I thought you asked him what he wanted from marriage, he answered, and you were thinking about what it would take to deliver on that.
I don't remember how the topic came up. I just remember him listing off a string of things that God wants me to do. I'm perfectly fine sleeping in the other room.
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It doesn't seem like you respect him, so you treat him like someone who is not worthy of your respect.
I think you're putting a veneer of "nice and accommodating" over the top, but it's easy for him (and the folks on this board) to see through that right away.
WRT the respect issue, do you believe your H is as intelligent as you are? DO you respect him? It doesn't sound like it, it sounds like you feel contempt for him and look down on him. If that's the case, it's going to be hard to get back to loving him.
Honestly, no, I don't respect him. He's done too many things to me for me to do that. Plus, it seems nearly impossible to get basic courtesy and respect from him, so no, I don't offer it in return. I do think I'm probably smarter than him, and he would say so too, but that alone wouldn't cause me to disrespect him. He worked hard for many years to earn it.
I have mentioned that I'm the WAW, right? That my greatest desire for a long while has just been to get as far away from him as I can? That I'd like to salvage our marriage, but for now I'd just like to eliminate the conflict? Because I'm thinking you all are expecting a whole lot more from me right now than I'm capable of.
If you can just help me to not antagonize the situation, that would be good. The "nice" parts will have to come later.
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A couple other thoughts, when H asks you what you mean or what you think and you don't tell him, that's really aggravating, I think if you get to that point you're not doing yourself any favors by withholding your thoughts. I guess I would ask why you're having these conversations you're really not interested in having.
I think it's probably best not to have them. If I have any opinion that differs from H's, then it gets heated. It's as if my being married to him means I'm supposed to think just like him, and if I don't, I'm doing something wrong. So would it be reasonable to simply decline? Could I say that's not a topic I care to discuss? Remember, I'm just trying to not make things worse, to reduce the conflict.
So, going back to the Sole Partner book, there's a chapter on anger. It's sort of mis-titled because it's primarily about expectations. But it says that "when we expect or anticipate something and it does not materialize, disappointment follows and our hurt is transformed into anger, which, if not resolved, usually turns into resentment, and can over time, develop into bitterness." I think that's something I can work on. I think I might even be past the anger and resentment into bitterness already. I definitely have a pile of failed expectations. The book says you can either smolder, lower expectations, or leave. Obviously, it leads you to lower expectations. It looks like it's just a method for facilitating looking at yourself. So I'm going to try to work on that. I wish it went more into what the relationship looked like afterwards. It has a few examples, but a lot of them are people leaving. I don't know how to lower my expectation about honesty, so that I just don't expect my H not to lie to me, and then still create a healthy marriage. Thoughts on this from y'all would be fabo!
I'm kind of all over this book right now, squeezing it in when I can. Hopefully I'll have a chance to really read it this weekend.
