He did respond at first and there were some real revelations that came out of it and he seemed to be ok with everything. But the more we went down that path, the more he seemed to hate it. It's hard to say exactly what changed but I think when it became clear that he was expected to contribute more and think about his feelings and share them, he didn't like that.posted by jessamyn at 8:39 PM on November 14, 2011
ok, lots of commenters wished i had been more snowflakey, so here i am flaking out. sorry if this is a bit rambly/wall of text.posted by mathowie at 8:38 AM on November 15, 2011
i rewrote this a few times to try be clear, but i know can't address everything.
btw, nice stuff he does: he brought me robot cookies from the bakery a months ago. i do like robots. he folds my laundry if it's in the dryer when he goes to put stuff in there. he likes to cook and will help me make dinner stuff. he can make me laugh. he cleans the bathroom. he introduced me to sushi.
and when i say lonely - i mean with him, two ships passing in the night sort of thing. i have my own friends and social life. i dont just sit around waiting for him to entertain me.
I have been in therapy due to family issues and anxiety. I still see a therapist about twice a month, sometimes less. We went to therapy as a couple for a specific reason, not just to talk about feelings. We had been having the same arguments for a while and I thought it would be helpful to go to therapy about it. He agreed.
Here is why I thought therapy would help. So that we could have someone else help us figure out what each of us was trying to say, because we obviously weren't hearing each other. And me keeping things bottled up inside until i was just a crying mess wasn't helping. If I tried to have relationship talk in a more calm fashion, I was met with resistance - he felt "fuzzy" or whatever and couldn't concentrate right now, but we'd talk later. So then I'd try later, like a day later or some other variable of "later". I'd ask him what him later was, he would say I don't know, just now right now, I'm sorry. Eventually, i would not be able to take it anymore. Me trying to initiate convo about a relationship issue (usually that i felt lonely and would like to be touched more, maybe we could even have more sex) happened maybe once a month or six weeks, where'd I try for a few days and then give up. After a few months, I'd have a breakdown. Not healthy. He would just sit there, overwhelmed by my emotions. Understandably so. If we did have a conversation that was not all crazy, it was him saying how my anxiety made him nervous and he didn't want to be around me when I was feeling down. I would say that I understood but just a hug now and then would be great. He said he would try.
So in therapy, I say the same stuff I do all the time, and he actually hears me. He'll even say he was sorry, he just hadn't understood. But nothing really changes. He avoids me if I seem anxious, or down, or even when i'm happy. sometimes i feel like i can't be happy around him because it seems to make more distant. I still feel alone all the time. If I didn't initiate it, we could go days without touching. Sometimes he seems to "remember" that I like being touched and will pat my shoulder as a greeting or goodbye. Yet he gives lot of hugs and touchiness to friends at parties and gatherings, even my friends. He spends hours at the gym most nights of the week. And when is home, he plays video games. if i try to be in the room with him where he plays games (quietly crocheting or reading), it bothers him. i like it when he plays games on the wii because i like to watch (he likes RPGs and stuff like Metroid Prime, they're like watching movies half the time.), but that doesn't seem to bother him then since the wii is in the living room. he's also terrible about planning things, like he says he wants to do more camping and hiking (which he did sometimes back in college).
this is great example of our relationship dynamic. he likes to go on hikes. he wants a partner who is physically active. super, (he doesn't go alone without me or something, it's not like i'm sleeping in and not joining him on this activity, or that he repeatedly asks me to go and i say no.). l like hikes too. what happens is that Saturday rolls around, he sleeps in til 10 or 11 (i'm up before him usually, he stays up late playing video games till 12 or 1 most nights, but denies that it's that late whenever i bring it up.), then says "what do you want to do today?" I say "whatever, i'm got homework/nohomework/errands/etc." he says "how about we go for a hike?" i say "ok great! it's a beautiful day. let me get the books of hikes." two or three hours later, after he's had a leisurely breakfast and watched some cartoons, he's suddenly all "let's go!" meanwhile i've BEEN ready for hours, packed snacks etc. however, we have not picked a place yet because he was "fuzzy" or whatever and he'd be with me in 15 minutes or whatever, he just needed to wake up. so then it's another 30-60 min of deciding. i suggest places, he says no, he suggests a place that's like 4 hours away, so it will be dusk by the time we get there. i suggest a closer place. and so on. eventually, we agree, but he's miffed because we aren't going to $FARAWAY place (which we wouldn't have been able to get to until at 4 or 5). then i print out google map directions and we go. we get to wherever, it's late in the day (1 or 2 or 3, depending on how long all of the above took and how far away we go.), we hike for maybe two hours. it's nice. we don't talk much, that's cool, that's how he enjoys hiking. so then, we get back to the car and he starts with his little sighs and "i wish we had gotten here earlier" and other lamentations. i don't say "i told you so." i say "next time we'll have to try to leave earlier." he agrees, apologizes for being so lazy earlier, he was just feeling "meh" or "fuzzy". at some point we have again conversations about his desire for a physically active partner and he wants to go hiking more and do longer day hikes, and we get excited talking about it, and everything seems cool. then i suggest that we look at places one day during the week and then plan on leaving early on saturday to make a day of it since we tend to leave later in the day. he gets huffy and says "fine fine ok whatever." i'm like what? so i ask what's wrong and he says something about wanting to be spontaneous. and all i can think is that planning to go on a four or five hour hike some place that is four hours away is not something spontaneous. trying the new sushi place on a whim is a spontaneous.
so we never go on the kind of hikes he keeps saying he wants to go on, which he brings up a point of discontent in our relationship, but when i suggest actually planning to do things so they are more enjoyable, he gets all huffy and weird.
he will NOT go to individual therapy. he tried it twice for me, and hated it. he was so distant for days after the last session that it was like ice in this house. i said ok, it doesn't work for you that's cool. same with couples therapy, this doesn't work for you, we don't have to go, i'm not going to make you do this. (again, it worked great at first, but now as i write this, it becomes more obvious, which i think some of you pointed out, at first it was all about me being the "broken" one who needed "fixed". but the more we needed to look at how we functioned as a couple, he really hated that. as long as it was about how could fix me or what we could do fix me, therapy was ok. but actually agreeing that the relationship needed help didn't really happen. one day she asked him what he wanted from the relationship, he said he'd have to think about it. days later he says "i want a partner who is more physically active than you are now. that is important to me. " i say ok, i will try to exercise more. he says ok thank you i appreciate that and seems satisfied. and actually, in a couple of our sessions, she had even asked him, "we know what she wants from you, but what do you want from her? is there anything you'd like her to work on or change that is important to you?"(i wanted more affection) after a few minutes of quiet where he was thinking, he would just say about the physically active partner. so i really have been trying to be more physically active. i'm not overweight or have health problems, i've never played team sports and neither does he. i try to work out a few times a week, but i'm not going to be spending 20 hours a week at the gym like he does. if i try to get him to define it more so i understand, it turns into the conversation about hiking.)
anyways, you've all given me a lot to think about. without having details, i know it was hard, but some of you were pretty spot on.
posted by dawkins_7 at 8:06 PM on November 14, 2011 [19 favorites]