First off, I need to say this thread has really been there for me for the past year. Thanks everyone for sharing their stories and helping others out.

My situation - after 4.5 years for marriage, I filed for divorce from my wife in March. We have a 3 yr old and just started mediation.

We dated for 3 years before getting married and things were great but our main issues started after our daughter was born. My wife’s mood changed big time and she started getting extremely controlling and verbally abusive. We moved out of our city and into the burbs due to our location not being hospitable for a child, and my family lived in the burbs.

We spent 3 years trying to make the family work but no matter what I did, it was never enough. Change all the diapers, make everyone food for the week, drive our kid to/from daycare, make more money, none of it mattered. Our sex life ended and I was being talked to like a bum on the street. For a while, she would get me with “you’re not a family man”, and I’d double down and do more but it never satisfied her. Our main issue was that she definitely has some type of bpd. No hesitation about screaming at me full force in front of our child literally every day. Or if I attempted to take her out, it would end with her berating me in public. I couldn’t get away from it. Eventually it turned to the point where she’s chase me around the house screaming and hitting me. She burned all bridges with her family (and mine) and unleashed all her fury at me.

I was depressed. Everyone told me. My family, my friends. I thought this was my permanent life. Up until now, I’d had 30 something pretty great years and now I accepted that I’d be living like a total asshole for the rest of my life.

After talking to my family, her mom, and reading this thread I finally came to thinking, we might be better apart.

One day as I was boarding the train for work, some guy pushes me to get on first and I watched him huff and puff getting to his spot. I actually took a picture of him and thought, man, one day that’s going to be me. I don’t want to end up miserable after holding a marriage together for years and years just to keep everyone miserable. That guy motivated me to get my life back.

Raising a child in 2 comfortable environments is a thousand times better than living in a super stressful hostile environment.

I’m going through the ringer right now w lawyers and mediation, and might push this to a court hearing but I will get a fair shake at raising my daughter and hopefully won’t go broke in the process.

If you’re going through this, keep going!

I made a huge mistake but still have an amazing daughter at the end of the day. Just need to get through the next few months and will hopefully get a new lease on life.

Thanks all