Never posted here before, but most of the discussions i've read have helped..perhaps someone can lend me some insight.
My wife and I got married 5.5 years ago after 1.5 years of dating- I was 30 and she was 27. We had both had 2-3 4+ year relationships, complete with years of living with our bf/gf. Our first few dates showed us that this was 'special'- we shared a desire of not having children, our religious views are identical as well as political views, goals, education, finances, family importance, etc, etc.
The first year of the marriage was a little rocky, and im trying to be honest. Ho violence, but she was dealing with some depression and I was overreacting to petty sh*t. We sought counseling and this seemed to clear things up.
At that same time, her best friend's fiance was brutally murdered outside of a bar as a random act of violence. This shook me to my core and I changed overnight. All of the sudden I realized how perfect this woman was for me and how ridiculous it was that I was making her sad by overreacting to BS issues.
Since then (4 years), i've felt that things have been better than perfect- we are the couple that people point to as the perfect marriage. We travel together perfectly, we make each other happy and laugh on a daily basis. We make the same amount of money and have the same financial goals. She supports me 100% and I make it a point to make her happy whenever she starts getting down. She hugs me every morning as I go to work and we go out many nights and enjoy each others company over drinks and laughing.
Unitl 3 weeks ago when she told me she had to move out.
I was absolutely crushed. It makes no sense at all and I still cannot wrap my head around it. We've gone to counselling for 2 weeks, but the last session (last Monday) she said that she is not interested in saving the marriage, only moving past this relationship and mediating the separation....
Her main reason is that she needs her independence. She feels that she cannot truly be herself within a marriage. Also, in the same week leading up to this, she went out with an old recently divorced friend that is 37 and having a REALLY hard time getting back into the game...which really bummed out my wife. She told me "what if she had gotten divorced 10 years earlier??"
There is also a guy she works with that she has a crush on...she thought the crush would burn out, but it's still there. It's only been 4 weeks, but she texts him constantly. After telling the counselor that he was an 'escape' she asked him to go out to lunch with him and explain that they cannot see eash other until we resolve the marriage issues. When she got done with lunch, she told me that her feelings for him were 'overblown' and they really don't know much about each other.
In addition to that, she doesn't feel like she's in love with me anymore...her main complaint is that she feels the same way when she hugs me as when she hugs my male friends...just good friends...not passion.
She said she's felt that we shouldn't be married for some time, but everything just became clear recently. I fear that she is making rash decisions and wants to throw every thing away without thinking through things...
We bought 6K in airline tickets the week before this happened, so i know she didn't feel that strongly at that point...
I don't know what to do...the counsellor is telling me to start working past this, but I din't even recognize my wife as being capable of doing all this without giving me a chance.
Sorry that this was so long...it's been held in for awhile.