Quote: No I haven’t acknowledged that this is my problem. I don’t believe that it is solely my problem. I’m the one with the sense of rejection, and in that respect it is, but that aspect of it must be dealt with privately. As a matter of fact, she’s told me that. So to “open up” would imply that there’s something she can do to help, thus moving it to the realm of “couple issues.”
I think this is moving into the area Michelle covers in the section of about who's right/who's wrong. In the end, it doesn't matter. To move you beyond that, you do not have to believe it is you problem. You are validating that you understand it is her preception that "it is you problem and she can't fix it so you must on your own." However, the purpose of the talk is an attempt to subtly shift that perception from "I’m forcing my issues back on her."
to one where she can help you fix it just by listening . The goal here is to be able to share each others issues without the perception the other has to fix it.
Previously KAW posted:
Quote: ... and add at the end, "Thanks for listening. It really does help."
To which Andy replied: "... I won't lie to her and tell her that all I want is to be heard."
... but if you reach the intermediate goal of being able to share how you feel with your W without her negative perceptions wouldn't that make you feel better than you do now? ... so it really does help if she listens and you are not lying to her. The thing is too, if your W starts to believe that she can help you just by listening, it would probably make her feel better about herself too.
Keep in mind JJ didn't mean for you to bombard her with a list of issues. This is just one more thing you can add to your "hit & run" arsenal. Simply state, "I know it is my problem, but it would help to share with you ... State your issue ... I know you think it is my problem, but thanks for listening, it really did help." then walk away with a smile on your face. Watch for a couple of days to see if the effect changes anything. If there are no negative effects, try another "hit & run" and watch again.
Just remember, you told me to keep throwing them out there ...
Thanks KAW. I was trying to figure out exactly what to say, and you took the words right out of my head!
Andy, I totally understand where you're coming from, and can totally relate. However, you are stuck, my man, and I see this as the area that you're getting stuck in.
Remember that you are going to be "trying" some of these things, and are not putting your feelings aside forever.
"Hit and run".
"Experiment, and monitor results".
JJ
Read about Divorce Busting® Telephone Coaching here!
Well, I guess I'm a lot more patient than I used to be. I don't sweat the small stuff as much anymore.
I do think it's awfully difficult to deal with a lack of attention when your spouse is right there in front of you. I dealt with that for a lot of years. I know it's really rough.
Yeah, H will be gone four years in early Dec. I am feeling good about the decision to move on. I just couldn't handle dealing with it anymore. I don't even know what H is doing these days. He lives about ten minutes away and I don't even know if he is still in town.
I'm pretty happy these days. Haven't filed, so aren't dating or anything, but I am getting noticed a bit. It feels pretty good.
Quoting KAW: ... but if you reach the intermediate goal of being able to share how you feel with your W without her negative perceptions wouldn't that make you feel better than you do now?
In a word, no.
Quoting KAW: ... so it really does help if she listens and you are not lying to her. The thing is too, if your W starts to believe that she can help you just by listening, it would probably make her feel better about herself too.
Again, I have to go with no.
I understand what you guys are driving at, but I’ve tried this too many times, and it’s always blown up in my face. Yes, I could try again. But I know that no matter how I try, it will be badly received. I know you all will say that it’s been my approach, and you may be right. But either there is no approach that will work, or I’m incapable of tuning my approach to the point where it will work. Either way, I just can’t do it.
This is one time that I have to admit that I do not have the courage or ability to pull it off.
Having said that, I’ll go back and explain my rather terse answers to KAW’s post.
W cannot help me by simply listening. She can only help by empathizing. That doesn’t mean agreeing. It just means empathizing. Even better if she could change her behavior.
Now. Before I hear a chorus of, “You can’t change her” let me say this. I’m not talking about changing her. She is – by nature – an extremely sensitive and empathetic person. Her perception that I preyed on her sympathy, thus forcing her to protect herself from my feelings is what stopped her from empathizing with me.
This has changed somewhat because I stopped complaining.
Since then, I have made a coupla hit-and-run forays into explaining my feelings. They haven’t all been negative. She has gone for hormone tests. She has agreed (but not followed up on) personal Cing.
So you see. I’m not as stuck as it may appear. I just don’t know how stuck I am, and I’m gonna have to live with that for now.
If I were to follow JJ/KAW’s advice, I can see three possible outcomes. Actually, I can truthfully say that I’ve already seen three outcomes. They are:
1. She empathizes, and maybe even changes her behavior, or 2. she listens and says nothing, or 3. she listens and responds (despite my request not to).
If her reaction is number two, then I’m left wondering if I’ve just set us back two years, and I feel like krap. Option three invariably makes me feel worse than I have in months. It is usually accompanied by her withdrawal. Sometimes for several months.
Of course, I could hope for option number one, but I’m not that brave.
Now. If I could only hook her up with Mattie
P.S. My current strategy (which included a hit-and-run where I flatly told her that her perception was wrong) has caused her to open up some. Actually, it was her that opened an OR talk in that case.
There is no tension that I’m conscious of right now (except mine), and she now gives me brief news about some of her “personal” issues.
Oh, yeah, been there, done that!! I felt that whatever my H was feeling was definiately his problem. If he had the gall to suggest to me that try to figure out why my desire was so low, I would get very angry. "Who says I have the problem? Maybe it's you that has the problem!" Yikes.
I've been racking my brain to try and remember what triggered my change in attitude. I know it was during a conversation we had one night, but I can't for the life of me remember much about it now. That was two years ago. I do remember being angry -- yet again -- but in the morning I felt different -- we felt different together. I can't explain the feeling, but there was this "thing" between us that had never been there before. I didn't like it. I asked my H if he felt it. He said he did and didn't like it. I made the decision that very day to change things. Shortly thereafter my H told me he had fallen in love with me all over again, and that I'd "saved his life." We spent hours upon hours talking and making love. I figure it was somewhere between 2-3 weeks after that "conversation" and during our wonderful "reconnection" that my H started his PA. I still don't understand that. I will never understand that. It still hurts me to the core to relive that time.
I think you're doing everything you can at this point, Andy. It really is up to your W. I hope she comes to her senses before it's "too late." I don't mean that in the sense that you'd betray her -- I know you wouldn't -- but I do know that day by day you are losing some of that "specialness" that you had between you. And I know that words can be difficult to take back. I apparently said the same thing you W said to you, "I wouldn't care if I never had sex again." I don't remember having said that, but my H sure does. And no matter how things have changed, I know he will never forget those words.
And, I will always remember my H telling me he didn't think he loved me anymore; wasn't committed to me; wasn't sure he wanted to be married to me anymore; was in love with the EA. Well, happily all that turned out to be untrue. I KNOW those words were not true (I knew it at the time they were said), but the fact is they were said and they "HURT," and I will never forget that he spoke them. I would never have imagined my H being capable of saying those things to me. I know that he wishes he could take those words back, just as I wish I could take back the ones I spoke that hurt him so deeply. Can't be done. Have to live with them.
Just don't let words and feelings from the past defeat your present and future, Andy. I'm a living testiment that people change.
Thank you so much, Mattie. After last night, I was pretty much ready to throw in the towel. I just didn’t think I could take it any longer. It’s a good thing I came to work so early today because when I read your post, I literally had tears flowing down my cheeks.
Last night, W said she wanted me to take the kids out on Saturday so she could do some housecleaning. I said that I was hoping we (i.e.: she and I) could do something. You know… Ask for what I want. Well, it turned into a little of what JJ/KAW were suggesting. But her reaction wasn’t on my list. She just shut me down. Flat. Squashed me like a bug.
Please, Mattie. If you can think of anything…
Well, W called me this morning and asked me out to a movie on Sunday.
Why is it necessary for her to slap me in the face (figuratively) before ceding to my request? I just don’t get it.
Quote: Why is it necessary for her to slap me in the face (figuratively) before ceding to my request? I just don’t get it.
HABIT!
After reacting that way for ... what? ... 2+ years?, it became a knee jerk reaction - a reflex. The important thing here though is she recognized her own reaction, felt bad about it and wanted to change it. It will take time for her to break the reflex, but it should gradually get better. It also sounds like it worked to express your feeling as well. How else would it be possible for her to cede to your request in the first place?
A couple days ago you posted to Racheal:
Quote: So now, when I get home, W is out. I don’t know when she’ll return, but I do know that the kids will be all over her, and there’s no place for me. And like you, if I want a slice of her time, I come off as selfish.
I was going to say something then, but let it go as you seem to be getting ... well ... frustrated. But that was wrong because it repeated itself again last night in a variant form. It appears your W would like to have some time by herself at home . In the above senerio I was going to mention if it would be possible the next time she goes out, would it be possible to take the kids out as well and arrange it so your W comes home first to a quiet house for a change?
As far as her request last night with the outcome resulting in the call this morning (of course hindsight is always 20-20), next she make such a request, maybe lighthearedly negotiate a trade ... I'll take the kids, if you can perhaps finds some time for us to ________ . Better yet, next beat her to the punch and offer to take the kids out and see if she is willing to make a counteroffer soon after.
I'm glad you were able to work through this rough spot Andy, I think the rest of us here are seeing the little changes in her you haven't recognized yet. She is coming around slowlee.
Yes, I can relate, but it seems like a life-time ago. I need to remember -- not only to try and give you some insight, but also so that I don't slip back into the "old" patterns. Each time I hear you relate the pain you're feeling I feel a stab in my heart. I caused those same feelings in my H. I didn't know it at the time; and, quite honestly, I'm not sure I would have cared at that point. Pretty awful, huh?
I want to take a little time to try and remember what was going through my head during those years so that I can give you a clear picture. Right now I've got some business to take care of. I just wanted you to know that I've read you're posts and that I will be back later.
I know it’s habit, KAW. I guess my question is rhetorical. And you said:
Quoting KAW: I think the rest of us here are seeing the little changes in her you haven't recognized yet. She is coming around slowlee.
Actually, I think there are major changes that you don’t see but I do. That’s because there are subtle things that I don’t necessarily post, and there are major things that you’d have to pour through all of my threads – and probably other people’s threads to find.
We’ve come a long way, KAW. And that’s why it hits me so hard when she reverts to her old behavior. I’ve made changes in my behavior, and it did indeed provoke changes in hers.
She makes a lot more effort to do things with me. She’s still stuck in the mindset that it’s wrong to put “too much” effort in that. Hence the knee-jerk reaction sometimes.
I think you were there when I posted that she said I was patient with her. It’s very frustrating when she reverses that stance by getting impatient with the fact that I want to spend more time with her.
Quoting KAW: It appears your W would like to have some time by herself at home . In the above senerio I was going to mention if it would be possible the next time she goes out, would it be possible to take the kids out as well and arrange it so your W comes home first to a quiet house for a change
W is a stay-at-home mom. Our kids are all in school, so 5 days a week, she can come and go as she pleases. If she wants to come home to a quiet house, all she has to do is go for a walk around the block
Thanks for all of your advice, KAW. But I have other stresses too, and I honestly don’t think I can handle much more. Y’know something? I work long hours and still spend much of my evenings and weekends trying to help (dishes, clean doggy-doo, wash floors) I’m not perfect, but I really try hard. And I do spend time with the kids. Not all the fun stuff either. S#2 sticks like me like a dirty shirt when W isn’t there. Of course, she doesn’t see that, but it’s true.
I’m not gonna do less. Whenever I can, I will do more. But overall, I have to agree with Mattie. I’m really doing all I can at the moment.
Your suggestion that I negotiate me-with-kids time against time with her doesn’t strike me as something I want to do. It strikes me as using the kids as a bargaining tool. I know you don’t mean it that way, but it doesn’t feel right for me.
I don’t want to wheel and deal for her time. My time with my kids is for them and me. My time with W is for her and me. I don’t want to turn it into a business transaction. Know what I mean?
Lily also said she’s trying to reach back into her past and see if there was anything Sage could have done to reverse her mindset oh so long ago.
I’m sure you didn’t care how you made your H feel back then. But it’s not awful. Life’s stresses always seems to have a way of turning our perception in such a way that – my W stated it so well – she had to go into “self-protection mode.” It’s so tragic when a person feels they have to protect him/herself from their spouse.
Going back to your previous post…
Quoting matilda: I hope she comes to her senses before it's "too late." I don't mean that in the sense that you'd betray her -- I know you wouldn't -- but I do know that day by day you are losing some of that "specialness" that you had between you. And I know that words can be difficult to take back. I apparently said the same thing you W said to you, "I wouldn't care if I never had sex again." I don't remember having said that, but my H sure does. And no matter how things have changed, I know he will never forget those words.
So much of that “specialness” is gone. That’s what makes me the saddest. But it would vanish, and I’d forget those words in an heartbeat if things turned around the way it did for you and your H.
He will forget those words, Mattie. Trust me on that one.
And I want to thank you again. And Lily, and everyone who’s given me support, advice, and especially hope. I don’t know if St-Andrew could have held on to his integrity if it weren’t for kind-hearted people like you.
Haven't filed, so aren't dating or anything, but I am getting noticed a bit. It feels pretty good. 
It will take time for her to break the reflex, but it should gradually get better. 