I'd like to add a little anonymous clarification/feedback to the discussion, if you don't mind:posted by jessamyn at 10:00 PM on January 27, 2011 [2 favorites]
Thanks for the very many thoughtful responses to my question. Much to reflect on here. I want to thank waterandrock, especially--that's exactly the kind of feedback I was looking for.
What bedevils me in this situation is that my husband is, in some ways, incredibly thoughtful; he knows me better than any other person alive, respects my preferences when they're different from his, etc, etc. He makes me coffee every morning even though he hates the stuff himself. I do know on the whole he's a good man who loves me in his way, which is why I'm struggling so much about the things that aren't working, which are serious matters. I am not talking about being pissed about trifling things, because he doesn't bring me flowers or bought me the wrong color bathrobe or whatever.
The kinds of things that I think should be transparently obvious to adults are things like:
--If I talk to him about things that bother me in the relationship, and he literally will not respond to me, then those problems can never be solved. I needed to explicitly point this out to him. The corollary--if we can't talk about problems that are big and serious to me, and somehow reach a resolution, then we need to get a divorce--seemed to be a big wake-up call for him. Now whenever we have a direct discussion about a point of contention, as we sometimes do now, I am still flooded with resentment that I needed to practically beg him to talk to me at all.
--If the widely-recognized expressions of emotional and physical intimacy (spanning the range from showing evidence of wanting to spend time together, through relatively platonic forms of physical affection, on through sex) have been absent for years--if one partner notices, tries repeately to reach out, and the other one clearly does not regard this as a priority and doesn't respond--that this can reasonably be interpreted as distance and disinterest if not outright rejection. Now when he tries to connect with me or suggests that he desires me, I can't believe that he's actually interested--I think that he's just doing it to keep me from leaving. This is such a sore spot. It hurt so badly for so long to be rebuffed when I reached out, now any attempt to connect with him, initated by him, is so painful.
--Adults need to take interest in and responsibility for major decisions in their lives, including those involving finances, children, major life decisions. In the last several years these responsibilities have tilted more and more in my direction, despite my pleas to him to get more involved and do his share. Last summer I hit the breaking point about this issue (as well as those mentioned above, and yet a few more) and he has since been conspicuously picking up more responsibilities, though we are still nowhere near equity in this realm. But again, even when he does show initiative and take responsibility for something, it reminds me how furious I am that this was even an issue--that he let it slide so much in the first place.
Again, this isn't "why doesn't he know that blue is my favorite color". To my mind the above issues seem so obvious and straightforward that I am having such a hard time forgiving my incredibly smart, capable husband for Not Getting It. As I said, we're in therapy individually and together to tease out the dynamics that led to the above situations, but this issue of resenting having had to ask is huge for me and I just don't know how to get past it.
I appreciate the continued discussion. Parasox, Griselda, burnmp3s, what you wrote is very insightful and meaningful to me, thank you very much for the compassion and the suggestions.posted by jessamyn at 10:25 AM on January 28, 2011
I decided that I should write the first followup when I was reading comments like decathecting's "he's trying to listen to you and work on your relationship, but he, like most people, is much better at communicating in words than in signals and coded messages. Talking is a much more effective method of communication." My friend, I couldn't agree with that statement more. Trouble is that in the recent history of my marriage that describes what I've been doing, and my husband not at all.
Bearwife, regarding your second post, I truthfully do not know how I could have conveyed more clearly the importance of these issues, all along. In fact, one of the things that made me recognize the end of my rope last summer was rereading some of my writings about a crisis we'd had two years earlier. At the time I brought home the requisite Gottman books, we read them, we discussed them a little; counseling was rejected on the grounds that we couldn't afford it, which we couldn't; and despite a recognition then that Things Were Bad And Needed Fixing, the efforts trailed off when the pressures of the rest of life (kids, jobs, some big life decisions) came to the forefront.
I think it should have been possible for us to keep working on things in the midst of all that, but again, somehow the responsibility to better the marriage defaulted to me, as did all the major rest-of-life responsibilities. I couldn't do it all and prioritized as needed. I continued to practice my gratitude and focus on what was good about him as a way of keeping my sanity and my family intact. But when I realized last summer that two years had gone by and all that had happened was that we'd dug into the same rut even deeper... I was all out of steam.
I realized I had taken as much responsibility as I could, and much more besides, and I was couldn't take it any more. I told him that if he really wanted to stay married he needed to make some serious changes. If we were going to see a counselor, he needed to set it up, because I was done doing the legwork.
To my amazement he did: got himself into therapy, is doing some important work himself, found our marital counselor, is participating and making changes. All of which are great, a huge change in the right direction. I know that he loves me and, as our therapist points out, no one would voluntarily sit through our very difficult sessions unless they were highly motivated to do the work and stay.
So now I need to get past my own stumbling block, which is this resentment, hence the question. Now when he does what I've asked him to do for so long, the pain is very great, and I don't know how to make this resentment go away, and I know I need to find a way.
But suggestions that I need to take more responsibility or be a better communicator are hard to swallow. I feel like I have done all that in spades with no return on my efforts. In fact I am struggling with feeling like a dupe for even writing this question and its followups, feeling like again I'm working harder than he ever would. There's that resentment seeping in again.
For many reasons I don't want this marriage to fail and I appreciate the thoughtful replies. Thanks all for your efforts to help.
He tends to declare this along the way - "Remember, this one doesn't count!" - which makes me giggle, which helps us move along to the good times more efficiently as well.
Good luck! There are workarounds out there, so don't lose hope.
posted by Eshkol at 1:51 PM on January 27, 2011 [65 favorites]