Angry WAH blames me for everything.......

[Calibri]

IMHO, because you are always so tough and "don't have a lot of sympathy for victims," you are not letting your H have the opportunity to get out of the role of victim. By constantly showing that you are a hard ass, your H will continue to be soft, which in turn makes you more frustrated and more irritated at why he is the way he is.

So I've been thinking about this for days. I'm on the fence about this. H had victim tendencies before we got together. But they didn't become glaringly apparent until we hit serious conflict (money, my MIL, apparently buying that damn house). When I say I'm a hard ass, rest assured, I'm not riding H 24/7. Most of the time I was laid back. But when we had conflict, that's where the hard ass came out and was directed towards him. I tried different approaches with him, and the only thing that got results was being a hard ass.

Seriously. We could agree upon something, and he would go along with it for a week or so, and then fall back into old habits, or "forget" that he had agreed upon something. I attribute this to what I call the "special snowflake syndrome." With the way he was raised, his mother placed her kids on unrealistic pedestals and gave them over inflated views of their roles in the world. I've touched on it before, but what it boils down to is - they were given the message by their mother that they could do whatever they want, because they're so gifted/smart/good looking and that life was too short NOT to do what you wanted. And if they made a serious mess, their mother always cleaned it up while either raking them across the coals saying she "raised them better than that" or placing the blame on someone else in the situation.

So when I would get frustrated, he would tell me that, "it's not that big of a deal." Which is like waving the red flag in front of me and daring me to say something. :-) What got results was either a)yelling or b) being a hard ass. I think he responded to that because that's what he grew up with his mother. Nothing was ever discussed, it was angry reactions and screaming that they all abided by because it's what would pacify her at the time.

I don't like that I had to be a hard ass or yell to get results from him. But I felt, that was the only way that would get a response, and that would get me heard. And I felt that way, because that's the only thing that got me results. And for the record, this wasn't like every day things -- there's been only five times over the course of ten years where I was a serious hard ass and we were having knock down drag out fights about something.

So, to answer your question, I genuinely don't know if not being a hard ass will allow him to change. I think he has to change his view on how HE wants to be. I know he has expressed a desire not to be the way he is, but he doesn't see himself as victim. I'd be curious to see what he actually thinks of himself. I think he doesn't believe he has the ability to change his situation.

Oh hell, I don't know. But good thought provoking question of the week!