What is best for the kids may not necessarily mean staying in the marriage, but staying in a happy marriage is best for them.
Well, picking the lesser of two evils was always H's response. At least if we stayed together and were civil, we could hold their world together. A happy M would be ideal, but a happy family would be second best.
It also allows you to dodge the real issue, and that is intimacy.
Honestly, intimacy had never occurred to me as the real issue. And actually, the MC mentioned it to me before she ever met H, during my individual session with her. She said the behaviors I describe in him are representative of someone who avoids intimacy. I forgot about that.
He is also in a Catch 22, which I think may be a subconscious tactic by you to maintain some level of control. If he questions your commitment to the kids, that you should be putting him first, he knows you will not react well.
This is where you start to go wrong and are maybe projecting as you suggested because he is actually the one that questions *my* level of commitment to the kids, not the other way around. IMO, he is too focused on the kids, S5 in particular, wanting to be his best friend and wanting S5 to be his little protege having all the toys and experiences that he craved as a boy but never got. I am the one that would love to be put first. But how can one ask for such a thing in a M??? How does a mother look at her H and say "Geez, I wish I was number one in your life...". He says that is incredibly selfish of me and I can't help but feel he's right. S5 even sleeps in our bed with H...while I am out on the couch. I think H would rather do just about anything with S5 than do anything with me.
Even though he may be guilty of dodging the real question, which I think is intimacy, you have also placed him there too. He can’t really focus on you, because doing so means putting you above the kids, and he knows that is not a position which you will tolerate. But putting the kids first precludes him from giving you what you really want.
All wrong, based on incorrect assumptions.
What do you actually mean when you say 'enmeshed'?
"Happiness is a butterfly, which, when pursued, is always just beyond your grasp, but which, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you."
