@Here we go again when we get overwhelmed with emotions it's not wrong to feel these emotions. Instead we need to sit with these emotions and sort them out and that's why a therapist can be helpful.

You have shared how very much you did love your husband and wanted your marriage to work out. Unfortunately, when your husband served four tours in Iraq he was changed and he also developed PTSD. This challenge is very hard for a spouse and it's also very hard on the person who suffers from PTSD. When someone is challenged with PTSD they have to come to terms with how they are never going to be who they were before they developed PTSD. It's very hard for a spouse to understand how this is going to change their relationship. What has challenged me is how people wanted me to be who I was before I developed PTSD and I can't explain that I am changed and that even I am struggling with being different.

If you focus too much on "he did this to me" and embrace anger and resentments, that can prevent you from healing and learning how to accept this challenge for what it is. I put up that link so you could listen to different people talk about suffering from ptsd and also spouses who suffer because of how the person they love has changed. It's very hard to finally let go of what we wanted to have which is what you experience when you talk about having beautiful children and how you want to love him and work on healing as a family etc.

It's not unusual for someone suffering from PTSD to need to change their life and not be happy trying to reclaim who they were before they had so many experiences that changed them and traumatized them to the point where they developed PTSD. The desire to distance from any reminders is incredibe and can be debilitating. It's very possible that your husband wishes he could be part of, but, also gets the urge to distance and this challenge can cause a lot of emotional confusion in him. One of the things that someone suffering from PTSD is challenged with is their sense of control. This is something the sufferer has to work through and they will choose to do things that don't seem normal. Given the fact that trauma happens when someone experiences things that deeply threaten them in adverse ways, they get overwhelmed and can develop a change in their brain that is called Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. This is NOT something you can fix or change but something your husband has to work out himself and it is NOT easy and it won't be easy for anyone that has a relationship with him to deal with.

Your are right, it's "so unfair and painful". Yet, what will help you sort this out for yourself is to understand this isn't something you can change and that even though this is hard the best thing for you is to accept you can't change this and allow him to go and find whatever he needs to do to bring him some kind of sense of self again. And the truth is, some day as you work through this and learn to accept it you can actually help your children learn to do the same. And your husband isn't really detaching from you or his children but who he was before his life was changed and he developed this very difficult challenge that he will have to work on the rest of his life. PTSD is an extreme anxiety disorder, it can get exhausting for the sufferer. Some have it worse than others too. It's very hard to live with someone who struggles with this and it can cause the partner to develop secondary ptsd symptoms.

The healthiest thing for you to do for yourself and for him is to let him go so both of you can work on living your lives and working on your healing. There will be a period where you will mourn what you feel you lost, that will take time for you to finally process. Yet, you can heal from this loss and as you do so you will gain some knowledge and skills to guide your children to learn to do the same. And honestly, if you do love him, pray that he finds peace within himself because when someone struggles with ptsd, that is genuinely a challenge for them.