Should I stay in a loveless marriage
assalamu alaykum,
I hope you're all in the best of health and imaan. I'm posting this as a last resort and for some objective opinions on the current state of my marriage. I could go on forever but I'll try to keep it as brief as possible.
My husband and I have been married for almost 10 years with two children aH. Everything was great before we had kids, I truly felt like I was with my soulmate and would always go above and beyond to make sure he was happy. However I feel like in my initial infatuation I was also blinded to some major red flags. My husband displays many characteristics of a narcissist, is egotistical, controlling, short temper, etc. however he also displays good characteristics as well, and cares about his family deeply. After having kids I felt like the entire burden was put on me and if I asked him to help he would very quickly get angry or frustrated with our child which would make me reluctant to ask him for help again, even if we discussed the issue. He's said hurtful things about me and my family, he's pushed me out of anger, thrown things, and done many of this in front of our children.
After having two children back to back all while still working a full time job remotely from home (all throughout pregnancy and post partum), I've literally had no break and feel exhausted a lot of the time. This has led to a decreased drive to be intimate (around once a week now). Because we arent intimate as frequent as my husband likes he blames all of his angry outbursts, rude temper etc on this. Is that normal? Is it normal for a man to get so angry if he's not sexually satisfied 2, 3, 4 times a week? I would really like another married man's opinion to chime in here.
Anyway, I've basically become resentful of my husband. With the lack of help, bad temper, general egotistical behaviour and on top of that he had some really strange close relationships with some of his female coworkers where I even found him talking about how hot one of them was, I just feel like I can't trust him and don't feel drawn to him anymore. I feel like I don't care to make him happy as I once did and I'm not sure if I'll ever feel the same love I did for him before.
I've been praying tahajjud every day for almost a year and just asking Allah to turn my heart to what's right, but still feel lost. Just looking for some advice from anyone who's been through something similar :) JAK
EDIT: I'm just going to add some additional context here after reading some of the comments. I understand no marriage is perfect, but I feel like mine is super toxic. If you've ever been in a relationship with a narcissist you know the good days are good but the bad days are really bad. I feel like my mind and heart and constantly burdened by the bad, even if we have some good days. Islamically, I feel like I am not fulfilling my duties as a wife to the best of my ability and that really hurts. I've come to terms emotionally already that my marriage may end, but I'm not sure if I should just stick in it for the kids and keep praying things will get better. I come from divorced parents and yes sometimes it is better for the kids, but a lot of times it's not. Also he's already using them against me saying things like "how are you going to survive without seeing your kids if we're split" etc.
We've sought counseling through family so far and nothing has really helped. He's a good talker and makes it seem like I'm being a bad wife and that's why our marriage is destroyed, but refuses to acknowledge all the hurt that I've been through that led me to being this way. My family even agrees and tells me that what I'm going through is not that bad and I have to make it work.