Let me add another point that I haven't really focused on. The only bullet point that "rings true" are these:
[*]Nice guys put other people's needs and wants before their own. [*]Nice guys sacrifice their personal power and often play the role of a victim.
The second part of the second bullet does not match up, however. Maybe only recently have I felt "victimized."
This marriage is so very different from my first one. Where the first one felt like a partnership right up to the birth of our son, this one has been a battle since day one. Being in a relationship should never be this much work and this much of a fight. It's not been compromise, its been me being in a continual state of conceding.
And what I learned from the outset was that it was ultimately better to "give in" than to "stick to my guns." And what have I given up? Well, the tangible things are things like my music (she doesn't like it and so my music and my very nice stereo system are put away), my mountain climbing and hiking, my skiing (I became an accomplished snow skier between marriages), most of my photography.
It's even reflected in the furnishings in the house. There is hardly anything in this house that I've supplied or picked out to reflect my sense of style. I had not noticed that until several months ago. The closets are full of her stuff and with the exception of one bedroom that I've used as an office, I am living in a house that I pay for and live in but hardly have furnished. Don't get me wrong, it's not that I object to the furniture, I've just had very little say over it and if I were to walk out today, there would barely be anything of "mine" to take with me.
It was not like that for me before and I think it's more than a nice guy syndrome. In her employment, there is no question who the boss is (she sometimes complains about "being in-charge"), but the dominance is subtle. Not a tyrant by any measure, but she is going to get her way (or life is going to be miserable). And that is my perception at home as well. Only recently, she asked why I just gave up on something and I told he that with her I always gave up, that's nothing new and she's known that from day one.
The incident that she threw back in my face the other day about "my anger" being threatening occurred 21 years ago and it was over my exhaustion of rarely, if ever, "winning" or at least having my point of view really matter. I took the relatively few possessions I had at her condo and threw them out the door so I would not have to keep going in and out the front door. I was putting them in my car and leaving not just for a business trip, but forever. (I was going to California for business and then was going to Lake Tahoe to ski. It was the skiing that was the point of contention. I ended up not skiing and making up. Point is, I gave up something I wanted to do to "keep the peace."). It was an incident that I had forgotten. How different would my life have been?
I may be the perfect person because I've been so tolerant. However, I am reaching a point where I ask "Is this all there is?"
As I said, from her POV, this question is not even open to discussion.
Earl,
You have been so utterly and completely placid throughout the entirety of this marriage, that it beggars belief!
(1) In what precise way has it been "better" to give in (on each and every occasion it seems)? Where has all this "giving in" got you?
(2) I'm staggered that you have ceased virtually everything that you previously enjoyed doing - that made "you" You - Why?
(3) You think there is "more" to this than Nice Guy syndrome. Well, I suggest you actually get the book and read it. It seems like you have an inherent fear of confronting this woman, and you need to work out why that is.
(4) You ask how different your life would have been if you had stood up to her before you got married. The obvious answer is "Very". Your life still can be very different - but You need to ask yourself what You want out of your life - and then using willpower, discipline and enthusuiasm start carving that life out for yourself. You had a Life before - its never too late to get it back - but only if you really Wake Yourself Up (no-one's is going to do that for you).
(5) PS "tolerant" on the scale you've described is not really very nice at all; nor is it admirable. Its fearful, weak and lazy. Forget Earl Grey and start smelling the coffee.
S&A
"A man can be destroyed but not defeated" - from The Old Man and the Sea, by Ernest Hemingway.
Which I take to mean that every man has within him a spirit of relentlessness and optimism. Its already there; he just has to cultivate it.
