Bless your heart if you were married to me..haha Are you picking up on my stubborness or what?
He holds off on them because he is afraid, frankly. He is afraid of losing you most of all. You're right. He's said this many times! H and I look at this differently. If communication doesnt include the negatives, it's not communication! To me anyway.. it's a fairy tale if a couple can't work through the good and the bad. I know part of it is because of our history and his fear of losing me. My fault that he feels he could lose me so easily. But if he took inventory of the negatives I've stayed through, he'd see that it isnt the negatives that will make him lose me.. it's the lack of communication and whether or not we can compromise and negotiate through the problems. It's him NOT telling me point blank the truth and us dealing with it that makes this seem hopeless. It's him not following through on things I think we've agreed on, but later found out that he just told me what I wanted to hear at the time. And that means we didnt solve anything to begin with!
Somewhere inside of him is sure that he doesn't deserve this. That Sheila is much to a wonderful a person to want him, that she has seen that once before and it's only a matter of time until she sees it again. That self fulfilling prophecy is so painful to watch for me. I was there. It ends with the exactly what you don't want. Do you know my H? Seriously. He's said this too.. that he doesnt deserve me. He say it in a way like he thinks I'd like to hear that from him. Maybe he's just admitting he's made mistakes, but making mistakes doesnt mean he doesnt deserve me. I can see what you're saying though. If he doesnt think he deserves me and thinks I believe that or will come to believe that it'll be reflected in our R.
Maybe you could try something like "on Tuesdays you are going to tell me something that you absolutely hate about me or our marriage WITHOUT ramifications or at least the most horrible ones. Parlor tricks...LOL Well, I've tried them! I've played the I'll tell you something negative and you tell me something negative and then we can both admit that there are parts of us that arent great, but it's OK. No way no how! He'll do it, but what he shares is always safe and very measured. If he could just see how VALUABLE sharing is. For instance "I dream of being single sometimes". Well, yeah, so do I! What do you think you'd like about being single? I know there is stuff to be explored and we could understand each other so much better. I mean, I share (or I did) this kind of stuff with him. Maybe me sharing it with him was too hard and he doesnt want to cause me the pain he felt? I told him exactly how thinking about him with OW makes me feel when we ML. It's info he should have if he's ML to me. Maybe he didnt want that info, and thinks I should protect him from that and he should protect me from that?
If it isn't said, it's not real. That's how I think H thinks.
Somehow he sucked you back into a marriage that you left because it was so bad, and NOW you are not happy. He is to blame, so he thinks. Sheila's life has been ruined twice because I am not good enough to get her what she needs. I can't let her go voluntarily, but I could push her away. This might be closer to the truth than even I'd like to admit. I'd have to agree he might not think about pushing me away consciously. But, when he moved out last spring, he did say that he didnt want to move back in because he didnt know if he'd be able to stop hurting me or not and he was tired of doing that. Now, this comes from someone in a PA/EA. So.. he dropped that when his R ended with OW and then he came back home. So maybe that was true, or maybe it was true and he only admitted it because he thought he might have a fresh start, no history with her. He's smart.. it would be much easier without our history. No doubt both of us could do better if we were free to be accepted for who we are at this moment in time, and not be seen as an accumulation of past and present good times and bad.
Thanks Al! Like I said, I don't know if I have anything to give, or if it would work so I'm doing nothing. H has given me some things to think about and he is changing. I just don't know if he's changing and we'll be better together or if he's changing and he'll be better for the next woman that comes into his life.
