I have another, maybe even bigger problem with W not being willing to talk. Quite simply, I know what W does and doesn't do that bothers me; I don't know what I do or don't that bothers her. I want to make myself and our R better, but without input from her, I'm shooting in the dark and hoping to hit something.
Clearly, I've figured out some things that needed to be changed - and I've changed them. But how many more are out there? What are they?
For example. I could tell her, “W, I believe that you put more value on the dogs than you do on me.” She can then argue, she can agree and tell me that's just the way it is, she can choose to take actions to show me that that's not the case, she can choose to dismiss my feelings, ... But the point is: she's aware of how I feel and can choose either to do something about it or not.
To pull something kind of similar out of the air, suppose W feels that I place more value on my job than on her. In this scenario, I know that's not the case, but she believes it and that belief causes problems in the R. The problem is that I KNOW it's not the case, so it would never occur to me that she would believe such a thing. Obviously, I would then have no reason to try to make her see that her belief is erroneous – after all, in this scenario I don’t even know that she feels that way. I will be blamed for something that isn’t true and about which I don’t even have a clue. So assuming this scenario to be fact, how would I EVER get myself out of the proverbial doghouse?
I know there are others here in the same boat. I know that I’m not the only one who has made an effort to improve himself and his M only to find that he is the perfect husband. But that IS what I get from W – if I can get anything out of her at all. I would be OK with perfect if there was even the slightest glimmer of a possibility that it was true, but sadly, I know that I’m far from perfect.
