Thats a long post that essentially is blaming her entirely for the downfall of your marriage. I am interested to know the other side. I think everyone here is a lot more interested in helping you than in helping her. I am worried that you are so focused on diagnosing her problems and suggesting you can fix her than on looking inward and figuring out your own problems.
What did you contribute? What would SHE SAY that you contributed (whether you think so or not)
I think you might have missed a few things in my post. Im not sure I did. But I will listen...
As mentioned, this is her second marriage and her ex husband says that she did the same things with him (compulsive lying, hiding money, manipulating, temper tantrums). I also mentioned that I have apologized for many things even though they were not my fault. Of course some things were, but not everything. She NEVER apologizes and always plays the victim. OK. These are problems of hers...
I understand that no one is perfect, but I have done everything I can to be a good husband. I would never cheat on her, don't drink, smoke, do drugs or gamble and would never raise a hand toward her, our her in danger or verbally abuse her. ( AND THAT IS NOT IMPLYING I AM PERFECT). Of course I have flaws. We all do. OK. In your eyes, you were a great H. Got it.
I have tried several times to get her to commit to MC, but she will not try. She is never content with anything and always wants something new or different. Unfortunately, theres not a lot of benefit to MC to get someone to recommit to the MR. The MC is really focused on trying to improve the marriage. So, I think even if you did get her to go, it would not do what you hope.
As mentioned, her parents have interfered many times and have actually showed up at our house because she had called them when she was having a "panic attack" while we were having an argument.. If she doesn't get what she wants, she either pouts or gets angry. OK...more of her problems
As mentioned above, her son moved back in with me because he was tired of being manipulated by her. She blamed My oldest daughter, who was 14 at the time for her (my wife) depression and thoughts of suicide. Yep. Her again.
Also, we had a MC offer to mediate handle the assets for is instead of wasting money on attorneys. She refused. Ivalso told her we could take the equity from our other houses and buy her a condo near by since she said she wants and needs to be on her own. She refused that as well. At this point, we have spent more than $35K on attorney's fees when it wasn't even necessary. Now you are trying to SOLVE her problems.
If someone who is reading this is not familiar with PAPD, they MIGHT get the wrong idea, but I know she has these issues and it has been mentioned by two different clinicians. She says she has been depressed all her life. Her again
You ask what she would say? She would say everything is my fault because that is what she is saying now. She also says everything on her first marriage was a his fault and has told me stories about him over the past 18 years that I am now finding out are not true and the things he is telling me he did, was actually her. Her again
I am not disparaging my wife. She is often, (but not always)difficult to deal with. I have an unconditional love for her and want my family back together. Her again. Also, you love her.
It is easy to misunderstand someone's tone and story in a forum and I am sure I could have made things a little more clear and less jumbled.My main reason for coming on here was for advice and to see if anyone had similar stories and were able to save their marriages. Nope. I thought it was well written. Im pretty sure I understand.
I have told her repeatedly that we can work on counseling individually and together and we can help each other with our issues and communication between us but she refuses and has always refused. Trying to solve her problems again.
Like I mentioned earlier, others have said "you can do better", but I live my wife and want to help her and save the family.
Any advice from anyone would be greatly appreciated.
OK. Reading through my comments above, you probably think Im a complete jerk. Im NOT trying to do that. I just wanted to show you what you wrote and what I took from it. And Im not your wife....imagine what SHE would take from it.
Heres the thing, there is nothing you can do to change her. If she will do anything to divorce you, theres not a single thing you can do. Its not like youre going to chain her up in your basement, right?
So, what can you do? You can work on you! Shes not going to come back to the same relationship she had. So, if in a year, she wakes up and realizes what she lost, she isnt going to come back if you are the same person that you were and she would be in the same relationship she was in. So, you need to grow. You need to learn from the mistakes you made and change them. So, I was asking about you so that we could understand what mistakes you made that led to this point so that we can get to work on fixing them!
