This is a valid question, but it's not the only question.
The other question is, "Why is she acting in this way? Are some of her stances legitimate, or is she going through something else right now that I need to be supporting"
You've mentioned in previous postings (I think) that W may have PPD. This is a real medical condition. I can't say whether this is the case or not, but you have the best insight. If you suspect this is a player in the mix, please consider the second question. If you don't believe it's a player in the mix, disregard my post.
When people say "Marriage is hard" I always assumed it meant external factors that W & I would face together. You know, a death of someone we love, cancer, moving, jobs....all these life things. I thought it will be hard with her by my side. No. What they mean when they say "Marriage is hard" is that sometimes you're not on the same side. That's what makes it hard.
Hi Yail,
Thank you for dropping by and adding your thoughts. I’m gonna preface all this with a big fat scoop of BELIEVE NOTHING THEY SAY.
As to why she’s acting this why, she said yesterday that she’s changed a lot of her beliefs in the last couple of years, especially with respect to birth control (her now having the IUD). I told her my thoughts about that, but I also didn’t believe it was worth blowing up the MR. It’s a lot easier to remove an IUD than it is to undo a divorce / separation.
Are some of her stances legitimate? To a certain extent, I know there are kernels of truth in her complaints about me and our MR. But I could fret all day about what I could have done differently. I’ve tried to change some things, and I’m trying to work on other things now. But some parts of me won’t change (some things are ‘hard-wired’ in), and I was good enough for her to want to date, marry and build a life with back then. And most of those qualities are still there, I believe. Are there things about her that I don’t especially like, or that have bothered me? Yup—and I’ve tried to tell her, or I’ve learned to live with it. There’s very little that would cause me to want to blow up an MR (I’d start with adultery / abuse, and there may be *some* others, but I’d have to think about it).
Is she going through something else right now that I need to be supporting? That’s the real question, I believe. And who the h*** knows, and I’m not even sure if she knows. For all I know, she could be MLC’ing at 30 (a former IC told me that MLC’s can happen at almost any age). Not much I can really do about that one. MLCs gonna MLC.
Others have mentioned PPD, and I’ve talked about it, too. It wouldn’t totally shock me if this was / is the case. I guess the question is—how can I support that? Can’t exactly push her into therapy for that one. Either she believes she doesn’t have it, or that she’s managing it and can manage it without my presence. I do know that she’s been really tired. Breast-feeding can do that. It could also be that she’s depressed, and it’s one of the manifestations of that.
I know she’s been unhappy in the past about some things, and she would make vague references to me about saying things so that her ‘at the end of the day, [her] conscience would be clear.’ I would ask her what that would mean, and she would just tell me that her conscience would be clear. I always took it as a veiled threat, even if I didn’t always act on it.
I also believe that in trying to toss me to the curb like a discarded Christmas tree, that she will ultimately be trading one set of problems for another. Being a single mom will not help her, or bring her much more joy or relief. Whatever I have done (or failed to do), I also know that I’m not the full set of her problems—and that if there is some deep unhappiness within, it will haunt her unless / until she confronts it and slays that demon.
I could totally be misunderstanding it, but I sometimes wonder if DB’ing is basically giving the WAS / WS enough rope to hang themselves. “Oh, you really want life without me? Okay, here you go.” [/time passes] WAS / WS realizes that grass isn’t always greener. Or it’s like out of ‘A Christmas Carol,’ and we as DBer’s are like ‘The Ghost of Marriage Future,’ and we try to show the WAS / WS what life would truly be like without us, and maybe it won’t be as great as they think.
When W and I were out last night and she BD’ed me, soon after she started talking, our wedding dance song played over the speakers at the restaurant. Of course, I didn’t say anything, but it’s stuff like that that makes me believe God hates me or that the universe really doesn’t give an F. That song was about how each partner would accept each other the way they are, and would help each other through the various trials of life, and into old age. On our wedding day, we walked down the aisle together—to be symbolic of us taking things head on, together.
And now she wants to cut and run? I’ve been there for her through times when she’s had job difficulties, 2 pregnancies, a cross-country move, various moves in SoCal, all sorts of late nights and days / weeks / months when she’s gone on work trips, cared for her (and paid for) dental work for her (this will probably sound mean, hateful and really uncharitable, but I’m really sure lots of men down the road will be attracted to a woman with bad teeth).
But she has had enough of my flaws, and just decides it’s not worth it? I mentioned this earlier, but when I threw out my back in February, she told me that she wished she loved me enough to want to take care of me. And that’s the thing—she used to do stuff like that, but the idea of helping me through things now is just much too much for her.
We went out for dinner as a family tonight (sushi). Some moments it feels like nothing has happened—she offers me some of her food (you want some?), or when we talk about dessert, she says “how about you get this and I get this and we split them.” Just like old times—like we can work together and get along...but also reminds me of how things used to be between us. But then the ride home was pretty much silence between the two of us.
