A week ago my wife came to me in tears. She told me she needs to move out, and is not sure if she will ever move back. She said she is heartbroken that she was pulled away from her country 12 years ago, and she needs to reconnect. She asked me if in 2014 I could possibly allow her to take D8 and D4 to her home country for a year so they could be enrolled in school and my wife could see if she could make it in her country again. She told me I was not welcome to go, and that they would return and go back to their lives here (probably never coming back to the house). I was so shocked at everything that she was telling me, that I agreed to think about it. A few days later I finally realized it was a mistake, and told her that no matter what happens between us, the girls need both parents near them until they are 18. Taking them away from their father for a year is not what they need, any more than taking them away from their mother!! My wife completely lost it. I thought her head was going to fall off! I held my ground (which is a first), but apologized for “changing my mind”, even though I had never given my consent, only agreed to think about it. I left for work, and when I came home, I noticed she had taken her wedding rings off and put them on the sink in our bathroom. She gave me the silent treatment for the next few days, although remaining as cordial as possible around our daughters.
Last night we finally had a huge fight, which for us is a big deal since we have had maybe two fights in our 10 year marriage—both within the last 3 months. My wife pounced on me for just rolling over and “letting her walk out the door” instead of standing up and trying to fight for our marriage. I was completely taken aback, since she has taken such a hard stance about wanting to leave me. I admit, since her standard line over the last 2 months has shifted from “it’s over, but I don’t know what to do”, to “it will never work, I need to get out on my own”, I have just given her space. Whenever she brings it up, I have kept telling her that I DO NOT want her to leave, but if she does, I will do whatever I can to support that. Anyway, she told me she wants a divorce, where before she was only thinking about separating. She has SO much pent-up anger over what has happened over the past couple of years, and I think it continues to make her angry to feel that I am just rolling over now.
After calming down for a little, she backed up on the divorce issue and told me she would agree to a legal separation. She believes it is the only way we can heal and “find” ourselves after being so strongly emotionally connected. I tend to agree, although I really don’t want her or the kids to go. I don’t know what else to do…
After all that, my wife softened a lot, and apologized for everything that has been happening. She asked me the following 3 questions, and here is what I answered—digging as deep as I could. I’ve thought about it a lot today, and I think my answers say a lot about the things I need to work on in order to fix the problems I bring to this or any future relationship.
Why didn’t you just continue to be spontaneous like you started to be six months ago? I noticed your attitude slowly changing, and I panicked instead of trying harder. I worked on the house/kids more and more instead of working on you, because I was trying to show you I could CHANGE. When you started talking about needing to detach from me emotionally, I took it to mean that you needed more space. So I gave it. It was all wrong….I did the wrong things. In reality, detaching emotionally meant that my emotional problems and depression could no longer be all-important like they used to be. You didn’t need someone to stand on the sidelines and wait for you to approve, you needed someone to come to you and show you that you were loved. I did not do that.
Why didn’t you try to focus more on making me feel loved and cherished? It took me a long time to figure out how big of a problem it was to you. I kept playing the victim for you having an affair, thinking that you would continue having the desire to work on the marriage and keep our family intact. I see now that I was just comfortable, because I still had you with me and things were still decent for the most part. I didn’t realize the amount of effort I had to put into changing how I interacted with you. I thought that if I changed my behavior in other ways (housework, kids, etc.), it would be enough to show you that I can be like I used to be, or even better. Now I understand that isn’t what you wanted…it was just a nice thing, but didn’t do anything toward making you feel wanted.
What do you think prevents you from actively changing the way you interact with me? I worry too much if my actions are going to be good enough. I only know to stay out of your way instead of pursuing you. Something is blocking me from freely expressing myself to you. I have always been afraid of making you angry or affecting your mood. I suppose it is a combination of two things: my own fear of rejection and general fear of you, and the fact that I became comfortable in the “perfect” relationship you created where I could be aloof and you would pursue. I’ve known it wasn’t the right way since you came back in August, but it has been very difficult to change it—more difficult than I ever imagined or acknowledged.
