I’ll preface this by saying, in the past year I have gone through losing my father suddenly, launching a successful business for myself and promoting and launching a second business in my father’s memory.

I’ve been married for two years (and been with my husband 8) and my gosh he is wonderful. So wonderful in fact that I have been taking him for granted. He works 60 hour weeks, comes home and relaxes on the couch until bedtime. I take care of all the household duties since I work only between 30-40 hours per week, in comparison much less.

Over the course of the last year, since losing my father, I have basically just tried and maintain status quo. I took off virtually no time and between balancing a small business and home life I feel like I barely made it through. I confide and talk to my husband a lot about my internal struggle. Which hasn’t created much change in our lifestyle though, as he hasn’t helped more around the house, I feel the pressures of home life on top of my compounding work/business life and I never took the time to truly process my dad’s death.

So here I am, ruminating in my lack of self care and wondering where I went wrong. I am day dreaming about what life would be like if things were different. Which I hate myself for, I am constantly berating myself and remind myself I have it really good. I’ve not painted an honest picture of my husband but he is such a wonderful man and he has been there for me in times when I needed him. I love him so dearly. Which is why I am having so much confusion about my unfaithful thoughts. His best friend lives close to us and we see him fairly regularly. First it was the dreams (harmless hang outs with this man, some dreams have been intimate but for the most part they are just him and I travelling together or just having a fun time together and always laughing) and now I am thinking of him in my awakened life. At first I thought, this is just a phase, it will pass. But it hasn’t.

I’ve been using the analogy, water the grass on your own side because the grass is not always greener. I have been actively communicating with my husband and trying to process my long overdue personal/mental health. I am finding it so difficult to be passionate with him lately because he is overworked, not himself, always tired. I recognize my dreams are coming from a place where I want to be paid attention to, fantasizing about someone spending time with me. Which I want to have with my husband again. How can I clearly communicate to my husband that we need to work on things, when his argument is always “I’ve got nothing left in the tank at the end of the day, how can you expect me to want to help with household chores or be active with you” (he works in construction so he really is tired...) I’d love for us to seek counseling but unfortunately it’s not in our budget.

Any advice is appreciated, thank you in advance