Just Honest..

[SirPrizeMe]

I want to offer a different perspective, maybe a view from the other side of the "angry spouse". This is something that came to me as I observed my own angry spouse. Other people have seen anger in her too, independently of me, so I don't think her anger is something I am imagining. But I want to maybe peek into that and see where it comes from.

My wife left our marriage, was unfaithful, then when I discovered her deceit, she regretted it, but then did it some more. I maintained that I wanted to reconcile, and worked hard on myself and on our marriage. She on the other hand never left OM, even while we were in counseling. She came upon this idea that "I'll stay in my marriage if it feels right." Sort of the exact opposite of "Love is a decision." Her thing was "Love is a feeling". She got the "feeling" - new love, the excitement, the spontaneity, etc - from her affair with OM.

Anyway, the "decision vs feeling" discrepancy seemed to drive a further wedge between us. She was hopeless as she came to a realization that her "feeling" for me would not return all by itself. She wanted it to be a natural growth, just sort of osmosis. If she worked on it, it would not be true, ya know? While I washed her car and meditated on her good qualities, I smiled and focused on the positives, she sat passive and over time felt (I think) more and more that there was no good way out.

I told her how much I valued her presence in my life, what I loved about her, the memories we shared and the memories we had yet to make. With 4 young kids we have so much ahead of us. This felt like pressure to her, I think. Pressure because she wasn't "Feeling it". When our counselor suggested she share something like that with me, she just refused. Couldn't, wouldn't.

Fast forward a while - she filed for divorce, and became very angry. It was the oddest thing to me - this is what she wanted, or seemed to want, all along, and now she was going to get it. She should be glad. Relieved. But yet she was noticeably MORE angry and erratic, blowing up at little things, venting, very hostile.

AND, like your husband Kiki, my wife avoids me now. It's much more explicit with me - she has filed a petition for a domestic violence protection order, and that petition was granted. She wants NO CONTACT with me whatsoever, and now the law is behind her.
Why? Why is she angry and pushing away so strongly?

There was no violent act that precipitated her petitioning the state for protection from me. But I do not deny there was something traumatic for her in our interactions - the trauma of discussing our divorce. In the days and weeks prior to her filing for protection from me, we had regular contact on things like where the kids will live, how we will settle on a custody arrangement, our respective budgets, and so on. In other words, the mechanics of divorce. She couldn't handle it, so went nuclear.

She wants it, but doesn't want it. It's as if she wants to eject me from her life, completely, but she wants none of the other consequences. She insists on divorce but refuses to discuss with me a parenting plan. She is getting a restricted budget but refuses to sell the convertible we bought her for her birthday. She has to move. She will be forced (practically if not legally speaking) to get a job. From now on, the kids will be wearing discount shoes instead of the Nike's they want. All of this is what makes her angry, I think.

She is realizing that she has set this course of motion in place. She is getting what she asked for, though, and I know this sounds totally pompous, I don't think she realized truly what divorce would be like.

At the same time, her OM is showing his true colors: he has been arrested multiple times for DUI, he is going to jail, he has essentially abandoned his own children. This is her "soulmate." How pitiful. How ridiculous to have thrown away a good life and a workable marriage for this!? At the same time she CANNOT come back to me because it would mean shouldering the responsibility for the mess. She cannot do it. It would mean a total loss for her sense of self. It is too much for her. So she is well and truly screwed. I may be over-analyzing, but this is what I see.

Getting back to your guy, his situation is different than my wife's. But even still, is it possible that he is just pissed at what he has done? He is just angry at the consequences of his own making. And when you approach him, still happy, cheerful, not interested in combat, he feels even worse. He would rather you hate him, throw grenades at him. He sees your cheer and resents you even more. He just wants to eject you, because he cannot face the truth. Nor can he face the consequences.

If this is so, then the best thing is not to text him and await replies. Nor to ask how he is, nor to show any concern for him at all. It seems to me (and I am no expert, this is just my opinion) the best thing for you now might be to just really back off and detach as Lissie and others have suggested. It's just to back off, completely off.

Actually that is sort of the wrong perspective. "Backing off" still sort of refers to the spouse, doesn't it? You are "backing off FROM this person." A better way to look at it may be not that you are going away from him, but that you are going TOWARD something else. Do your thing, or if you don't have a thing, get one. The proverbial get-a-life advice. I know this sounds crappy, because your thing is your husband, your marriage. (I am that way, too). But that ain't happening right now. So what does make you happy? Do it. Find something. Find a new you.

How on earth can I make him feel safe if he has a brick wall up???

You cannot MAKE him feel or do anything. You can only do what you do, and wait. In a while maybe he will feel differently, or maybe you will.

I am so sorry you are here.