Looking for advice
Hi all, nervous first time poster so I'm sorry if this is a mess. I guess I'm looking for advice while trying to organize my thoughts.
I've been with my wife for a little over 5 years now. Everything's been going pretty good I would say, with some communication issues here and there and the very seldom "big fight". Lately though, I haven't really felt like a husband. I work from home in an admittedly "cushy" job, I'd say about 60% of the time its pretty easygoing, but when it gets stressful, it gets STRESSFUL. My wife works in a pretty physically demanding role, so I'm the one who mostly takes care of the house and pets and other errands since she's normally pretty wiped out after work. Going into this relationship, she made her intentions known, she wants kids, and I want to give that to her. I've always had to advocate for waiting until we're more established, not living in a 1 bedroom apartment, and have more money saved up. I grew up poor, bouncing around home to home in foster care, and I don't want my kids to even remotely have to worry about that. But I'm always painted as the bad guy for wanting to wait, or wanting to be as prepared as we can be. Intimacy has turned into being just about her, or getting pregnant. What happens after we have kids? Is she going to leave? Am I going to take on all the responsibility and work? Thats only part of it though and I just feel so overwhelmed. I don't feel like she reciprocates like she used to, conversations don't really feel the same. I feel like at any given moment there's only 3 things on her mind, when are we having kids, something something about one of my exes, or something she needs me to do.
I'm starting to feel less like a husband and more like a means to an end, it gives me such an overwhelming feeling of despair because I genuinely and honestly love my wife, and she used to make it known that she genuinely and honestly feels the same way, but lately, for a while now she hasn't and I'm not really sure what to do. She always encourages me to talk about how I feel and what's bothering me, but those conversations usually end up with her being upset or it gets turned into being about her.
Thank you anyone and everyone for reading this disorganized mess, any advice is deeply appreciated
@LossAndLost marriage and relationships not easy! But try to have an honest conversation with your self and then with your wife. Nothing wrong with wanting to have a kid, now depends how old are you and your wife, us, she might want to be a young mama, she might really want to have that kid with you, sometimes later in life can be to late, I get it, a kid is not a joke but it can’t hurt if is with the right person, if the love is there and is right you will work through together.
now, if you feel like she only wants a kid to have an excuse to not work and put all the blame and responsibilities on you, that’s not fair for either of you, so just having those honestly conversations and reflection should help.
remember it doesn’t matters what the outcome is, you deserve the best partner in life so take the risk because if you don’t care about yourself nobody else will do it for you
@affableSugar264 Thank you so much for your words of wisdom, I really appreciate it