Gave my wife an ultimatum to save our marriage from becoming a lifeless charade for our daughter,

Gave my wife an ultimatum to save our marriage from becoming a lifeless charade for our daughter, and now she calls me manipulative. I'm a 30 5-year-old man who's been married to my wife, who's 37. For the past seven years before marriage, we had spent three years together, so we've been in each other's lives for a full decade. #reddit #radditstory #askredditstories #redditstories #storytime  Together we have a wonderful five-year-old daughter. By all outside appearances, our life looks picture perfect, a nice home in a great school district, a bright and happy kid fulfilling if sometimes stressful jobs. My wife's job is more demanding, requiring her to travel periodically and spend at least three days a week in the office. My job, meanwhile isn't quite as lucrative, but I work fully remote, meaning I'm the one who shuttles our daughter to soccer, takes her to doctor's appointments, and makes sure the house doesn't fall into chaos. Let me clear up something before anyone even wonders. This isn't a weight gain issue. I'm active and fit, and so is my wife, but the truth is, for the past four years or so, it's like the romance in our marriage has just evaporated. My wife treats me more like a roommate than a husband. There's no intimacy, no handholding, no kisses. Not even those small affectionate touches or moments that make a couple feel like a couple. It's not just about sex, although that's basically non-existent too. The entire atmosphere between us is flat cold. Once we were an amazing couple, fun, affectionate, passionate about life together, but now it feels like she's just disinterested in my world altogether. She forgets important things. My birthday, our anniversaries. Our last anniversary was a blow. I've made dinner reservations, but she canceled on me saying she had to work late that Friday and prep for a business trip, I felt like an afterthought. I brought this up in therapy and after a session where I explained our situation, my therapist suggested couples therapy and even offered some recommendations. When I approached my wife with the idea, she refused outright. There's nothing wrong with me. I don't need therapy. She declared. I've tried everything I can think of to pull us back from the brink. I've suggested family vacations, hoping maybe getting out of town as a family could help her answer. Our daughter won't appreciate it. I don't see how a five-year-old wouldn't love the beach, but maybe I'm missing something, but. I tried to set up a romantic getaway for just the two of us. She shut it down. Too busy at work, or why can't we just spend time together at home? Even proposing weekend activities for the three of us, like a bike ride or lunch meant I'd get, I wanna just relax. Eventually I wore out. I stopped trying to initiate anything. The coldness left me in a place where I actually started looking for a way out. I've seen what a dying marriage does to a child. I watched my parents drag theirs out for a decade, and I refused to do that to my own daughter. I've already talked to a lawyer, drawn up divorce papers and found a condo I can afford nearby to keep my daughter in her school and with her friends since I definitely can't swing the mortgage on our house myself. Yesterday, while our daughter was out at a play date, I finally confronted my wife. I told her I was seriously thinking about leaving her. I spelled it out. I don't feel like I matter, and our relationship is never her priority. I admitted I had an exit plan and if nothing changed by the new year, I'd file for divorce and pursue full custody. That sparked an explosive fight. She railed at me for being manipulative for blindsiding. Her calling me an asshole, but I laid it all out. None of this would be happening if she honestly cared about us or even just pretended to. I made it clear our daughter deserves better than to grow up watching her parents stuck in a lifeless, unhealthy relationship. All of that happened just yesterday. I have voiced my concerns plenty of times before. Usually things get marginally better for a week or two, but inevitably collapse back into the same old pattern. I genuinely hope there isn't something else going on like an affair. I don't wanna imagine the person I thought I'd spend my life with doing something like that. But I'm starting to wonder if this is just a marriage of convenience for her and what's left for me at this point is shriveled to nothing. I refuse to stick around just for the sake of appearances, fooling myself or worse, failing my daughter. Something has to change one way or another. Update one. It's been a whirlwind couple of weeks for me. #reddit #radditstory #askredditstories #redditstories #storytime