Desiring other people

Oh Adam, I feel so badly for you. I feel badly for your wife. I have lots to say here because I live and see both sides of this story.

I guess firstly your wife sounds like me. Just lost so much and having no get up and go. I don't work, but I do have 3 kids, so that is a little different. My dad always told my H it was his fault I was overweight. Now that was a half true statement. My H told him well I didn't set on her and force her to eat. But he did contribute to my feeling of helplessness. That can do crazy things to ya. To be in an abusive relationship like I had been in the past (and kinda currently as well) it just drains every bit of self worth out of you and you have no one but yourself to dig you out of that whole. That sounds kinda like where your wife is stuck right now.

Financial debt could be holding her back. She knows it is on your mind. She knows you will have to take care of that and she may be blaming herself for putting the burden on you. That is a hefty amount that the loan is for, I am sure that it is overwhelming to think how that is gonna be paid for. Is she by any chance passive aggressive? Meaning does she have ignore it and it will all work itself out mindset. I know that is my downfall.

As for going back to work, it is difficult as a larger person to find the acceptance and a lot of time you have already made up your mind that ain't gonna work trying to find a job. Larger women in my opinion have good luck when find "mothering" roles in terms of employment. At least there folks seem to be more accepting. Set w/ a senior, baby set, health care. I saw she worked in day care. Maybe keep a child or two at your home. If that is to demanding and down't work w/ her video gaming schedule,(I'm not being funny, a lot of people take video gaming very serious) maybe before and after school care. It pays fairly well. Here it is 50.00 a week. It's an hour in the morning and 3-4 hours in the evening. 3 kids $150. a week and never have to leave the house. I used to have a home owned day care. I had my 2 boys and 8 other full time kids plus 4 after schoolers. I never had to leave the house. I gave that up not because of my issues but because of my H. But that is a whole nother story.

Now I pet set. For farm animals mainly and reptiles. That provides some spending money every now and again. It would be helpful if she did something for money. Pet setting, dog walking. Even if it was not enough to pay on loans. (what a depressing way to spend your hard earned money) But it might give her confidence. New clothes, a hair cut, a new CD jsut a little enjoyment in life can go a long way.

I can feel for you. I know that sex is not what it once was back in your skinnier day's, I am not exactly a small fry. I tell my H no one chooses to be over weight. Little kids don't say one day when I grow up I want to be OBESE. It kinda chooses you and you have to deal with it and keep it from taking over your life and it will. That could be part of the sex issue. She doesn't feel as attractive as she once did. You still love her, my H still loves me. But it is just not what it once was.

She doesn't seem to be receptive to touches and hugs and stuff. That is difficult. That is one of the reasons my H and I started seeing a marriage T. My H feels unlovable and hurt by my actions, or lack of actions. I'm not just talking in the bed room stuff, but everyday touch stuff. There is zero here in my house hold. I can relate to your wife. I told the T my H was like a horny dog. Always attached to me, breathing all over, rubbing on me, good God get off of me is all I can think. I have learned to stay still and not walk away from his advances but I sure don't respond to them either and I realize now that hurts him. That seems to be as far as I can get to accepting his advances. I think that has to do w/ abuse. Having been in that position it leaves horrible footsteps on your heart. That alone is reason she should get into counseling. I do trauma T, trying to work on this but I don't have a supportive husband, so I can't work on that a lot right now. But it sounds like your wife has that much going for her, well for her and you to.

My H is the soul provider for me and 3 kids plus himself, definitely think before you purpousely have children. As for the video games it is most likely IMO a substitute for pot or what ever her drug of choice was. It is also mind numbing. You get an adrenalin rush, you spend hours of time numb and not in touch w/ reality, what's not to like. Except it don't pay the bills, it comes in between people, it destroys real relationships. Like any addiction it starts out small and harmless. What is it they say addictions will take you places...... it will take you further then you ever wanted to go.

Adam I feel badly for you. I see your wife in me, and your struggles in my H, except you guys get along. I fear to soon you will not get along if this doesn't get resolved. I don't want it to turn into resentment and slowly eat away at you guys.

I remember now what the title of this was, it was about finding someone else attractive.
No, that is not wrong. I tell my H we are not blind, we can't pretend to be. God made beauty to be seen, but not always touched. You can't touch the sky, you can't touch the soul, you can't touch the sun, all of Gods most wonderful creations you can't touch.

I hope I didn't take over your thread w/ my stuff. That was not my intent. I just want to let you know that I can relate and how. I hope this was not to scattered and wishy washy. By evening my brain is toast and I can't keep much together. I wish yall the best. Keep posting and letting us help support you.

People show their side that are desirable, no relationship is as perfect as they make it seem - or we believe it is. Yes life will be different with someone else, but you'll also have various problems with them as well, who knows? Employment is extremely, extreemmely stressful But it sounds like she is going overboard with the gaming

She could very well be addicted to gaming yes, may be using as a mean of coping - an unhealthy way of coping, to forget about stress... I used to do it, I got lost in video gaming for years. The hardest part was pulling away from the only thing I was so familiar with - i had an online bf, I had online friends, people to talk to who understand and go thru the same things, that's why nobody could change me. I mean there's nothing wrong with being online, it's just that... she is risking her health her life. It's tough, and I am hoping your wife doesn't fall deeper into her addiction or she will be in for a rude awakening

It sounds like your finances are getting worse. I would advise you do a couple of things. You say you don't think counseling would help, but from my perspective you two definitely need some kind of outside help to get communicating about how you feel, how she feels, why she can't or won't look for a job. You talk a lot about your feelings (which is only natural, since you came to this site as an individual) but you need to understand what her feelings are. You mention agoraphobia. If that is likely - all the more reason to try counseling. You don't seem to know why she won't look for a job. Is it laziness or could it be that her debt is so high that it seems insurmountable, and she's paralyzed by the anxiety or the shame she might feel if she can't get a good paying job, even with her education. Counseling could help her deal with issues like that as well.
I wish you all the best in finding a way to make both of you happy and healthy.

Hi Adam --

What you said about wanting more demonstrative affection and so on - my husband felt the same way, so he told me he wanted it, and so I learned to express myself a little differently to give him joy. I presume married people ideally want to please each other; it's a part of the mix.

I will not judge your wife or say what she should do or if she needs a counsellor or what have you -- but I can sure understand you feel it is not a very equal situation. You're being very responsible and she's not. When my husband was briefly like that, I said we can't live like this. This is not being adult. This is not appropriate. I want to feel we are equal. Sure not the same, and better at different things, but equal. Maybe you want the same thing. But it sounds like you sure need some real communication with your wife and time for problem solving. I feel sad that you had to air this with all of us on this board, rather than her taking the time to take this stuff seriously. Maybe equality is what you want, or maybe there are some other values in priority, but shared or differing values are very important for spouses to discuss.

Since she is such a great cook, I bet she could get a cooking job without a lot of difficulty. Something to keep her going until she feels more confident for something ambitious.

I hope you both can resolve these problems in your shared situation! It sounds tough.

And the initial thing you asked about, well, you are just seeing the qualities your wife is lacking - and she's not even trying to improve. If you don't try in this world, you get nothing. But there is no shame in feeling attraction to attractive people, imo.

AdamK it might be helpful to take it a step further and get a copy of her student loans.(transcripts from the school) It's important that you know the amount as you would have a better perspective on it. Not saying you should pay for the loans. She sounds immature thinking maybe since she had four brothers and had everything done and payed for by someone else(parents) she wasn't taught the importance of what being accountable and responsible is about. I admire you for your compassion towards her. It's obvious that you love her unconditionally. It seems you have taken every measure possible to communicate with her about your concerns. Take away her video games.She is being irresponsible and inconsiderate of you. Take care

Things are worse than I imagined. I recieved a call from collections for her loans. Apparenty she hasnt been answering their calls or returning thier voicemails. She owes as of today. $95,000. It can be resolved one of two ways. I can come up with 70% of the funds and pay it off. Or I come up with 10% and thier would be 0% interest for the remainder of the loan.

They want 10% in by two weeks or it goes back to sallie mae and they start to take legal action.

I talked to Sarah and she agreed to work anywhere to come up with the monthly payments. Im affraid I wont be able to get the money they want.

I didnt think this was that big of a problem until today. Now I dont know how to deal with it.

Part of me wants to resolve this, and part of me wants to run away and not deal. I feel like this just got dropped into my lap now.

The monthly payments would be $460 for the next 15 years.

oh no adam. I wish there was something I could say, something I could do. That is unbelievable. I hope your wife does go back to work. She can flip burgers or work at wal mart if she must. I am glad she said she'd work, I hope she makes good on that.

I am not a fan of bankruptcy. Can you bankrupt student loans? I know it would ruin your credit for 5 -8 years. But a $460 loan might just ruin you if you don't do something.

$95,000 seems so overwhelming, is $460 a month possible for you? I'm so encouraged for you that your your wife agreed to look for work. She will feel better also knowing that there is a solution you can work on together. I think when it's broken down monetarily like you stated, it seems like a lot of money but it doesn't sound as unreachable, does that make sense? warm thoughts to you both.

If she worked even at minimium wage that would be 900 month at 40 hours a week.

If she worked the last 6 year at walmart and used her whole paycheck on the loan it would be paid off today.

Tell her that. Without judging but just as an FYI

You can't file bankruptcy on school loans.

Can she take out another loan for the 10% to bring it back down to 85k then pay off the the 10% while paying minimum payments for the school loan?

I wouldn't put my name on any loan (associated with this) because your credit will be terrible if you cosign anything with her.

I'm going to see if I can borrow the 9K and give it to her. She has terrible credit. I don't think anyone would loan her money.

We don't have any shared finances really, except our taxes and a credit card I co-signed with so she can go to the VET for her cat, but it has a really low limit.

Do you really want to take a loan out?

I do not know the law in the USA, but normally something like a student loan, the partner is not responsible for.

Is there such a thing as an IVA in the USA? An IVA is a private agreement between a debtor and creditors and can mean that a person pays back a lot less than the debt, and then its over. Here it can reduce a debt even as much as 50%, but the payments have to be met each month otherwise things get sticky. Your wife just has to get a job, there's no other way out of it. I really hope that this is the making of her.

Adam is this a good idea to give her 9K? will she put that towards her loan? intuitively it seems risky to think she will be responsible with that money. Not wanting to sound rude. You love your wife and want to make things better however given her history of not being responsible about things in general and putting it on you to take care of. It seems that you have faith and you want to trust her to do the right thing. I admire you for wanting to give her the money. It would be something to reflect on maybe.
take care

Adam, have you thought of contacting a debt counseling service for her? Often they can lower payments, stop interest etc.

A debt consulting service, that is what I was thinking of.

My sister paid off her husbands student loans as well as hers. Her H has never learned to accept responsibility for any past debts or current debts. She has said so many times she wished she would have let him pay on his own loans and the feel the gratification that comes along w/ successfully paying that off and getting to see what life is like w/ that money to spare.

Because she paid his loans, he never learned to be responsible. He has bought a new car only to decide a few months later he didn't like it and traded it in for another. It has been terrible for there relationship. If he could have only learned to pay his debt. He put all of his schooling, meals, gas everything on a credit card. So it was not exactly school loans, it was but on a credit card. 4 years of gas, meals, books and tuition add up.

Just sayin, it may not be that way for you guys. I hope not.

I don't know if it is a good idea. My instincts are telling me to let her solve the problem. She agreed to the loan, and I didn't cosign anything of the loans with her, in addition the bulk of the loans were there before we were married.

My feelings tell me I love her and want to help her out. Shouldn't we make sacrifices for the ones we care about? Where is the limit? Does said limit have a dollar amount?

Im not pushing you to do something that doesnt feel right Adam but I want to go a little further to explain to you what a debt counseling service does and if it still doesnt feel right then I hope you'll find something that does.

Google 'debt counseling service'. You'll get a whole list of them. Some can even be contacted online so she wont have to leave the house and since she loves the computer maybe it will be easier for her. I think I saw one that was US Gov related? But most are private enterprises. They will meet with your wife (or online) and discuss her outstanding debts. They will help her make a budget. They will counsel her on how to keep the budget. They will contact her creditors in her behalf and arrange lowered payments, etc. She will make one payment to the service who will then disperse it to her various creditors. They do charge a fee but it is a small amount that is added to her monthly payment. Since the debt is still outstanding, working with a credit counseling service may still show as a negative on her credit report but it is substantially better than having a no pay show.

The good thing on this is that she is handling it on her own (if she got the min wage job). You are just helping by supporting her in taking care of her debt. You dont need to do more than encourage her to follow thru. She does the work and makes the payments.

Adam,

So you, following learning about how bad the situation is, have gone into a problem-solving mode. Tell us what she has done following learning how bad the situation is. How many job applications has she filled out?

TL;DR any of the responses but I did read the original post.

Everyone desires what they perceive as perfect... What is "perfect" is often what we cannot have because we idealise things until they become reality & we are able to properly process their flaws.
So it's perfectly normal & not awful of you to be having fantasies of being with someone other than your current partner. And I admire you for not choosing to cheat on her. But you can either take these desires as a sign to end something that isn't working or as a sign to improve the bond!
That choice is yours & yours alone -- And neither choice is better than the other. But a lot of what makes relationships work is finding a partner whose flaws or downfalls are compatible with our own. It seems like yours, at least from what you describe, are very incompatible with hers & that is a major source of unrest.
Hopefully this message finds you well & closer to coming to a positive resolution.

I think i've come to a decision. I am going to borrow $3,000 for her. That is the limit that I can borrow and still be confident to pay it back with or without her help. I hope this is enough to satsify her lenders, but I must realize this is her problem. I can be supportive and help her, but It's not my responsibilty to pay for her debts. She agreed to borrow the money for school, not me. She is the one who must take the lead and repay what she has borrowed. If I took care of this, I am just enabling her irresponsibilty and it would be much more money than I have to pay. I have to do what is best for me. I wouldn't expect her to make sacrifices of herself that hurt her well being for my own. I think $3,000 is a generous amount. Expecially after being lied to about the status of this debt. A lie of omission is still a lie. I've tried very hard to be honest with her and it bothers me she keeps things from me. I feel better about this issue now.

Adam you are a smart man. Let her pay her own debts, pay 3000 dollars and show her you care. You have taken care of the issue and saved the day. You are a wize man. Somehow you managed to show your wife you mean business and help her see you care. That sounds like a very balanced option. I hope she knows how lucky she is to have you.

She has 95,000 in student loans, she needs to pay it back. If say you and her want to buy a house or car or even get a credit card it's very possible that you could be declined due to her student loans and lack of payments.

Some states even look upon student loans as a joint loan once married.

You are in a tough situation that is for certain.