H’s IC last week: I ended up going to H’s IC appointment last week. The reason we were there, allegedly, communication. H had come to the house the week before, I had gotten emotional about our stitch and was asking what we/I could do to help get us some progress. H announced that he wanted to start coming around the house once a week to help with things because, “maintaining the place was too much for one person”, he wanted to start talking on the phone more and perhaps start doing something together once a week. Told me that his therapist was “on board” with the idea. As he’s done this before and it’s backfired pretty immediately, I suggested that before we committed to that we talk to a third party to see how that would work/if it was in our best interests. I also found it questionable that the therapist would suggest increased contact, specifically when H is having a hard time controlling his temper/verbal spew. Asked him if he had told his IC about how angry he was, he hadn’t.
H set up the appointment with his IC. I wasn’t immediately comfortable with the setup, so H encouraged me to reach out to his therapist and discuss my concerns. My primary concerns being: safety and expectations of the session. In regards to safety, do I feel that my H would hurt me on purpose? No, not at all. But, as angry as he’s getting, and so rapidly – I had concerns about the therapist maintaining control of the situation, especially seeing as H hadn’t told him how angry he had been getting. Expectations of the situation: H wanted to talk about communication, I wanted to make sure I wasn’t going in and being ambushed. Having been in previous therapy sessions before with H (prior to MC) where the therapist at the time ambushed me, I wanted to make sure there wasn’t a hidden agenda (ie: I’m trying to control the situation for my comfort).
I talked to H’s IC, and I’m not impressed. At all. He came off as very condescending and rude. He questioned my dedication to H and if my fears of H’s anger were actually valid saying, “women who are fearful of their spouses don’t pursue relationships, much less agree to be in the same room.” He then went on to insinuate that if I was “truly concerned” about H’s anger that I would’ve reached out to someone and tried to get him help. And that is where, I politely lost it. I explained to therapist that I had called him and left him a VM regarding H’s sudden personality change and anger. He never called me back (he confirmed that was correct). I reached out to our MC at the time. Our MC never called me back. I spoke to the on call emergency MC who expressed concern over his behavior at the time and suggested that I get his family and or a doctor involved. As the doctor can’t do anything without H coming in himself, I called his parents. And his parents blamed everything on me. So at that point, I had pretty much exhausted my options short of getting him involuntarily committed (which wasn’t even a viable option or one I was even considering, but can happen in our state). The therapist’s response? “You didn’t call *random mobile crisis center that I’ve never heard of* so, you TRULY didn’t use all of your options. I also explained that while I was concerned for H’s anger and his safety, that I had been exposed to lots of things in life and that I had seen what the power of medication, therapy and time could do, so I wasn’t the “fearful woman” he was portraying me as. He seemed kind of taken aback, but encouraged me to come to the session so I could “learn and hear all about H’s progress.”
FWIW, I did tell H about the conversation and he was pretty taken aback and appalled. Said he would’ve never expected that kind of reaction from IC and would never have suggested I talk to him or come in if IC was going to act that way. Said it was up to me if I wanted to come to the session, he would understand if I didn’t want to.
I put on my big girl panties and went. And continued to not be impressed with the IC in person. He still came off as rude and condescending. He made a big deal about how the session was not MC. Got it. He basically read me bullet points from H’s session.
Session 1: Getting to know you
Session 2: H thinks that relationship is “really bad”. IC tells me that he told H that he could end the relationship at any time if he wanted to. And that sometimes, r’s can’t be fixed because they’ve run their course. IC pauses to say that he’s “pro marriage and thinks marriages should be saved” but sometimes we “have to accept that not everything can be saved and learn to live with the disappointment of things not working out.”
Session 3: Talked about H’s childhood background. So on and so forth. IC told me things I already knew. IC continues to go on that we “could” save our marriage, but that I would have to change, H would have to change and the R would have to change but that it only took one person to want out then that was it.
After all of this, I finally get a chance to say something, and I ask how does one expect the m/spouse to change if they don’t say anything (alluding to H not saying ANYTHING). And how does one work on this, when one party refuses to talk because of their anger, or their mood, or anything else. Because at this point H hasn’t said ANYTHING during the session. I pointed out that H has a history of not saying anything about his feelings, but wanting people to do all the work for him so that he wouldn’t have to do the hard stuff (to his credit, H nodded) and the IC basically ignored this and said that we shouldn’t talk without a third party until we can both learn not be emotional. There’s our communication advice.
He then told me that I could leave, that he wanted to spend the rest of the time with H.
To his credit, H texted me later in the afternoon, thanked me for coming and told me he wasn’t happy with how the session went. At least we agree on something. --- My IC last night:
I talked about the session with H’s IC. I expressed concern that it felt like my H’s IC was pushing H towards D/ending the R based on what he said. Express concern that H might be swayed by the ending r talk, as H always looks to other people for guidance/decision making. Case in point, last week when talking about the R (I know, bad DB) I asked H if he felt the R was over. He said he didn’t know, because he hadn’t talked to his IC about that yet. I realize this is mind reading, I realize it’s a big what if, but it’s also scary to me that H could be so easily influenced. My IC validated my concerns but felt what H’s IC was doing was pushing H to realize that there were options, but that H had to choose what he was going to commit to. She knows H’s IC IRL and is a little taken aback and my opinion of him – but wonders if he’s therapeutically trying to push buttons to get a reaction out of either one of us. She also thinks the reading of the bullet points was to convey to me, without upsetting H, how slow the process is – and how long it’s going to take. They’re on session 6? Now and still haven’t talked about why H is angry with me. She felt that he was doing his best to convey the longevity and to see if I had the patience to deal with it.
She was thrilled to hear that I wanted to start focusing on me, and less on why is this happening to me. I mentioned a few of the things that I wanted to work on: 180s, PMA, etc. I also want to work on taking a hard look at the person I was/am in the marriage. Because apparently she’s not awesome. She said, I’m sure there are things that you did in the marriage as a result of your H’s actions. And immediately, I had several things come to mind. So obviously there’s work there to do.
M:32,H 32 T:10, M5 BD/H Move Out: 9/2014 - extreme anger H Mental Illness Diagnosis: 4/15 Served D Papers: 10/15 Divorced: 11/15
