I feel like I'm dealing with a teenager who is throwing a tantrum.
You probably are!
MLC is childhood issues, so yours is a teenager.
He's not yet 30. I know that it can happen at any age, but this feels unreal. The 23-year-old whom I married 7 years ago was a far more emotionally-mature person.
My H is in a place where he does not accept the idea that he might be asked to do more or to do better. It doesn't matter how nicely or non-confrontationally this is put to him. He views any such request as rejection of him.
He has next to no relationship with his mother, who has been nothing but nice and supportive of us. She helped us move every time we moved. She helped us out financially. She has me staying with her during the week while I attend classes. His gratitude? Christmas of 2016, he threw a fit because I promised her that he'd empty a mop bucket for her. According to him, he felt disrespected and treated worse than a dog. This past summer, while he was still in the throws of his first hissy fit, he refused to come into her house and stayed in the car while I went in. He never calls. He'll have vacation in May, but he will not come visit her. The day that he and I sign our divorce papers may well be the last day she sees him or hears from him.
The relationships that seem to make him happiest are those which are most shallow. The great sum total of his current friendships can be defined as "people he texts stupid jokes to and occasionally goes to drink beers with." His friends are also consistently (1) younger than him, (2) single, (3) not as good looking as he is, and (4) not as educated or intelligent as he is. But they are in awe of him and have no real expectations of him. It's like he's trying to re-live the college days that he never got to have because he worked all though undergrad.
That lives me in a very precarious position.
As much as I want to read him the riot act, I cannot, and it will do no good.
At the same time, I can do no right. I know what his reaction will be if I try to talk to him and reconcile -- he will reject me in the most hurtful way he can think of. Acting like I don't see how badly he is behaving and continuing to live my own life also produces nothing but irritation from him.
And this is my problem with the implementation of the LRT. The three outcomes listed are (1) nothing, (2) tepid curiosity, or (3) a spouse that quickly attempts to reconcile. There is no option #4: a sulky juvenile. How do I gage whether what I'm doing is only driving him further away?
Me: 28 H: 30 T: 9 M: 7
WAH: First half of 2017. Round 2 started in Spring 2018.
