Is this really so insurmountable??

[heatherg]

Thanks for the input Ohio, I will try to control my reactions. For the record, I think I would have to ignore the reactions forever, not just for now. I've been with H for 12 years and he doesn't like to "talk", so he's ALWAYS been this way.

Here's a little history about me and H. We met when I was 17 and he was 18. I had sort of a troubled teenage life, didn't have good friends, was definitely headed in the wrong direction. I had 7 sexual artners, all one night stands by the time I met H, yet had never made love. H came across as arrogant at first, but I was really attracted to him, so I asked a mutual friend to tell him I'd like him to call me. He did. We became very close very fast, dated exclusively from the very beginning. I soon found that he was very controlling though. Through his intense reactions to things, he controlled the clothes and jewelry I wore, the music I listened to, where I went and who I saw. I noticed though, that the same rules didn't always apply to him. He was still able to see his friends, go to parties without me, etc. He also had a huge need to know every act I had done with these 7 other people, EVERY single detail. Every time we would have these "discussions", which was A LOT in the first few months of our R, I didn't know if I would ever see him again. He seemed disgusted and hurt by my behavior, almost as though I had cheated on him or something, when in fact, I didn't even know him. The discussions made me horribly uncomfortable and even more insecure. The only reason I continued to discuss it was because I thought he was such a good person and that perhaps his acceptance would somehow redeem me. If he could know every bad thing I had ever done and still look me in the eyes and tell me he loved me, I guess I thought it would be worth the indignity.
So, I dropped all my friends, which I suppose wasn't an altogether bad thing. I stopped listening to dance music and never danced if we went out. We listened only to his music. I wasn't allowed to wear silver jewelry. The list goes on.
My point here is that I have a lot of negative feelings towards H for this, even still. I am a very strong woman now, and feel very angry that he treated me that way. He has changed over the years, no longer tries to control those things. But the price for that he says, is that he has become emotionally disconnected to me in many ways. It sort of went to the other extreme, actually. The last couple of years, the angrier I got about his drinking, the more I pulled away from him until it got to the point where I was going out every Friday night (his drinking night). He never seemed to care. Never accepted invitations to come. So, it was like it was either controlling everything or caring about nothing. And although I now wear what I want, etc., I feel that he is still had a great deal of control over me. It's almost like I am emotionally afraid of him because his reactions to things can be so intense. I do not like people to be angry with me or ignore me (which is his favorite thing to do when he's mad at me). That's a little bit about our history together. I think it's important b/c I think we were wrong for each other from the beginning. We were too young to know it though, and b/c we are very loyal people, we've just stayed together through the years, just continually adapting to the environment.