Relationship Woes and Advice 25: Now with extra Valentine

[Coidzor]

Alright, time for a bit of venting of my own.

I was a wild guy until I met my wife and we kinda settled down together. She was pretty young when we met and in the beginning she was pretty controlling, which in part was fair and in part was annoying. Gradually, we adapted to one another and became a happy and well functioning couple. Then at some point, we bought an apartment together (based on her suggestion) and later got married (partly her suggestion as well although I was in the consideration stage and she kinda jumped the gun on me). We also got a dog, or well she got a dog because that was the agreement.

So there we are, we own all these things that tie us down, anchor us to a normal life with a normal schedule and now she wants an open relationship, which we discussed the possibility of negotiating a long time ago if it seemed "necessary", and she wants this not necessarily because she wants to have sex with other, but because she wants to be free to go have all those misadventures and do the very same stupid things that she stopped me from doing. Barring that, we're probably splitting up. So basically, our relationship is more or less going down the drain because my wife is unhappy with me becoming the person she wanted me to be

Sounds a little like you may have just been rolling over and doing whatever she wanted rather than having an equal voice in your relationship from how you put it forth here. And maybe you need to show her that you still have some passion and feeling in your blood and bones.

Though, at this point it sounds like you need to look into relationship counseling, now, whichever way this ends up going.

I already passed the 'gut reaction' stage, It's already too late for me to simply say no without weighing the consequences. I hope your situation worked out in the end.

We'll see if I ever get there.

Not sure what else to say to the rest though, other than to be careful and remember to take care of yourself first and foremost.