Original thread:
https://www.reddit.com/relationship_advice/comments/bo1p1d/m34_overcame_heavy_ptsd_and_wife_f32_was_there/
Really don't know where we stand right now and not sure if I have any concrete questions, but feels that the process of writing all of that down and especially all the advice I got was so helpful that I'd like to have another go at this.
At the same time feels like the original thread was grossly trivializing our problems and that they are in reality far more complex than that. Yet even the simplified version got "this is very complex, don't ask reddit" as the top answer, sigh...
We had the councelling appointment last tuesday. It went pretty much as poorly as it could have. She was very adament that she wants a divorce and that she does not think any councelling would help. The therapist (while mainly letting us talk) kinda felt more on her side. Although that might have been just her doing her job well and avoiding any siding on my position ("we at least need to try, as we cannot know where we would be if the issues we have would be addressed").
We had had a somewhat amicable discussion on last sunday about the logistics. Basically I told her that I'd want 50:50 custody (as I consider myself an equal parent), I want to stay in our house (as it is financially possible for me plus I seem to love this place even more than her) and I want to be the "primary parent", as it does not really affect anything else than bureaucracy and gives me so much protection as a true equal parent to her.
She was agreeing to this first, but on the councelling just turned this into me being an asshole and laying out the terms etc. So yeah, feels like we could end up in a nasty custody battle too, woop-de-fucking-doo.
It wasn't still all 100% negative. At some point she (wife) asked me how I'd feel if I accepted that our problems cannot be fixed. I asked her in return how she'd feel if she accepted that they could be.
I took a few breaths in an maybe like a minute of silence, and told her honestly that I would feel peaceful. That we could grieve the loss of our love and breakup of our family and mutual dreams together. And that I could be the loving ex-husband she deserves. She did not answer how she'd feel.
Another positive point was the therapist noting that when we had our previous divorce talks three years ago, she also started by saying that she does not love me and that she absolutely wants a divorce.
She did not say, but def seemed to imply that we did leave her office eventually as two little love birds, even though I was really scared about how easy it was and how we did not really do anything to address the deeper problems we have, nor dig down in the things described in OP. Or my feelings, as it was all about her.
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We ended up going way overtime and needed to call it quits. Next session is booked 1 month from now. She gave us homework of thinking what it would actually mean in practice if we divorced.
After that we came back home while the kids were still in daycare. I asked if we could talk about 2 urgent things that we need to discuss: mutual respect and boundaries. I wanted to have the convo in english (not our native language, but we've eg. lived together in an english speaking country. I'm fluent, she's close to it), as I feel doing that last sunday was not only giving us room to discuss w kids there but also somehow making the discussion more mature and constructive.
I asked her about her needs for boundaries and respect, but she wanted me to start. I explained that I need her to stop conrolling and micro-managing me and having respect for me as a parent, human being and an (soon-to-be-ex-?) husband. Meaning that she can disagree with my choices but she must respect that I am doing them by myself ultimately and that I generally act in good faith. Plus that I am SANE and so are my choises.
She soon switched to our native language, and I told her (still in english) that this is already annoying me as a) even if it was my idea we agreed to have this discussion in english together and she would not respect that b) I'm not sure how using english is making things more constructive and but that effective certainly is gone and I'm getting really annoyed by her words.
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In a normal situation I'd probably have sucked it up, but a few comments I got in the OP made me realize something about the dynamic we have. I've definitely noticed this earlier but I feel she's nearly always unable to see any fault in herself whatsoever, and instead of seeing a broken dynamic, she just sees that manifest in me.
Whenever I've brought this up, she's either avoided the topic, turned it against me (she's only X because I'm Y) or most commonly accusing me of making everything her fault. Even if I explicitly say that "I totally see my part in this but in order for us to resolve this you also need to understand that you have an effect in this dynamic too".
I've always thought that it is because of personality differences. For example in school I was always a "bad student" (yet successful academically) and got a lot of shit thrown at me, and as a result gotten a thick skin. I'm also a very trial & error type of learner, so it is natural for me to make a lot of mistakes and learn for them. Deep down I think I'm nice and compassionate, but I'd quite clearly identify as a troll rather than a people pleaser.
She on the other hand... I guess she has a bit more rebellious spirit than your typical people-pleaser extremely nice and responsible straight-A girl but she is still definitely very much all of that. I don't really think she's ever had a situation where some person does not like her. If somebody tells me that I'm a fucking asshole and they hope I die, my natural reaction is "well, can't get along with everyone" where as she'd be devastated by far far less.
While this too does have an effect, I just realized how huge part the caretaker-crazyperson dynamic must play in this. She was the hero that kept me alive and I was the weak one who just flipped, so naturally she's the sane party here and nearly always right. When we argue I just get pointlessly angry and try to make everything her fault, because I cannot handle her criticism, not that she - the saint - would have anything to do with it.
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So, I did not suck it up. I did raise my voice. I did get angry. She reacted her typical way which is running away from the conflict and just finding whatever excuse possible not to discuss things further.
The usual dynamic is that there is some conflict between us, I strongly want to resolve it and get it out of the way. She strongly wants to push it under the rug. The more I push for resolving it the more she wants to avoid it. The more she's running away from it, the more frusterated (and eventually angry I get). The more frusteration I show the more scared she gets and feels the need to run away.
Typically things end up in a spot where she's ready to cry and I'm ready to blow up. Because of some stupid issue that could have easily been resolved by just communicating it properly. And then I just suck it up.
I don't think it's always been that bad. Back in the good days we always resolved our fights fast and rarely if ever went to bed angry. I feel like this is caused by all the baggage we have. When there's a fight about something minor and stupid, it is just a manifestation of deeper issues. That we cannot just let out and have it be over with.
It is very much true that I am hot tempered and that I might be scary looking when I am angry (or even when not, I'm a big aggressive looking guy & loud voice etc). I might yell and curse and punch things that won't break from that. But I have never ever ever done anything even remotely violent in my life to anyone, let alone her. For example I've even been in several fights but have resolved all of those either by using my reach to calm the opposing side down or running away if that's too risky.
So - no matter how bad this might sound - I firmly believe my behaviour in the shitshows we've had has not been abusive and was not it this time either.
This time I didn't force myself to calm down and just felt entitled to shout and curse and punch things (away from her) as much as I fucking wanted. Yelled her something along the lines of "fuck you, it is perfectly natural to be angry in this situation and your avoidance of conflict is as much to blame here as my hot-headedness. If you would not run away from conflicts we would not be in this situation".
She responed by something like "Oh yeah, how would it go if I did things your way?" and proceeded to shout things like "I hate you! I hate you so fucking much!". I responded with something along the lines of "if I didn't see the dynamic in this I could also say I fucking hate you and want you out of my life. But I don't hate you, I hate this fucking bullshit that is between us".
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Surprisingly things calmed a bit from there. Quite a bit actually. Cant remember what exactly we discussed, but it wasn't for much more than 10 minutes. 1 potentially essential thing was when the discussion had somehow touched my NPD mother (who's given her own share of difficulties for our family, a looooooong side story better suited for
/raisedbynarcissists ). She said sthing along the lines of me not being able to take the divorce because of my abandonment issues.
I told her that I could never feel she has abandoned me after all she did for me. And that I'm a grown ass man now, I can handle that. But that I did feel that she would be abandoning our family.
She had to leave to pick up the kids, and we acknowledged briefly that hey at least this was communication.
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When she came back, we proceeded to neglegt the kids (just not give them much attention for those w/o a sense of humor) and talk in english in front of them for over four hours. We didn't really go deep on any particular issue, but scratched the surface with a huge amount of things. None of them particularly on topic to what the OP was about, but basically almost 8 years of baggage.
Didn't get far but at least acknowledged that there is a LOT of baggage. It also felt that with enough effort all of that can be unpacked. We must have touched like fifty different issues each of one probably enough to cause a crisis in it's own.
Few hilights:
- She kept derailing things to how different we are and using that as a reason why we are incompatible. I noted that this does not need to be true and used my closest friends as an example for this. Basically most of them are in different ways the polar opposites of me. Yet we still manage to have and incredibly deep emotional bond.
The differences between me and her were extremely clear right from the start. Pretty much an epitomic yin & yang relationship. Explained her how I think that works if and only if our communication works and our traumas are healed, otherwise it's just gonna be a shitshow.
- She does not feel like she can be herself with me as she feels I don't respect (not true) and make fun of (true) of certain things very important for her. She opened up, to the verge of tears and said how important her faith was for her during the difficult times and only reason (in addition to our unborn son) she managed to get out of bed back then. She noticed a slight smirk on my face, and got offended by that.
I proceeded to tell her that yea, I've been actually praying quite a lot recently and primarely about her rekindling her faith. And that last week when I sent her this "you'll never guess where I am right now" message I was actually at a church crying and praying. Plus explained about my religious experiences and how I recognize them to be the same as christians might have. Even though I'm a very strict atheist and a skeptic, and generally have a hostal attitude towards all organized religion and pseudoscience.
Her face pretty much:
https://i.kym-cdn.com/entries/icons/original/000/018/489/nick-young-confused-face-300x256-nqlyaa.jpg . I won't go into details how I manage to hold these beliefs w/o any cognitive dissonance, but let's just say that mammal brains and conciousness are interesting and evolution is creative.
I kind of had the hypothesis that something around this could be both necessary and sufficient solution to our marriage getting fixed. And sure feels I was correct there. Lots of other issues were discussed but that felt like a tipping point.
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Soon after we had this very gentle moment, standing there and holding each other and looking each other in the eyes. I felt a very strong urge to kiss her, and did not feel I was alone in that moment. I either reasoned and/or chickened out and soon the moment kind of unfolded.
She then started doing this thing that she does often when we're close, that she does consider a form of showing affection but that I really do not like at all. Explaining it would need too much irrelevant background info, but let's just say that I am confident 95%+ would agree that it is terribly unromantic and weird for her to think it is.
I weighted whether to say anything but ended up gently telling her that I don't like when she does that. Partly because whatever the solution is I don't think it should involve me just swallowing my emotions and being a doormat. Partly because I really think we should learn how to show affection to each other.
She went on about me always rejecting her when she tries to show affection. I see this partially but at the same time it feels so absurd for me given how thirsty for any signals of affection from her I've been for so long.
She took an example how she'd like for us to hold hands/touch otherwise when we're driving. I told her that whenever we do it is virtually always me who's initiating it, and even then she just tends to use my hand as a stress toy, which causes me pain but I don't always pull my hand away as hey - at least we're touching.
Also told her how I feel it is always me who is doing all the displays of affection. What I did not tell her but what is also true: I come to hug her. I come to kiss her. I grab or slap her ass when walking by (something she claims she doesn't like but has also confessed loving. Also to my defence - that is a very juicy ass). I'm the one who's initiating sex 99% of the time. I have initiated maybe 95% of the I love you - I love you too - exhanges. I was the one who said it the very first time. I was the one who proposed her.
I also did the 5 languages of love test and urged her to do the same. She hasn't done her yet, but feels like something I'd like to know. My results were def a surprise for me, but also correct. Words of affection and gifts ranked top. Latter was a surprise, but then again I still own, frequently use and cherish the socks she knitted me early on our relationship. And frown (yet did not say anything) about her getting a plasma cigaret lighter for me & similar for my dad for last christmas. I don't smoke - tobacco - and you can't use that on bongs -> clearly not any thought put into that -> don't feel I am entitled to be offended but bleh...
The bottom one with large margin was acts of service. Not really a surprise for me, but I guess it would be for her. Obv only got myself to blame, I mean in normal circumstances I'd probably answer her "how would you like me to show you affection" with "a blowjob would be nice" or something. But yea, I guess I ultimately just want to hear I mean something to her.
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We didn't quite return to that peak anymore, but discussed loads of different issues. One minor but still somehow significant feeling part was when I brought up the time after a friends wedding when she said she's sick of always being embarrassed by me and at best I'm not doing anything shameful. And how she wished she had a husband she could be proud of. Granted - I am an occasional drunken idiot, but definitely the fun kind. For example I heard the bride of that wedding said she was happy for us being there bringing life to the party.
But it's not the shame part I'm offended by. It's the pride. I generally have this feeling that nothing I ever do is enough for her. There was this one other wedding where she was clearly very, very proud of me. I don't want to go into details to avoid giving identifiable information, but let's just say it was an almost surreal situation and if that is what she needs to feel proud about me then god fucking damned her bar is high.
I also told her that there have been instances where I've been very ashamed of her, mostly due to either her getting too damn high in company or losing her sense of humor and getting offended on behalf of my friends when I joke with them. I also listed her some times when I've felt really proud of her.
She then asked - with a weak voice - whether I was ashamed of her at our daughters christening party when she sang. Told her - honestly - that I found it extremely beautiful and had to hold back tears and believe that everyone else felt the exact same.
I told her yesterday that I've now got the song stuck to my head, and her version of it. She smiled and it clearly made her happy. Later that night I heard her singing alone, sthing she rarely does.
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Not really sure where we stand right now. Nothing has been taken back so far, no love-yous, no calling each other honey (except a few times on accident), no sex, no kissing.
Except she did kiss my neck when we hugged. She said it was an accident, but a happy one (Bob Ross reference most likely unintended). I proceeded to grab her ass and told her that was an accident too. She said she doesn't like when I do it and it kinda ruined the mood. No regrets still, because dat ass.
There has been other displays of affection & good moments too, but feels like her mood about that fluctuates. Some chance that nothing really has changed and that those good moments were just outliers. Then again some chance that the not so good moments are due to the stress we're both in, even without our crisis. Three small kids + me running my own business + her being in the process of starting hers - good support networks = quite overwhelming even with perfect carefree relationship.
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Overall feeling quite lost and conflicted. On the other hand feels like just pushing my own feelings aside and showing how good of a husband I can be and how happy our family could be when intact could be would be the way to go.
I think we've been doing quite poorly as a family too. I'm usually having a great time when I'm alone with the boys or even with all three of them. When wife is involved it just often feels so goddamn tense. That I can't have fun with them and need to do everything under her micromanaging control.
Part of that problem is probably that both I and the oldest kid have diagnosed ADHD and the 2 other are quite fun loving and wild too. So naturally, the way I tend to interact with the kids is quite fast and action packed where as she prefers quiet and peacefull stuff.
We've been also fighting a lot about general pace of leaving the house to do something. For example if we did things my way it would go something like this: somebody gets an idea that we should go to the forest to catch pokemon -> all right let's do it! -> put some clothes on for kids and self -> start the car in 10 minutes from initial impulse -> shit they're hungy, oh well let's pick up something from the way -> shit they're cold, oh well I'll give them my hoodie or tell them to suck it up, or just change plans on the go and do something else.
Where as when she is involved it usually takes like 1h of back and forth about whether we should do that, or maybe go swimming. Or not do anything at all because there's so much to do around the house. Or maybe I go alone with them, or maybe she goes. Then when I ask her to just fucking make up her mind and pick some option & I'm fine with everything she insists that we do exactly what I suggested in the first place.
Then when we actually decide leave for the damn pokemon hunt it takes her fucking 2 hours to pack food for us on the go, make breakfast, tidy up to kids, put far too many levels of clothes on them just in case temperatures suddenly drop 10C and have multiple sets of spare clothes.
Obv exaggerated and biased, and I'm sure that there is some middle ground where we take the best of both worlds, but have not been able to find it, just ended up fighting. And as it takes fucking 3 hours to leave for any activity, it does not make any sense for us to do something together that takes less than a few hours -> we end up doing very little together.
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Not really sure how to approach this. Feels like a blunder to just be a doormat and go with her tempo. Definitely feels like a mistake to enforce my way or to start yet another fight about it. I guess we'll just try and utilize our now improved communication & be open but calm about our frusterations.
Just feels so difficult when I feel she's lacking respect for my way of doing things. I see her need to take perfect care of everything, but can't there just be some middle ground?
Being a good husband feels difficult too. I am obviously extremely hurt by all of this, so it's hard to keep up this "we can make this work and if we do it will be just pure bliss" -mindset, and even harder to try and find this loving connection between us while simultaneously repressing all my negative emotions.
If I do bring those up, I'd expect her to respond with something along the lines of not wanting to hurt me any more and accelerating the divorce process. And no matter of convincing how much pain I can and am willing to take in order to save our family will help.
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1 option is to take up on the therapists homework to think what the divorce would mean in practice. For example trying this 50:50 schedule out. 1 week of me handling absolutely everything in the house alone and her staying out except for sleeping and vice versa the following.
Feels like it might further open her eyes that being divorced and having a broken family sucks even if it comes without the added financial strain and traumatized children. OTOH I think the shitshow we had on tuesday also helped a bit on removing the rose tinted glasses from her.
Just would not feel right to approach this by "let's try because splitting up would suck" instead of "let's try because being together after fixing all of our problems could be amazing", but I guess those are not mutually exclusive.
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Sorry for the length and lack of coherence. Still feeling I'm leaving so much essential information out. Felt like just writing this helped a bunch, but would really appreciate any advice you might have to any of the problems we're facing.