OYS
This is my first OYS post.
Me: 44 yrs Wife: 40 Son: 6 Together 15 Years, married 11 Height 6' Weight: 218
Lifting & Working Out:
3 miles running per week
~20 miles, 3500' vert of mountain biking per week
1 day skiing per week
RP At Home DB Periodization, 4x per week. (Basic summary: Biceps: 30#, Tris30#: Deads: 25#x2, weighted situps 35# rows: 30# Pushups: 10x, lunges 40x2)
Read NMMNG, TMSLP
Physical Health:
I'm in great physical health, though I have put some pounds back on since fall. Was at 198 in October, but let my eating and drinking habits get the best of me since. Drinking way too much lately (3-6 beers per day) and toking an ounce per month. As for eating, I'm eating healthy most of the week, just too much. I took a break from working out from February 16 - March 15 to enjoy ski season and live a good life and really paid the price.
Mentally, I'm all over the map, but I'm feeling really burned out with my career and frustrated about working with difficult programmers. I've built a career on related jobs such as design, business analysis and QA and I've mostly had great reviews. Even though I have a good, flexible well-paying career right now, I struggle with feelings of powerlessness, inadequacy and pointlessness. Especially when I have to fight with the devs over whether something is a bug or not -- which often times is.
I've also been working from home for 4 years now and have struggled with making real life friends of my own that are outside of my wife's circle. And I'm really tired of spending all my damn time alone in this room in front of this screen. I try to compensate with lunch-time workouts and bike rides and 1-2 nights out per week either on extended bike rides, hikes or skiing nights
Both wife and I work from home and while I do try to put on a happy face, I too often show or tell of my frustrations about work (sometimes she asks, sometimes I tell w/out her asking, sometimes she can just tell). When things go well, the job can be rather cushy sometimes. In either case, she gets noticeably irritable and cranky around me. Kid is a great kid, but clingy and very much has a touch love language. Wife is frequently drained after letting him cling on her and this has been a sore topic for a while now.
Dead bedroom has been an issue for a couple years now. Confronted it 2 years ago, got couples counseling and my own. We both stopped it after 6 weeks when things started looking up. Last year we bottomed back out after she got laid off and we were all stuck in the house together quarantining. I finally read NMMNG after delaying for year and am now currently working with a therapist familiar with NMMNG and trying to work through what I need to do.
Last week, I finally admitted to myself that I've always wanted to be a photographer and be outside and started moving in that direction. I got my llc squared away and made it a point to get out of the house and shoot in the mornings. One day in the afternoon, wife was fighting with kid with a laundry list of things she laid out for him to do that he had been stalling on. She said now do these things and don't disturb me in my meeting and then slammed the door. I needed some bike parts, saw that he had things he needed to do, she didn't want to be disturbed, so I just went to the bikeshop. Took the camera to get some photos nearby and got a "Where are you?" text. Got home, wife yells at kid to take care of something in his room and then storms over to me and proceeds to tell me that I need to check in with her before just leaving. Later that night she tells me she feels like she's the one who has to do everything around here and that I'm not helping with the parenting and that we're not in a very good spot here.
The thing is, I do do stuff around here and I am involved with the kid. He starts the day off in my office and then goes in to her's when I have meetings. When I go get him back, she always says he's fine, it's cute that he jumps into her meetings and not to worry about. So, I took that answer as it is and decided last week before all this that I should stop caretaking and trying in that department and let it go. We talked about it that night -- actually talked and not argued and I made it clear that she needs to set better boundaries with the kid and figure out how to get along better with the kid. I also told her how I noticed that it doesn't seem like he does well with a laundry list of 5 things to do after this one and yelling at him louder isn't going to fix that. She said fine and that we're going to have days now where 1 day is my day, 1 day is her day and just leave it at that. I also told her that I don't know whether I should
come or go anymore. "You say you need space and that I don't need to spend so much time around the house and then when I do, it I get bitched at for not being around."
Come the weekend, I tried to get frisky but was repeatedly shot down. She says she just doesn't feel it anymore and that sex is the absolute last thing on her mind. She said the sex isn't a problem and it's good when we do it, but she just doesn't have the desire for it. Once a month seems like plenty, twice is amazing, but I'm afraid this month is going to be zero. I have zero game any more, I don't know how to get her in the mood and I'll be honest, I don't even know how to be sexy. Apparently there was a time when I was, but I have no clue what I was doing right back then.
Anyways, we did have a good weekend otherwise. We had a March Madness gathering with her dad and sister under the car port and had a great ski day on the mountain with the kid. She went out of her way to make me pistachio cupcakes with strawberry frosting -- all from scratch -- for my birthday yesterday. And I got to go enjoy a powder day. Last night though, all I got was a pat on leg and a good night, happy birthday.
I slept like crap last night and am feeling cranky and distracted today with negative feelings of being a marital failure and that this relationship is over. I'll push through it and probably feel better after fetching the kid from kindergarten and doing a workout, but it's been in the back of my mind all weekend.
Other goals for the week include setting up my business license now that I have my llc, performing my regular job duties, shooting a sunset or 2, and getting the kid out of the house an afternoon or 2. I also need to catch back up on dread and figure out how to employ it. And try to make friends.