Infidelity topping the list

I started a conversation with my husband about my medical condition. I am so tired of feeling sick all the time and not being able to do the simplest of tasks around the home, nor take care of our daughter the way she needs to be taken care of. He tells me that my medical condition is all stress related and then says all the stress I’ve been under has been due to my mother’s health problems. That is when I gave him a run-down of everything that I’ve went through over the past year and how he has contributed to my illness.

Stress time line:

February thru June – Three and a half months in the states taking care of my mother. For a better understanding, read how it all began.

Early June – Spending time re-adjusting to living in this country after being gone so long – the longest I’ve been gone since I moved here. This took me about six weeks. Not to mention trying to sort out all the emotions I had carried back with me from that long three and a half months.

August – My mother suffered from congestive heart failure and no one wanted to take her to the hospital so I called a friend who got her there just in time, saving her life in the process.

Mid- August – I suffer from a hormonal in balance that kept me in bed for three weeks. This is when I decided to no longer worry about my mother and start concentrating on my own health issues. I ended up going on Hormone replacement for one month.

Mid – September – Hormones are back to normal. My gynecologist tells me my left ovary is getting lazy and if we want to have any more children to do so immediately. He recommends fertility treatment to give me a boost.

October – After a mutual agreement between me and my husband, I go on fertility treatment to help conceive. Husband starts taking off on weekends. Claims he needs to get away. Things with him start becoming way too obvious. Fertility treatment goes better than expected but still, we don’t conceive.

November – I’m hit with another hormonal in balance. Worse then the first, and one that messed with the mind in the major way. I thought I was going out of my mind. Husband wanted me medicated and starts becoming very cruel towards me. I go to my gynecologist who puts me back on hormone replacement for three months which literally saves my life. Me and husband sit down to discuss our marriage where he tells me about how I am the cause that our marriage will break up and begins his blame shifting. He leads me to believe he is having an affair with A. Phone calls and text messages start coming through all hours of the day and night, even more so then the previous month. Husband falls in love with his cell phone and starts sleeping on the couch. He treats me like shit for three weeks all of which is verbal abuse. I go through a week of moaning about not having another child, not that I couldn’t, I just knew I couldn’t do so with this man. Due to a failing business, husband is trying to get me and my daughter to move back to the states to start a new life. By the end of the month, I found out about his affair through an email I find.

December – Found out more information about the affair and I go through more verbal abuse from husband. I’m faced with returning to the states with my daughter, alone, to start a new life. Husband is confused and continues changing his mind at least three times a day if we should stay or go. Physical abuse takes place one night when I decide to go which prevents me from going. In the end, I didn’t go due to a threat of getting the law involved.

January – Tried to work on the marriage only to find that he is not doing his part and the failing business takes priority which causes me to float and wonder where we are headed. Other woman contacts husband on the forum to tell him that he is making it way too obvious by ignoring her on threads. Then A puts two and two together and realizes that she was used by husband to get rid of the other woman. She tells him and then presents it on the forum telling husband off but not naming him. Husband is forced to contact the forum owner to explain what has taken place. He is worried that his position as moderator will be taken from him since earlier this month, moderator status was removed from a woman only because she went after a member hoping to start up an affair. Husband is relieved that moderator status isn’t taken from him. An attorney is contacted to inquire about international custody agreements. Husband is willing to sign over full custody to me of our daughter.

February – Forum problems continue only because A doesn’t want to let it go. Husband is back to his old self with blame shifting and verbal tactics. Business is still going down.

March – I find out that husband hasn’t taken full responsibility for the affair he had which puts us back to square one. He is still not working on the marriage and blames his business for it. The other woman contacts husband via email. He hires a new employee at work, someone he knows, that in the past, he has admitted to being attracted to.

April – Chat authorization comes through from the other woman. I am told by husband that he never wanted me to find out about his affair. He still isn’t working on the marriage and refuses to talk about it. Business is still going down.

After running all this by husband, he didn’t have much to say. I told him that most of my stress came after finding out about his affair and the way he treated me. I went on to say if he really loved me and cared about my well-being, he would have put a stop to the way he was treating me knowing I had already been through enough shit the entire year. The only thing he continued saying throughout the entire conversation, was that all the stress was related to my mother and he wouldn’t accept the fact that the way he treated me before and after I found out about his affair contributed a great deal. I was steaming by this point. Especially after he said that I must be feeling better to be able to talk with him about this. I told him I wasn’t feeling better, I was just using the strength I had to get it all out. The conversation lead no where, I wasn’t getting through and he was going to believe what he thought to be true. Needless to say, I was hit with anger big time. After I cried it all out, I felt much better.

I guess I should have just ended it there, but it was a good opportunity to share with him what the biggest stress for me had been all this time.

I tell him, “You know, through it all, the one thing that probably caused my body to finally shut down, was the constant thinking about going and starting a new life alone with our daughter. I don’t even know where to go or how to start and that in itself is enough stress for anyone.”

He then replies, Oh, so you have been thinking about leaving this entire time? That must be why you haven’t been working on the marriage.”

Being quite upset, I tell him, “We wouldn’t have a marriage if it weren’t for me. I have been holding this marriage together for a year and a half now. What have you been doing to work on this marriage?”

He replies, I cannot concentrate on the marriage because things keep on coming up with the business.

The conversation ended as it always does with nothing but excuses on his part and him not seeing things for what they really are.

In the end, I came up with the conclusion that perhaps my body subconsciously shut down due to the fact that I had decided to leave this month if things didn’t change in our marriage. On top of that, starting a new life alone with my daughter could have been just too overwhelming for me to accept. The illness took control over my mind and body to the point where I was not able to concentrate or do much at all which prevented me from traveling to start a new life in the states.