[StarPonysMama]

Has anyone had any experience with the following type of thing? It's a guy who doesn't want to ask for help so, I told him about PC, and he's still chicken so, I figured I'd ask for him.

A friend of mine has been with his children's mother for 10 years. They have never been married. It's a bit of a long story so if you don't want to read or respond that's cool - just thought I would throw it out there. Let's just call my friend "Joe".

Joe was best friends with Jeff. Jeff was married to Beth and and they had a child. Joe was married to Patty. Joe and Patty were unable to have children. This ended up ending Joe & Patty's marriage.

Joe went about life dating here & there, working, etc while he was waiting on Patty to consent to divorce.

Jeff, Beth's husband and Joe's best friend went back to his home town for about a month to find a job because he and Beth had discussed moving back to Louisiana (where they were both from). In the meantime, Beth starts calling Joe saying she is lonely without Jeff and wants to know if she can go to the drag races with him. Joe, thinking that this is a best friends girl and he's being a good friend to his best friend, says, "Sure".

He notices that Jeff's wife is very friendly. Inadvertently in that week Jeff's wife starts telling Joe about the awful relationship between her and Jeff and how lonely she is. She tells Joe how all along she wanted him and that she doesn't know why she married Jeff. Inadvertently she is seducing Joe. Joe gives in because he's young and dumb and wants a family. Just before Jeff is about to come back home to Louisiana, Beth finds out she is pregnant. With guess who's child? Yep, Joe's. Joe and her had sex two weeks into the thing and BAM she was pregnant. (the child in no doubt is Joe's - he looks identical to him.) Joe, trying to be responsible takes in Beth, all the debt from the previous marriage, and decides to talk to Jeff. Jeff is upset but also understands that he and Beth's marriage was never right. He is in the end just grateful that he & Beth's child will not be partially raised by a stranger step-parent.

Joe and Beth move in together in that month. For the first two years, things are good. They enjoy hobbies together, mud boggin, racing, hanging out with friends. Etc. However, Beth is never much of a socailite and Joe is a social butterfly. Two very different personalities. One day Beth tells Joe, "I don't want to do any thing with your friends anymore, the woods are dirty, and I don't like those things." And that's it. She just stops. All she wants to do is stay home. No more interaction with people and places. Just shut down. This rocks Joe's world. He loves taking the kids to events, and places, and sometimes going out without them. He thinks - what happened? In addition to that their sex-life becomes non-existent. He told me that at night laying in bed when he tried to get romantic she would simply turn and say, "Hurry up and get it over with so I can go to sleep?". I just said WOW.

So, in a bad way, Joe makes a bad situation even worse. He starts going out with his friends and hanging out at bars and drinking. He becomes borderline alcoholic. For the next 8 years, Joe continues to go down hill. Just recently he gave up drinking. (thus one of the reasons we have become closer friends). He now sees much more clearly but wants to know what kind of affect all these years may have had on him. He feels like he doesn't deserve to be happy.

My personal opinion is that his self esteem has been in the gutter for 8 years. He used the alcohol to cover it up.

He has been separated from his ex for a little over a year. He dated for a while but it did not work out with the girl because of his drinking and staying out at all hours of the night. His ex is already remarried. She remarried to another guy exactly a year after they split.

What do you think?

He's open to all opinions? He just wanted to put feelers out there to see what others think of the situation.

[Rhapsody]

WOW! - that's a tough one...
But never the less what I see is a man that while wounded inside is still trying to sow his oats while having a life of security and family (kind of like having his cake and eat it too) and those two things do not usually go hand in hand...... never have never will as a family needs more than a fly by night husband / dad.

Has this "Joe" ever asked his wife (ex-wife now) if their relationship fell apart due to the fact that she felt abandoned by him when they spent all there time with his friends? - for while they may have been together physically they were still so far from one and other emotionally, as his true attention and love was for the event/game and direct more at his friends and not that of his once beloved wife.

Just a thought there..... IDK?

[StarPonysMama]

Rhapsody.

I know, strange situation there.

The way I look at it is - there's two sides to every story. I kinda see that she likes to move fast. Joe and Beth were never married (but lived together for ten years).

Beth Married the 3rd guy Tom in less than a year of breakup with Joe.

Joe is selfish. He admits that. Guess he's just trying to figure out why he doesn't deserve to be happy.

I think at the root of the problem, IMHO, was that they were just two different people and things happened too fast. If you can't enjoy each other - how can you live with each other??? And in my PO since she got pregnant 2 weeks into it - what time did they REALLY have to know each other?

I don't know either but, thanks for reading, I'll pass it along.

[StarPonysMama]

Oh yeah and Rhapsody,

He admitted that he never "loved her". She got pregnant the first time they ever had sex and that's how they ended up together.

Just thought I would throw that in.

[Rhapsody]

</font><blockquote><div id="quote"><font class="small">Quote:</font>
StarPonysMama said:
He admitted that he never "loved her".
She got pregnant the first time they ever had sex and that's how they ended up together.

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">

That's the PROBLEM in a Nutshell...... as Marriage is hard enough with love -
and IMO no one should ever get married just because a child was conceived out of sex.

[Perna]

Joe has made several decisions in his life that I don't think he thought through very well. I would get counseling, see if I could learn how to relate interpersonally better/get to know myself better so I don't make the same mistakes in the future. I think most of Joe's mistakes were because he didn't know himself very well and didn't know what was best for him. There's no "excuse" for sleeping with your friend's wife. It's not automatically "responsible"/the right thing to marry her, deciding to drink instead of divorce/help your kids was not a good choice for him, etc.

[StarPonysMama]

They were never married. He told me that he always found a way to get out of it.

Basically in the end I think he was home long enough to pay the bills and leave again.

IMPO - they never should have started living together because of a child. Two competent people can raise a child not living together. And then, I think he just made a bad situation worse and she just gave up.

Kinda a sad story really. And in the end, the kids suffer.

I totally agree Perna. (you always have great insight) Ten fold. I know we all make mistakes but I think it's the steps of self exploration that helps us self-correct.

I think that's what he's starting to do. He's starting to question. A good sign of not wanting to hit the repeat button, I think.

[BalishBun]

I know way too many men that are afraid to ask for help.