Last night we were talking about someone else who is having marriage troubles. 19 years of marriage and the wife says she's always been unhappy. I've heard that before. I try not to be party to that info but (business relationship) but it ends up in my lap.
Of course the conversations with my w on the subject she wants to blame it all on him. He has some really messed up problems stemming from a freakish childhood so it's easy. He's a friend but he's not at all ready for any help. He'll have to come to it when he's ready.
But anyway last night I'm talking to my wife and she's saying how pissed the W is and how she'll probably be sleeping on the couch if she stays there at all, what a loser. And she goes on a bit about it.
My wife sleeps on the couch.
I don't know if that slipped out and she realized it or what. It certainly wasn't directed at me but it did get to me.
That reminds me of something that happened in the summer with me and H. We were driving somewhere and I told him that I'd been seeing an old neighbour at soccer. H asked if he still comes on to me, and I said yes, like I'd ever get involved with someone who always seemed to be on the verge of cheating on his wife! ha ha ha...oops! H cheated on ME. Ack! I really put my foot in my mouth. H just looked at me with a half-smile as it dawned on me what I'd said. Trust me, it had NOTHING to do with him, never even crossed my mind.
I know I would take it personally, too, but it probably wasn't meant that way. In any case, you and W are on a different track: she's not sleeping on the couch as a prelude to moving out; she's doing it as a postlude to moving out, or a prelude to moving back in, right?
N
Life isn't about finding yourself; it's about creating yourself My thread: Trusting God's Plan
Thanks for checking in on me in my absence. W and I just got back last night from our big Kung Fu adventure. It was a fun but exhausting weekend.
Since the weekend had a Buddhist theme to it we listened to a cd by the Dalai Lama and read to each other in the car. It was a 12 hour drive so plento of time to absorb. Lot's of info on issues she has been working on (and me too). He spoke a lot on marriage and relationships. Good stuff.
It's so confusing. Sometimes I think all is good, we've solved our marriage problems. She kisses me like everything is good. Then every once in awhile she kinda turns her head to the side a bit and half kisses me.
We seem to engage perfectly as a married couple. We are best friends, love to hang out with each other. Totally look out for each other's best interests. We are proud to be each others mates. She looks to me for strength and values my opinion. When she tells a story to someone else she always looks into my eyes as she tells the story.(hmmm I'll need to think about that). And we have learned to fight. We no longer hold things in when we shouldn't (I think)
Even our future talk is good now. I's are now we's. She no longer talks in the selfish controlling manner she did many months ago.
Yet she sleeps on the couch and does not wear her wedding ring.
I was affected a little more over the weekend because we slept in the same bed while on the road. But it felt like she was miles away. She kept to the side. I wanted so badly to cuddle up but I knew what the response would be.
So I lost sleep over it. There's a bit of a pattern there in me. I am affected by the non-affection and lose sleep. Then when I lose sleep I'm more prone to being affected. I am not as strong when I am tired. On my end this is the only thing I can percieve as affecting things in a negative way.
But there must be more.
Actually after writing this I have some ideas in my head. I will go think on them and come back. They are this "strong woman" thing again.
I was thinking about the other night and remembered this. Before the trip we had had some conflict over bringing a business associate. W had strongly pointed out that he might be a problem in that he certainly wouldn't understand and might really blow the meeting with our new Buddhist friends. Eventually she won out and we asked him not to go. This was a very touchy situation.
As we were eating dinner I had said that it was really a good thing we didn't bring him it would have been disastrous if w had and I thanked her for her "persistence" in convincing me. She said "Thank you for describing it that way"
I hadn't thought about this as in any way important until today but maybe there was some importance to it considering our last fight was about her making decisions. She has felt excluded from decisions for some time and I had told her that yes I realized I was excluding her from decisions because her standard answer was to shoot me down. I had had years of negative conditioning.
So there may have been some importance there.
I still can't figure why she turned a little cold on Monday. Only thing I can figure is she percieved some of our discussions in the car as me being a know it all and proving my point. I wasn't but I've found that often times her perception of my meaning is way off from my actual meaning. Preconcieved notions and a negative self image tend to lend to this.
So I think I'll go slightly dark for a few days. A little experiment.
We've got an event in Nov that is a romantic black tie event. I sure would like to be in by then.
Yes, were getting there. In my younger days (when I was shy) I used to be an outstanding listener. But I have had to re-learn it. Pretty good now and getting better.
There were years that her input was incredibly negative. My statement wouldn't hardly have left my mouth before she was shooting it down. But our situation was incredibly desparate also. I think some of what happened during those really tough years trained some bad habits into both of us and it has taken some time and effort to train them out.
We are both working hard to understand one another lately it seems. She often clarifies her statements lately. Trying not to dump things on me. Her dad said once (and I never realized the wisdom in it until recently) "You know the good thing about Xue, he can do anything. You know the bad thing about Xue, he can do anything". That causes conflict as to many people rely on me rather than figuring out how to do it themselves. It's been a problem but I kinda get the feeling my wife is starting to help solve that. Or maybe she has been all along.
