Marriage Issue - Lost and Confused

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Xantippe said:
Bernadettefaith said:

In my experience, unless you know somebody pretty well, they seem to have a great marriage, right up until the divorce.
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YES! Once my husband and I were fighting and he made a comment about how his friends are happier in their marriages. I said, “You don’t know that! You don’t see what goes on behind closed doors!”

So true. I have heard so many times of “happy” marriages ending in divorce and everyone is confused bc they had such a “great” marriage.
 
Serap said:
YES! Once my husband and I were fighting and he made a comment about how his friends are happier in their marriages. I said, “You don’t know that! You don’t see what goes on behind closed doors!”

So true. I have heard so many times of “happy” marriages ending in divorce and everyone is confused bc they had such a “great” marriage.
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Definitely. I think I got complimented more on what “a great marriage” I had the month that my husband and I almost separated. :o

Of course, those compliments could have been sent by God to tell me to not give up:D, but it did let me know that things look extremely different to outsiders.
 
I agree that it looks like a marriage is perfect from the outside when that’s not the reality. I know of many of dh’s co-workers who have divorced due to infidelity or who have cheated on their wives. Dh doesn’t really see fidelity as a positive in a relationship as he thinks its a given. The counselor explained to us that we didn’t have any of the three major issues (abuse, adultery, addictions) so he didn’t see any problems that were not workable.
 
Another positive about this counselor - he actually asks questions and gives feedback. Dh told him that he’s much more professional than the last counselor.

When we talked about intimacy issues, the counselor pointed out that it’s not really fair to me that he’s rejecting me for rejecting him. Dh is upset that I was not interested in sex yet when I do work on it and express interest he’s still upset. The counselor said that it sounds like I’m damned if I do and damned if I don’t. Dh said that he was upset about intimacy yet I express an interest and he’s still upset.
 
sounds like a much better counsellor. Dh liked the other one bc she let him carry-on about self pity.
 
Serap said:
sounds like a much better counsellor. Dh liked the other one bc she let him carry-on about self pity.
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Yes! I’m glad that he at least realizes that she was unprofessional and disorganized. This counselor asked “why?” to all of dh’s complaints rather than letting him go on and on about his feelings without getting anywhere.

The counselor said that next time he will do most of the talking about what we can do to fix the relationship. The last counselor almost exclusively listened without giving much (name removed by moderator)ut. I’m not sure if this will work better, but it’s worth a shot.

Dh is concerned that we will start therapy without talking about every single issue. I don’t necessarily think it’s beneficial for him to go on about everything that has upset him over the last 13 years. He’s already told me about every past issue that’s bothered him so I don’t really consider it necessary to tell the counselor about the smaller issues. That would probably take another 3 months before he describes every single time I’ve upset him. We’ve covered the major ones.
 
Bernadettefaith said:

“I know of many of dh’s co-workers who have divorced due to infidelity or who have cheated on their wives.”

So, everybody’s got a better marriage than you…except for the people who have gotten divorced?

“Dh doesn’t really see fidelity as a positive in a relationship as he thinks its a given.”

It’s good he thinks that, but it really isn’t a given.

“The counselor explained to us that we didn’t have any of the three major issues (abuse, adultery, addictions) so he didn’t see any problems that were not workable.”

I like your counselor already.

It’s great that your transition to this new guy is going so smoothly.

“Another positive about this counselor - he actually asks questions and gives feedback. Dh told him that he’s much more professional than the last counselor.”

Yay!

“When we talked about intimacy issues, the counselor pointed out that it’s not really fair to me that he’s rejecting me for rejecting him. Dh is upset that I was not interested in sex yet when I do work on it and express interest he’s still upset. The counselor said that it sounds like I’m damned if I do and damned if I don’t. Dh said that he was upset about intimacy yet I express an interest and he’s still upset.”

Does the counselor have any suggestions about that and does DH understand that he’s being unfair?

Interestingly, I think it’s not uncommon for women to do something like what your husband is doing–to reject overtures, but at the same time to get all pouty when they are turned down.

“Yes! I’m glad that he at least realizes that she was unprofessional and disorganized. This counselor asked “why?” to all of dh’s complaints rather than letting him go on and on about his feelings without getting anywhere.”

Yay!
 
Bernadettefaith said:

“That would probably take another 3 months before he describes every single time I’ve upset him.”

I don’t think your counselor is going to let him eat up your time with this stuff. Because obviously, you also have stuff to say, and your counselor has stuff to tell both of you.

You may want to point out to your husband that his griping is costing you $70 an hour, so you need to prioritize. (Find a nicer, more wifely way to put this, of course.)
 
On reflection, the fact that you are paying for this may be helpful in getting your husband to be less diffuse, and focus on moving forward.
 
I think so too. The other counselor was $120/hr but was covered by ins so Dh didn’t consider it a paid service. This time he probably won’t want to waste so much of the counselor’s time (and this counselor likely won’t let him).
 
Xantippe said:
Bernadettefaith said:

“I know of many of dh’s co-workers who have divorced due to infidelity or who have cheated on their wives.”

So, everybody’s got a better marriage than you…except for the people who have gotten divorced?

“Dh doesn’t really see fidelity as a positive in a relationship as he thinks its a given.”

It’s good he thinks that, but it really isn’t a given.

“The counselor explained to us that we didn’t have any of the three major issues (abuse, adultery, addictions) so he didn’t see any problems that were not workable.”

I like your counselor already.

It’s great that your transition to this new guy is going so smoothly.

“Another positive about this counselor - he actually asks questions and gives feedback. Dh told him that he’s much more professional than the last counselor.”

Yay!

“When we talked about intimacy issues, the counselor pointed out that it’s not really fair to me that he’s rejecting me for rejecting him. Dh is upset that I was not interested in sex yet when I do work on it and express interest he’s still upset. The counselor said that it sounds like I’m damned if I do and damned if I don’t. Dh said that he was upset about intimacy yet I express an interest and he’s still upset.”

Does the counselor have any suggestions about that and does DH understand that he’s being unfair?

Interestingly, I think it’s not uncommon for women to do something like what your husband is doing–to reject overtures, but at the same time to get all pouty when they are turned down.

“Yes! I’m glad that he at least realizes that she was unprofessional and disorganized. This counselor asked “why?” to all of dh’s complaints rather than letting him go on and on about his feelings without getting anywhere.”

Yay!
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As far as everyone else’s marriage, dh does agree that a lot of people have terrible marriages. From what I’ve heard from him, he doesn’t want just an “ok” marriage. He feels that if we can’t improve enough to get a good or great marriage that it’s not good enough. He knows details about some close friends’ marriages and just believes that they should be divorced. However, most of our friends who have divorced have dealt with abuse (at least verbal/emotional abuse), affairs, or addiction of some kind. I really don’t know too many who have divorced for reasons that could truly be worked out - though my circle of friends typically have more traditional values than the general population. Of his friends (mostly coworkers), there aren’t a lot of divorcees but the ones who are had spouses who had cheated on them (or they cheated). I’m guessing the relationships weren’t great before the infidelity but I’m sure it did impact their decision to divorce.

The counselor didn’t suggest anything about intimacy yet. He did ask dh if he would cooperate with what he tells him to do. Dh said that he would, but if the suggestion is to have sex then dh knows it will not go over well. The counselor insisted that he would not tell him to have sex - though we should work up to that point. I’m glad that this counselor at least pointed out that it’s unfair. Dh agreed that it wasn’t fair but insisted that he’s too angry to try sex at this point.
 
Bernadettefaith said:

“Dh agreed that it wasn’t fair but insisted that he’s too angry to try sex at this point.”

Does your husband understand that there’s something wrong if he’s so angry without there being any obvious current thing going on? There are spouses dealing with actual abuse, adultery and addictions who are way less angry about it than he is with you. In his case, it seems really pathological–there’s so little connection between your actual relationship and his emotions toward the relationship.

By the way, not to sound stereotypically Freudian, but what is his relationship with his mother like?
 
I don’t think that he sees anything wrong with his behavior. The former counselor told me individually that she felt he was punishing me but of course she did nothing to try to change the behavior. She said that he’s just having a delayed reaction because he held his anger in in the past. It’s so unusual because he was always interested in me before this came up. I would have never guessed he was unhappy.

He generally gets along with his parents, especially his mom. He did say that he was upset that I became a sahm because it wasn’t what his mom had done. Not sure if that’s relevant.
 
Bernadettefaith said:

“It’s so unusual because he was always interested in me before this came up. I would have never guessed he was unhappy.”

If understand the timeline correctly, he was interested during the time when you were blowing your top and only now, when you are not blowing your top is he not interested in you.

???

I still think that it’s probably important that all of this surfaced about half a year or so after you had your second child. My best guess is what he’s feeling now is the shock of realization at how HARD being a grownup is.

“He generally gets along with his parents, especially his mom. He did say that he was upset that I became a sahm because it wasn’t what his mom had done. Not sure if that’s relevant.”

No, there’s nothing obvious there.

Good luck with the new counselor!
 
I think the worst of the problems he’s referring to happened when dd, our 5 yr old was a baby. I didn’t notice a decrease in his interest in me until told me how his feelings had changed. I’m sure I had my moments during my last pregnancy/early postpartum months. For the most part, my “scary” moments that he describes happened at least 3-4 years ago. He’s just upset that he didn’t insist that it stop at the time. He says that nothing that he’s upset over has happened in the last 2 years.

I do think a lot of this has to do with the second baby coming. During the last pregnancy I had no libido and sex was painful. He didn’t seem to get it and would be hurt that I turned him down. He still acted interested in me and was always very affectionate. Then after the baby was born we rarely had time alone - maybe every 2-3 weeks. I’m thinking the loss of intimacy brought out all of his resentment. It was terrible timing because I was 5 months postpartum and finally starting to be interested again.
 
Bernadettefaith said:

“I do think a lot of this has to do with the second baby coming. During the last pregnancy I had no libido and sex was painful. He didn’t seem to get it and would be hurt that I turned him down. He still acted interested in me and was always very affectionate. Then after the baby was born we rarely had time alone - maybe every 2-3 weeks. I’m thinking the loss of intimacy brought out all of his resentment.”

Yeah.

“It was terrible timing because I was 5 months postpartum and finally starting to be interested again.”

Bummer.

Do mention the his and hers version of your stories to the counselor, perhaps with a written timeline if necessary (it almost seems like a case for PowerPoint!), because I think it’s important to get across how very differently the two of you see your recent history and that his version is kind of weird.

Best wishes!
 
He agrees that he was interested in me up to that point. He said that he cared about me and wanted me but it wasn’t “love” because he didn’t feel that emotional connection.

He’s also told our former counselor that it’s been years since anything “scary” happened. The panic on the way home from work just doesn’t add up if it’s really been that long. The counselor asked why he panics. Do I physically abuse him? Do I yell and scream? He says no, but I’ve yelled in the past.
 
He got something for the anxiety/panic at his dr’s appointment the other day. Please pray that this helps.
 
bernadettefaith said:

“He got something for the anxiety/panic at his dr’s appointment the other day. Please pray that this helps.”

Amen!
 
bernadettefaith said:
He got something for the anxiety/panic at his dr’s appointment the other day. Please pray that this helps.
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Perhaps whatever they prescribed meds for will be a covered condition for counseling? Even if it isn’t it’s a good thing he is willing to address the panic and anxiety.

Still praying 🙂
 
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