My current POV is that the problem with my marriage is that my H suffers from both dysthymia and obsessive, compulsive disorder. Basically, he bounces back and forth between a personality type that is kind of like Monk and one that is kind of like House. My contribution to the problem has mainly been due to the fact that I have taken his behavior personally and not maintained the even, tough-as-nails emotional keel necessary when dealing with someone like my H. (I should note that my H has been diagnosed with dysthymia and our S18 has been diagnosed with OCD so I'm not "playing" psychiatrist by saying this.)
There is no reason why I should take sexual rejection from my H personally, for the same reason that no rational woman should take sexual rejection from Monk or House personally. The fact that Monk can't have sex until the whole house is vacuumed has nothing to do with my housekeeping skills and the fact that House will criticize my appearance as a defense against whatever intimacy he can't handle at the moment has nothing to do with my actual appearance at the moment.
The reason I stay in this relationship is that when he is in Monk mode he brings out my maternal instinct and when he is in House mode I find him sexy for the same common female sicko masochistic reason that so many women find House sexy.
Anyway, Friday night he was on the upswing from Monk to House, so first he brought home a little Charlie Brown Christmas tree (to which he was obviously personally relating) for me to decorate and then he f*cked my brains out in total throw-down style.
It's become clear to me that the only way to maintain my sanity in this relationship is to become absolutely unconcerned with "pleasing" my H. I can be tolerant of him or nice to him but if I try to "please" him or "make him happy", I will end up as one frustrated, miserable little mouse collapsed on her treadmill.
For instance, we were out Xmas shopping this weekend. Shopping with my H is pretty much the equivalent of shopping with a 3 year old. We were in a store choosing a last minute gift. I had spent maybe 4 minutes max trying to make my selection and my H went into total House mode and snapped out something like "Just grab something and let's get the h*ll out of here.". Usually, I would be sort of angry and embarrassed in this situation since the clerk heard him snap at me. Instead, I just turned to him and smiled and said "Hush." and then smiled at the young female clerk too as if to say "I am really vastly undercompensated in many ways for taking on the immense job of caring for this unbelievably high-maintenance man but he is sort of cute so there you have it.".
"Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?" - Mary Oliver
