Why is my dh such a prick?

[Tinykins]

We have been going through a bad patch.Waiting on counselling at the moment. We had decided to tentatively go out for dinner tomorrow night and try and start talking through things.

Then a couple who we are friendly with texted last night to invite us to go out for dinner with them for the guys birthday. I thought about it, and given that things are still strained and we are on a truce, I said to my dh this morning before he left for work that I felt we should leave it and not go out with them.

I felt him bristle at that, and he sighed and said in a resigned voice "well it's totally up to you, your call." I said what about you, do you want to go? He got sort of ittitated and said stuff like, well its a "shame" that we have to be letting down our friends" and a "shame" that we cannot go out on a saturday night and enjoy ourselves, etc all said with this kind of annoyance and resigned sigh as if it is all down to ME that we find ourselves in this predicament.

I then said to him that he seemed a bit annoyed about it, and did he want to actually go out tonight? Then he spoke to me very crossly, raised his voice, saying stuff like "As usual I have no control over how you interpret how it talk...I dont give a fuck what we do tonight..etc etc just think it is a shame this is the way things are etc etc

And I felt upset for several reasons. Firstly the real Shame is that our marriage has got to this state. Secondly, he ALWAYS does this. He gets angry with me, I ask him why he is angry, he ANGRILY denies that he is angry instead insisting that it is my oversensitive INTERPRETATION of his tone, (this drives me MAD that he wont even admit to his own anger) and then he flounces off to work telling me that this row is going to hang over him all day and ruin his day, (And of course this is all my fault)

Someone please tell me that this is not normal interaction and it there is some bloody book out there that can help me understand what the hell is wrong with my dh and why he gets so angry but then gets even angrier when this is pointed out to him, and why he hurts and upsets me and then goes around as it it is all my fault! Please help.

Can't help but am listening, sounds horribly familiar. I don't think it is all your fault, but then I'm effectively you.

Prick (him not you) but that's not really going to help you is it.

It sounds to me like he needs to grow up and take some responsibility for his own behaviour.

I'm sorry that's not much help either is it. Hopefully someone who can offer constructive advice will be along soon.

It does certainly seem that there is a lot of anger there and his perception of what you say is rather warped I remember in my marriage when things had gotten to this stage that things could flare up over very minor things, even when I was trying to have a reasonable dicussion and was open to his opinion.

Do you not think you could have a good time with these friends afterall? Have a drink and a laugh?

I don't know your back story and how things led to this point but sometimes it's good to get out and have fun as a couple with others?

I hope the counseling starts soon and you can work things out though

To be honest you were jiggling him
and just before he was going out to work probably not the best time
easy to say in hindsight but would have been better ifyoud just said 'shall we go out tonight to our friends house' he'd probably have said yes and who knows you might have had fun
but instead you negatively said lets not bother as we piss each other off and that's how tge conversation went tits up!
IMO obviously

Niggling sorry!

Oh see everyone else disagrees with me, lol

No excuse I know but could he be depressed? Sounds a bit like it to be so negative.
Could he see his GP?

Thanks OmaLittle and AngelCat. We have been on this communication merry-g-round for years, we have had counselling in the last 18months and I felt it was useless because it only scratched the surface and never addressed what I felt were the real issues.

But thats beside the point. My dh is irritable, gets angry, gets angrier if I ask him why he is angry, and then tries to make ME feel bad for stressing him out when I react like any normal woman would which is to cry out of sheer upset and frustration with his refusal to admit to his feelings and his insistance that he is not an angry person, instead it is all somehow in my head, that I am oversensitive and see anger when it isnt there.

and let me guess, whilst you would happily open the question up to a third party opinion, he finds that an irritating suggestion even though you are both necessarily subjective?

Sounds to me more like he needs some counseling, the CBT type. To help him work through his responses. Google it and have a read.

TeaandCake thanks, I texted him after and said that if he wanted to go then we would go. I honestly thought that he wouldnt want to go either becuase he stated clearly last week that becuase of the state of affairs between us we were NOT going to go out with anyone, as it was too much effort to make to pretend to be getting on in front of people at the moment.

He himself said that.

So that is why even though things had calmes a bit, I still thought he would not have the heart for it.

So I felt even more blindsided by his obvious anger and frustration at my decision that we would leave it tonight.

If he had said to me, you know what, lets just go, we might enjoy it and it might do us good, of course I would go and probably enjoy it too.

Its the mixed messages and barely suppressed anger that upsets me.

I agree with compo.

My Mum used to do what it sounds like you were doing, there's nothing worse than someone telling you you are angry - there's only one outcome.

It doesn't sound to me like the communications problems are all his.

HousewifeOOC - When someone is standing there, looking at you like they detest you, and saying things like "I dont f*cking care what we do tonight" it's hard to infer anything else other than that they are angry..Why would I try to wind my dh up by saying this? He looks angry, sounds angry and therefore I ask him if he is angry, because I must have made him angry and I never meant to, and dont (never) understand what it is I am saying to arouse such anger in him.

I am not playing silly little games here. I am trying to understand this man, because our marriage is on the rocks, I am living on tenterhooks with him, and this CANNOT be normal, I live with a knot in my stomach, and THAT cannot be right.

You wanted a book that might help?
I'd try counselling for toads

It will give you a good insight into why you are BOTH behaving in the way that you are. It's not all him, unfortunately. You are winding him up - not saying you are doing it on purpose, but if you keep on communicating in the way that you are, then you're both going to keep on feeling frustrated, unheard and irritated.

But you're going to counselling, right? I think that will really help you both. What you're going through is pretty common and there are some really simple exercises that can break this negative pattern.

Best of luck.

It almost sounds like he detests you right now

I really do think he needs to get to the bottom of why he feels as he does, whether it's private counseling for him and marriage counseling or both.

My dad was an angry man and my mum spent large chunks of the marriage tip toeing round him.

He sounds controlling in a way and tries to manipulate you with his anger, especially after your last post. This must be a horrid situation for you.

Was he always like this? Do you think there is hope you can work through things?

Tinykins - yes that does sound horrible. It sounds like you've got yourself into a pattern where the pair of you follow an unofficial script. DH and I do this - our rows are interchangeable we both do and say the same things. In our case the rows are rare, so we vow to do something to break the cycle but never actually do. In your case, it's getting bad, you are not happy and he probably isn't either so it's time to get some help.

You are more than likely to come out the other end stronger.

I had very similar behaviour from my DH. He resented me and thought I was trying to control him.

He would watch me doing all of the chores and feel guilty and then hate me because he felt compelled to help.If I was quiet he would decide I was judging him for watching football and not helping me. Even though I had said nothing and did not expect any help, he looked at me like he detested me and spoke to me the way your DH speaks to you.

I just looked at him and said if you despise me, and you clearly do, would you have the decency to leave. I gave him an ultimatum to change the way he behaves towards me and DS. We had a long talk and a lot of what he thought was complete nonsense, just lack of communication, the way he interpretted things was quite weird.

In the end you have to say lets work on this together and give it 100% or bin it. You need a good long talk.

Thanks all, was away for a couple of hours there shopping.

LYNLI - I have said more or less that to him, and his response was that he was not leaving our kids or our home, and if I wasnt happy then it was up to me to go.

We had scheduled a big chat for tomorrow night, had booked a babysitter and planned to go out for dinner.

I do feel like he hates me some of the time. I do feel that he has a lot of anger that is only below the surface, and that no matter how i try and have reasonable chats with him, they often degenerate as this morning.

HOUSEWIFEOOC - We have had help in the past, and nothing has really changed, which I find very disheartening, but I am still going to give it another try.

TEAANDCAKES - I dont know if it can work. I dont know what it the matter with him. I went into town this morning to sho, called in to his workplace (he is a pharmacist) first he said, r"ight well I would be fine to go out tonight, will rise to the occasion but no point in doing that if you are going to be sitting there no wanting to be there and miserable" I insisted that I wouldnt and that it would probably do us good to get out. So he said ok then lets go. Then I went to go, and he said, ah sure, lets not bother, its not worth all this fuss. So i said fine. Then he called me back and said oh, ok then, ring Jane (our babysitter) and see if she is free. So I left the shop and texted Jane. Then 10 mins later got a text from him say, "actually I will probably be too tired after work today and it is probably not a good idea anyway, so dont bother contacting the sitter."

WTF! So hwat was this morning all about?? Now I have to go back and tell the sitter, no thanks, our friends will be disappointed, and he will come home tonight, and not speak to me for the evening, because somehow, all of this shitty situation will be deemed to be All My Fault.

So I dont know what the hell counselling can do for us at this stage because I dont know WTF the problem is!

He has his own demons he is struggling with. He needs help. CBT counseling would be a good move for him imo.

I doubt that he will ever agree to CBT. He has and will agree to Marriage Counselling because he genuinely believes the problem lies with me, and hopes that counselling will make me see this.

For him to go to CBT he would have to realise and accept that he was stuck in a negative thought pattern, and he is not going to do that.

We are stuck in this miserable cycle as far as I can see.

Have you considered the possibility that your husband may not be angry, as such, but expressing some other emotion that comes out sounding angry? E.g. he might be hurt, upset, sad, anxious, disappointed, feeling rejected by the world, even just not feeling very well? But that he expresses all of these as anger?

Both I and my DH often express other emotions as anger. DH especially has problems with anxiety and sadness, and these are always expressed as anger. If I interpreted my DH's emotions as being angry with me, every time, I'm pretty sure he would feel misunderstood and irritated too.

I like Beanlet's thoughts.

I've heard good things about this book. Maybe worth a read?

Your post sounds very familiar to me particulary the angry bit, denying hes angry and putting the blame on my interpretation of a discussion, so sorry to hear of your problem,i am going through similar and am thinking of you x

My H left at Christmas and its hard but no one in my life speaks to me the way he did (does )and I am not constantly left feeling in the wrong about everything . It feels great now I am moving on from him and realising I am ok person not someone who deserves to be hated.

Its quite a rough ride though Tinykins but worth it. Good Luck

Yes Beanlet I agree with that but if the other person refuses to acknowledge that or entertain the possibility of getting therapeutic help you are still left with constantly being treated badly and making excuses for that person on the basis that " Oh maybe hes frustrated at work " etc meanwhile soaking up their behaviour.

"Why Does He Do That?" by Lundy Bancroft
might help...(and don't be afraid to interchance she for the pronoun).

The 'walking on eggshells' books are good.

It is difficult to have to edit/review your words to be certain the focus is on the subject and can not be bended on a tangent that wasn't intended. But some people will always look for the tangent like a reflex. I don't know why they do it. Entertainment? Some sort of power game? Avoiding the subject? Buying time to 'think'?

I agree that blaming you is an easy out for him to not take responsibility, as earlier mentioned.

I don't know what to say about his flip-floping about deciding to go out or not.

Is he secretly chemically dependent? Sorry, had to ask, because of the pharmacy.