What kind of support network do you have? Do you have anyone with whom you can discuss this offline, who will support you?

Don’t have any. My whole family basically are the same as my wife.

Also, I assume this is something where you don’t feel safe just leaving when your wife is there.

It helps me to understand what precisely is the mechanism by which this would go wrong, if you just told her “I’m leaving”.

Can you describe that? The reason why it has to be when she’s away?

Pppp! It’s mental. I’m in a god awful amount of pain (not in quality, but in quantity, the sheer number of parts of my body that hurt is too many to count, and it’s extremely erratic, changing constantly. And then when she finally allowed me to use money to see a doctor in late 2021, the meds they prescribed messed up my stomach, lungs, and I’ve gotten pretty bad dizziness, chest pain, and now stomach pain, and it’s just as erratic as my pains are. Then throw in just normal aging pains, and my mind is just nuttier than hell). On top of that dealing with her…erm…lack of empathy/love/caring/whatever does not bode well when I need to concentrate on driving. There may be other mechanisms that cause such distress, but for the most part it’s just to be far more relaxed and have nothing more stressing me out.

I can connect you with people who run men’s groups online, if that would be helpful for you in establishing a support network.

Edit: After thinking about it over night, maybe it would be best to join a men’s group. I could definitely use more social interaction. It would be so helpful, plus I really need to find friends…and learn to stop myself from over indulging my depression (both from pain and marriage)…Especially while I’m still capable of learning (even if it’ll be rather slow). [If it’s too late, meh, that’s ok. I am well aware of how slow I am now, heh].

It would be nice if I could use it, but unfortunately my situation is just so convoluted. The chronic pains, GERD like symptoms from those meds, and her attitude towards me all mashed together creating a quagmire of nonsensical mental duress. The really only way I’d be able to see if there can be anything that can calm me down would be getting away, but that’s if and only if my pains don’t get in the way.

When I did try leaving in 2017, I couldn’t find a job that wouldn’t exacerbate my pains, and I ran out of money and came back to work for my brother in law doing electrical. I pushed myself for full time and in two months, that was it. I pushed myself too hard, and the pains have never calmed back down to…meh…sort of…kind of…a little bit better.

I finally got out of a long relationship which I had thought was going to last until my death. I was resigned to an unhappy, unfulfilled fate. Then I got out, and boy has it been hard. But worth it! SO WORTH IT.

I am myself again. I would be honored, if this is what you need, to help you find that in your own life as well.

I should have left a long long time ago, but I am my father’s son, and he basically lived the same kind of life with my mother. So one could say it’s a curse.

Anyway, there’s a lot of things I live with from this marriage that I’d like to forget. Like witnessing two of my son’s suicide attempts and his case workers completely ignoring me when I tried to get help for both of them. “Why doesn’t she love me?”, I still hear those words a lot, and I still see images of things that never happened a lot.

Erf…I better not say more, I’ve been eating the wrong things today and am having a hell of a time breathing. Back hurts in several spots, entire body feels weighted down, and I’m so dizzy…Yeesh! Can’t concentrate very well.

Just re-read this, and it’s very much an over-simplification…O_o, and I had hoped to not over-talk…Yeesh!

Oh I definitely need to get out, for both my mental and physical health, and I know it’d take longer than four days til I’d be able to grow ferns, heh.

However, I do know what I’d need, as I’m in a unique position that it’d take only a week to two weeks to know if my body and mind are still capable of holding a job. However, I would definitely need to start making money ASAP, as my health really needs certain foods at regular intervals (thanks to desperation and seeing a doctor before I was fully able to afford it, to which the meds she prescribed for chronic pain seriously messed up my digestive system and quite possibly exacerbated the damage to my respiratory system by a lot).

The key is finding a job that my broken body and broken mind can even have a chance to do. I need to be far enough away in a completely different environment. I need to have a comfortable bed, couch, cot, whatever that’s not on the floor/ground, and a place to shower and go to the bathroom. As well as electrical for a small burner to cook food. Unfortunately, I do believe I need to be alone (Which, I’m totally fine with camping as long as I can get a bed off the ground and a large enough tent for it. I have most other things that I’d need), and any job I get would definitely have a flexible schedule so I could find the best hours for my broken body.

If I was even half healthier than I am now, I’d be gone, heh. Alas, I am not…OOooooow, my back, knee, belly…OOooooow! Meh, at least I get to sleep on a bed for the first time in two years for at least the next four days, YAAAY! HAH!

Spaghetti carbon-era would work, too.

Loving your methodical approach too!

Speaking of, I am spending way too much time on this, heh! I’ve got two hats and a pumpkin bag to knit, and a small painting to do ( Maybe more like these ). I’ll just stick to a cloth of some kind, and let her touch it up how she wants. 🤣 .

Welp! It browned in several spots over night. Maybe because of the dirt? Or the heat gun? Or???

Next tests, I’ll need to try a two layer method. (one with a lower layer of baking soda, and another with a toilet paper bottom. That should help to deduce if the dirt was the cause of it).

First issue I found, I needed to add a little water to the mixture so it would keep from pulling up the dirt as I tried to spread it on. Made it so I could just pour it over. Wtich means two things, I’ll see how moisture reacts to it, and have to wait maybe two days for it to dry…which, if so, might make it really difficult in that I’ll have to fill the unit with dirt before we move it (and it is quite heavy without the added dirt).

Update:

Well, I’ll be damned. I used a heat gun and it dried up within seconds…Everything is back on schedule again, 😃

Although it’s a pretty sheltered location, but wouldn’t the baking soda dissipate with any moisture? Humidity, rain, and/or snow?

Edit: I just thought about it, and what I’ll do is run an experiment. I can place some near my kitchen sink’s handle. Water dripping from my hand and the humidity should give me a good idea how it’d work outside.