If he is having a more 'anxietal' day than usual, I think I'd wait until a better time.
I think it's a good email. You explain what happened, why you didn't tell him, and already have solutions laid out.
You might want to consider adding something more about how he might feel having this sprung on him, "I understand why you might feel ______ that I didn't tell you earlier."
I have two observations one about you and one about him.
Watch your words, you speak in absolutes about your husband - he can't cope with anything.
About him, he doesn't know healthy coping, communicating or relationship skills. You mention it that he avoids his parents and grand-parents because they devalue him. He equates conflict, speaking about his feelings, and criticism with pain and fear. Even if you don't say it he equates your money situation with him being inadequate (a criticism). He is his own worse critic. He hides behind his pain by pushing you away.
I think your letter needs to be very matter of fact, not emotional, not bringing up the past and some possible solutions. Make the tone and information all about the financial situation and if he gets upset let him know that you are not upset or disappointed with him but that you want to partner up with him to find a good solution.
Stick to the issue and a solution. Show him good coping techniques, relationship skills and communication skills. Show him how to replace all that fear with love.
M22,H45,W45 S21/18D12 Retain faith that you will prevail in the end, regardless of the difficulties and at the same time confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be.
You know that e-mail seems very defensive. Reading through it; I believe you feel you did something wrong. But if I read this right, it sounds like you were taking care of things through some difficult situations.
It also sounds like you are expecting him to get mad. Perhaps you could take the "as if" approach and assume he will be understanding? You could at least ask for his understanding. I don't know your H, so you will need to make that judgement.
I would hate for my W to say she "dreads" talking to me ever. I would hope she would feel that she could come to me with anything.
If he is having a more 'anxietal' day than usual, I think I'd wait until a better time.
I think it's a good email. You explain what happened, why you didn't tell him, and already have solutions laid out.
You might want to consider adding something more about how he might feel having this sprung on him, "I understand why you might feel ______ that I didn't tell you earlier."
Good Luck.
I can tell you are much stronger now.
I think his anxiety is getting out of control and I'm glad he told me about it. I think the next step is to use this opening and this weekend to talk about him getting some help. The last time he agreed to medication was when he had an anxiety attack all by himself that wasn't related to me or to the kids. IOW...it was all him.
If he could get this under some kind of control then the other issues would be a lot easier to handle.
I don't know how to talk finances with someone who just said "I'm so over-f**king-whelmed!!"
My mother's advice was to print out the email(whatever it says) so it has the date on it and put it aside so that if it comes up unexpectedly I can show it to him, that I was planning to tell him, but felt he wasn't in a place to hear it yet.
I have two observations one about you and one about him.
Watch your words, you speak in absolutes about your husband - he can't cope with anything.
I hear what you are saying. It's more like when he's in the grip of anxiety, he literally cannot cope with anything. He will say it himself. "Don't tell me anything, I can't cope with it." But I need to not think of him that way in general.
And a big part of this whole ordeal with money, which isn't new, is that he DOES want to leave it to me and then get mad if everything isn't how he wants it. He wants control but not responsibility. He wants me to have responsibility but not control. He told me recently that he was glad I take care of all that stuff, bills, etc, because he cannot f**king deal with it. Then he said I do a good job and I felt kind of sick.
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About him, he doesn't know healthy coping, communicating or relationship skills. You mention it that he avoids his parents and grand-parents because they devalue him. He equates conflict, speaking about his feelings, and criticism with pain and fear. Even if you don't say it he equates your money situation with him being inadequate (a criticism). He is his own worse critic. He hides behind his pain by pushing you away.
I think your letter needs to be very matter of fact, not emotional, not bringing up the past and some possible solutions. Make the tone and information all about the financial situation and if he gets upset let him know that you are not upset or disappointed with him but that you want to partner up with him to find a good solution.
Stick to the issue and a solution. Show him good coping techniques, relationship skills and communication skills. Show him how to replace all that fear with love.
I'm trying. I didn't think of him feeling like he is somehow "less than" because of the money sitch. It's hard to with the flak that gets thrown up because of his feelings of inadequacy because it totally doesn't have anything to do with the issue at hand. But I will approach it with that in mind.
You know that e-mail seems very defensive. Reading through it; I believe you feel you did something wrong. But if I read this right, it sounds like you were taking care of things through some difficult situations.
It also sounds like you are expecting him to get mad. Perhaps you could take the "as if" approach and assume he will be understanding? You could at least ask for his understanding. I don't know your H, so you will need to make that judgement.
well I do expect him to get mad. He says things like we better not have any credit card debt. We better not be in any kind of trouble. (trouble as defined as we had to spend money). I never want you to tell me something like that again.
This happened one other time, when WE had some credit card debt and I was terrified to talk to him about it, so I just kept putting it off. He was hysterical about it, even though he spent a lot of the money. Then later he said well, He did spend all the money. But I took my 401K money and paid it off. WTF did I do that? That was a long time ago, when things were worse.
Anyway, I did do something wrong, I have lied to his face about how much money is in our acct. More than once. Of course all he has to do is ask the bank, but he won't do that. That last time, when we had this issue of noncommunication over money, I told him I wanted him to have all the banking passwords and to look things up himself, keep himself up to date and then I'd never be tempted to cover stuff up. He refused. I mean, REFUSED to have our own banking passwords. OMG I have a bizarre marriage.
I am friends with a recovered alcoholic/addict and she said, yep, they want someone else to be responsible, and someone else to blame when things go wrong. I don't want that.
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I would hate for my W to say she "dreads" talking to me ever. I would hope she would feel that she could come to me with anything.
Oh, he knows that. He knows for sure. He knows I'm afraid to come to him.
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Those are just my thoughts.
thx. I like guy input. And sometimes when I try to clarify for someone else I clarify things for myself.
All of this really puts a nice shining light on how dysfunctional this relationship is.
He does exhibit some compassion for it...recently he found out I'd lost a diamond earring. This happened in the middle of treatment, etc. I was sick about it, but it was really a small problem considering what was going on. One day he asked me about it and I told him I lost it and he got furious. I cried. Then later he said...I'm glad you didn't tell me, I couldnt' have handled that then. Then...he said why do you do this to yourself? why do you carry this stuff around?
Of course he just answered that, but at least he felt some compassion that it's a nightmare carrying "this stuff" around.
It's hard to with the flak that gets thrown up because of his feelings of inadequacy because it totally doesn't have anything to do with the issue at hand.
So here is how you handle it. Stick to the issue, he goes across the boundary - blaming, getting angry, ... whatever the bad behavior is then call him on it very calmly. "I am just bringing up a financial situation that we have. It's nobody's fault we are in this situation but I have a responsibility to you to make you aware of it. I also want your input on a solution."
Stick to his behavior that makes you feel _______________, then let him know. It's a win-win (yes, you will need to be consistent, calm and will qualify for sainthood) He sees you are not criticising him and you get some relief.
M22,H45,W45 S21/18D12 Retain faith that you will prevail in the end, regardless of the difficulties and at the same time confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be.
Coach, any advice on what to say if he says I will never refinance the house, for example. He gets really rigid and inflexible under stress...and I don't know what to say.
"OK, I understand you don't want to refinance. We have two options here. Increase income or decrease expenses. I know how hard you are working and that the economy is tight right now. So I know it's hard to increase income. So do you have some suggestions on how to decrease expenses?"
His FOO really did a number on him. Have you read up on irrational beliefs?
M22,H45,W45 S21/18D12 Retain faith that you will prevail in the end, regardless of the difficulties and at the same time confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be.
His FOO really did a number on him. Have you read up on irrational beliefs?
Well I get to experience a lot of them.
My MIL were down on our property recently (that noooobody takes care of) and there was some clover growing in the driveway. A quarter mile long gravel drive that had a patch of clover in it.
She said did you see the driveway?? Didn't it just make you SICK??
I said, well...no. I rubbed her shoulder and said, It's clover. We'll kill it. And she nodded her head and said okay. okay. but it just makes me feel SICK.
Well, THAT makes me feel sick. Ai yi yi.
Last thing if you're still here...what's your opinion...do I approach him on the anxiety issue this weekend, and wait til next week (or later this weekend) for this finance stuff? I don't think he's very ready right now.
