John’s Breaking Point: Why Some Men Stay in Miserable Marriages

Okay, if you're a frequent listener of the Dad Starting Over podcast and you find yourself saying, "Yeah, that sounds like me," well, you don't need another podcast episode. What you need is support. The Help for Men Brotherhood is where men go when they're done pretending that they got it all handled. You know, your dead bedrooms, your divorce, your loneliness, your rebuilding life. We have private forums, frequent live Zoom meetings, one-on-one coaching courses, all my books at no additional charge. And yes, we get together in person. Real men and real conversations. So stop doing this alone and join the Help for Men Brotherhood today at help4men.com/join. I look forward to seeing you in the next member meeting. Okay, this is a good one. Uh, dear DSO entry from a guy that we will call John. John says, I am writing today because I am at my breaking point. I have been patient, kind, understanding, a good husband and a great father. I have been married for many years and have two children. My wife leaves early in the morning and always has. She's a heavy wine drinker, close to a bottle a night. She doesn't eat healthy, doesn't cook, doesn't grocery shop, doesn't make kid lunches, doesn't get them to school, doesn't take the trash out, doesn't cut the grass, pays for a maid to clean. She removed sex over 4 years ago and removed intimacy and any kind of touching years ago. She is unwilling to go to a counselor. She yells often and doesn't share money with me. She sleeps in bed with the youngest. Parentheses: I have slept in a different bedroom for about 4 years. She is very defensive when it's time to communicate. I have tried to get her to go to coun— to a counselor, but she gets mad when I ask. I have been seeing a therapist to keep my head on straight for 2 years, and it helps, but I am becoming very lonely, and I feel like a slave. I do the cooking, lunches, kids to and from school, and I have a full-time job. And then I grocery shop and make dinner every night. I still think there is hope, but that is fading day after day. She tells me how to spend my money and dictates to the kids rather than parent. During our relationship, she mentioned divorce about 5 times, and she even sent it in a text. I guess I'm here asking if she will ever change or if this relationship is over. I have communicated my needs and even took sex off the table, and she says that is okay. There is zero action towards connecting. I was a single parent before in my first marriage, and I did great. This would be my wife's second marriage as well. I feel I go above and beyond in my duties as a father and husband, but still not good enough. Is this the end? I need someone to tell me the truth. And that's the end of John's submission, but John and I actually had a chat via Facebook, uh, Instant Messenger here. He says, uh, just as a follow-up, that he feels that he is a very disciplined individual and he can overcome many obstacles, but for some reason this one is difficult, meaning this relationship with her. It's like, to quote him, he says, it's like she reprogrammed me. It is bizarre the way I feel. Well, right away I'm going to push back on that one a little bit, Mr. John. You are putting all of the, um, the responsibility for your situation on her shoulders. She's bad, I'm good. Look at all the bad stuff that she is doing to me. Woe is me. And yet you hang on, don't you? And yet you fail to see what everyone who just listened to everything I just had to read sees plain as day, which is this is not a person you want to be in a relationship with. Sorry, I don't know what more you need here. There's signs possibly of depression based upon her actions, but at the same time, she's basically flipping you off saying, I don't want to get help with this. I'm fine the way I am. She's drinking excessively. She's not doing anything around the house. She refuses any kind of connection with you for a period of 4 years plus. It sounds like it's not good, dude. And, and you have a— it sounds like a history here with a past failed relationship, which in that first relationship you were the single father there. I'm curious to see what happened there. Be nice if you kind of flesh that out a little bit. And then she had a previous failed relationship too. Overall, it's not a good, not a good scene here, my man. And what you need to do is ask the very important question of, what is it about me? What is it about my past? What is it about my current makeup, as you know, current John, the state that he's in? What is it about me that caused me to get into this mess? Possibly sounds like maybe for the second time. And what is it about me that hangs on when probably everyone else in the world says, dude, run for your life? Instead of continuously pointing at her going, she's the problem, she's the problem. Dude, even if she wasn't in the picture, you still have issues you need to work on, my friend. She is illustrative of a lot of issues that you have. A lot of stuff you got going on between the ears, if you know what I mean. You need some help. Continue on with the therapy. That's, it's huge, the fact that you're in therapy. Kudos to you for doing that. But what you need to do is look at your therapist and say, okay, enough of the bullshit. Why am I doing this to myself? What's going on with me? What is it about my past that put me in this situation? What causes me to feel this intense connection to somebody who is frankly, it could be construed as kind of abusive towards you. To help illustrate, I found over the years that this kind of gets the point across to a lot of people. You know the stereotype, we've seen this in movies and television reality shows over and over again. I remember when I was a kid, there was a show called Cops. On TV where a camera crew would follow around real-life police when they go on their calls. A lot of drama, a lot of people, a lot of domestic, you know, issues between a man and woman. And often you would see a woman who was physically assaulted. So, you know, pretend she's got like a black eye or something like that, so it's very obvious husband hit her. And so what do they do? All right, dude, stand up, put put the handcuffs on him and walk him out to the cop car. You're officially, you know, going to jail for the night till we figure out what's going on here. And what does the wife do in a lot of the cases? She runs after the police. No, don't take him away, I love him! And everyone watches, goes, oh God, this poor woman. Almost like a Stockholm Syndrome type of thing where you're so insecure, you basically hate yourself so much, and by virtue of probably your upbringing, don't see the reason to leave the person who is abusing you, but you further stay attached to them and defend them against others. It's a weird thing, but because it's also in combination of fear of the spouse. In fact, Mr. John, I'm going to pick on you a little bit further here. This, what I just read to everybody, your message wasn't the first message. The first message that you sent to me and that you gave me the okay to post on Facebook was filled with a little bit more detail, including the children's ages, your wife's profession, and so forth. And you asked me to please delete it or post an edited version because why? You were scared of the wife reading it and realizing that it's about her. Which, what are the chances of that? Very, very little. She's not going to find my page or whatever. But regardless, what's going to happen, dude? The woman reads your message and goes, hey, 'Is that me? What the hell, John?' And you go, 'Yeah, that was me. I submitted our story. Every bit of it's true, right?' 'Yeah, well, fuck you. You don't have the right to share the story.' And then what? What's she gonna do, haul off and hit you? She gonna divorce you? Oh, perish the thought. You're scared, dude. You're basically that abused woman with the black eye, scared of her abusive husband. And yet when they're taking, you know, him away, you're chasing after her saying, No, no, no, I love her. It's a very messed up situation and we need to figure out what the hell's going on with you. And frankly, it's above my pay grade. This is a therapist thing. But if it's a good therapist that you're working with, what they will do is say, John, buddy, you need to, in addition to talking to me to figure out the root cause of a lot of your issues, you need to go hang out with dudes. You need to work in a men's group, a support community, get in some meetings, talk to some guys about what's going on with you, compare notes. Socialize with men. That is something a lot of you guys don't do. You need to reclaim, you know, a crucial part of your masculinity, your identity as a man. This is where myself and guys in our group— this is where we would step up to the plate and say, we're here to help you, dude. Go to help4men.com/join and check out the brotherhood. Private discussion forums, live Zoom meetings, all my books, 1,200+ hours of audio. We get together in person. There's coaching, there's courses, there's just all kinds of good stuff, and it's all there to help men just like you, dude, who need a little boost, need a little help. And in fact, I got a book coming out called Rebuild. And as of this recording, I'm recording this on Tuesday, October 7th, 2025. For those listening in the future, it is soon to be an early release. So if you want to be put on the list to, to be made aware of when the book is available early so you can download it or get a print copy earlier than everybody else, go to help4men.com/rebuild. It's a book all about reclaiming your identity, figuring out what it is you stand for, and laying out a blueprint for life that corresponds to that. And what you'll find is when you have a good sense of identity, values, and a good strong sense of who you are, and you recognize your own innate sense of value, these kind of situations just do not happen. You don't love yourself very much at all, dude, and we need to figure out why.. And I think our group and the book Rebuild, which by the way, when it's available, will be available to our group members at no charge. I, I think that would be huge for you, but I'm a little biased. I'm the guy that put that all together. So whether it's our group or some other kind of group, you need to surround yourself with like-minded men that are there to help you in addition to your therapist. And your therapist really needs to get to the bottom of what's going on. It's very often that I hear from a lot of guys in these situations that they go to therapy for years And I ask, so have they kind of identified like some childhood issues? No, we really haven't gotten to that. We've gotten to how I can deal with my anxiety with my wife. It's like, ah, I get— I can see the importance of that, but we're not dealing with the root cause here. And if you've been going to a therapist for years and you're not dealing with the root cause, in my opinion, time to find a new therapist. But hey, that's just my opinion. But John, thank you for writing in, buddy. I do wish you all the best. Yeah, this relationship is over. It should have never begun. You got some real work you need to do to figure out what's going on with you. Don't worry so much about her and get some help, brother. All right, thank you for writing in, and guys, we will catch you on the next one.