We were married 20 yrs this past May but for at least 10 of those years, we are not happy. We have two children, ages 10 (daughter) and 12 (son who has ADHD). Daughter has ADHD too but not as severe.
I still live at home sleeping in the office which has a single bed in it now since June, 2006. So my wife and I haven't been intimate for going on 15 months now. My wife does not talk to me, only yells and swears at me for most of our marriage. I guess I enabled that because I said nothing until I exploded after months of hanging on to that resentment and anger. I learned that to hang on to stuff like that is too heavy to begin with, only makes you sick and is futile to your mental well being.
My wife holds me responsible for the way our marriage is, yet does not hold herself accountable. As for myself, I have changed myself since January because I prayed and asked the Lord to let me see myself as He sees me and in humility, I asked Him to change me because human beings cannot change themselves. That is the only person you can change, is yourself.
My wife is too proud to admit her faults and also is unwilling to change her behavior, even for the sake of our 2 children. She keeps score on things I do and in all honesty, she never grew up. She risked the peace within our own home rather then have a 2 minute conversation with certain members of her family who enjoyed persecuting me. I finally stood up to that and wife and family expect me to say I'm sorry. I have never gotten due respect from wife and family and they never treated me as they would want to be treated.
So now they all hate me. At least, now I do not have to hear about how much Jesus, the Passion and the Gospel is full of Shi@ and their other bigot attitudes towards my faith. I have learned though they these people will not get me angry anymore because they no longer have power over me. I know Jesus loves me and I want to do His Will.
I am hoping my wife is agreable to Retrouvaille too because the sucess rate is over 80%. It will challange you and from what I read, it is the last technique. I did DB for months and saw no results. I pull my weight more around the house, am kind and considerate but my wife has her problems. When she was going to summer school, she would call me on the way, because my kids would be alone for about 1/2 hour and just shared her day. No matter how good or bad a day I had, I always answered the phone like, Hey, how's it going? or Hello how are you? and my tone was always cheerful.
My wife expects perfection and was raised that way so her family is messed up in the head too.
If I call her, she answers "WHAT, OR YEAH ROCK or something like that but in a nasty tone. I ignore it as best I can.
