Life, One Day at a Time (22 months)

[adinva]

So, today I had occasion to try to recap wth happened to my marriage, and I thought I'd post it here. I don't always completely capture my thoughts, some bits and pieces that turn out to be relevant don't make it in, and some words or phrases are misfires, not to mention that my thoughts and emotions change. It's kind of like trying to grab goldfish from a tank.

I thought I was all over the place closer to the beginning of my sitch, and I knew I might eventually settle closer toward some kind of statement that more accurately captured what I thought happened. Here's what I thought happened as of earlier today fwiw (with a little more finetuning since I'm not typing it with my thumb):

I don't know what his beef is really. And he won't give a clue.

He became very secretive after he got work with secret clearance and got interested in guns and all that good guys and bad guys stuff. (This was maybe two years prebomb, and I was alarmed at how he would shut down any questions with "I can't tell you that." He almost seemed to enjoy doing that. I soul searched and decided that I would be the best top secret wife I could and support him and try not to be curious or alarmed.) Now looking back, I think he went from a little OCD (high anxiety over anything not exactly according to his rules or his way) to a little over the edge, like insane. I had to disguise him in our pinewood derby photo for the Cub Scout newsletter to avoid his being associated with our kids in a photo. I went along with this, but it added to unhappiness that was already there.

For my part I think that I was deeply disappointed in my marriage and would not accept that that was okay so I put a happy face on it and made the best of it. I did not know how to accept and give deeply felt love, and so his take-the-good-with-the-bad attitude and his not-very-nice terms of endearment, and his brusque frat boy treatment when I wanted romantic sexy treatment, I accepted as my lot but I did not like it. My fault was not being able to say what I needed, or know what I needed, or wonder how one might learn to do that or why. My fault was thinking that marriage was forever even if it was lousy so don't bother labeling it at all.

And my inability to be enthusiastically loving to him helped increase his withdrawal and the divide became worse and worse. I can clearly recall a handful of events that he responded to with such frozen calm that I felt we'd past a point of no return - one was the night my "love tank" was so low I couldn't bring myself to do more than go through the motions...on his birthday. He was p!ssed but said FINE don't bother, and was a little colder ever since. There were other times like that and I could look back and see they permanently set us back each time. For example I objected to Maxim in the bathroom - my bathroom - and tried to be accommodating and understanding until the boys got old enough to start stealing it from there. I objected again and got FINE. I won't get it anymore. And then the temperature turned down just a little more, irreversibly.

So I didn't behave super well either. I was quick to bicker, quick to challenge his tone and temper, quick to take offense at what and how he said things to me. We became the bickersons. I became lazy, developed an internet habit, very forgetful around the house, passive aggressive. If you can imagine a conversation between us the captions would have been "Well oh yeah? FINE. If you're going to be that way then I'm going to be MORE this way."

I saw this getting worse and worse and I just did not know anything other than tolerate, explain, understand, tolerate. I considered myself a fairly happily married woman and last I heard from him he said he was a happily married man. No point looking deeper.

There were signs of cheating, around 2002 or so, a very close touchy friendship, latenight chatty calls (he never liked talking on the phone to me and often hung up before I was finished talking, so finding him on the phone while folding laundry, chatting away, was alarming.), and more, odd behavior around trips, total drop-off of interest in sex. I just did not know what to do, but we married for life, so put a happy face on it.

And then there are elements of his ways with the kids that are really literally horrible and damaging (ok that is my opinion) and my extreme the other way drove another wedge. He cited to his mom that one of his reasons for leaving was "he didn't like the way I had raised the kids." And looking back this seems unfair, except until you notice that we really didn't and don't seem to be able to work through something - anything - with a common goal, to appreciate what each other brings to the table and negotiate compromise or real agreement. In hindsight it seems to have been either my way or his way, there was no our way. And he tended to back down so I thought I had agreement when he thought I was overruling him and getting my way. So if you see it that way, I did raise the kids and not the way he wanted.

In our entire adult lives together I've never seen him change his mind go back on a decision sincerely apologize (to me or any peer; I ONCE this year heard him apologize to our S12 for calling him a demeaning name and that was a first) or admit an error. He has always been praised for being extremely smart, having extraordinary common sense, knowing things "he knows nothing about," generally just being very very RIGHT all the time. I personally really admired that, and I have heard his friends admire it too. I think being right is integral to his self-identity.

Now, I think he's depressed. He's acted depressed since maybe a whole year before BD, and the almost two years since then. A doctor told him he's not, and he's sticking with that story. But he spent all day in bed after work through most of my kids' middle school time. Maybe he got depressed because of our sitch, because I didn't know how not to aggravate him, because he interpreted our challenges in a way that made him feel less of a man. Maybe depression aggravated our sitch instead. Maybe it's a MLC. Maybe we're just not compatible people. I don't really know.

Because of how he is being, I think no matter what I do it would take a miracle way beyond my control - IN ADDITION TO a clear sense that being with me would be different - for him to change his mind about our marriage.

I have a few reasons to believe he's been cheating for a couple years possibly. My IC is as sweet and kind as I could imagine and she thinks he is a sociopath. He has no empathy, she says, he literally cannot feel for another person.

I'm just trying to do the next best thing every day. DB really helped; i would have stayed in a rotten marriage if it meant winning at this. But over time here that changed. If H could learn to connect emotionally, and wanted to, I would see hope for a future for us, but I wont spend my kids' high school years in a futile waiting game. I will show them when its time to fold your cards and go on, with love, regret, and hopefully compassion.