what is the proper Catholic thing to do here? I love him desperately, or rather, love who he was 8 months ago. I don’t want to separate, definitely don’t want to divorce, but how long can I live in such a loveless marriage? Is that what I’m called to do in this situation? Please help if you can.
 
“Gaslighting” is when someone gives false information with the intent of making a victim doubt his or her own memory, perception and sanity. Sometimes, though, people do it because they’re “gaslighting” themselves. I mean that when a spouse gives false information so that you doubt your own memory, it isn’t always willful abuse. Sometimes, they can’t be in denial with themselves and be honest with you, so they have to lie to you, too.

Correlation isn’t causation, so just because the change happened around the time of the business trip doesn’t mean that the business trip changed him. Your questions when he got home might have been a precipitating factor: that is, he was doing a good job of hiding things until he faced the stress of knowing you had noticed a change. It is hard to tell.

Does his boss notice anything at work? Does he have a partner? Do you know his friends? What do they say? Has he changed towards them? Do you know anyone who was on the trip with him? Can they guess what might be up? Just because he says there has been no change in him does not mean that there hasn’t been any change in him. It may be that there is a change that he doesn’t want to admit or doesn’t know how to cope with. If you have a few people on your side, it might be easier to get him to acknowledge that while there is a problem, he is the only common denominator.
 
I agree with EasterJoy’s comments, especially the insight that the change may not have been as sudden as it seemed, and specifically related to the business trip.

Just one question to perhaps shed some light on things. The new motor bike stands out as a cliched “mid-life crisis” action. Is your husband a few years older than you? My own mid-life crisis started at about age 35 when I struggled against the constraints of marriage and fatherhood and wanted more “me” time.
 
Hey Lizzie, sorry for what you are going through 😦

Do you incorporate your faith and God into your household? I read that you have not been consistently going to church, are you feeling closer or further away from Jesus? How is your husband’s relationship with Jesus?
I have heard many times that going to your parish priest helps a lot. Many times married couples feel separated from each other because either one has chosen to separate from God. Talk to your parish priest, he could help.

There is something to this story, is your husband depressed? Is there pornography involved? I’ve read studies that suggest these kind of jobs cause mental health problems such as depression. From these sign that you have described, my best bet would be he might be facing depression but is having trouble communicating it? There are some signs and you’ve noticed them yourself, which is a good thing.

As for your question, I think you answered it yourself. You don’t want to separate as you love him dearly. I say try communicating with him. Perhaps alone go and ask help from your priest, he will give you much better advise. If things get better maybe you can encourage him to go together.

I will pray for you!
 
Perhaps something happened at work - he is a police officer and sees, hears, is involved in stuff that “regular” people never need to be near.

The motorcycle:

I have some expertise there;)

If he bought a Triumph you are fine, but if he got a Harley you are hooped. Just kidding, and I hope you laughed a little.

However: the bike could be a big dare - *I’ve got this. Men have them. I dare you to deny me this pleasure. *

However… riding a bike can be very much like being a Catholic - I’ve got a few posts on my blog to that effect. Strange to say it may actually save him (If it’s not just a dare, and is something he would really enjoy)

If I were you - or if I could give you the benefit of my experience (as a 300lb biker who is a devout Catholic) - embrace the bike, ask to ride pillion, be interested in it - even if it is a dare.

But, but! First: Have a conversation with him about the bike. Ask if it’s a dare or for real, and if it’s for real then ask/demand that if he has this time to himself then he needs to reciprocate for the sake of the family.

Make sure he has proper MSF safety course and rides with the proper gear (ATGATT all the gear all the time), and if you ride with him get a helmet gloves and a jacket at least!

However, when I ride with my wife it is a wonderful time together - and for a guy it is great because it is task oriented and in silence:D For her, she gets to keep her arms round me and be close, as well as enjoy the ride, and I enjoy the companionship of my wife.

But having a bike doesn’t mean that he’s going to become a satanist;)
 
Thanks for all the responses. He does not have a partner, and claims no one at work has noticed any difference in him. My parents immediately noticed a difference without me telling them what was going on, and female friends of mine have also seen a big change. I have even had friends tell me that his voice seems flat, monotone. His male friends do not notice any difference in him. I had read, however, that sometimes depressed people (if depression is what this is) can put on a happy, normal face for friends, but are unable to keep that same exterior when with their spouse, who they can’t “fake it” with. The thing is that I’ve been with this man for years. I’ve known him since we were 15 years old, and we’ve been together for 10. I should know when something is different. My opinion should matter the most, because a. I am his wife, and b. I spend the most time with him of anyone, and I know him the best. But that’s a moot point, because he won’t believe me. I agree that it is possible that the changes I see might not be as sudden as I remember, especially because I had my third child at the end of March and may not have picked up on any small differences before the business trip. He actually roomed with a very good family friend on the trip, who says that nothing happened on the trip that would have caused this behavior. I have plenty of friends and family who agree with me, who see a difference, but he doesn’t believe them, the same way he doesn’t believe or want to believe me. I also thought mid-life crisis, but he is younger than me- just turned 30 a few months ago. I’ve been contemplating seeing a priest. Since this whole thing started I have RUN to the Lord, and I just can’t believe that in a crisis like this he wouldn’t do the same. It seems like his faith is completely gone, and that seems to have happened so abruptly too. I’m assuming there must be pornography, although I have no evidence of that, since we haven’t been intimate in 8 months. I think his disinterest in intimacy is great evidence of depression, as well as the fact that it is a problem he can’t deny. He can deny that he doesn’t talk to me and hasn’t changed, but he can’t deny the fact that we don’t have sex. I don’t think it’s willful abuse, I don’t think he’s acting this way to just be mean, but I’m so hurt and lonely without my husband. I am also concerned for my children and the fact that we are not modeling anything close to a healthy marriage. I just don’t know what to do anymore–I’ve been putting up with it for so long with no progress!
 
He did get a Harley! It was more of a “you’ve been telling me we can’t afford this, but I make the money so I’m going to get it anyway” situation, which is bizarre, because he would never have said anything close to that 8 months ago. Nor would he have ever made such a big purchase by himself. I have tried to look at the bike as something for him, something he wanted for a long time, and not a betrayal of our marriage or of me. I think the bike just really indicates that he has a problem that he thinks the bike will solve. And as a side note, he has no idea how to ride. He has his license and a helmet, but that’s about it. I hope he doesn’t kill himself. I’d like to save my marriage first!
 
Well now he’s proven what a big boy he is by buying the bike he needs to man up and learn to ride properly.

He needs the MSF course EVEN if he has a license, because on the road untrained he is a liability to himself, other traffic, and more importantly to his family.

I don’t think the bike is going to really help here - it did with me 'cos it was a way to de-stress, pray and meditate -and my wife bought me the MSF course for my birthday!

To me this sounds like depression - but I’m not a doctor.

He’s probably scared of getting “help” because of the job. “Macho men don’t need shrinks they need bikes.”

I’ll pray for you both.
 
Do you know who he goes out drinking with? Do his male friends know that he is doing this? Has he told them why? Might they be concerned if they knew? The change in his drinking pattern and the loss of interest in what used to interest him, including sex, sounds like depression or some great distracting stressor. Porn would not be my first guess; he’d be trying to spend time alone on his computer, and he wouldn’t be needing alcohol or motorcycles. No, he seems to be trying to self-medicate something, not hiding some secret life. If he were gradually spending more and more time in bad company, that would be one thing, but if he’s not confiding in his male friends, that is a red flag, too. Maybe something happened prior to the trip that he was too busy to reflect on until he got out of his normal busy routine.

My first instinct is that police work has a high divorce rate, suicide rate, and stress-related illnesses, and so many departments have resources for spouses and families with concerns. People in police work give so much, they deserve to be taken care of, too. It is possible that he did have some life-changing revelation while he was on that trip, even though his friend didn’t notice it. Something switched his noodle. Find out what mental health resources exist at work as preventative measures.

I suppose he could also be overwhelmed by your growing family, and something on the trip could have tripped that realization. It is hard to tell. Get outside advice, especially if you can find advice that’s aimed at the spouses of police officers. There is a lot of wisdom about how to navigate the rough spots in a police officer’s life, wisdom that has been learned the hard way, and you don’t want your family to be re-inventing that wheel.
 
triumphguy said:
To me this sounds like depression - but I’m not a doctor.

He’s probably scared of getting “help” because of the job. “Macho men don’t need shrinks they need bikes.”

I’ll pray for you both.
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I agree. I also think that there is also something else happening here. The OP has eliminated some of the possibilties (eg. an affair, homosexuality). I won’t guess what the something else is, but I do think there is something. It may be external (eg. work related), or internal. Whether the OP should try and find out what it is (if anything), or whether she should just leave it to him, I don’t know.

I have heard of several cases of men “bottling” something up, and not ever letting their spouse know what’s going on.

OP, you may well find that your parish priest can offer very valuable advice.

– Edit –
EasterJoy’s comments about getting help specifically related to police work are very good.
 
My ex-husband was in law enforcement. I’ve been around cops my whole life. They clam up and shut us out. Some of them or worse than others with doing this. It is not easy being the spouse of someone in law enforcement. Unfortunately even a wedding ring can’t always cross that thin blue line.

The reason his friends aren’t noticing a difference is b/c he’s probably the same around them.

Please speak to your Priest. Obviously something is going on with him.

I will be praying for you.
 
Many times I have wondered if this has to do with the sudden passing of his father. His dad, who he and his siblings lived with after his parents divorced, died of a heart attack in April of 2010. They were close. To me, he never seemed to grieve his father’s death, never talked about it much. Two weeks after his dad died, he went on the same “business trip” I am referring to in the first post, which I should clarify is not exactly a business trip, but the Police Unity Tour, a bicycle ride of over 300 miles from Jersey to DC to honor fallen officers. He did not attend the bike ride in 2011, but went in 2012 and came home “different”, according to me. So to summarize, right after his dad died in 2010, he made this big bike ride to DC. At that time, he mentioned when he came home that it was difficult; during the big candlelight vigil they have, he thought about his dad a lot. He then skipped the ride in 2011. In 2012, he went on the ride again, and came home a different person, and possibly depressed. I wonder sometimes if there was some trigger that happened in DC, something that made him revisit how he felt when he went in 2010, something that made him start the grieving process for his dad which I never saw him exhibit. It’s a possibility, I guess. He just seems so angry with me all the time, and I’m not sure what I’m doing wrong. I think talking to our priest is a good way to go. Thanks! If anyone has any other ideas or suggestions, please let me know.
 
Years ago, I worked with a man who went through a very difficult crisis. He was my superior and he was 20 years older than I was, which made it unusual that he would confide in me. He was, two years after his father died a sudden and violent death at the hands of his son (my boss’ brother), coming out of the ‘shock’ of losing his dad and finally beginning to sort of ‘ooze’ grief–it was emerging a little at a time until it hit him fully.

This man’s delayed grief led him to question everything in his life, particularly his marriage. He came into work quite early and stayed late. He spoke about his wife AND children in monotones: flat, disengaged conversation that was always condescending. He spoke of wanting to go away somewhere, by himself, to start over. On the other hand, he took his commitment to his wife & family quite seriously. He (they) really struggled. When I knew him last, he had become a pretty bitter, sarcastic person, with glimpses of his old personality only coming through at times.

He was not a flirt, but was obviously not comfortable sharing his emotions with other people. Why he talked to me about how he was feeling, I don’t know . . . except that I was young and worked for him (not on the same administrative level). He was a very ‘nose to the grindstone’ type of person. It was difficult for him to talk about how he was feeling. When I left the company because I was getting married and moving out of town, he gave me a sympathy card instead of a congratulations card! Tongue-in-cheek, of course . . . but you see where he was.

I have no idea if he and his wife weathered the storm. But I know that his grief hit late, hit hard, and led him to question everything in his life.
Just a thought . . .
 
male depression…many many men have it, but they don’t want to admit it because it’s not “manly” to be depressed. I don’t have advice, but this is my assessment (unless he is being unfaithful, but it seems like not). lots of men just have no idea how to open up about their feelings and probably never will.
 
The death of his Dad and the Memorial ride may have something to do with it. We all expect the first year after losing someone we love to be bad. What most people don’t realize is that the 2nd, 3rd years, etc can be even worse. For some reason people seem to think they should be “over” it by now.
 
maltmom said:
My ex-husband was in law enforcement. I’ve been around cops my whole life. They clam up and shut us out. Some of them or worse than others with doing this. It is not easy being the spouse of someone in law enforcement. Unfortunately even a wedding ring can’t always cross that thin blue line.

The reason his friends aren’t noticing a difference is b/c he’s probably the same around them.

Please speak to your Priest. Obviously something is going on with him.

I will be praying for you.
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They aren’t all the same, though. My husband is in a line of work like that, and it can be different. The OPs husband has changed, rather than failing to change as she might have hoped after marriage, and he doesn’t seem happy. A great many people wind up ruining their marriages because they don’t know how to handle really difficult times, but others figure out how to get through their difficult times, and their marriages are better than ever. That is what the OP is looking for…
 
OP: for the strength to continue to fight for your marriage, and to choose to love him at this difficult time, maybe read the book of Hosea.
 
Motorcycle. Lots of gym. Late nights away from home. No longer intimate with you. Behavior suddenly changed and others notice it, too.

There’s a lot of smoke there. I’m not saying he’s definitely doing something he shouldn’t, but I also believe that Occam’s razor is a pretty powerful truism.

Sometimes the correct answer is the simplest, most obvious one.
 
VirtusTransitus said:
Motorcycle. Lots of gym. Late nights away from home. No longer intimate with you. Behavior suddenly changed and others notice it, too.

There’s a lot of smoke there. I’m not saying he’s definitely doing something he shouldn’t, but I also believe that Occam’s razor is a pretty powerful truism.

Sometimes the correct answer is the simplest, most obvious one.
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Except, for the “no longer intimate with you”. I can’t speak for every man, I would expect that a man covering an affair would continue sexual relations with his wife, rather than stop them. My wife continued relations with me while she was having an affair…
 
VirtusTransitus said:
Motorcycle. Lots of gym. Late nights away from home. No longer intimate with you. Behavior suddenly changed and others notice it, too.

There’s a lot of smoke there. I’m not saying he’s definitely doing something he shouldn’t, but I also believe that Occam’s razor is a pretty powerful truism.

Sometimes the correct answer is the simplest, most obvious one.
Click to expand...
I know, right?? All of the signs are there! If you Google “is my husband having an affair” he fits every one of the symptoms. But he won’t admit to it! Sometimes I’m convinced that’s what it is, but he seems so sincere that it’s not . I told him at one point that I wished he was having an affair, because then at least there would be a reason for his behavior!! I’ve checked phone records numerous times and come up with nothing, and I don’t know how to get him to come clean, if that is what is going on, short of hiring a private detective.
 
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