Non communication

[temponame]

If your husband refuses to communicate with you, you have been honest in a not too emotional way but he is constantly defensive, refuses to admit to any feelings or discuss anything about the relationship whatsoever, and then you discover he has gone through your joint email account and deleted every single email between you (home and work) which relate to the contentious issues (money, children etc), would it be reasonable or unreasonble to suspect an affair? Would it be reasonable to ask someone to go on living with non communication from a husband indefinitely?

Justthisone no i did not say "we need to talk about money and make some changes" and this is why i am so confused. is it me being ultra passive or is it him controlling me or do we just set each other off. either way how can i broach the very straightforward question you set out which needs to be asked from a position of safety (ie with a plan b in hand if the bottom drops out of everything)

how long has this been going on?

no true joint account. think he will think i am trying to take money off him if i suggest a pro rata basis for paying all bills but as you say i cannot see that i can go on much longer without having the conversation. the question is what will i do if there is melt down

What a horrible situation.

I wonder if he is testing you? He obviously has a poor opinion of women, calls them cheaters and deceivers, and I suppose this stems from feelings of hurt and being let down by his mother's actions when he was younger. He is seeing women now through poisoned eyes, only ever seeing the bad side to us - ie his stepmother is controlling when she tries to arrange things between him and his father. Is she, or is she trying to get the two of them to maintain a relationship of sorts? I don't know, but he seems eager to always take the pessimistic view.

It seems that the tests he sets you will increase over time, you can't ever 'win' or succeed at them. And he probably doesn't actually want you to, as that would mean that he has to change his jaundiced view of women. Possibly deleting those chosen emails is a way of leaving him with the set of 'bad' emails which he can look at, and which then reinforce his views.

Maybe he doesn't realise that he does this. Possibly he could change if he understood what he was doing, and actually wanted to change? Or maybe his actions are calculated and controlling?

You say that you have a daughter - you really need to consider how it will affect her, growing up with this emotionless and controlling man who has such a poor opinion of females.

Scared thanks for your email and your thoughts many probably accurate. I don't think he will ever be self reflective or certainly not at my prompting and if there was a way I could get comfortable with the situation without asking him to do this I would be happy. Actually he totally adores my daughter and if anything spoils her, it was when I was expecting my son and after his birth that his reaction to my son started to trigger things. I don't know why this is, perhaps he feels scared of having to be a father to a boy in the light of how things are with his father. As commented above I am not very good at pop psychology, suffice it to say that it hurt my feelings that he did not bond in the same way with our son as he has with our firstborn daughter, i told him this and in a rare moment of honesty he agreed ths was the case and has been trying to bond more with our son.
I don't want him to test me i just want enough honesty that we can function day to day without any tests (if that is what they are) escalating. Money is a sensitive trigger for me because my mum was so left in the lurch by my dad emotionally and financially and I cannot tell whether i am being over sensitive or this is the reality. On the one hand i think well if i totally trusted him notwithstanding the fact that on a day to day income basis we are 70 - 30 that would not matter. On the other hand I wanted him (in a way as acceptance of our son) to say now we have two babies the childcare costs are more than you alone can pay so lets re arrange our money a bit. But that hasn't happened. At the moment I feel i have no choice but to take the totally cynical view that either he is or he might completely do me over financially and try to get some information about his income and savings. The ironic thing is when we first met we both had relatively high incomes and kept things separate even after we married because i didnt feel any need or threat from not having a joint account. Now my income is so (deliberately) reduced and we have babies it is different for me. Maybe this is obvious to him and he is playing me or maybehe is just totally focused on work that he doesnt see it. Outwardly his expenditure appears to me to be whiter than white - for example this morning as I type workmen are fitting new double glazed windows to our family home which he is paying 100% for out of money he has saved up. Things like this make me think I am being paranoid and over reacting. Our family home is in joint names after a bit of persuasion by me (back when I had a bit more confidence)

The problem is I just dont think i have the skills to come out and ask for a 50-50 relationship as he just walks off

Of course you have the skills , you are communicating clearly on here and we all understand what yous saying . You are doing what i and many others have done , blaming yourself when its not your fault .

I cannot stress strongly enough that it is not normal to walk away when someone is talking to you . He doesnt do it because he doesnt know how to talk / issues with his parents divorce ect or anything like that .

He does it because he enjoys the powerfull feeling it gives him . End of . You say you feel nervous and scared at the prospect of having any discussion with him , thats utterly appalling. Would you accept this sort of behaviour from a freind ?

Theres several books i recomend you read , in fact i will happily send them to you if you wish . One of them is Controlling People that explains whats going on with men who behave like this , and its quite an eye opener .

I assume youve changed a lot since youve met him , moulded into this woman whos scared to even have a conversation with him. What happened to your thoughts and feelings , your wants and needs ? You stuff them down in order to not upset him , which is exactly what he wants.

Men like your H dont see you , or hear you . They just see a Live Dolly , and any attempts to be independant ( even expressing your own thoughts ) are met with contempt and a refusal to acknowledge you , as you know.

You havent got a problem with money , youve got a problem with a controlling partner who REFUSES to see you . Its quite possible to test this theory .

Forget the money issue for now. Raise any issue that your unhappy with , the issue surrounding your son for example , or the issue of being expected to arrange meetings with his dad ,how hard it is with the baby ect , in fact anything that is your own thoughts.

Youll be ignored , walked away from , left unheard and frustrated . He has very set ideas on who you should be , what you should think and feel , and every time you express yourself youll be punished . And its working.
Your hesitating to have a conversation with him , which is exactly what he wants.

When you say meltdown what do you mean ? Does he rage ?

no unlike my own dad he does not rage and is not violent. he just changes the subject if i try in any way to talk about feelings

"what will i do if there is melt down "

what kind of melt down?
what do you think he might do?
other than walk off and continue the silent treatment?

what do you actually fear might happen?

you are supposed to be a partnership - money in a pot (you can still have separate accounts of course) pays for mortgage childcare etcetc.

he just changes the subject if i try in any way to talk about feelings

Hes happy enough talking about his feelings and thoughts though isnt he .Can you see how incredibly arrogant that is .I know your focusing on financial issues at the moment , and even if you resolved that ( which i dont think you will ) something else important would probably come up and youd be back here.

I spent years trying to resolve issues from finances , in laws , sex , childcare , pets ,anything and everything. At times his stance was ludicrous but yet still he wouldnt budge because it wasnt really about any of those things.

Have you looked up stonewalling / blocking / diverting , ect ?

I am glad to hear you are going back to work. Very important. Behaviour like this ruins your self-esteem. My H ruined my self-esteem and then punished me for being too incapable of getting a job.

And it is fine for them to get angry and upset about stuff, but if you get angry and upset - you are crazy, a nutter, even though you have become like this maybe from perhaps giving you the silent treatment.

I think you should hand him a weekly bill: washing, cleaning, ironing, shopping, cooking, washing up, child care etc. Show him how valuable your contribution to the household is. Some men only see things in monetary terms (my dh is like that) but it covers the fact that they are using it as a power tool. They earn more and are therefore worth more. You can play him at this game by showing how much money he would have to pay out if you simply weren't there.

I am really concerned that you can only communicate via e-mail. This is simply not on. He has to speak to you and if he won't I think you may have to deliver The Ultimatum - Relate Or Else.

Jux thanks
He has sent me an email home this morning saying should he take the day off next week so we can go out for lunch but I think he thinks if we just spend time with each other etc it will all just automatically sort itself out.
He does say he loves me (reasonably regularly and more than i say it to him) but i dont know whether he does.
At the time of our wedding anniversary back in August he went on a fishing trip with his friends. He sent me an email saying "i suppose you would like me to look after the children so you can have some time off" i said no because that is not really my priority. he went on in the email to say "i know i have acted like nothing has happened " (referring to the birth of our son). i was astounded at such an honest confession and sent a joky email back saying "DH is that really you" etc. Just before he left on the fishing trip after some thought I brought up that email with him in private - he said " no i said you think i have acted like nothing has happened"...(Actually i had never given it any thought). I went to try to find the amil again to see exactly what it did say and it is gone. that was maybe our only chance of an honest discussion

This is really awful. I send dh e-mails (he's usually on his computer in another corner of the room!) but they'll only be for links to stuff he's interested in. Otherwise we talk - or at least try to.

To communicate like you two do is really not normal or reasonable (I'm not getting at you honest), but you need to change this asap. If you were communicating normally (ie talking to each other) then the financial situation wouldn't be so much of a problem as you could talk about it.

As it is, he's got you on a string, dangling. He might answer your mails, he might not. He might delete them, he might not. This has to stop.

This thread has made me think about what it was like to live like this , and also peoples reactions to it. I remember confiding in several freinds and family and the suggestions were that i try to communicate more effectiveley , perhaps we could go out for a meal and i could raise it then so he couldnt walk away .

Maybe i could subtly suggest that i might want sex more often if he would listen to me.
Maybe i could write him a letter , or get the dcs in bed and carefully broach it then. One well meaning freind even suggested i record myself and put it in his car.

Everyone i spoke to assumed it was me with the problem , and had a range of reasons why he might find it hard , and how i could "fix " it . Not one person said " What hes doing isnt ok and you dont have to accept this ". Not one.

In a way the message that he sent me every day " your not worth listening to " was reinforced by my well meaning freinds and family. Ive often wondered what the response would have been if i confided that my boss was ignoring me and walking away when i tried to talk to him . Ive no doubt people wouldve been shocked and stated i didnt have to put up with it.But it wasnt a boss , it was my H , so it must be okay.

Its wrong that we put up with stuff from a partner that we wouldnt be expected to put up with off anyone else , and also that society often supports this.

Temp , in regards to him saying " You think i have acted ,,," how do you feel about him claiming to know what you think ?

dignified in answer to your question i would very much love to have an honest and loving conversation with him about that email he sent but i think he will walk away. he also once sent me an email saying he hates himself and feels what he does is not good enough. i think i replied something like but i love you. that email is also gone

Temp , in your shoes i think id state clearly and calmly what i needed one last time . If he walks away or doesnt listen it might be time to consider your options . The alternative is years and years of this , and the likelihood that your dcs will marry and replay the whole thing. As they get older you may find that they too walk away from you and ignore what you say .

He might well say he loves you , but love is measured in actions not words . I would pay close attention to what hes doing , not what hes saying . Turn the tables Temp, would you treat anyone you loved like this ?

In the meantime id stop communicating via email and that would include responding to any that he sends you. In fact if he wont listen , id stop listening to him , i would literally get up and walk away whenever he trys to speak . Sounds ridiculous doesnt it when you consider behaving that way yourself.

Dignified do you think me walking away when he is speaking will make him open up and be honest with me?

When u behave like him, you will probably see how frustrated it makes him.I have had years of silent treatment and if I do it once he loses his patience after about 30 secs and can't comprehend someone is doing that to him and treating him like that. But does it have any effect on his behaviour in the future? - probably not ?. Because he never thought he ever did anything wrong or denies it.

And why would anyone purposely keep treating someone they loved in a way to hurt them - over and over again?