It's not OW, Rachael. And, it's not him. Nor is it you.
It's a pattern of thinking that you and your H got into.
Happiness comes from within. Your H isn't responsible for your happiness, but you're trying to pin it on him.
That's what he thinks. It's in all the self-help books, isn't it? Everyone knows it.
Well, IMHO that way of thinking is a vast oversimplification. But I think that's your H's mindset.
He's not trying to start arguments. He's just trying to be happy by himself, and expecting you to do the same.
You and he have gotten into such an adversarial position that it's hard to get out of. He probably doesn't recognize it, and the worst thing you can do is to point it out to him, but all of this is pure posturing. In fact, I think you're doing a little posturing yourself without even knowing it.
It's a game, and a krappy one.
It's a game that W and I played over and over again.
You've read my recent turn of events. Two years of posturing before we could both let go of the game.
My W once noted that, "It's been a long time since either of us engaged in emotional blackmail." That was her way of saying that we used to use this sort of posturing to get our respective ways.
Your H accuses you of using sex to control him. That's emotional blackmail, isn't it? And he's refusing to let you blackmail him.
The only way I found to get out of this was to refuse to play the game. I stopped anything that could be construed as emotional blackmail. If I felt neglected, I vented on the boards, but to the best of my abilities, I kept it hidden from W.
You want a R based on mutual support. He wants a R based on mutual respect. You're both right, but you're both misinterpreting each others actions based on your own needs.
I'm convinced that this is what happened to me, and it looks soooooooo much like you're going through the same thing.
