My husband and I along with one of my stepsons play WoW. It is very addictive, but there can be a balance if that is what you enjoy doing.
There could be several reasons that your wife is doing this but she would have to tell you her own reasons. And I can tell you that like any addiction, you are not going to understand it, fix it, or stop it.
I used the game, while with my ex, as an escape from my reality of a bad relationship. My husband, when he was with his ex, used it to avoid her. My ex used it to enhance his drug use…my brother-in-law used it to meet “people”. My best friend’s husband played almost 8 hrs a day during the week. I think that when he stopped playing he had over one year game time involved.
EDIT: I am in no way saying these reasons are the same as any your wife has, nor am I making excuses for my own actions. There were considerable issues with my ex and I did not help any of those by running away from them. That’s just how things were.
Now when we play, it’s “play” time. It’s our time to not be serious or to have to worry about “real issues” at least for a little while. It does not rule our lives. We play together. There are days that we do not play at all and there are days that we do nothing but play. This is after many years of watching how an addiction like this can ruin lives and coming to terms with the fact that it is an addiction, like any other. I never thought of it that way before though I saw it it destroy several families. I just thought of it as a game, and what harm can it be doing if I’m playing a game? I’m not out at bars, and I’m not hurting anyone so what difference should it make. But I didn’t realize that time flies by when you are on a game. You sit down for just an hour and the next thing you know…it’s 3 hours later.
I do not know what to tell you about how to seek help or what to do to get your wife back…it sounds like you have tried.
Maybe there are support groups out there that could help you. Maybe you should ask her to set a time limit on her playing…maybe you should let her know much it is affecting all your lives. Have the internet connection closed for a time…
Has your wife gave you any reason for her continue to play after repeated attempts to get her to limit it? Has she given any reason why she doesn’t want to pay attention to her marriage or children and instead chooses to sink herself into an alternate reality?
Tried to get an answer - she said I couldn’t handle the truth, and when she gave it to me it was a bit much to handle. A few weeks ago she told me the reason she was so depressed was that she felt she has only been interested in having sex with women and she knew if she had an affair I would end our marriage, so she was going to try and find a doctor to “fix” her, but if I was willing to become a woman then her life would be perfect because she loved me and needed my companionship. Then when I tried to talk to her about it once the initial shock wore off after a few days she said she was not sick and didn’t want to be fixed. So lots of issues, very few solutions.
Oh my!.. I am terribly sorry to hear that. The game makes it easy to avoid real problems…
My suggestion to you is this then. Decide what YOU want and proceed towards that. If you do not want THIS marriage then takes steps towards what you DO want. I believe that marriage, like life, is what we make it. So that means that you can either decide to stay with your wife and change yourself or way of thinking and your plans for the future or you can leave and change your way of thinking and plans for the future. Either way you do not sound happy with THIS marriage.
Don’t look for a solution to an issue that has no solution. Deal with what you can control; yourself and your children. If they bite, punish them. It’s wrong to bite people regardless of the reason they bite. If you want to take them hiking, take them.
Your wife is missing out and one day she will realize that, but it’s her loss. You can not force someone to participate in life or enjoy life. Get her help if she will let you, be supportive if she will let you. If you believe that she loves you, do what you can to help. But do not make it your problem too. If she will not let you help, then you can’t help. Focus on yourself and your children and maybe even seek counseling yourself.
Don’t know if there is precedence for this - so I will ask here. I have been married 8 years and we have one child that is 2. My wife now has an addiction to World of Warcraft MMORPG (massive multiplayer role playing game) and works full time. She plays that game 4-5 hours every weeknight and 8-10 hours on sat and sunday- about 35 hours total a week. I can not get her to stop playing even though I have asked. When I take our child outside for hikes or to go to the playground, she opts to stay home and play. She doesn’t cotribute to any housework or family unless I guilt her into a day here or there. Last Jan she got a text message from someone she met in the game that said “I love you” that I just happened to see since I was in the kitchen. She said she made a mistake when I confronted her and is now on antidepressants but is getting more and more distant and playing that video game more and more. She even refused to help plan a vacation this year to a tropical island because she said she needed internet access and would just rather take the time off to play WOW than go on vacation.
So according to what I read on the website - as far as I know she did not engage in sex with this person that sms’d her, but she did talk hours and hours with him on her cell phone (which I checked and she had lied about how much they were talking). She is not addicted to any illlegal substances, but her video game addiction is interfering with her real life - no friends in real life, no social activity, no exercise.
Our child is now getting increasingly violent towards her because they want her attention and she is usually so tired from staying up all night instead of going to bed that she just lays on the couch and tries to sleep. When they try to get her attention and she ignores them, they bite her to get her to acknowledge them, and then she expects me to discipline them for biting her because she is ignoring them.
There are alot more issues, but this is the one that touches on new territory. I have been trying to get her into counceling but she stopped going a couple months ago and says she doesn’t plan to go back.