Introduction

[TJT]

Steve, I really appreciate your post... I'm not even going to quote it because I have so much to respond to in it, lol. But thank you for the welcome and for relating, first and foremost.

I totally get what you mean about not doing things just to see his reaction. What I meant by that was not necessarily experimenting on things I wouldn't normally do, but doing things as I feel natural and seeing if they are helping or hurting, and if they are not helping, to find some other way to approach it. I don't know if that makes sense.

I believe you have a point about enabling, and that is the hardest thing for me to make sense of for myself because it's like there's this fine line between being supportive and positive through anything and figuring out when you absolutely must push back on someone.

To address some of the points Accuracy made, I've spent a long time thinking about why I haven't been more definitive in drawing a line on some his behaviors. I am NOT a person afraid of conflict or to speak my mind. But over time I think I've learned that because it doesn't really "work" to point out even specific examples of things that bother me or that i don't like, I have had a choice to make each time and ask myself if a particular issue is something I really want to push on, knowing it won't motivate him to change, or would I be okay letting it go?

More often than not my answer to myself has been that while it would definitely be IDEAL to have him be more receptive to changing certain things, I've never thought the overall relationship was terrible or without any other good things between us, so I'd rather keep the relationship alive rather than try to push someone to change to an extent where they would think I'm so unhappy or to where they would get fed up with the "nagging" and leave. Admittedly this results in some of my needs not being met, but I can't always meet all of his needs either (taking the perspective of neither of us being perfect).

I get that it's more the principle of these things and how he's less willing to work with me to make changes, or being less concerned about how I feel than it seems he should. I will say that HAS been the one thing that has bothered me, that even if he can't understand where I'm coming from or why something is important to me, he hasn't really ever been the type of person to try and find out. It's like this just "are what they are" with him.

In situations like that where I try to point out that it seems like he doesn't care when he doesn't do X thing, he has (of course) just gotten defensive and says that he does try and I just must not be paying attention or seeing it. So then of course who am I to say he's not trying? I just start questioning if maybe I have been a little absent minded lately or if maybe my expectations or standards are too high (generally speaking this tends to be the case with me, but I am also very self aware, so maybe I have been overcompensating in this area to the other extreme...)

It's just hard to enforce something when you know the other person is going to interpret it different than our own reality, and you can't change how they see it, and overall you believe they're still a good person, with no bad intent, and they do other things to show they care about you and the world is not on fire. While many things suck, I feel like you're human and I still love you and as long as I believe you still love me, we'll keep going and keep learning (I would hope) and hopefully get better over time, even if it's a long time. Because someone else will probably have something I don't like and that I can't change too.

But, clearly, the "you love me" part seems to have changed, since the love isn't being "felt" on that side anymore..which, yeah, I know means I need to make some changes too. For the record, there have definitely been times where I just say you know, he doesn't seem to realize what he has and should be fighting harder if he really did care about it.

Back to Steve's point, this whole gender role thing I think is key too, and something I will have to try to adjust for. I am a very strong woman and given my career success I know that it can't be easy for him, no matter how much he seems to be supportive and okay with it on the face of things. And while it won't be easy for ME to be more "submissive" or less of a provider than I know I am, that's one of those needs I know I need to do better in trying fulfill for him, now that you put it that way. The whole "letting him feel like he can stand on his own two feet" was a really helpful perspective, especially in making me feel better about detaching, so thank you for that.

I have more to say and update you all on but I am going to try to take a break for lunch and then this afternoon I am GAL with a friend, who I just let in on my sitch recently...so I'll be back. But again, thank you all for your thoughtful responses and reading!!