Worried I found DB too late #2

[houndfan]

CW - thanks for your reply, I think that you hit some important topics that may need to be addressed with yourself and H!!!! Again not taking sides, but I think that we have been in parallel situations.

So how do you communicate to him without being critical or overbearing? That is tough because of course I don't know your H. So I will tell you how we are doing things in our house....

First all judgement needs to be set aside in order for your communication to be effective and purposeful. For example, the dust thing is a great sitch to evaluate. It is possible to suggest to him that alternate timing could have been better for the family without judging or being critical. Me thinks saying something to the effect of: I love our plans/stove top/whatever, but the additional dust really made it difficult on me when my sister was here, we had to clean etc rather than spending quality time together. Next time maybe I need to plan better. Sounds like you are deflecting the blame to yourself, when in reality you are communicating a need to him without any danger words!

In the past my W would have said to me in that sitch: Why did you decide to make the cooktop change now, don't you see what it did to me, you didn't help clean yada yada... DANGER WILL ROBINSON - it becomes about blame rather than solutions!

Here is what I see from your posts -> He seems to me to be wanting to participate in the family. He seems to want to try, but he is holding back on you and your kids! Your task is to get him to participate more in the family in a way that is non-threatening and non-judgemental. It does not mean that life as you know it changes forever because that would be unfair. But it does mean that you may need to give more than you want until you TWO can seek professional help in your M!

In my house, dinner time is the time of day when 80% of all arguements happen. Very similar to what you have shared above. Me thinks it's great that you have been able to offer a suggestion to H that he is following by staying around for the entire dinner. But again, I would suggest that you really look at what is important and focus on those things FIRST! W and I have talked about the dinner stress in MC several times and we just see the time differently so we have had to learn new approaches to the stressors. It becomes about our individual responses to anxiety.

We used to blow it out over similar things. She would comment under her breath that she was the maid as she made dinner, got drinks, etc and the boys and I would swing in and out. Well now she communicates to the team in advance as to what the expectations are at the table. Once she is seated she is not getting up and she will no longer enable that behavior.

In return she does not let it stress her to the point of a blow-up. So what did I do? Dinner became much less stressful for all of us and now I help out like crazy because it is fun. It was a perception thing she would get pissed and think that we didn't appreciate her because of our approach and I would feel alienated by her approach. It would create anxiety and she would deflect by getting on me.

This is hard to communicate in a post, but I hope you see what I am driving at... our mutual behavior changed because she changed how she communicated expectations and I began to listen. She did it in such a way that I wanted to make sure that I met them. At first when we were S it was not this way, but slowly things have gotten better.


You said something in your post that really is similar to our sitch. Let me give you some background about my sitch first. I am a jerk, arrogent, pig headed... I cheated, lied, stole - the entire bit from my wife. If I were your H you would have kicked me out years ago. But I had the balls to tell her that I was done with the M. So she kicked me out and decided that maybe she had had enough. So I had no room to be asking for anything at all. But I asked for one thing during the S which was to make my feelings matter....

So.... you had said that "it's how I feel, not what he means."

I think that most marriage problems start with that exact feeling. What you said there is very selfish and not the behavior of an OUR marriage. While your feelings are very very important they should not trump his intent EVER! If his intent is to show his love to you and he's not good at it, it should not damage your feelings. Does not mean that you can want for more and communicate that to him, but you should never assume what he means. (That is stright from our last MC session) Those assumptions are relationship killers. The cooktop is interesting again because it seems to me like he wants to provide aesthetic improvements to your house he seems to want to participate but you have judged the timing etc... other things suggest the same.

I have a question for you: How do you handle his need to be an individual and conversely yours? In our pre-S life we were Stay at Home Mom and Professional Dad and that was it. We were not Hound and Ms Hound EVER. We had no individual interests. And when one of us would show interest in something it would create - yep you guessed it ANXIETY! She would have it because I cheated and she thought I was off being an ass. I had it because I was upset that she did not want to spend that time with me after working 80 hours a week. So we never created identities. Since the R in December we have really worked and encouraged some individual activities. I am smelling some of this in your posts as well. Especially as it realtes to your kids.

Again, I am just offering from my experience, but I used to get so pissed after a long week when I would ask to go play ball with my buddies or whatever. she would always repond with "I've been on duty all week and you need to do XYZ with the boys." Well resentment would build toward W and kids. I would do the same crap to her too.

So now we have these awesome individual identities which have made all 4 of us happier! And we allow the other to participate without JUDGEMENT. Now we had to find balance here too, but I think we are doing a great job. So in your case, maybe this bachelorhood is a byproduct of the same feelings. Is it possible that he felt compressed by family life and you feel compressed by motherhood and neither of you can spread your wings?

If that is the case, this is an excellent opportunity for you to AFFIRM....

CW run to Barnes and Noble immediately and buy John Gottman's Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work. Get it tonight!!! Right now!!! Read about the Four Horsemen first and then read about your "start-up" you can do this stuff in conjunction with DB, in fact I think I read somewhere that Michelle was a fan of Gottman's work.

Don't get too caught up in Gottman's study and the mechanics of the book, I think that right now that does not help you or H. Also, I would caution your getting H's participation right now in the exercises. When W and I started the exercises they were full of negative thoughts, now though they are fun and we do them all of the time over and over again!

Again, not taking sides but sounds to me that you can use some of the principles to help you make some movement with H right away. Also, CW, I don't think that you need to become a Patsy in all of this either. But, I found that changing how I respond to stress, anxiety, and a multitude of situations saved my marriage!!!!

I am not a clinician, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night!

Send me a message after you have read some of the book!