Agh! He's detached completely!

[IWillSaveOurMarr]

robx- Thanks for your post.

More details:
My H feels that I lied by omission in not telling him that my small business wasn't doing as well as it could. I told him along the way that I was struggling by telling him I needed a loan from the parents, and that I had to use retirement funds to make ends meet, etc, but he wanted to know exact numbers, which I didn't have until after we were married because I took an extension on my taxes that year, it was the first year I had had all SBO income to report (as opposed to employee W2 100%) and the many #'s of scheudules weren't easy for me to understand at first.

Then 2008's income was even worse, negative, because I spent too much time with life changes (moving, selling my place, wedding planning) and not work. It's a long story, needless to say. But he's really resentful that he's had to support me to some degree and again, we lost major $ on selling my place which didn't help matters.

This year was really bad for me becasue I got hit with the worst depression I've ever gone through in late Jan through mid March. I think it was because of all the changes I've been through and the fact that my H is very resistant to change and very controlling, plus I moved into his house.

Then I got a new medicine whcih helped me start to come out of the depression and BAM, my H hit me with two weeks after starting this (so it hadn't started working 100% yet) "If you don't earn xyz dollars in the next month, I'm filing divorce papers." This absoulutely paralzyed me and I was unable to get anything done for that month because all I would do is sit and worry, then cry , then worry more.

Then I left him, came back 2 weeks later and he wasn't talking to me for the next month. At somepoint during this time, he made up his mind that we were "done" with our marriage, even though it had only been 5 months at that point.

So I feel that we haven't really had a time that both of us have been trying at the same time and also workign on the marriage. He refuses to go to therapy anymore after this Monday's session and says he only wants to talk about a divorce settlement. Since we are dynamically opposed on this matter, he is ok to let the judge handle it, he says. I am ok with this because it frankly buys us time. I've told him already that I'd rather he, me or both of us had $ rather than attornies, and he agrees, however, he's refused to understand how this state, a community property state, works as far as income and property goes. His income (since mine is negliable after business expenses) is 1/2 mine, and so is the property, since we mergeed individually owned properties into joint properties wehn I sold mine late last year after 8 months on the market and so much less than what I paid for it a mere few years ago! But he refuses to acknowlegde that I'm owed a dime, and so, I'm hoping we will be remedied long before the wheels of justice officially divorce us. If my friends experiences hold true, it could take at least a year, if not 16 months for us to go through the entire process if he is continugig to drag his feet as he has been. While I love him, I refuse to take "scraps" in the divorce settlement, because I am owed something here, and the law is on my side. I gave up my place, at a huge loss, because I put full faith in this marriage, and now I have noplace to go, so I'm continuing to stay in our small house, wiht me in the bedroom, him on the couch and not talking.

My H had a horrible childhood full of his mothers abuse after the divorce of his parents, his undiagnosed schizophrenic mother, who beat him and used her child support for raising animals for money instead of buying food for the kids, so he had to raise his little brother and use welfare money to do so, and government peanut butter. They were denied visitations with his father for years, and then they left the mothers place in his mid teens, never to return or to talk to her ever again.

He has been getting treatment for the past 3 years for "co dependency" that stems (accd to our MC) from these experiences with this mother. He was marriaed and divorced very young, and then in a series of bad rlsps before me. Now, he's rewritten history to include me in that group of seriosuly disturbed women and women trying to use him, unfortunatley. He refuses to go on medication, and his therapist is the instigator that's been pushing him to divorce me. He refuses to consider additional treatments or alternative treatments for his anxiety and has had 1 "panic attack" as he calls it early this year. It is not like any panic attack I've ever heard about howeve,r and I want to learn more about his disorder, however there are no books for wives of COD people, because usually COD's are with alcoholics or gamblers, etc. I have been reading about COD itself though, and it's all about how these people control others.

For me, I see my job income problem as a totally temporary situation and i'm trying to get a PT job to help make ends meet until my business does. I'm mroe that happy to give up the business for him, because I personally don't want to keep banging my head on the wall either for making no money. It's in our best interests right now to hold onto it for the next few months, (long story) so that's why I will do so. I've been doing this job for almost a decade and did well as an employee there, but I hate my "promotion" to being a small business owner because now I am in an office all alone and it has been very bad for me, personally, professionaly and otherwise. I need people around me, which is something I didn't know. Plus, I hate having to buy toner and fix my printers because otherwise no one else will. There are so many extra expenses and responsibilites being a SBO I had no idea. It's not sustainable for me as is, and I know this.

So no, it's not really about money. For him, he hates, due to his COD to be "needed" and althoguh I'm not reallly adding to his expenses much at all (he paid the mortage and everything else by himself long before I was in the picture), he resents it big time. For me, if he decides to work on this again, I'm totally afraid that he will ditch me once again when we come to challenging times. I feel like we haven't had a chance at all to work on our marriage this year especially because of my depression, then him not talking to me. All I want is a bit more time, but he's anxious.

When he's anxious, I was trying harder and harder to please him and subsumed myself too much to save the rlsp. That's why the divorce thing caught me so off guard and hurt so much. I thought that was the point of marriage, that you work thorugh tought times. Anyways, his anxiety has totally fed into this whole thing and everything has been a snowballing out of control.

Our MC says it's a shame that he's not giving us more time, but that I'm indavertently triggering stuff in him from his past that he can't deal with (mother stuff). At first she told me that it had nothing to do with me at all, I was just getting punsihed for ex wife and bad girlfriends. He swears that I am the problem, the alcohol, he is the alcholoic. and says I'm very needy. Being self employed, I HAVE relied on him way too much for my emotional needs, not having co workers to chat with, and I get that. I also take full responsibility that I haven't gotten what he's been trying to say through months of MC, but frankly, I was not in a good place for the first part of 2009, and cannot blame myself for that depression.

I feel like I never lied to him, but knowing his exacting nature, I should have given him at least ballpark numbers. He never gave me his #'s at all, mind you, but he is a details guy and I know this. I should have told him details, but frankly, it was a fluid situation, and I'd been doing the job for 6 years already with no problems as an employee, so I figured that my issues were temporary, not knowing any better. I didn't know what I didn't know. I feel horrid for dragging him through this, but I never meant to, and was open about my anti-depressant use, etc, early on.

I think his anxiety has been set off, and he sees the only way out is to cut me off. He does say he loves me still, which is hopefull, but prefers that I not talk to him day to day because that increases his anxiety. He is losing weight and doesn't look good nor healthy. OUr MC said that he may have already set his mind to this, in which case it may not be able to be changed, but she did say that he is hurting and that's why he can't engage with me or even look at me in sessions with her, and that I really need to not make him feel threatened, because that only increses his anxiety and makes him shut down. And I'll admit, I have been scary angry way too much lately, but it's cause a lot of the time he blindsides me with big, horrible news and expects me to respond immediately. Like I said in the orginal post, he wanted to already play "lets make a deal" on the day that he told me in marriage therapy that he wanted a divorce immdeidatley! When he's anxious, I get anxious and either sad or very very angry, and say things that are scary mean.

So that's why I have to do the DR as far as the time being, to control my emotions in front of him and get my own act back together again, no matter what happens.

Hope I answered all your questions. Let me know if you have more. Thanks for your response, it is appreciated.

PS: Nope, there was no affair on either side. He has a lot of female friends though, and got really upset when I asked him to PLEASE not go out with them alone just on Friday or Saturday nights w/o me! He says I'm showing I don't trust him, but I'm totally bending over backwards I feel because he can see him any other time, or in my presence Fri or Satu, just not alone because it looks like he is having an affair. I feel it's totally disrespectful of him to insist on this, because I make no fuss whatsoever about him going to lunch, brunch, dinner or whatever on weekdays or weekends, just NOT those 2 times on Fri and Sat nights because those equal date night in my book! We've been unable to resolve this in therapy, because I don't want to designate those times as "couple times only" because I do stuff with my girlfriends ocassionally on those nights, and that would mean I could no longer go to bachlelorette parties or gifls nights out, and I don't want to give them up. This couples times only idea was broached by our MC, but like I said, we've not resolved this at all. Neither he nor I is dating right now, we had a discussion about this that was very uncomfortable. I believe him.