Hope you saw the newsletter from Cunningham today. If you haven't read the "emotional scale" descriptions yet, search through his archives for info, or read it in the book if you have it now. Way back when, I commented to you that your husband was "me" - THAT is what I was talking about. Men have a natural desire for stability that women DON'T, and women often take that desire to be apathy. When you said months ago that your husband panicked and things got better for a couple weeks, then went back to normal, THIS IS WHY: Men NEED things to be stable, just as women need some excitement and emotion. Everyone knows this, right? Ask a guy how he is, he'll say "fine" - probe further, he'll say "tired", "hungry", something shallow. He doesn't find deeper emotional states to be desireable - they're disruptive to his preferred state. Women, on the other hand, tend to be social, and emotions are a great source of satisfaction. Note that both men and women are criticised for being that way - men are "insensitive", women are "flaky". What BS that is! It's when we go beyond blame, and respect, enjoy, and laugh about our differences that we can truly enjoy a relationship. But in troubled times, that's hard to do......
The best piece of advice I ever gave anyone about marital trouble was after I learned it the hard way. I asked a friend what his wife was looking forward to. It was rhetorical, because if the answer was "nothing", he had a problem. If it was "I don't know", he had a problem. It sounds demeaning if you look at it from only one direction, but if you think of a marriage as an opportunity for BOTH people to make sure the other has something to look forward to, things could work pretty damn good, don't you think? And bluntly, few men need that as much as women, and as a result they don't even think about doing it - they think (naturally, don't you think?) that if they work their butts off doing for YOU what makes them happy, you'll appreciate it and be happy. In fact, you'll be bored to death, emotionally starved, snippy and unpleasant, waiting for something to happen that ain't gonna happen.
Boy, wish I knew more of this 5 years ago!
Read that "emotional scale" thing of Cunningham's.
