Thanks everyone for your input. I do not take this very lightly and have pondered everything for a long time now. It is just so damn hard! I do not see how I am going to make it. I want what is best for my children. But I also cannot put my needs aside either. Just this morning I took Kit's advice [ Your husband needs to hear what you are telling us] and spoke to my husband about how I was feeling. I have spoken to him several times about it, but he does not want to get it. He says that everyone wants to have affairs after 13 years of marriage. That my feelings about it are normal. He also thinks that he is there for me and meeting my needs even when I tell him otherwise. He says that if he can't make me happy then nobody can. That no one can measure up to my standards. I told him that he was a idiot and a fool and get a f.....ing clue!
An affair would just be something fun, exciting and something to look forward to and take my mind of my troubles. Nothing more.
I have tried to explain to my husband why his drinking hurts me, our marriage and family. He does not see the pain it is causing, therefore it is in my head. His attitude just blows me away. He has been to rehab 3 times in the last 4 years and sobriety lasted maybe a month tops, and only because it was the first rehab.
My parents divorced when I was five and my mother was a single parent, so I know full well how divorce affects the children. It totally sucks.
I love my husband, but his drinking has to stop if this marriage is going to survive.
Louisedx seems to fully understand what I am feeling [Suffering at the hands of a loved one is hard. You get cheated out of love, exceptance, and kind treatment. You want to feel love and be protected by the person you have committed to and sacrificed for. . ] I feel I deserve better, but my children are what keep me here. My husband is a good provider and father, when he is sober, and we have many other marital issues like most alcoholic marriages, but we cannot begin to solve those problems until his drinking stops.
I am just tired of waiting for him to get his sh.t together! Once mine is together, I will be out the door. There has got to be a better life on the other side.