No, my H was not good about talking about his feelings, at all. He was quite closed off. He has every single characteristic of a distancer. The only true emotion he seems comfortable expressing is mild anger. A very few times, in extreme moments he showed some sadness. I can remember one instance pre-BD and two after BD. VERY rare. In talking about his childhood (which he has been doing a lot lately) he is sort of matter-of-fact/mildly annoyed despite the fact that the stories are very painful and extremely sad.
As his fog has lifted there have been times things hit him hard--sad stories in the news, world happenings. My son has a friend who broke a bone and H was very empathetic (all post BD). H seemed to be disproportionately feeling in these instances. The pendulum had swung pretty far the other way. Maybe he was trying on masks?
There are times where, as I am raising my two sons, I see my H learning how things should be, too. In MLC, sometimes he has repeated my exact same words to the boys days later. Sometimes he watched/listened just like a child himself as I explained basic things: how you should treat each other, how to deal with someone pushing your buttons, etc. When I teach my boys how you treat your brother, H is particularly owl eyed--he has one brother himself. (But he was not "learning" in heaviest of fog, this only started when fog lifted a bit. In heaviest of fog, he couldn't even remember where he was driving or what day of the week it was.)
As your H is in his own fog, if your son is around and you are talking to son about feelings or how to deal with people, I would be curious to see if your H was learning along the way, too? Watch his face and see.
But he knows something is off. He has told me that he is surprised at how I can express myself and how much I feel. I am waiting to see if in MLC he is going to grow up with my boys. Sometimes I think the timing of his MLC is synced somehow with sons, developmentally speaking. I think he got stuck somewhere between the ages my boys are now and he is trying to learn with them.
Let me ask you, does your H have all the characteristics of a distancer? Also, I am curious, is he ok with sharing things? (Like a bite of his food, his stuff,etc.)?
Me 41, H 47, M 15 yrs, S11, S13 BD 1: 11/4/14 we work on it; really I pretzel myself BD 2: 3/31/15 H goes down to "dorm room" 8/15: H back to MBR 10/15: H back in dorm room 1/18: H files, now divorced
