I have been married now for 16years. This is my second and her first marriage.<br>Ten years ago, she asked if she could join the service, and after much thought and discussion, she did.<br>Everything has always been fine up until last summer, when she was returning from a six month stint commisioning a new ship.<br>She out of the blue said she does not love me anymore, she made a mistake to marry me in the first place and she wants her freedom to live her life her way. Off she left for the ship, leaving me with our two sons.<br>She did return home several weeks later but it has never ever resembled a marraige these last several months. She would reather go off with her friends (Mainly male friends from the ship, as a group) and which I am never included.<br>She has now told me that the marriage is over, that she does not want to have to commit to anyone, wants nothing at all to do with a relationship, hates sex, period. However she does not want a divorce, just lots of space.<br>For my part, I have been super nice guy trying to do ANYTHING I can think of to win her affection back. Which has only made caused us to get farther apart<br>What do I do? Stick this out and hope for the best or just start getting on with my life?

Thats only a question you can answer. First, get some counseling. Second, as hard as it may seem, take a deep breath, it is going to take some time. Your emotions will be up and down. Give her some space. You will know when the right time is to make the appropriate decision.

Thank you for your response, getting counseling seems to be a familier theme throghout all this fiasco, maybe it's something to stop concidering and actually doing. It sure can't make things worse and if I can JUST learn to have that patience I do not seem to have but always talk about, that space and time my wife wife is always asking for??????

David,<p>It sounds like your wife is having an affair. I'd suggest that you purchase the book "Surviving an Affair" (Harley/Chalmers) as your first step. I'd also suggest counseling: Steve Harley at Marriagebuilders is very good. Whoever you choose, make sure that they are aware that you WANT to save the marriage, and that they can help you design a plan to do so.<p>There are lots of thing that you can do to start working on yourself and your "side" of the marriage. SAA has lots of information in it, as does the other books available from Dr. Harley. Because of your sons, I hope you choose to stay and work on the marriage: they deserve to grow up in an intact, loving family environment.

As much as I would love to believe she is having an affair, I know she is not. From talking to a lot of people who know her and have gone with her on her little excursions, all say the same thing. She just likes to be with her friends. She feels safe to be able to keep them at a arms length away and not worry about having to commit to anyone or having to answer to anyone or to be responsible to them. <br>Just telling me that she was having an affair she knows would actually make it easier for me, to find some closure, some excuse, some reason for all this. And she has told me herself she knows that that would be all it would take. So, I just do not think she is. Part of me wishes she was, A lot of this not knowing what to do would end. But as long as we still have that very basic trust for each other, I will not leave her. I just hate the idea of not being able to getting on with my life, to be in limbo like this.

I did forget to mention I did go see my doctor today. She had already wrote up some paper on me, and is very worried about my depression and has started me on paxol. We shall see