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helpfulApricot5028
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PathStep 1 Compassion hearts7 Forum posts1 Forum upvotes2 Current upvotes2 Age GroupAdult Last activeAugust, 2026 Member sinceAugust 6, 2026
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Rocky relationship— stay or go (long post)
Relationship Stress / by helpfulApricot5028
Last post
 August 7th
...See more This is a long and hard story for me. My husband and I have been married for 27 years and about seven years ago. I had an emotional affair —never met in person, and it was by text only. The person I spoke to was from my past actually. The other person and I had a brief but truly meaningful relationship, we shared a common interest, and then when our separate ways only for him to message me out of the blue like 20 years later. Because of that, when my husband found out, he placed some demands on me due to the fact that since I did this, I owed him something in return. One of the things that he said he needed was a fetish of his that he got into after I left him for eight months due to a physical affair on his part. With that being said, I am a Christian woman and his demand for this lifestyle did not lineup with my Christian beliefs. I told him this and thought he understood but I was totally wrong. The thing that is breaking us is a dominant submissive relationship that I don’t think I can do because his idea of submissive is not what is portrayed in the Bible. So for the last seven years, this has been just hard to deal with. He claims that he’s not interested in that anymore however, it seems to always come up that I’m not begging him to pursue this dream of his.  Fast-forward to today we get into arguments almost daily over this and it’s really wearing all me mentally he calls me names and has taken my self-esteem to an all-time low. Don’t get me wrong. I do love this man and this is hard after all this time. What it initially boils down to is that during these heated arguments he tells me to shut up. He doesn’t want to hear what I have to say and then to confuse me even more when I do what he asks and don’t speak—- and then says I’m not trying, don’t care and don’t want to talk to him. So when I do speak up and try to share my thoughts and feelings, he claims that I’m making it about poor little me and it should be all about him. Empathy is not his strong suit and when he makes me cry, he claims I’m mad or angry so he shuts up after saying that I’m overdramatic I feel at such a loss that I can’t even open up and talk to my husband a man I’ve been with for 30 years, which is really sad. He makes me feel and implies that at this point, only his feelings matter and mine don’t count, whether he thinks they count or not they still exist.  We are now at a crossroads and I’m not sure which way to go. He says he wants a divorce, separation needs a break from me then in the same breath, he wonders why I’m not chasing him and moving mountains.(which I’m guessing is because I won’t participate in his submissive thing). I have prepared myself mentally to leave and I’ve endured this situation for a long time and I can be mentally prepared for that too, but I will tell you it’s wearing on me and I can’t in good faith give into something I don’t believe in, because I think if I give in that will open up the door for more demands, and quite frankly that scares me. His anger has escalated to a level that I never thought would be possible. Thanks for listening and any objective advice is truly appreciated and with saying this out loud I may have already answered the question.
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