She's a great mother to our son but outside of not wanting to leave him I'm absolutely miserable in the marriage. I don't trust her as a life partner. She's great with the whole family dynamic and being faithful in a relationship but I've long thought her decision making wasn't the best or most thought out and unfortunately she's smitten by the cliche Disney princess facination. I'm a logic/data driven person whereas she makes her decisions based on emotion. This might be part to our drastically different upbringings.
For context, I grew up away from most blood relatives and spent a majority of my early childhood between foster care and living with my mom's sister before a couple year stint with my mom until she temporarily abandoned me in a sober living to relapse before spending middle/high school raised by a former partner of hers that fell in love with me as a baby and decided to be my "dad" since my biological one didn't want anything to do with me. She on the other had lived with her mom and siblings, raised amongst a huge family, saw her dad frequently (emotionally unavailable but financially present father) and was coddled by her mom. Essentially she wasn't really allowed to make critical decisions for herself so she never cared to learn growing up and whenever things got difficult she'd walk away or let someone else fix it. This I've learned definitely came as a result of my now mother in law "wanting the best for her kids growing up" but completely mind fucking them by not allowing them to make their own decisions or have much mental fortitude.
Despite loving her I struggled believing in marriage and I made that clear to her. This as a result of wasting money buying jewelry for women before (mom, sister, her) for it to get lost, seeing so many unsuccessful marriages, having to spend soooo much on a ring/one day party for others to enjoy as well as someone (usually the male in my state) getting completely screwed in court when the divorce happens and don't get me started if there are kids involved.
Most of our adult lives I've supported her financially paying all/majority of rent and bills while she worked in grad school. This way she could afford gas, apt. internet, insurance and her car note. Dumb on my part looking back as I wasn't making great money and wasn't the best with it but better than her working part time while in grad school. Looking back, I wish I would have talked finances with her instead of being the guy who just took care of it.
Eventually we got jobs in the same city, collectively we made six figures, didn't have to pay rent, and could actually start considering saving for travel/house. Our relationship was great, I didn't have to take care of her out of obligation and wanted to build a forever life with her. Decided logically this was the best time to get engaged and start building that life together.
Months out from our wedding she quits her job (racism in her department and treatment of staff). We talked about these issues as they were coming up but I didn't expect her to quit. Frankly, racism sucks but as a person of color, regardless of where you are in the US you're going to experience it, especially in university settings, so don't spend your life running from it. Mind you, we hadn't paid for the wedding yet (75% remaining).
We move out of free housing provided by her old job and get an apartment. No issue with my jobs salary but still stressful month to month considering she made this choice without even having a solid savings established. Therefore I became that financial support again when she couldn't contribute to our bills or pay her own. She decided she didn't want to go back to the field she was in at university because of racism at higher paying schools. Mind you, this decision came less than 18 months after finishing grad school that took 2 years and cost her six figures in student loans. I considered calling off the wedding because it wasn't feasible to have and the entire foundation of stability I based our marriage on changed. Her dad offered to pay for the wedding and even gave her the remainder of the money for it but she used it for her bills and personal/ student debt. Not a cent went towards helping me with rent which passes me off but at the time i just shook off..
Here comes the curve ball! Despite using emergency contraception, a month before the wedding we find out she's pregnant. Due to covid our official wedding was postponed (no sweat as I didn't want one and we hadnt paid it off). Neither of us wanted to have a child outside of marriage so we got a friend to officiate for us and had a safe and very small wedding with close family only.
I love our son but since the moment we knew she was pregnant I wanted to have an abortion, she didn't. I feel like shit saying it now that he's born but logically and financially it made no sense to bring a child into the world when you look at all the other issues we had going on.
I talked myself into thinking and feeling like this is what I wanted but I knew it wasn't real deep down. I spend most of my time avoiding conversations outside of our son with her, ive isolated myself from friends and family out of embarrassment over my depression and involving them in a failed marriage. I have good moments in the relationship and then I'm back at hating her. Hating her for making so many emotional decisions that now I have to deal with. It tears me up because we have a beautiful son but part of me hates that he's here because if he wasn't I know I wouldn't be.
I'm not crazy enough to hurt myself especially if it meant leaving my son to be raised by her or any of her family but I really feel trapped and see no way out. I know she wouldn't hurt him physically but she's indecisive and weak minded when faced with adversity and I don't want him to be like her.
I know I dont want any more kids in this marriage. We've talked about it and she wants to wait until we get property and a house. I don't say much, just sit back and chuckle in my head at the fact that i definitely don't want anymore kids in this marriage and that she thinks we could afford to get a house when she has all this student loan debt. I know I should leave and deal with the whole two parent household but I feel like my happiness would cost me so much more and hurt our son than if I just stayed.