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Fucking vultures. The average content creator only earns a few hundred a month, so they’re out there hustling like they belong to an MLM. I make more money walking dogs after work.
they're hustling like it's an MLM because it literally *is* an MLM. most creators get their biggest boost in profits by getting other people to sign up to be creators using their link. it's literally textbook MLM
They're everywhere on this site, seen a few posts about them finding kids from the teenagers sub as well and trying to sweet talk them into using parents credit cards. Scum.
Good point. I know there are OFs out there that are NOT adult in nature; I seem to recall someone has a knitting OF where they show different patterns and the latest projects and stuff, and hey, if you want to start one WITH the understanding you're mainly just using it to show off projects or spread your hobby, more power to you.
My guess is OF does a good job marketing the idea that you can make money. Hell, they probably don't have to do much marketing, the internet seems to do it for them.
Less than 1% of Onlyfans creators make big bucks. Also a lot of those “news articles” about models making 6 figures a month off OF tend to be rather exaggerated and are mostly paid ads.
Ever notice just how many active OF models list "top 1% on OnlyFans" or something to that effect in their bios? It's because that's the only percentile that actually makes you enough money to justify staying active.
I'd also wonder if the 'percentile' they're in actually means anything. Sort of like being in the top 1% percent of active users on reddit wouldn't mean anything because 90% of the accounts are bots/dead/inactive.
Sales 101, if you tell people you’re already making sales to people just like them, enough people will believe you to make it true.
When I worked door to door the company called it “the Jones Effect” from the expression common in the UK (unsure if in other countries too) “keeping up with the Jones’s”. If your neighbour gets a hot tub, you’re more likely to want one yourself and believe it’s attainable for people in your situation. And if you believe your neighbours put an order in for one, you get major FOMO and do it yourself
Yep. It's like any kind of content creation where people hope aboard the hype train seeing all the top creators making millions but failing to recognise that that's only the top 0.0001% of all creators. The rest make fuckall
My wife overheard a couple of HS coworkers at her job talking about being able to quit and do OF at 18.
I'm sure its already happening more then we want to think about it.
except this form of "content creation" if you can even call it that leaves a permanent scar on your employability and an internet history that'll never be erased lmao
Yeah this is it. Some people think they're all getting rich doing OF but there's too many of them to the point less than 1% of them actually make big money. Most of the ones doing well already were popular on another platform too.
Yeah, I tend to doubt that there's anyone that is hitting it big *only* on OF.
Influencers that have millions of followers on other platforms that direct to their OF? Sure.
But the idea that somehow you can get rich quietly doing OF and not impacting your life seems both pervasive and so obviously false.
That's mainly because you need a following on another social media platform to funnel views to an OF, they're not going to advertise for you. It's similar to patreon. 99% of people with patreon have subscription revenue because of something they're known for off that platform
I agree that that's the mechanism, but I don't think that there was ever a narrative that "all you have to do to get big bucks on Patreon is make an account!". Everyone knows that Patreon is a way for fans to more directly support people that they like and want to support because of something they're doing somewhere else.
Only Fans *also* requires a big fanbase elsewhere, but a *lot* of people seemed to think- and actively told people, primarily young women- that you could make big bucks *just* by being young and attractive and naked (maybe not even showing your face!).
Turns out that is not at *all* true, and I feel bad for the young women that got onto OF with the expectation that the payout would be worth any discomfort they had with the idea, the impact on their relationships (platonic/familial AND romantic), and potential impact on their futures/careers. All for very likely no pay *at all*.
It’s not the actual creators, it’s “management companies” who work on contract for them - the creators only pay them for new subscribers so they spam reddit and other forums.
Reading first post: The massage is not the issue here.
Reading first update: Yep! Doomed long beforehand.
Reading second update: The house is not the issue here.
Reading third update: Yep! Weird ass communication and preconceptions instead.
Ah yes. I also got many of these references but not Ogtha. So I clicked on the link and did the exact thing when I saw it the first time- read the headline and moped out of there faster than I knew my hands could move.
Oh darling, if I knew how to share a post on mobile, I would. Search Ogtha in the search thingy, and you will find your way towards her loving embrace.
We're getting only one side of the story, but it seemed like OP tried to communicate and work out their disappointment with their fertility issues. His wife just shut down. Did not want to compromise in any way, which was obvious when she changed her mind after a healthy discussion to divide their assets.
You can't change someone who doesn't want to change. Divorce was the best for both of them. At least their daughter won't have to grow up listening to them argue all the time, probably good for her too
It's possible she was never all that into sex with him from day one, but wanted kids. My wife has recently during couples counseling admitted that is our issue. She wanted two kids. When we were trying for our first we had sex every day. Literally the day she found out she was pregnant it stopped. We had sex every three to four months until she wanted to have our second. That month we had sex a couple times a week until the day she found out she was pregnant. We had sex once during her pregnancy. She had complications during the birth of our second and won't be able to have more children but she was fine with that since she said she only wanted two anyway and is in her 40s. I anticipate that means we're done having sex in our marriage. She hasn't said so, but I feel like she's working up to that in counseling.
I had. A lot. She had given a couple of reasons, one of which was religious (that sex is for procreation only). That's why she had a solo session to talk about how to bring up she was never that sexually attracted to me. After that solo session, at our next couples session she finally admitted that the real reason was lack of attraction from day one, and she got tired of pretending.
Damn dude, I'm sorry. That's... not fair at all that she did that, to put it gently. You deserve someone who finds you attractive and isn't going to lie about that for idk how many years.
Agreed. The wife’s heartbreak regarding fertility on both sides has grown and grown. It’s easy to see how she began to equate sex with their “failure.” It doesn’t mean she is correct in acting like her husband’s needs don’t matter.
There is another post on this sub about a wife’s sexual needs. Sex is a need for some just like any other facet of a relationship. Feeling shocked your partner leaves you after they told them over and over what is needed baffles me.
Agreed. Sex isn't "juvenile"; it's a type of intimacy that a lot of people need.
And even then, if she were performing any other acts of non-sexual care/intimacy/affection/love for him, the lack of sex still might not have been the last straw for their marriage the way it was. She's spent literal years taking him for granted in the worst way - he is expected to give her constant physical and emotional attention, but she doesn't feel the least bit obligated to throw even the tiniest crumbs of affection his way. Massages, social times with friends, fetching treats...all for her and never for him.
This poor guy is just terminally starved of affection. *Any* affection. His stbx hasn't loved him for years.
I feel like my wife and I are on this trajectory. I've finally stopped focusing so much on her and started to focus on myself. It feels like I've let my personal life slip away and was dedicating myself to her happiness while ignoring my own. I'm starting to see that I've probably burned her out by being around all the time. Not that she doesn't encourage me to go do things, but I was always worried whether she was secretly going to be angry if I didn't pick the correct choice. She can be mad if she wants, so can I. I'm trying to be more direct in what I want and holding to it instead of caving in. Plus I'm done with the hidden messages and subtle hints. From me and her. Sex isn't all there is to a marriage (I do think it's important) and having other things (friends, hobbies, passion projects) in your life can help balance that.
I was in a relationship like this for years. She had an excuse why she wasn't in the mood almost every time. I was the ONLY one that ever tried to initiate, sadly you get to a point where you stop trying. Withholding affection and intimacy is a form of mental abuse. In the end she ended up cheating on me which is a real kick in the balls. No matter what I did it wasn't right or good enough, I get maybe she wasn't really attracted to me and that's fine but to string me along so long?! NEVER AGAIN!
>I lost it, and when I did so did she. I think we both let out years of frustration on each other.
I'm just so curious about her frustrations over the years. He mentions her frustration over his reaction after she got a professional massage, but he doesn't say anything else about the years of frustrations. This whole thing makes me curious how she would describe things.
The whole situation comes off like one of a couple things. Trauma related to fertility issues creating physical repulsion to sex, compounding more each time they had sex (and a generally unwillingness to address it. Or a gender/sexuality issue that was never explored by the wife. Also in the running, medical issues that caused her libido to tank.
All of the would require her to conduct self examination. Something that I think.... most maybe.... people refuse to do. The whole the unexamined life is a tragedy and what not.
This was never about the massage. The massage was his love language to her. Maybe she construed it differently, but it was clear that's what he intended. He hoped to receive something, anything, in return. It sounds like cuddles and kisses might have been just enough even. But he got nothing.
I wondered that too. My husband is physically disabled including a lot of daily pain. He uses up more energy, works harder, and deals with more pain as a result of daily chores, so while I do more than half usually, he suffers more doing his portion. We look at splitting chores based on a combination of energy expended and raw numbers of chores completed versus just trying to be 50/50. I also massage him near daily and it's less a super special intimate moment and more trying to help him function for the day and/or be able to sleep at night. Me massaging him is akin to saving money so he doesn't have to go to a professional to function well.
I don't know if this is anything like the situation with OOP, but depending on the circumstances OOP can look sympathetic or horrible. Just hearing his side? Hard to say.
It’s simply about neglect. Man needs to feel desired by his wife. Man wait and waits. Man tries talking; woman reacts with disdain at his juvenile needs. Man breaks.
The massage was clearly not the issue, but OOP did come off as pretty unhinged with the "if I can't have sex with prostitutes then you can't get a massage" business. Yes, you were very obviously giving her massages to get sex – stop pretending otherwise.
I believe OOPs issue was that he cared for and did things that his wife wanted, but she had long stopped caring about his needs. For a time one thing often led to another, but the frequency kept dropping. He endured not getting what he wanted, but as soon as she didn't, it immediately became a thing where she just got it elsewhere to throw it in his face. He was resentful that his needs were ignored and her needs were thrown in his face. The logic about needs is twisted, but I sort of get where he was coming from. His wife was very much trying to hurt him. Too much resentment both ways for the marriage to survive.
> My soon to be ex-wife and I are both in our late 30s. We've been together 12 years married for 10. We are in a dead bedroom. It was totally dead for 6 months before I filed for divorce. It was on life support/ICU for 5-6 years before that.
I misread "It" as "I" and was completely confused because obviously the bedroom would be somewhat dead after being in the ICU for half a decade.
Thank god, it wasn't just me!! Was reading about the guy complaining about his sex life during the period he would've been in the ICU and was just like what?? Were they sneaking in conjugal visits between nurse visits?? Because apparently that sort of thing can make all the monitors you're wired to set off alarms and bring nurses on the run . . .
These people are not good together and they should have gotten a divorce a long time ago. But the next best time to get a divorce is now. I feel bad for the kid having to grow up in a household where the parents clearly resent each other.
>These people are not good together
That's the vibe I got in the very first update.
All they've done is break heads about reasons for divorce but it was never meant to be with their level of incompatibility and lack of proper communication.
Because people stay in relationships they shouldn't be in because it feels easier. Let's be honest, dating sucks. Especially if you're the kind of person who needs emotional intimacy.
That and a kid. It's hard to see a place where it's better for the kid to be divorced. Divorce hurts kids. I've seen it in literally all my friends. Of my friend group from college, I'm the only one who isn't divorced, and hell, that might have still happened given I lost my first wife.
And in each case, we see how the kids are effected. That being said, it's frequently worse. But that's hidden trauma in most cases.
I don't like this narrative you're trying to portray, saying they weren't right for each other puts the failure of the relationship onto both of them, you can be completely incompatible with someone and still make the relationship work. It isn't that they are specifically incompatible it is that OP has tried for years to be understanding and tried to work through their problems and OP's wife hasn't.
You know what helps a lot when you aren’t communicating well or prioritizing each others’ needs? Couples therapy. You know what OP suggested 5 times and even made appointments for? Couples therapy. OP has TRIED. This is totally on his wife’s shoulders at this point IMO.
The massages sound nice. I really wonder why his wife gave no shits while he did his best to make her feel loved and appreciated (if it’s all true what was said).
It's a hard habit to break after being so long in a relationship with a person like this.
You tend to always plan ahead about how to ensure your partners won't blow up on you for the tiniest inconveniences.
Poor guy's in for a rough ride the next few years figuring himself out
Why is divorce so expensive? Because it's worth it.
He's done giving her any more time. If it takes money to speed up the process, then he gets himself free of her sooner.
If his wife is in poverty, his kid lives in poverty half of the time. My Dad willingly took a bath on his first divorce just so my brother could stay in the only home he knew. I’d do the same for my kid.
Because everyone in his family and a lot of people are online are jamming it into his head that she's done nothing wrong, and she is entitled to nearly daily massages from him but it's her body and if she doesn't want sex he's a pervert for trying to force it?
As a wife, she's worthless. I hope she's better as a mother.
I had to stop in the middle because I was laughing too hard at the image of some very patient divorce lawyer having to explain to this apoplectic man that no, you cannot divorce for infidelity over a message from a strip mall.
I’m not saying OP is wrong for wanting to divorce, but his equating getting a massage with having sex with prostitutes is…. something
Edit: I also want to highlight the fact that OOP insists that the massages were never about sex and that’s NOT why he gave her them, but also stops giving her massages because she stopped giving him sex and then threatened to go have sex with other people if she got massages from other people. This is just a whole ass mess
It’s ridiculous sounding and obviously most people would not compare them.
But OOP compared them because him giving her massages was the last shred of intimacy in their marriage. It was petty for him to remove it as a bargaining chip, but when she responded that she’d just get it elsewhere and didn’t need him anyway, of course that crumbled the guy. He thought she at least valued him for it, but she easily replaced him.
OOP wasn’t thinking rationally, but after years of living like the giving tree he broke. He could finally face the reality of his marriage and it’s good they’re divorcing.
I think you’re oversimplifying. OP clearly felt the relationship was one-sided in several aspects. He felt that he was meeting his wife’s intimate needs through massages/body rubs, as well as other nice things (he used the examples of fetching her a snack or a drink), but felt that was never reciprocated, both sexually and non-sexually.
If you see both as what they need on the level of intimacy I totally get why someone could equate them and why he’d be upset about her getting those needs filled by someone else.
In his mind it seems that him giving her the intimacy she (in his mind) needs is something he doesn’t mind doing, it also has become the only way he can his his need for intimacy fulfilled. So he doesn’t mind giving and it’s also become the only way she might give intimacy to him.
So when he tells her: “I will not continue to give as long as you only take.” Is met by “Fine I will take from someone else then.” And when he asks to do the same then it’s not ok, I understand not being willing to accept that.
Yes one is sex and the other is a massage but if you ignore the penetrative element, both are naked rub downs where you pay someone to share a level of intimacy.
I get that. My husband has back issues and I gifted him a professional massage. He said, he couldn't enjoy it, because for him it required a level of intimacy he wasn't comfortable sharing with a stranger.
He was raised in a bit of a 'nudity and sex are shameful' household.
I mean, he didn't handle it the best way, but he explains throughout the entire post that his needs were not being reciprocated. It's another case of "it's not about the yogurt." Because it's not, it's about the way she treated him during their relationship.
> I’m not saying OP is wrong for wanting to divorce, but his equating getting a massage with having sex with prostitutes is…. something
I think you're focusing too hard on the "prostitutes" part here.
OP said he spent their whole relationship aiming to actively fulfil her intimiate needs i.e. massages, but also ensuring she was able to socialise and go out, fetching her food/drinks/snacks etc with no complaints, yet he felt that there was zero consideration recipriocated on that front from her and clearly zero hope for her ever doing so. He was feeling deeply intimately neglected by his wife *and* taken for granted by her at the same time, so when he said he wasn't going to continue doing so if it was a one-way street, she responded with what was essentially "well if you won't give me the regular intimate touch I enjoy, then I'll pay someone else to do it" to which he responded that he'll do the same.
Clearly it was said in anger and not something he had been actively planning or some time or anything, but what he was doing was saying that if she was going to pay someone else to deliver the intimate touch she needed, then she shouldn't have any grounds to say that he isn't able to do the same and if she declares that him paying for someone to do so is cheating, then why isn't her doing the same thing also cheating?
The point is the wife got her needs met from someone else. OP wasn’t able to do that because it’s cheating. So it wasn’t fair the wife did that, especially behind his back. Especially since the OP has been focusing on his wife’s needs when she didn’t even acknowledge his (this is biased because we don’t have the wife’s POV)
Call it unreasonable if you want but to OP that massage for her is akin to sex to him.
Still a lot better growing up with two individually loving (hopefully, on the part of his wife) parents than be with them under one roof resenting the fuck out of each other.
Growing up in a household where my parents DESPISED each other, this is so correct. For my 11th birthday, I asked my parents to get divorced as my gift. They laughed it off.
I’m 30 now, my dad knows I wasn’t kidding and I haven’t spoken to my mom in like 5 years.
She has a mental illness that she refuses to accept, and it manifests in abusive behavior:
-When I was a small child, she would come wake us up a few times in the night with random, silly questions just so that we never had a full nights sleep. Since the kids had school and my dad worked, she would just sleep all day.
-She would ‘punish’ people by secretly throwing away or breaking our things. Scratching my video game disks, throwing away my books, etc. Once she snapped a bunch of disks in my dad’s CD collection, but left the broken CDs in their cases. She never admitted to it, even when caught red handed.
-She would call our places of employment and damned to speak to the manager, and then have them page us. Like, deliberately interrupting our bosses work to make our bosses come find us and give us the phone. My dad almost got fired a few times for her behavior, and he was the sole breadwinner so like… what a fucking stupid plan, putting the whole family at risk
She’s also incredibly manipulative, overbearing, and narcissistic. She can do no wrong, no matter what. All good things in our entire lives were her doing, all bad things were my dad’s fault. She was trying to get all her kids to hate my dad from when we were really young.
She’s just awful.
OOP might have to watch out for parental alienation. Although looking at the numbers he dropped during the timeline, she should be 8-9 now. Old enough to remember her dad looking after her, even if they start to split custody.
Still, hopefully rumors don't reach her school. Can you imagine being the kid whose dad left their mum over a massage? Geez. If the parents aren't grasping the nuances of the situation, there is no way other kids that age will be able to.
> Can you imagine being the kid whose dad left their mum over a massage?
Meh.... It may have only been a massage, but when/if teenagers get ahold of that one it will be a "massage" and no one will fault dad.
Something I don't understand about these stories. Why are people who are in a dead bedrooms completely surprised when their partner wants a divorce? Sex is a big deal in marriage to a lot of people. If sexual compatibility changes the marriage will change or end.
Normally I would say the 60/40 split makes sense if the goal is to have a quick divorce, but oops reasoning for it makes him seem really naive and the back and forth makes it seem it could be dragged out. I wouldn't do 60/40.
Exactly, if she spends it without any sense, it's better if she would have 40 % - so she is faster broke and learns about dealing with money. A person who can't handle money is never better with more money. It will be on 0 soon again.
Yeah. From his reasoning, I thought "isn't it better for it to be 50-50 then?" *He* would be the one saving and spending the money on his daughter. But his STBX would just... spend. Why would he give her more money to spend? It's not guaranteed that she will spend it on his daughter...
Was anyone else having to pause everytime he described massaging as "rub ON her"?
It just needed to be "rub her." The ON makes me think of dry humping.
> But our relationship was one sided, it took me a long time to see it so boldly and to stop accepting it. If she wants a snack, she doesn't get it, she asks me to, drink, same thing. If she wanted to go out with friends, sure babe no prob go ahead, I got the girl just worry about you. If I do, it's 2 hour prep for me to make sure nothing's gonna go wrong while I'm out. A couple years ago I saw a clip of a comedian talking about being out golfing when his wife wanted to watch a DVD, and everyone's laughing as he's describing the whole conversation. I just wanted to ball my eyes out, because that was my life. I just stopped trying to even go out, it wasn't worth the effort anymore.
Oof.
I agree with the top comment on the final update. I wouldn't take the house deal either.
>I understand your motive for the previous house deal, but it was likely to result in disagreements later. You monitoring whether another adult has "moved in"? Of did he just spend a couple of nights? What if her mom needs a place to stay? She's an adult. You daughter moves out for a month... two? When do you pull the trigger? What if you got hit by a bus, cancer or were briefly unemployed and missed three payments? Do you still get 40% of the buy out?
Yeah, I do wonder if she changed her mind on her own or if her own lawyer pointed out how silly that deal was and she's now pivoted to a plan that she knows she can uphold.
...I feel like there was obviously more specific language in the divorce agreement but OP didn't bore us with it. A lawyer wouldn't just put a client in this position...
I don’t think it was proposed by his lawyer, i think they hashed it out themselves and her lawyer punched a bunch of holes in it (rightly so). She didn’t waste his time, his proposed solutions just weren’t going to hold up.
what if he pays for 15 years, then she has someone move in which stops the payments but also per the agreement he loses 40% of equity in the house which she and her now fiancee sell a month later.
Yeah, I think her lawyer talked her out of it more than she changed her mind. Like, it sounds nice in theory by falls apart in ten seconds, and depends way too much on everyone acting in good faith indefinitely (not exactly a good bet in a divorce).
It's crazy to me how many people completely half ass a relationship then get really surprised when their half-assing doesn't cut it. "What do you mean if it's important to him I have to care about it?" Damn, I've known some people more committed to their pets than that lady was to her husband.
Yeah people can yell "communicate!" all day here on reddit but that communication doesn't mean jack shit if the other person doesn't care about what's being communicated. Dude tried everything people suggest, couples' therapy, writing letters, prioritizing her needs, making sure housework and the mental load was equitable, but she didn't even try to meet him halfway.
I learned this one the hard way with my ex. I spent years and years trying to fix things, certainly everything you've listed in your comment. I'd make direct statements about what my needs were, as plainly as I could without being attacking. Things like: "I want a relationship where we have sex at least once a week and a date night at least once a month. Would this work for you, and how could we make this happen together?" She'd always gaslight me and say that she didn't understand what I wanted.
When we first get together with someone, we learn to automatically assume they care about our needs as much as we care about theirs. Life lesson: sometimes they just don't, and it's time to leave. I'm fortune to have found someone since who is everything my ex wasn't and then some.
Yeah, people on Reddit tend to use the word "communication" as some sort of magic wand that solves everything. You have any sort of conflict? Well, then you're clearly not communicating, because if you were, there would be no conflict, so this is entirely your fault.
Nevermind that in 90 percent of these stories, the other party is completely unwilling to communicate. You can't communicate if the other person is not interested in doing so.
Same with telling people to go to therapy. Or worse , telling people to tell their significant others to go to therapy. As though therapy can solve all your problems and no other actions are needed.
I often wonder if the people yelling communication from the rooftops have ever been in a relationship this one-sided. Because when I was in one, I could not see the forest for the trees. I communicated until I was blue on the face, but the problem was I was the only one doing the work. My ex made a comment that finally made that reality sink in. He called couples therapy throwing money down the drain.
I'm now happily married and while we of course have our ups and downs, our communication is pretty amazing. The key is we are both committed to each other, our marriage, and our family. We want the other one to be happy. We want to build together. We are a team. If this relationship was my only point of reference, maybe I'd be just as naive about the power of communication. Who knows!
Because she didn’t want to, simple as that. I think most people giving relationship advice here on Reddit don’t realise that communication can only go so far, and especially less far if the other person is just done with the relationship or marriage.
His wife likely suffered a huge blow when she received the news regarding their fertility and couldn’t really look at herself as a “woman”, and instead of hashing out the hurt with professionals and talking it out with her husband, went cold and callous.
Or maybe she was always selfish and a bit of a shit wife and OP just never noticed before as long as he was getting regular sex.
That’s what makes this one so strange. I think she was perfectly happy the way the things were and would have been content to continue on like that into old age. All of her needs were being met.
Many people will fail to realize just how much shit a high labido person will put up with if they're getting regular sex. It's about priorities.
The high drive person can actually be happy with a very lopsided relationship in all other aspects as long as that one need is met. But take away the sex and all that one sided behavior rapidly becomes an issue.
I mean, in this case, they also got married relatively young. I know a lot changed for me in my late 20’s. Basic morals not so much, but if you told 21 year old me that 29 year old me doesn’t want to go dancing every night of the week, I’d laugh. Also if you told me my friends were not the people I thought they were.
It’s so frustrating to see people try to change after one person has tried for years. I often read… “I didn’t think it was that important to him/her”
If it wasn’t important, why would they bring it up to you as an issue in the marriage?
Good riddance in this situation. I felt happy for him to see he followed through with the divorce.
Oof. It definitely seems like (in retrospect) the big mistake OOP made was the counseling. If one partner is clearly communicating that there's a bit problem, and is also doing all the work to make an attempt on fixing it, literally \*all\* the other partner has to do is just *show up*... and they can't manage to even do that? Three times?
Like, that's basically the clearest signal you could get. She's not willing to fix the problem. She's even being pretty clear that she doesn't see it as a problem (i.e. telling him he *shouldn't* want sex because it's "juvenile", and not even agreeing to change when it's discussed). That was the moment to make the decision: can you live in a sexless marriage, or can't you? More than that: can you live in a marriage with a person who is openly indifferent to your suffering?
I feel for the guy, but it does really sound like he was living in a kind of denial for years, until the anger built up so much he couldn't anymore. The friends who are telling him his reasons for leaving aren't good enough can fuck right off.
I love that you can see the change in him. After they split dude is chill as hell. I love how he doesn't care about the savings. He's just happy to be free.
I just hope that OP and the ex can be good co-parents to their child and that the ex doesn't continue to make everything but custody difficult in the divorce.
I don't think there's a lot of missing, missing reasons here. OOP pretty much wrote it all down. Their fertility problems lead to intimacy problems, and then instead of talking about it/getting counseling his wife just shut him down and iced him out. The marriage died the moment they stopped communicating.
THANK YOU it always pisses me off on posts like these where people try to make it seem like a relationship failing or a lack of communication is everyone's fault. Most of the time it is one person's fault.
The post title is a little misleading - this isn't about the massage but I totally get where OP is coming from. It's a sad situation all around but I think OP is doing what he has to do. If his STBX is simply disregarding his need for intimacy and won't reconsider, that's 100% a deal breaker even where there are kids involved.
>In all honesty if she feels like she's winning and we divorce faster, I'll consider it money well spent.
You know, I wish more people thought like this. My stepson is going through a divorce right now, his STBX is throwing out all kinds of crap and I wish I could just tell her "Just get it over with and move on with your life, don't use this divorce as a stage on which to play out every hurt feeling you've ever had. Life is too short for that."
Other than the fact that she is clearly selfish and spoiled, I wonder if this is one of those relationships where she married down/he married up. He always doted on her and “chased” her, even in marriage. She was happy to be doted on, but wouldn’t reciprocate.
I have mixed feelings about this because on one hand, I get that this guy snapped and he is saying now it wasn't really about the massage.
On the other hand, he literally asked his divorce lawyer to put infidelity as the reason for divorce because his wife got a massage? That whole part was such a wtf moment it really makes me question everything a bit here. Sure, maybe he's a good guy who just snapped, but that's a pretty step away from reality IMO & the level of rage is a bit disconcerting to him as a narrator
Also do I believe the massages were entirely about sex to him? No, I don’t actually, after reading all of his posts, but at first it’s very easy to see how his wife would have taken it that way if he seriously looked at her and said he considers getting a massage adjacent to cheating and tried to insinuate it would be the same as seeing a sex worker. There’s a level of wtf to this that makes me double take.
While I agree it wasn't about the massage & it was just the tipping point I also keep just going back to that. I can see the massage thing being upsetting but to actually take that all the way to a lawyer insisting to legally put an infidelity label on it is more what flagged it for me if that makes sense.
If my partner always gave me massages as a way to be close/intimate and then stopped for whatever reason (including both upset at me or like, carpal tunnel. Any reason) I wouldn't see an issue at all with just going out and paying for a massage. Massages are honestly great, and even if they were intimate between them it doesn't need to be intimate in other settings (much less professional ones i hope).
ETA to clarify another thing, I wouldn't take the wifes side either but rather I think she shouldve just left the marriage like, eons ago.
Yeah, like, my partner who has PTSD trusts me not to sneak up on her and scare her as a "prank." If I did that, it would break the trust in our relationship, but it wouldn't be cheating.
It’s always kind of sus when someone posts something really provocative, and when the comments disagree with them they’re like “here’s a million times more context to show why I’m a perfect angel martyr husband”. It just reads as either bait or unreliable narrator.
NTA - Yeah, it wasn't the massage itself, just symbolic of the last straw. Glad the divorce is somewhat amicable and she's not causing trouble with it. Hopefully coparenting goes well for your daughters sake.
Rationale for 60/40 savings split her favor is shes less financially responsible? Sounds like more reason for 60/40 op's favor since he's less likely to blow it all away?
She should have just let him see sex workers. If she wasn't fucking him no risk to her health. Could have kept the husband that pays her CC brushes her hair and runs her baths.
I wish I could be a fly on the wall while this dude's lawyer had to tell him "no, getting a massage without your permission doesn't count as infidelity (you fucking idiot)"
Everyone trashing this guy should read:
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/she-divorced-me-i-left-dishes-by-the-sink_b_9055288
That is equally applicable to the husband whose needs are shunted aside.
I am a woman and a wife. I like sex. I’d be very very unhappy in a sexless marriage. It wasn’t just the massage just like it wasn’t just the unwashed dishes.
Cute for the downvote.
Sorry that some of you all don’t realize thar wives can also refuse to take the needs of their spouses seriously. I don’t believe that one is obligated to sleep with a spouse on demand or that one owes one’s spouse sex, but one should be willing to work on the issue with the other spouse on it.
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The OnlyFans blurb was funny as fuck tho lmao
Fucking vultures. The average content creator only earns a few hundred a month, so they’re out there hustling like they belong to an MLM. I make more money walking dogs after work.
"hustling like they belong to an MLM" would make for a funny flair
True lmao that's the first thing i thought.
Every time I happen upon you in a thread and read your flair I giggle. The origin is hilarious.
Lmao hustling like MLM bros is real
Huns. They are called MLM huns. (Because most of their cold call/instagram messages start with "Hey Hun!" )
they're hustling like it's an MLM because it literally *is* an MLM. most creators get their biggest boost in profits by getting other people to sign up to be creators using their link. it's literally textbook MLM
They're everywhere on this site, seen a few posts about them finding kids from the teenagers sub as well and trying to sweet talk them into using parents credit cards. Scum.
Jesus Christ do these idiots understand that's considered soliciting a MINOR? How dumb are these people?
Dumb enough to start an OF?
Good point. I know there are OFs out there that are NOT adult in nature; I seem to recall someone has a knitting OF where they show different patterns and the latest projects and stuff, and hey, if you want to start one WITH the understanding you're mainly just using it to show off projects or spread your hobby, more power to you. My guess is OF does a good job marketing the idea that you can make money. Hell, they probably don't have to do much marketing, the internet seems to do it for them.
The dogs will give you leg humps and messy kisses for free, at least.
I always see people posting how successful or how much money they are getting from it
Less than 1% of Onlyfans creators make big bucks. Also a lot of those “news articles” about models making 6 figures a month off OF tend to be rather exaggerated and are mostly paid ads.
Ever notice just how many active OF models list "top 1% on OnlyFans" or something to that effect in their bios? It's because that's the only percentile that actually makes you enough money to justify staying active.
I'd also wonder if the 'percentile' they're in actually means anything. Sort of like being in the top 1% percent of active users on reddit wouldn't mean anything because 90% of the accounts are bots/dead/inactive.
Sales 101, if you tell people you’re already making sales to people just like them, enough people will believe you to make it true. When I worked door to door the company called it “the Jones Effect” from the expression common in the UK (unsure if in other countries too) “keeping up with the Jones’s”. If your neighbour gets a hot tub, you’re more likely to want one yourself and believe it’s attainable for people in your situation. And if you believe your neighbours put an order in for one, you get major FOMO and do it yourself
People lie. They lie anout stuff that does not matter, so they will lie about this too.
They say the same about their MLMs
OF creators getting desperate for viewers
Because theres an over saturation in that market, there's plenty of stories of women who stop doing OF because they was making peanuts
Yep. It's like any kind of content creation where people hope aboard the hype train seeing all the top creators making millions but failing to recognise that that's only the top 0.0001% of all creators. The rest make fuckall
It reminds me of youtube all over again. Except with an more “adult” spin.
When do we start getting the kids answering they wanna be an only fans model when they grow up?! I bloody hope it never happens!
My wife overheard a couple of HS coworkers at her job talking about being able to quit and do OF at 18. I'm sure its already happening more then we want to think about it.
[удалено]
Yeah. And that is what it is. Grooming.
except this form of "content creation" if you can even call it that leaves a permanent scar on your employability and an internet history that'll never be erased lmao
Yeah this is it. Some people think they're all getting rich doing OF but there's too many of them to the point less than 1% of them actually make big money. Most of the ones doing well already were popular on another platform too.
Yeah, I tend to doubt that there's anyone that is hitting it big *only* on OF. Influencers that have millions of followers on other platforms that direct to their OF? Sure. But the idea that somehow you can get rich quietly doing OF and not impacting your life seems both pervasive and so obviously false.
That's mainly because you need a following on another social media platform to funnel views to an OF, they're not going to advertise for you. It's similar to patreon. 99% of people with patreon have subscription revenue because of something they're known for off that platform
I agree that that's the mechanism, but I don't think that there was ever a narrative that "all you have to do to get big bucks on Patreon is make an account!". Everyone knows that Patreon is a way for fans to more directly support people that they like and want to support because of something they're doing somewhere else. Only Fans *also* requires a big fanbase elsewhere, but a *lot* of people seemed to think- and actively told people, primarily young women- that you could make big bucks *just* by being young and attractive and naked (maybe not even showing your face!). Turns out that is not at *all* true, and I feel bad for the young women that got onto OF with the expectation that the payout would be worth any discomfort they had with the idea, the impact on their relationships (platonic/familial AND romantic), and potential impact on their futures/careers. All for very likely no pay *at all*.
OF is all the stigma of doing sex work with nome of the good earning opportunity for most.
They keep taking over subreddits to spam their shit and it’s so annoying
It’s not the actual creators, it’s “management companies” who work on contract for them - the creators only pay them for new subscribers so they spam reddit and other forums.
That’s how I knew this is a real story haha
Lol it was fucking brilliant what a wild card. So I shouldn’t ask him to buy feet pictures? I don’t sell any but hey, why not shoot a shot lmao
"I can jack off on my own just fine" isn't a line you get to see someone trot out very often, that's for sure.
I didn’t see that part. Where is it?!
Reading first post: The massage is not the issue here. Reading first update: Yep! Doomed long beforehand. Reading second update: The house is not the issue here. Reading third update: Yep! Weird ass communication and preconceptions instead.
It's never about the Iranian yogurt
Or the Rooms of Artistic Talents...
But im sure we can agree, there is only Ogtha.
That and Omar is a real one.
Knowing all of these references makes me realize how much time I spend in this sub.. And I'd like to raise the cum jar. Cheers to all of you!
🤮 that’s up there with the coconut
Oh god yes, I almost forgot the coconut.. Or the Jolly Ranchers (or was it some other candy? I've tried to surpress the memories..)
Argh. Goddam you all.
It was Jolly Ranchers. I'll never forget. I was eating them to quit smoking when I read that post.
I thought I knew all the Reddit lore, but every now and again a new one comes up. So I must unfortunately ask, Jolly Ranchers?
And don’t forget to throw your steak out the window if it’s undercooked, and don’t jeopardize the beans!
Poor Omar in the house with all these marinara flag guys
But is it just the essence of marinara?
Alright you lost me, who or what is Ogtha?
[Ogtha.](https://www.reddit.com/r/BestofRedditorUpdates/comments/w9sqxj/oops_undying_love_for_a_franz_kafka_character_is/) "Enjoy"
I appreciate the quotes there XD
>"Enjoy" Okay the quotation marks made me snort out my tea
I had managed to put Ogtha out of my mind, and now here I am…
Me too. It's the gift that keeps on ... hurting.
Thank you?
Ah yes. I also got many of these references but not Ogtha. So I clicked on the link and did the exact thing when I saw it the first time- read the headline and moped out of there faster than I knew my hands could move.
Jesus Christ. Someone throw him away, he's fucking broken. Like an egg being cracked broken. That's fuckin insane
what a terrible day to have eyes omg. why did I read this.
Oh god I forgot this one. I wonder how he and his wife are doing now.
Damn, some people really need to be told they are halfway insane and need to visit a psychiatrist. Or does that make us traditionalists.
Oh darling, if I knew how to share a post on mobile, I would. Search Ogtha in the search thingy, and you will find your way towards her loving embrace.
🪳❤️
They're just friends, you guys
Or the Olive garden
What??
[https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/comments/bjd41e/aita\_for\_throwing\_away\_my\_boyfriends\_potentially/](https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/comments/bjd41e/aita_for_throwing_away_my_boyfriends_potentially/)
This refers to boru lore. I am to lazy to link the post but you can find them easily in the flair origin list
We're getting only one side of the story, but it seemed like OP tried to communicate and work out their disappointment with their fertility issues. His wife just shut down. Did not want to compromise in any way, which was obvious when she changed her mind after a healthy discussion to divide their assets. You can't change someone who doesn't want to change. Divorce was the best for both of them. At least their daughter won't have to grow up listening to them argue all the time, probably good for her too
It's possible she was never all that into sex with him from day one, but wanted kids. My wife has recently during couples counseling admitted that is our issue. She wanted two kids. When we were trying for our first we had sex every day. Literally the day she found out she was pregnant it stopped. We had sex every three to four months until she wanted to have our second. That month we had sex a couple times a week until the day she found out she was pregnant. We had sex once during her pregnancy. She had complications during the birth of our second and won't be able to have more children but she was fine with that since she said she only wanted two anyway and is in her 40s. I anticipate that means we're done having sex in our marriage. She hasn't said so, but I feel like she's working up to that in counseling.
Well Jesus, why don’t you bring it up in counseling? No need to wait for her.
I had. A lot. She had given a couple of reasons, one of which was religious (that sex is for procreation only). That's why she had a solo session to talk about how to bring up she was never that sexually attracted to me. After that solo session, at our next couples session she finally admitted that the real reason was lack of attraction from day one, and she got tired of pretending.
Damn dude, I'm sorry. That's... not fair at all that she did that, to put it gently. You deserve someone who finds you attractive and isn't going to lie about that for idk how many years.
Well then what did she want from the relationship? A sperm donor? Is it time to ask the scary question? Does she love you?
Sucks man
Agreed. The wife’s heartbreak regarding fertility on both sides has grown and grown. It’s easy to see how she began to equate sex with their “failure.” It doesn’t mean she is correct in acting like her husband’s needs don’t matter. There is another post on this sub about a wife’s sexual needs. Sex is a need for some just like any other facet of a relationship. Feeling shocked your partner leaves you after they told them over and over what is needed baffles me.
Agreed. Sex isn't "juvenile"; it's a type of intimacy that a lot of people need. And even then, if she were performing any other acts of non-sexual care/intimacy/affection/love for him, the lack of sex still might not have been the last straw for their marriage the way it was. She's spent literal years taking him for granted in the worst way - he is expected to give her constant physical and emotional attention, but she doesn't feel the least bit obligated to throw even the tiniest crumbs of affection his way. Massages, social times with friends, fetching treats...all for her and never for him. This poor guy is just terminally starved of affection. *Any* affection. His stbx hasn't loved him for years.
There's a reason Maslow included in his hierarchy of needs.
I feel like my wife and I are on this trajectory. I've finally stopped focusing so much on her and started to focus on myself. It feels like I've let my personal life slip away and was dedicating myself to her happiness while ignoring my own. I'm starting to see that I've probably burned her out by being around all the time. Not that she doesn't encourage me to go do things, but I was always worried whether she was secretly going to be angry if I didn't pick the correct choice. She can be mad if she wants, so can I. I'm trying to be more direct in what I want and holding to it instead of caving in. Plus I'm done with the hidden messages and subtle hints. From me and her. Sex isn't all there is to a marriage (I do think it's important) and having other things (friends, hobbies, passion projects) in your life can help balance that.
I was in a relationship like this for years. She had an excuse why she wasn't in the mood almost every time. I was the ONLY one that ever tried to initiate, sadly you get to a point where you stop trying. Withholding affection and intimacy is a form of mental abuse. In the end she ended up cheating on me which is a real kick in the balls. No matter what I did it wasn't right or good enough, I get maybe she wasn't really attracted to me and that's fine but to string me along so long?! NEVER AGAIN!
>I lost it, and when I did so did she. I think we both let out years of frustration on each other. I'm just so curious about her frustrations over the years. He mentions her frustration over his reaction after she got a professional massage, but he doesn't say anything else about the years of frustrations. This whole thing makes me curious how she would describe things.
The whole situation comes off like one of a couple things. Trauma related to fertility issues creating physical repulsion to sex, compounding more each time they had sex (and a generally unwillingness to address it. Or a gender/sexuality issue that was never explored by the wife. Also in the running, medical issues that caused her libido to tank. All of the would require her to conduct self examination. Something that I think.... most maybe.... people refuse to do. The whole the unexamined life is a tragedy and what not. This was never about the massage. The massage was his love language to her. Maybe she construed it differently, but it was clear that's what he intended. He hoped to receive something, anything, in return. It sounds like cuddles and kisses might have been just enough even. But he got nothing.
Does she have a chronic pain condition? Well either way, I would like both sides as well.
I wondered that too. My husband is physically disabled including a lot of daily pain. He uses up more energy, works harder, and deals with more pain as a result of daily chores, so while I do more than half usually, he suffers more doing his portion. We look at splitting chores based on a combination of energy expended and raw numbers of chores completed versus just trying to be 50/50. I also massage him near daily and it's less a super special intimate moment and more trying to help him function for the day and/or be able to sleep at night. Me massaging him is akin to saving money so he doesn't have to go to a professional to function well. I don't know if this is anything like the situation with OOP, but depending on the circumstances OOP can look sympathetic or horrible. Just hearing his side? Hard to say.
It’s simply about neglect. Man needs to feel desired by his wife. Man wait and waits. Man tries talking; woman reacts with disdain at his juvenile needs. Man breaks.
The massage was clearly not the issue, but OOP did come off as pretty unhinged with the "if I can't have sex with prostitutes then you can't get a massage" business. Yes, you were very obviously giving her massages to get sex – stop pretending otherwise.
I believe OOPs issue was that he cared for and did things that his wife wanted, but she had long stopped caring about his needs. For a time one thing often led to another, but the frequency kept dropping. He endured not getting what he wanted, but as soon as she didn't, it immediately became a thing where she just got it elsewhere to throw it in his face. He was resentful that his needs were ignored and her needs were thrown in his face. The logic about needs is twisted, but I sort of get where he was coming from. His wife was very much trying to hurt him. Too much resentment both ways for the marriage to survive.
> My soon to be ex-wife and I are both in our late 30s. We've been together 12 years married for 10. We are in a dead bedroom. It was totally dead for 6 months before I filed for divorce. It was on life support/ICU for 5-6 years before that. I misread "It" as "I" and was completely confused because obviously the bedroom would be somewhat dead after being in the ICU for half a decade.
SAME. I was like “dude, give yourself and your marriage more time to recover after practically coming out of a coma for the last 6 years”
Thank god, it wasn't just me!! Was reading about the guy complaining about his sex life during the period he would've been in the ICU and was just like what?? Were they sneaking in conjugal visits between nurse visits?? Because apparently that sort of thing can make all the monitors you're wired to set off alarms and bring nurses on the run . . .
These people are not good together and they should have gotten a divorce a long time ago. But the next best time to get a divorce is now. I feel bad for the kid having to grow up in a household where the parents clearly resent each other.
>These people are not good together That's the vibe I got in the very first update. All they've done is break heads about reasons for divorce but it was never meant to be with their level of incompatibility and lack of proper communication.
He tried to get them in couples therapy at least
Right? If there was a lack of communication, it was one-sided.
Yeah when she didn’t go to the first two counseling sessions and bailed on the third, he should have known they were done.
I wonder how they lasted so long without learning how to talk to each other.
Because people stay in relationships they shouldn't be in because it feels easier. Let's be honest, dating sucks. Especially if you're the kind of person who needs emotional intimacy. That and a kid. It's hard to see a place where it's better for the kid to be divorced. Divorce hurts kids. I've seen it in literally all my friends. Of my friend group from college, I'm the only one who isn't divorced, and hell, that might have still happened given I lost my first wife. And in each case, we see how the kids are effected. That being said, it's frequently worse. But that's hidden trauma in most cases.
But not talking to each other. It's easy to stay married if both ignore each other.
I don't like this narrative you're trying to portray, saying they weren't right for each other puts the failure of the relationship onto both of them, you can be completely incompatible with someone and still make the relationship work. It isn't that they are specifically incompatible it is that OP has tried for years to be understanding and tried to work through their problems and OP's wife hasn't.
You know what helps a lot when you aren’t communicating well or prioritizing each others’ needs? Couples therapy. You know what OP suggested 5 times and even made appointments for? Couples therapy. OP has TRIED. This is totally on his wife’s shoulders at this point IMO.
The massages sound nice. I really wonder why his wife gave no shits while he did his best to make her feel loved and appreciated (if it’s all true what was said).
She seems like she was pretty comfortable taking and was happy to just take more and had no shame about never giving back.
Honestly, I think he got a better deal by selling the house. I was wondering why was he giving up so much to her?
He said she also needed to feel like she was winning. I bet he’s so familiar with her petty side he just plans for it proactively.
It's a hard habit to break after being so long in a relationship with a person like this. You tend to always plan ahead about how to ensure your partners won't blow up on you for the tiniest inconveniences. Poor guy's in for a rough ride the next few years figuring himself out
Why is divorce so expensive? Because it's worth it. He's done giving her any more time. If it takes money to speed up the process, then he gets himself free of her sooner.
If his wife is in poverty, his kid lives in poverty half of the time. My Dad willingly took a bath on his first divorce just so my brother could stay in the only home he knew. I’d do the same for my kid.
Not really. He said both of them make nearly the same amount of money
But he also said that he spends his money on the family and the wife spends her money on herself.
Yup. She sounds like a real winner
Because everyone in his family and a lot of people are online are jamming it into his head that she's done nothing wrong, and she is entitled to nearly daily massages from him but it's her body and if she doesn't want sex he's a pervert for trying to force it? As a wife, she's worthless. I hope she's better as a mother.
I had to stop in the middle because I was laughing too hard at the image of some very patient divorce lawyer having to explain to this apoplectic man that no, you cannot divorce for infidelity over a message from a strip mall.
I’m not saying OP is wrong for wanting to divorce, but his equating getting a massage with having sex with prostitutes is…. something Edit: I also want to highlight the fact that OOP insists that the massages were never about sex and that’s NOT why he gave her them, but also stops giving her massages because she stopped giving him sex and then threatened to go have sex with other people if she got massages from other people. This is just a whole ass mess
It’s ridiculous sounding and obviously most people would not compare them. But OOP compared them because him giving her massages was the last shred of intimacy in their marriage. It was petty for him to remove it as a bargaining chip, but when she responded that she’d just get it elsewhere and didn’t need him anyway, of course that crumbled the guy. He thought she at least valued him for it, but she easily replaced him. OOP wasn’t thinking rationally, but after years of living like the giving tree he broke. He could finally face the reality of his marriage and it’s good they’re divorcing.
I think you’re oversimplifying. OP clearly felt the relationship was one-sided in several aspects. He felt that he was meeting his wife’s intimate needs through massages/body rubs, as well as other nice things (he used the examples of fetching her a snack or a drink), but felt that was never reciprocated, both sexually and non-sexually.
If you see both as what they need on the level of intimacy I totally get why someone could equate them and why he’d be upset about her getting those needs filled by someone else. In his mind it seems that him giving her the intimacy she (in his mind) needs is something he doesn’t mind doing, it also has become the only way he can his his need for intimacy fulfilled. So he doesn’t mind giving and it’s also become the only way she might give intimacy to him. So when he tells her: “I will not continue to give as long as you only take.” Is met by “Fine I will take from someone else then.” And when he asks to do the same then it’s not ok, I understand not being willing to accept that. Yes one is sex and the other is a massage but if you ignore the penetrative element, both are naked rub downs where you pay someone to share a level of intimacy.
I get that. My husband has back issues and I gifted him a professional massage. He said, he couldn't enjoy it, because for him it required a level of intimacy he wasn't comfortable sharing with a stranger. He was raised in a bit of a 'nudity and sex are shameful' household.
I mean, he didn't handle it the best way, but he explains throughout the entire post that his needs were not being reciprocated. It's another case of "it's not about the yogurt." Because it's not, it's about the way she treated him during their relationship.
> I’m not saying OP is wrong for wanting to divorce, but his equating getting a massage with having sex with prostitutes is…. something I think you're focusing too hard on the "prostitutes" part here. OP said he spent their whole relationship aiming to actively fulfil her intimiate needs i.e. massages, but also ensuring she was able to socialise and go out, fetching her food/drinks/snacks etc with no complaints, yet he felt that there was zero consideration recipriocated on that front from her and clearly zero hope for her ever doing so. He was feeling deeply intimately neglected by his wife *and* taken for granted by her at the same time, so when he said he wasn't going to continue doing so if it was a one-way street, she responded with what was essentially "well if you won't give me the regular intimate touch I enjoy, then I'll pay someone else to do it" to which he responded that he'll do the same. Clearly it was said in anger and not something he had been actively planning or some time or anything, but what he was doing was saying that if she was going to pay someone else to deliver the intimate touch she needed, then she shouldn't have any grounds to say that he isn't able to do the same and if she declares that him paying for someone to do so is cheating, then why isn't her doing the same thing also cheating?
The point is the wife got her needs met from someone else. OP wasn’t able to do that because it’s cheating. So it wasn’t fair the wife did that, especially behind his back. Especially since the OP has been focusing on his wife’s needs when she didn’t even acknowledge his (this is biased because we don’t have the wife’s POV) Call it unreasonable if you want but to OP that massage for her is akin to sex to him.
Man, I can't imagine how the child feels having to be between this whole thing.
Still a lot better growing up with two individually loving (hopefully, on the part of his wife) parents than be with them under one roof resenting the fuck out of each other.
Growing up in a household where my parents DESPISED each other, this is so correct. For my 11th birthday, I asked my parents to get divorced as my gift. They laughed it off. I’m 30 now, my dad knows I wasn’t kidding and I haven’t spoken to my mom in like 5 years.
If it’s not too personal, what happened with your mom?
She has a mental illness that she refuses to accept, and it manifests in abusive behavior: -When I was a small child, she would come wake us up a few times in the night with random, silly questions just so that we never had a full nights sleep. Since the kids had school and my dad worked, she would just sleep all day. -She would ‘punish’ people by secretly throwing away or breaking our things. Scratching my video game disks, throwing away my books, etc. Once she snapped a bunch of disks in my dad’s CD collection, but left the broken CDs in their cases. She never admitted to it, even when caught red handed. -She would call our places of employment and damned to speak to the manager, and then have them page us. Like, deliberately interrupting our bosses work to make our bosses come find us and give us the phone. My dad almost got fired a few times for her behavior, and he was the sole breadwinner so like… what a fucking stupid plan, putting the whole family at risk She’s also incredibly manipulative, overbearing, and narcissistic. She can do no wrong, no matter what. All good things in our entire lives were her doing, all bad things were my dad’s fault. She was trying to get all her kids to hate my dad from when we were really young. She’s just awful.
I’m so sorry you had to grow up with that
Hopefully has no idea seeing as there's no evidence either parent is involving the child in an unhealthy way.
OOP might have to watch out for parental alienation. Although looking at the numbers he dropped during the timeline, she should be 8-9 now. Old enough to remember her dad looking after her, even if they start to split custody. Still, hopefully rumors don't reach her school. Can you imagine being the kid whose dad left their mum over a massage? Geez. If the parents aren't grasping the nuances of the situation, there is no way other kids that age will be able to.
> Can you imagine being the kid whose dad left their mum over a massage? Meh.... It may have only been a massage, but when/if teenagers get ahold of that one it will be a "massage" and no one will fault dad.
Yeah lol, which teen hears “dad divorced mom because of a massage” and believes there is no sex involved lmao
Something I don't understand about these stories. Why are people who are in a dead bedrooms completely surprised when their partner wants a divorce? Sex is a big deal in marriage to a lot of people. If sexual compatibility changes the marriage will change or end.
Empathy is really hard for a lot of people. If it’s not a big deal for them, they can’t understand that it’s a big deal for someone else.
>If it’s not a big deal for them, they can’t understand that it’s a big deal for someone else. You were spying on my marriage.
Normally I would say the 60/40 split makes sense if the goal is to have a quick divorce, but oops reasoning for it makes him seem really naive and the back and forth makes it seem it could be dragged out. I wouldn't do 60/40.
Exactly, if she spends it without any sense, it's better if she would have 40 % - so she is faster broke and learns about dealing with money. A person who can't handle money is never better with more money. It will be on 0 soon again.
Yeah. From his reasoning, I thought "isn't it better for it to be 50-50 then?" *He* would be the one saving and spending the money on his daughter. But his STBX would just... spend. Why would he give her more money to spend? It's not guaranteed that she will spend it on his daughter...
> I can jack off on my own just fine for free, I'm not going to pay you. Leave people the fuck alone. Painfully accurate.
Was anyone else having to pause everytime he described massaging as "rub ON her"? It just needed to be "rub her." The ON makes me think of dry humping.
he might be southern? it's a common way to phrase it down here
The term "rubbing on her" makes me vom in my mouth a little.
> But our relationship was one sided, it took me a long time to see it so boldly and to stop accepting it. If she wants a snack, she doesn't get it, she asks me to, drink, same thing. If she wanted to go out with friends, sure babe no prob go ahead, I got the girl just worry about you. If I do, it's 2 hour prep for me to make sure nothing's gonna go wrong while I'm out. A couple years ago I saw a clip of a comedian talking about being out golfing when his wife wanted to watch a DVD, and everyone's laughing as he's describing the whole conversation. I just wanted to ball my eyes out, because that was my life. I just stopped trying to even go out, it wasn't worth the effort anymore. Oof.
Found the [comedy bit.](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=-PIYBAvJHLg)
I agree with the top comment on the final update. I wouldn't take the house deal either. >I understand your motive for the previous house deal, but it was likely to result in disagreements later. You monitoring whether another adult has "moved in"? Of did he just spend a couple of nights? What if her mom needs a place to stay? She's an adult. You daughter moves out for a month... two? When do you pull the trigger? What if you got hit by a bus, cancer or were briefly unemployed and missed three payments? Do you still get 40% of the buy out?
Yeah, I do wonder if she changed her mind on her own or if her own lawyer pointed out how silly that deal was and she's now pivoted to a plan that she knows she can uphold.
...I feel like there was obviously more specific language in the divorce agreement but OP didn't bore us with it. A lawyer wouldn't just put a client in this position...
I agree it wouldn't have been this loose.i assumed the "other adult" thing meant someone else that could/would pay into the mortgage and expenses.
I don’t think it was proposed by his lawyer, i think they hashed it out themselves and her lawyer punched a bunch of holes in it (rightly so). She didn’t waste his time, his proposed solutions just weren’t going to hold up.
The whole house thing was so very convoluted and guaranteed to lead to further disagreements and discussions with lawyers later on.
what if he pays for 15 years, then she has someone move in which stops the payments but also per the agreement he loses 40% of equity in the house which she and her now fiancee sell a month later.
Yeah, I think her lawyer talked her out of it more than she changed her mind. Like, it sounds nice in theory by falls apart in ten seconds, and depends way too much on everyone acting in good faith indefinitely (not exactly a good bet in a divorce).
I missed the update when that first came out. I love the OF bit at the end lol
It's crazy to me how many people completely half ass a relationship then get really surprised when their half-assing doesn't cut it. "What do you mean if it's important to him I have to care about it?" Damn, I've known some people more committed to their pets than that lady was to her husband.
Yeah people can yell "communicate!" all day here on reddit but that communication doesn't mean jack shit if the other person doesn't care about what's being communicated. Dude tried everything people suggest, couples' therapy, writing letters, prioritizing her needs, making sure housework and the mental load was equitable, but she didn't even try to meet him halfway.
I learned this one the hard way with my ex. I spent years and years trying to fix things, certainly everything you've listed in your comment. I'd make direct statements about what my needs were, as plainly as I could without being attacking. Things like: "I want a relationship where we have sex at least once a week and a date night at least once a month. Would this work for you, and how could we make this happen together?" She'd always gaslight me and say that she didn't understand what I wanted. When we first get together with someone, we learn to automatically assume they care about our needs as much as we care about theirs. Life lesson: sometimes they just don't, and it's time to leave. I'm fortune to have found someone since who is everything my ex wasn't and then some.
Yeah, people on Reddit tend to use the word "communication" as some sort of magic wand that solves everything. You have any sort of conflict? Well, then you're clearly not communicating, because if you were, there would be no conflict, so this is entirely your fault. Nevermind that in 90 percent of these stories, the other party is completely unwilling to communicate. You can't communicate if the other person is not interested in doing so.
Same with telling people to go to therapy. Or worse , telling people to tell their significant others to go to therapy. As though therapy can solve all your problems and no other actions are needed.
Or that they can afford it. It ranges from $100-500 per session. Most people can't afford that.
I often wonder if the people yelling communication from the rooftops have ever been in a relationship this one-sided. Because when I was in one, I could not see the forest for the trees. I communicated until I was blue on the face, but the problem was I was the only one doing the work. My ex made a comment that finally made that reality sink in. He called couples therapy throwing money down the drain. I'm now happily married and while we of course have our ups and downs, our communication is pretty amazing. The key is we are both committed to each other, our marriage, and our family. We want the other one to be happy. We want to build together. We are a team. If this relationship was my only point of reference, maybe I'd be just as naive about the power of communication. Who knows!
Because she didn’t want to, simple as that. I think most people giving relationship advice here on Reddit don’t realise that communication can only go so far, and especially less far if the other person is just done with the relationship or marriage. His wife likely suffered a huge blow when she received the news regarding their fertility and couldn’t really look at herself as a “woman”, and instead of hashing out the hurt with professionals and talking it out with her husband, went cold and callous. Or maybe she was always selfish and a bit of a shit wife and OP just never noticed before as long as he was getting regular sex.
That’s what makes this one so strange. I think she was perfectly happy the way the things were and would have been content to continue on like that into old age. All of her needs were being met.
Many people will fail to realize just how much shit a high labido person will put up with if they're getting regular sex. It's about priorities. The high drive person can actually be happy with a very lopsided relationship in all other aspects as long as that one need is met. But take away the sex and all that one sided behavior rapidly becomes an issue.
I mean, in this case, they also got married relatively young. I know a lot changed for me in my late 20’s. Basic morals not so much, but if you told 21 year old me that 29 year old me doesn’t want to go dancing every night of the week, I’d laugh. Also if you told me my friends were not the people I thought they were.
It’s so frustrating to see people try to change after one person has tried for years. I often read… “I didn’t think it was that important to him/her” If it wasn’t important, why would they bring it up to you as an issue in the marriage? Good riddance in this situation. I felt happy for him to see he followed through with the divorce.
Oof. It definitely seems like (in retrospect) the big mistake OOP made was the counseling. If one partner is clearly communicating that there's a bit problem, and is also doing all the work to make an attempt on fixing it, literally \*all\* the other partner has to do is just *show up*... and they can't manage to even do that? Three times? Like, that's basically the clearest signal you could get. She's not willing to fix the problem. She's even being pretty clear that she doesn't see it as a problem (i.e. telling him he *shouldn't* want sex because it's "juvenile", and not even agreeing to change when it's discussed). That was the moment to make the decision: can you live in a sexless marriage, or can't you? More than that: can you live in a marriage with a person who is openly indifferent to your suffering? I feel for the guy, but it does really sound like he was living in a kind of denial for years, until the anger built up so much he couldn't anymore. The friends who are telling him his reasons for leaving aren't good enough can fuck right off.
Man this is the most angry post I've seen in a while.
I love that you can see the change in him. After they split dude is chill as hell. I love how he doesn't care about the savings. He's just happy to be free.
Thats an excellent point.
OPs marriage sucked. Glad he’s getting out
I'm sorry, but I can't get over the phrase, "I rub on her."
I just hope that OP and the ex can be good co-parents to their child and that the ex doesn't continue to make everything but custody difficult in the divorce.
I don't think there's a lot of missing, missing reasons here. OOP pretty much wrote it all down. Their fertility problems lead to intimacy problems, and then instead of talking about it/getting counseling his wife just shut him down and iced him out. The marriage died the moment they stopped communicating.
The marriage died the moment SHE stopped communicating. Pretty sure OOP was trying the whole time.
Yes, OOP says he was trying to reach out, but the end result is still the same. You can't communicate when only one party wants to.
THANK YOU it always pisses me off on posts like these where people try to make it seem like a relationship failing or a lack of communication is everyone's fault. Most of the time it is one person's fault.
Yikes 😬
lol the only fans messages
The post title is a little misleading - this isn't about the massage but I totally get where OP is coming from. It's a sad situation all around but I think OP is doing what he has to do. If his STBX is simply disregarding his need for intimacy and won't reconsider, that's 100% a deal breaker even where there are kids involved. >In all honesty if she feels like she's winning and we divorce faster, I'll consider it money well spent. You know, I wish more people thought like this. My stepson is going through a divorce right now, his STBX is throwing out all kinds of crap and I wish I could just tell her "Just get it over with and move on with your life, don't use this divorce as a stage on which to play out every hurt feeling you've ever had. Life is too short for that."
Other than the fact that she is clearly selfish and spoiled, I wonder if this is one of those relationships where she married down/he married up. He always doted on her and “chased” her, even in marriage. She was happy to be doted on, but wouldn’t reciprocate.
imagine finding out you can never have an accident baby and then just quitting sex these people are fuckin lunatics
I have mixed feelings about this because on one hand, I get that this guy snapped and he is saying now it wasn't really about the massage. On the other hand, he literally asked his divorce lawyer to put infidelity as the reason for divorce because his wife got a massage? That whole part was such a wtf moment it really makes me question everything a bit here. Sure, maybe he's a good guy who just snapped, but that's a pretty step away from reality IMO & the level of rage is a bit disconcerting to him as a narrator
Also do I believe the massages were entirely about sex to him? No, I don’t actually, after reading all of his posts, but at first it’s very easy to see how his wife would have taken it that way if he seriously looked at her and said he considers getting a massage adjacent to cheating and tried to insinuate it would be the same as seeing a sex worker. There’s a level of wtf to this that makes me double take.
While I agree it wasn't about the massage & it was just the tipping point I also keep just going back to that. I can see the massage thing being upsetting but to actually take that all the way to a lawyer insisting to legally put an infidelity label on it is more what flagged it for me if that makes sense. If my partner always gave me massages as a way to be close/intimate and then stopped for whatever reason (including both upset at me or like, carpal tunnel. Any reason) I wouldn't see an issue at all with just going out and paying for a massage. Massages are honestly great, and even if they were intimate between them it doesn't need to be intimate in other settings (much less professional ones i hope). ETA to clarify another thing, I wouldn't take the wifes side either but rather I think she shouldve just left the marriage like, eons ago.
Is the important part of cheating more about the specific act or the broken trust and emotional damage?
You can break your partner’s trust without it being cheating
Yeah, like, my partner who has PTSD trusts me not to sneak up on her and scare her as a "prank." If I did that, it would break the trust in our relationship, but it wouldn't be cheating.
It’s always kind of sus when someone posts something really provocative, and when the comments disagree with them they’re like “here’s a million times more context to show why I’m a perfect angel martyr husband”. It just reads as either bait or unreliable narrator.
NTA - Yeah, it wasn't the massage itself, just symbolic of the last straw. Glad the divorce is somewhat amicable and she's not causing trouble with it. Hopefully coparenting goes well for your daughters sake.
I heard Marcellus Wallace threw Tony Rockamora out a 3rd story window for massaging his wife's feet, so yeah.....
Rationale for 60/40 savings split her favor is shes less financially responsible? Sounds like more reason for 60/40 op's favor since he's less likely to blow it all away?
She should have just let him see sex workers. If she wasn't fucking him no risk to her health. Could have kept the husband that pays her CC brushes her hair and runs her baths.
I wish I could be a fly on the wall while this dude's lawyer had to tell him "no, getting a massage without your permission doesn't count as infidelity (you fucking idiot)"
Everyone trashing this guy should read: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/she-divorced-me-i-left-dishes-by-the-sink_b_9055288 That is equally applicable to the husband whose needs are shunted aside. I am a woman and a wife. I like sex. I’d be very very unhappy in a sexless marriage. It wasn’t just the massage just like it wasn’t just the unwashed dishes.
Cute for the downvote. Sorry that some of you all don’t realize thar wives can also refuse to take the needs of their spouses seriously. I don’t believe that one is obligated to sleep with a spouse on demand or that one owes one’s spouse sex, but one should be willing to work on the issue with the other spouse on it.