When is it time to split up?

First, thanks to anyone who reads this through. I appreciate your patience. My wife and I are married 6 years, together nearly a decade. I love her, but much of the reason I stayed with her is because she seemed so vulnerable, and I think I married her because I knew it would crush her if I didn't. I always had my reservations, from the beginning, but I was a coward, and now I'm in a terrible spot. I've set myself up to hurt her even worse and it kills me inside. I don't feel many things these days - even that "in-love" feeling with my wife - but I do feel intense guilt and heartache over the situation I have helped create over the past decade. She is an extrovert, I am an introvert. I like solitary pursuits like making music and writing stories. She loves people and being among them. We have sacrificed a lot to meet each other's needs and make this relationship work, maybe too much. We each admit we do not like what we've become. Unfortunately, s acrifice comes too easy for the both of us. It's in our personalities. Now the issue of children is upon us, and I am just as ambivalent as the day we met. I did not think much of kids when we dated, but I expected that to change. Then we decided to put my wife through grad school, and I had to take a lower paying job for other reasons, and we put off the decision again and again. Surely I'd be ready after all that, right? Nope. I'm 31 and I'm pretty certain I want to lead a quiet life pursuing art, contemplation, much needed self-improvement. I am a chronic depressive. My wife had a bout with depression last year during which she totally checked out from life. She claimed work was the reason, but I never welshed on my crappy settled-for third shift job, despite having an underutilized college degree and being depressed and hopeless, which the night hours make SO MUCH WORSE. So the resentment began, and it hasn't stopped. And the money is tight (my w is really, really bad wi th money, but that's another thing), and there's pressure for kids (from wife, from in-laws who don't understand our debt situation or don't care), and we simply can't afford them for a while, but no one wants to look at the balance sheet and be reasonable. Meantime, back to the point, I'm trying to find a balance between grad school, work, and my real passions. I feel like I made the decision to marry for super, super wrong reasons. And it looks like the same super wrong reasons loom ahead for the child decision. And I don't want to make that mistake. For me and my wife and that potential child, I don't want to mess this up. I don't know what to do. I know that if I stand firm on no kid, I'll lose my wife too (she's 30, and getting pretty anxious, and maybe willing to split). So I stand to lose it all. It's the kind of thing that could lead me to suicide or radically and unexpectedly change my whole life (and maybe hers) for the better. She'd find someone with her same goal s, I might or might not, but I'd have my time and my own goals to pursue. It's a really tough spot, and I need to figure it out pretty soon. I've thought of trial separation? I'd love time to be independent, do our own things, allow me to just be me, her time to find herself, but I'm not sure she would, and it wouldn't really solve our core problem, would it?

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