Husband's midlife crisis

Approaching his mid-50ies, my husband declared in February that he no longer has passion for me, although he loves me deeply and tells me that I am very attractive and interesting person. I am more than a decade younger, we have been married for 15 years. There are plenty of reasons in his life that are beyond his control that could have that sort of effect on his libido. He is very focused on everything that is not right for him or in the world and 90% of these issues are beyond his control. He does not seek help from books, nor would he ever seek counseling, or take anything to increase his libido, nor get a cortisone shot for his chronic tendenitis. He openly (he feels very good about his integrity) had a short encounter with a woman 10 years younger than I am, which tore me and her to pieces. Although I never met her, she was suffering from severe pain in her uterus too. My husband on the quest ''to follow his heart'' realized that simply doing that, does not make things better.

Since then I have read ''Passages'' and ''Forgive for Good'' and have learned a lot from friends. We have a wonderful child to raise, a nice house, and I love him and hope he is able to make a new shift to being grateful for what he's got, including me (something beyond appreciation).

For the sake of my own health (that I am still struggling with right now) I have decided and communicated to him that what he calls a physical separation (no sex, but I am his best friend and we live together) will become a straightforward divorce if he takes up with another woman again. Although I make more money than he does, we do not have enough for our family living in different places.

So, what am I asking for? Any couple out there who made it through a midlife crisis? He is searching for that burning ''in- love'' feeling. Sex for me means to express the love I feel. Is it possible for men to make that shift when they've muddled through their crisis? Anyone out there with success stories? Also, if things were to go downhill from here (we are still having great family outings together and I do get hugs and kisses on my cheek), any advice on how to pay someone half of the house, so I can keep it for me and my child or any tips for affordable divorce lawyers? definitely anonymously

My heart goes out to you. It's very difficult to make it through a mid-life crisis. Fortunately there is help available. You are right to try to save the marriage.

Check the divorcebusting web site -- there's a section on mid- life crisis.

http://www.divorcebusting.com/ No name

My ex husband and I owned our home together when we decided to divorce. Fortunately our divorce was amicable and we came up with the following arrangement.

Before I could afford to buy him out, but after we separated, he paid half the house payment, and I paid him ''rent'' for living in his half of the house. Example: house payment $2200. Rent for a house of our caliber was, at the time, around $1400. He owed $1100 for the house payment, minus $700 rent I owed him, for a net contribution on his part of $400 a month. He also paid half of insurance, tax and repair bills for this period. He continued to be entitled to half the equity in the house.

About six months later, I had my finances in order to buy him out. I went about refinancing the home in my own name. This transferred title to me only, which my ex husband had to sign for because we were still legally married. The refi also gave me an appraisal value I could use for the ''buy out'' price. I subtracted 6% from the appraised value to account for realtor commissions I'd eventually have to pay when selling the house to get the actual equity. He was entitled to half this net equity. I signed a promissory note to him and began making him payments with interest - I used my new mortgage rate for the interest rate. A few months later, once the new mortgage was in place, I took out a home equity line of credit and paid him off. A slightly higher interest rate, but tax deductible, and the monkey off my back.

This slow process worked for us because my ex husband was not prepared to buy a new house right away. But I believe you could jump right to the refinancing/home equity loan if you are in a hurry.

Best of luck to you. anonymous

I wish you all the best of luck. anon

Next, you seem to want to assure yourself that he is still affectionate, attracted to you, etc. I'm sure that can be true, and that is what makes this so darn hard. Feelings can be sincere and ambivalent at the same time. However, you seem particularly focused on how he feels, not on how you feel. I think it'd be really good to try to focus on what you want, and what you need. Maybe you need to take some distance, or maybe you actually do need to take care of him to feel good about how you're responding, or to feel that you're doing everything humanly (or super humanly) possible to save your relationshp. Just be clear about why you're doing it. If you're suppressing your needs to address his, and expect him to wake up one day and have profound and demonstrable appreciation for all you've done, you might be disappointed. If anything is common about a mid life crises, it's that it's a time of narcissism. If you can just accept that, great. If you can't, take good care of yourself.

Last about legal/financial issues. Go see an attorney, and discuss your situation for how you might position yourself to best protect yourself or keep your options open. You don't have to hire them in a permanent way and doing so doesn't mean you're on the road to a divorce--but a couple hours of counseling may ease your stress, or make you aware of other areas you should focus on. This newsletter had a recent posting with suggestions for divorce lawyers/mediators. You might want to split your funds, separate credit cards and financial responsibilities, and take a few non-permanent steps that will make a later separation a little easier. If you have separate property (non-community property, such as an inheritance or assets that clearly were yours prior to marriage), you should try to establish their source (documents, records, etc.) or set it up that future separate property isn't intermingled with your post-marriage assets. Nolo Press puts out a few good books on divorce in CA; one on financial issues particularly (and another on child custody, although you didn't ask.) It might be good for you to read them, both to be prepared and start thinking about things, and also to bring down the level of fear you might (understandably) have about all the unknowns.

Last, a separation now does not have to be a divorce, and doesn't have to be permanent. It might help you to have some time on your own to sort out your own feelings. Perhaps one of you could find a summer sublet (many available now around campus) so you can get a bit of perspective, without dealing with a total move-out or disrupting your child's life more than you have to. I think it always helps to confront huge challenges by breaking them down into bite size pieces. What you're going through is really, terribly hard. But you're not alone. Good luck. obviously anonymous, too