Another way to become unstuck is to simply stop doing all the things you are doing to maintain your marriage. Start small. For instance, if you are mopping the floor every day just because that is MsHD's preference and you would be okay with once a week, switch to mopping once a week. This way you will start gaining some of the benefits of being single while staying married. Why are you babytending every night while your wife goes out walking? Hire a sitter a couple nights a week and do something fun for you etc. etc. etc. Scale back your efforts or contributions to the marriage to the point that YOU think is equitable.
"Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?" - Mary Oliver
I am with you on the "Catch-22" of the "I want you to be more confident," and yet when you try to do so, you get "you should have checked with me" thing.
Sigh.
In my case, the most recent example was her birthday. I made the mistake of calling her mom (her folks live in the same town as us), to make arrangements for my wife's birthday. We typically get together with her whole family to celebrate, but it may or may not be on her ACTUAL birthday (usually not), but rather on the nearest Sunday.
Well, this year my wife's birthday WAS on Sunday, and further complicated that it's two days before the 4th of July, and on the 3 "Summer holidays" we typically get together with her family for a barbeque at one of our houses. So I called her mom to try to make b-day plans, and her mom says "You all come over here, Choc., I'll make a nice dinner and we can celebrate."
Well, before I knew it, I was more or less agreeing to this, although I did say that I needed to check with D19, to see when she worked, and I'd get back to her. An hour later, my wife calls me at work, all upset because now her mom is all excited that we're going over there on her birthday, and she didn't want to spend her birthday that way. So I tell her that it wasn't firm, and that I needed to check with D19 anyway, and that I'll just call her mom and "undo" everything and move it to another day. Wife will NOT let me do that, as she says her mom is now "excited" that we're coming over (we used to come over every Sunday for the big Italian Sunday pasta dinner, but lately it's more like once every month or two).
So wife pouts all weekend. Despite the fact that I get up early on her birthday and make her coffee and have breakfast with her (she has to get up at 5:45am now, as she works Sat. and Sun. mornings). While she's at work, I buy flowers and a balloon, and wrap all of her gifts and clean the house, and when she comes in the door her gifts and flowers are on the table, and my laptop is playing a continuous loop of "Today's Your Birthday". She gets REALLY nice gifts (I suprised her with a gift certificate to have her BMW window-tinted, something she had really wanted), and we have a nice day at her parents. She seems happy.
Well, the next day she's pouting and angry again, and when I press her to try and find out why, she says it's because "no one made me a birthday dinner." (We usually celebrate family members' birthdays by making them their favorite meal). I point out to her that I offered to make her crab legs, one of her favorites, but apparently I made the mistake of asking wife and D17 to pick them up, since D17 called on the phone and suggested it and I just said "good idea -- pick them up, and I'll make them."
How is this a "confidence" thing? Because she's angry that I didn't ASK HER what she wanted to do for her birthday, instead I tried to plan it out and make it nice without her having to feel like she needed to accomodate her mom. She's said the same thing about "date nights," and escape weekends, pointing out someone we know or someone on Dr. Phil or something where the husband just planned the whole thing. Well every time I try and do that, I get criticized for "not checking with her," and just like your situation with your wife.
I feel like I can't win. If I make a stand on things, even stupid little things like what to have for dinner, she criticizes my choices and says that I should have asked her. If I defer to her (which I mostly do now, or else just state that I have no opinion either way), collectively, over time, this kills her attraction to me, and I can see why.
And FORGET about the sexual equivalent. If I initiate boldly, I get shot down and I'm "pressuring," and if I don't, and play "He-Who-Cares-the-Least," then nothing will happen, and my lack of confidence in approaching her boldly just turns her off to me.
I honestly don't know how we're supposed to act around women like we have. Either way, it seems it's wrong.
