A month ago my wife told me that I was emotionally absent and she didn’t feel loved by me and that I had pulled away. She wasn’t wrong, for the better part of the last 15 months we put the kids to bed then I disappear into the basement, turn on the television, and drink until I’m tired. She had come to this realization about two months before she told me, at that time she more or less completely shut down, I noticed but didn’t really do anything except pester her about what was wrong.

After she told me we had multiple “talks”, I’ve since read NMMNG and everything I said could be an example in the book of what not to do. I stumbled across the MRP subreddit about 5 days ago and recognized that I used to live my life in a manner that more closely resembled an RP man. I’ve since read NMMNG, started MMSLP, and read through a bunch of the recommended posts and some OYS posts. Before I even knew what the issue was, I had already started lifting again, significantly cleaned up my diet, and stopped drinking.

Today she told me that she notices that I’ve made changes but she’s hurting and can’t keep crying herself to sleep every night, that she needs space to heal and that she can’t do it with me constantly there as a reminder of the man who stopped loving her. She wants to separate for some period of time, 3 months or something. This would look like us getting a furnished apartment and sharing that while also splitting time in our existing house with our young children.

Having barely dipped my toe in this I’m not sure where to go from here. This post is pretty much just a hail marry for advice from people who have already made this journey.