Falling Fast

I am 31, married for 1 1/2 years to my husband who has been in my life since i was about 23.  It has been a rocky relationship, one broken engagement and another breakup...then reconciliation and marriage.  If something is hard to do, it must be worth it, right?  I don't think so anymore.

I'm told that I should focus on the positive things.  I can list them in a couple of keystrokes: He is loving, a great cook, patient, dedicated to family, tolerant and laid back.  It sounds great, doesn't it?  He's not a beater, not a cheater, would never hurt a fly.  This is what I have been telling myself for years - to convince myself that the right decision is to stick with him, because who knows what trouble I can get into with somebody I haven't known for years.

Now the negative.

He is a boy stuck in a man's body.  His mother is constantly bailing him out of his problems, even still trying now.  He is a procrastinator or do-nothing-at-aller.  His parents forced him to go to college and he partied himself out halfway through, with nothing to show for it except for a couple of stoner friends.  He cannot make a plan to save his life, and most things he attempts to do on his own are not accomplished on the first pass.  he spends hours and hours playing video games.  He has no drive to better himself, and has been stuck in the same low ranking position where he works for over 6 years now.  He has shown no interest in trying to repair our relationships, which start out great and so chock full of potential in the beginning, and then gradually get to the point where we dissolve.  I've initiated couples therapy twice, including my own personal therapy to see if maybe it is me with the problem.  I've bought self help books, asking him to read them - "sure I will read them..." but never cracking the cover.  Nearly everything in his life has come to him effortlessly, as his parents thought that was the best way to raise their son.  That trend continues.

Our personal conflicts.

Over the years, he has been smoking pot behind my back.  I asked him to stop, he says okay.  I've caught him with it several times, and there were fights and threats of breaking up if he did it again...even though he claims he "only smokes other people's" and "doesn't own a pipe".  Well imagine my surprise when we are driving on our way to a great honeymoon, I go in the center console for a napkin and find *shock* weed and a pipe.  our HONEYMOON.  I could have told him to turn the car around, that this marriage is not going any further, the lies continue, but in the interest of trying not to ruin our first day of marriage, I said "well, i'm not going to let this ruin today, we are going to smoke this together once we get there."  I haven't voluntarily done this since high school, I reformed myself, and you might think that this was encouraging to him, but I firmly told him that this was a one time deal, and it has been ever since.  For me anyway.  I know the people he hangs out with, and I can virtually guarantee that if he is with any of them, he will be coming home high.  

His past is riddled with suspect infractions...parking tickets that get ignored and turn into bench warrants, traffic stops, license suspensions...and I had faith that he would grow up and get tired of being a social deviant.  He still has not learned his lesson.  With Summer comes men's softball - To be as nice as possible, this is basically a gathering of men, some broken, some not, with an excuse to drink.  Going to games I would see the team drinking beer sometimes during and always after the game, smoking cigarettes (in case you were wondering, this IS considered a sport).  This summer consisted for me of wondering A)if he would make it home after going to the bar to "have a beer" with the guys (because the field drinking was not enough) and B)how drunk he would be when he did get home.  He is a beer connoisseur...good beers make him glow...imagine my surprise when 30 packs of Miller Lite started showing up in the fridge.  Imagine my surprise when I would come home at lunch to find him on lunch, eating a sandwich and drinking one of those Miller Lites.  I imagine if you can't make it through the work day without having a beer, there *might* be a problem.  Imagine my surprise one night when I am out with a friend after dinner, having a drink and conversation, when my phone rings and it is him, I have been pulled over by the cops and need you to pick me up.  Oh, what for?  for nothing.  I swerved over the line.  Have you been drinking?  yes...well I am sorry, I have too and I am not leaving here to be arrested myself.  I hear him get defiant with the officer, I want to call a taxi, they won't let me call an effing taxi...silence.  Officer calls me back much later saying that he is going to be put up for the night and someone will bring him home in the morning.  That leaves me to process all of what is happening, and as an added bonus, he was supposed to be taking his parents to the airport at 5 AM the next day...now that has become my burden, to explain to his mother that her precious son has been arrested, and I'm not even sure what for.  Happy vacation, your son is in the slammer.

Imagine my surprise the next day when he comes home and I find out that he blew over the legal limit, refused the blood test AND they found weed in his car!  must be a coincidence, since he never carries it.  I didn't know why on earth he would refuse the blood test, he claims he only had 2 beers, surely the breathalyzer was reporting the alcohol fumes on his breath...oh...it's because you had been smoking earlier in the week with your good friend.  Got it.  Mandatory 1 year suspension of the license.  ONE YEAR.  Back in the summer when the drinking started to ramp up, I told him that if he got in trouble for what appeared to be alcoholism in the making, I would not be making special arrangements to be a chauffeur.  It still stands.  His mother offered to drive him to work...I told him that he had better make sure he didn't do that.  her commute to pick him up is 3 times the distance to his work.  She doesn't understand that her enabling is what helped get him to this point of irresponsibility.

The legal bills are piling up.  He needs to get a second job because I am not paying (monetarily) for any of this.  He poo-poos any suggestion I make...how will I get to work?  Any way you can.  Public transit here is decent, you can take a bus nearly anywhere.  Study the schedule, understand how it works.  Now instead of spending money on beer, it's going towards his bills.  So all in all, we are looking at minimum one year of stalled life for him, because he seems uninterested in taking the opportunity to better himself.  It's the same husband, sans car and sans a case of Miller Lite in the fridge.  Did I mention his parents offered to pay for any continuing education he might want to take?  Is he interested?  Actions speak loudly that he isn't.

I am by no means an angel...I curse, get angry, have rotten thoughts...but I am definitely finding myself wondering how to get out of this unfulfilling marriage.