My wife - she just cannot handle any 'criticism'- big nor small- HELP

[Husband99]

Things are pretty rough. I just cannot raise anything with my wife without her just getting angry and now I'm stuck to know what to do. It seems I either just shut up- no matter it is- or it will kick off. The former just doesn't seem like a sustainable way to live.

Mostly things that come up are just petty. For example, I hate being late. She is always late when we have to leave for things. That puts me in a grump; I know it does- and need to get perspective- but I also do not think these things are the end of the world. What makes these situations far worse is how she reacts. Then it becomes her angry reaction (that always happens) that we argue about the reaction, and not the tiny thing that initially caused it that becomes long forgotten.

Basically she flips and loses her temper every time I raise even the tiniest issue and things immediately switch and she says that she is the one hard fine by having to deal with this. It just puts me in a position where I cannot raise any issue with her or else she will just flip. She never quietly considers a point, reflects, try's to appreciate where someone else (i.e. me) is coming from. Her instinct is always to just get angry and go on the 'attack'- every time.

I do my best to remain calm in these instances, but she quickly raises her voice and slips into personal insults like calling me a 'prick ' - I'll admit, I resort to saying things back at times. I am not perfect- my patience is not infinite and I know this is damaging to our relationship. To be honest, I do this as I feel bullied. I am forever in these instances saying 'but I am the one whose is upset with something you have done- why are you shouting at me?'. I just don't understand. We do discuss this, but nothing changes.

She doesn't seem to see that she makes things more significant than really need to be by her angry reactions. Because I don't react this way in reverse, she also feels that I raise a lot if things with her and just fails to see that I am not more pedantic, I just am able to listen when things that she raises are said to me. They get quickly forgotten and aren't even remembered because I don't get angry- I take heed and listen. It's just when I am upset or frustrated with something, her reaction is so predictably extreme and aggressive that I think it becomes memorable. There is always an excuse. How I raise things; the things I raise etc - what is consistent is the angry reaction not seeing that I have tried everything. My one option that I feel I have is to just not say anything.

Let me explain how crazy this can be. On occasion, just recently, we were travelling in the car and playing a game to pass the time- 20 questions. My wife got frustrated, thought I was being patronising as she was having difficulty guessing who it was (I know- I cannot believe I am writing this!) and she said 'God you are a wanker'. I was a little stunned and calmly said, 'ok- I don't want to play anymore'. Because we were on a car journey, I couldn’t take time out to get away and collect my thoughts, so I just plugged in my ipod- all calmly. She did say why did I want to listen to my ipod, and I said I didn't want to just sit here in a her moody silence (yes- she got moody with me despite it being her calling me a personal comment) and I just wanted to zone out and relax. No shouting - all very calm. I was upset.

This ended up being a blazing argument - I just don't understand why a moment of reflection doesn't arrive where she calmly, genuinely says sorry and feels sorry for what she did. Instead she gets angry about the fact that I am upset/ annoyed with what she did.

Ultimately I keep saying to her that I am allowed to feel a certain way if things (big or small) happen and I want to be able to share that. I am want to feel like I am allowed to raise things if I feel a certain way, but these see not an attack. There's no need to react like this. I am on her team. But her constant anger is so tiring. I don't respect it. I feel like I have to walk constantly on egg shells and that I am unable to share anything without it being a blazing argument- big or small.

Its horrible.

I know. I fucked up. I have never denied it the whole way through that I have reacted.

I just cannot understand why that first act of personal insult a) even happens and b) all recognition that this was the step that went over the line.

Your neutral response is brilliant. It may be interpreted as patronizing, I fear, but at least it gives me something.

OP, I didn't pick up on it at the time because of the way this thread has been, but to be honest your comment about thinking she's no less intelligent because she watches Geordie Shore and that's one of things you love about her did pop out at me before. You might mean it sincerely but she's unlikely to take comments like that positively even when said 'nicely'… It does sound patronising to some people, even though you don't mean it to.

she always gets personal and I am left with a choice of withdrawing, responding or just being pushed around

It depends if you feel diffusing her response by saying, "ok, I'm sorry, I wasn't doing it deliberately. What I was saying was…(in more straightforward language)" is being "pushed around"?

I can sometimes get red misty. DH doesn't. He now understands that I just cannot have a reasonable conversation when I'm in that mode and I need to be on my own for a while for it to simmer down or say something I'll regret, so he'll either let me walk out or will walk out calmly and wait for me to come to him. Is that him being "pushed around"? Maybe. I asked him to do this after our first big argument and he probably managed to instigate it by our third. His natural inclination is to want to have a reasonable - albeit heated - conversation, not walk away. But because he has adapted that response with me a) he knows he'll get the reasonable conversation sooner rather than later because the potential nuclear response has been diffused and b) because I know he can and has done this for me, I very rarely get red misty because I can rein myself much more easily than I ever could in my past when I feel it happening because I feel under a lot less pressure.

laurierf You see, we haven't got those techniques or understanding. I don't feel like I have a response that works, as you have described.

Consequently, I just feel picked on, and so does my wife.

We need what you have described, and I need a better radar to spot these situations on the horizon.

I'm like your partner- I am happy to talk- my wife needs time and the circumstances need to be right...but stupidly, that time can frustrate me in turn and I can reject it- and the spiral continues.

I can see it now.

The day after our last argument (when I left), she came down after working in her bedroom until midday. She cam down and offered me a drink- I rejected that fig leaf- ...stupid. I was annoyed that she needed this time. that is me lacking empathy and being annoyed still that she needed time, but the insults began from her. I was annoyed at root cause (or what I perceived it to be), but not focused on resolution.

Fucking idiot. I can see it now.

Don't think of yourself as a fucking idiot. You have very different temperaments and styles and that's natural. It's the starting point for a more productive conversation tomorrow. This is what I meant when I said you have to change if she has a chance to. Unfair? Maybe. Worth it? That's up to you. Some will be looking at this thinking I'm abusive to my DH and that your wife is abusive to you and I should not be telling you to change. But it works for us and I have adapted elements of my behaviour for him too and the result is we're in a really happy marriage, albeit with arguments here and there but never ones that linger on too long because we know we are on each other's side.

You're right, the response I gave will probably come across as patronising. I certainly snap at my DH when he says it to me!

The problem I think you've got here is that she is very very ready to detect patronising behaviour (for whatever reasons) and so you're going to be accused of it whatever your real intentions are. Unfortunately this can generate a certain 'Well FFS, if I'm going to be shouted at anyway I may as well do something worth the trouble' mentality. I don't know if you get like that but I do.

I must say that reading about your careful attempts to predict problems just makes me feel tired. I had a life like this with my mother; we always had to decipher her behaviour correctly, work out what she wanted/needed and respond appropriately on pain of her displeasure. Christ I was glad to leave home.

Think about whether that's a life you want, op.

Point taken, LadyPlumpington I am tired. As I have said above; my happiest times and my darkest have been with the same person.

I understand, but you may still need some time off from each other. It sounds like it would benefit you both.

Thing is, H99, this is all about new ways for you to tiptoe around her apparent vulnerabilities. There's nothing about meeting half-way.

She has a brittle ego. This much is clear. For your purpose, we are seeing this as a vulnerability.

Her ego was injured by some long words you used, so she said "don't use long words and try to sound clever". Think about why she doesn't simply ask "What does that mean?" or even "Do you mean [more words but shorter]?"
She could have done. If she loves your 'long word knowledge' as you love her 'geordie shore knowledge', it's absolutely what she would do, as she'd see it as gaining something from the conversation.

Instead, she told you off for uttering your natural language; indeed, told you not to do it. And added a playground snipe at 'trying' to sound clever. There's a world of difference between this and a more affectionate gibe, like "OK, clever clogs, what does that mean?"

Trying to control someone's language and to belittle their skills are both deeply unpleasant, abusive moves. This is why you snapped back instead of it being the non-event it would be in a healthier relationship. Keeping the grudge on a slip of paper shows incredible lack of self-insight (she missed how her dig started the exchange off) and a worrying commitment to building her resentments against you.

You weren't wrong. You weren't saintly but why would you be? Is your home relationship not meant to be the one in which you are fully loved for who you are; which expands & enhances your best self?

There's nothing about meeting half-way

Well there is, but he has to make the big move towards her first before she can start to move towards him. For example, let's say, they agree he needs to give her space to calm down when she's being irrational and no doubt mean. He needs to accept her drink as an offer of reconciliation and wait until she's ready to talk calmly. She then needs to learn to thank him for for giving her the space and then commit to engaging in the reasonable conversation now she has been given space to calm down… I would hope that the more they could do this, the more they will have the chance to communicate and to start to feel that they are on each other's side and can trust each other with their emotions… the safer she would feel to acknowledge that yes, she does need anger management and other counselling without feeling defensive about it… but there is so much water under this bridge, that it does sound like a lot of hard work for the OP, requiring huge amounts of patience, with a lot of feelings of hurt to be 'sucked up'… is it really, really worth it when both of you have had happier relationships before?

DH and I discussed it (different temperaments) a lot after our first big argument and agreed how best to deal with that… and we've always kept a sense of humour about it (e.g. making fun of me for being like the Incredible Hulk or of him for being like a comedy figure with exaggerated characteristics). I think you are a long way from having that sort of trust.

Also, crucially, neither of us would ever tolerate physical violence.

To be honest, I know I will have to be that person who makes this move if we stay together.

My difficulty is making that move to the middle, but maintaining that abuse is unacceptable- the line of 'unacceptability' will have to be grey to give her the space she needs at certain times.

My fear; does that condone? Will she (unknowingly/ knowingly) perceive that as weak- will she therefore respect that...will things perhaps worsen...but things cannot get worse.

OP, the fact that you are thinking along those lines is completely understandable and right but is the reason I'm doubtful that this will work for you as a couple. I have enormous respect for my DH's ability to remain calm - there is no question in either of our minds that it could be perceived as a weakness; it's an incredible strength and I'm grateful that he has this quality because it's helped me develop more of it myself. Equally, he would say he's taken on some qualities from me too. We also know that we are absolute equals, so there's no insecurities on either side to throw into the mix as you have.

When it's all so complex - 'I must do this when s/he does this so s/he doesn't do that' - is it worth it? I'm asking myself as much as you, and reading it from your point of view, I think it probably isn't.
There are other people with whom you will not have to tread so carefully. Life will be so much more pleasant. You are still young and can find someone else. (As can she.)
I'm sorry for the depressing advice.

I've followed your thread from the start. You seem like a man trying hard to understand himself, his partner, and relationships. All of which is good, obviously. But when everything needs to be analysed in this much detail, it may be (and I suspect this isn't what you want to hear) that you would both simply be more content alone, then with other people.

Do you feel like your best self with her? Does she make you happy? Does she bring out the qualities in you that you like best, the majority of the time?

If the answer's no, then be aware that in choosing to stay you are choosing to be a person you perhaps don't like or admire - potentially for the rest of your life.

Not every relationship is this much hard work. And if you take some time out, consider what attracted you to this relationship and kept you there, and take that knowledge to a new relationship - you'll almost certainly find it's joyful and calm, and you can feel proud of who you are and how you act, almost all of the time.

Gilrack's post above (beautifully) gets to the heart of the matter.

OP, I really think that unless you are willing to play the role of parent, servant, or therapist to your wife for the rest of your life you will save yourself much misery by getting out of the relationship now. There are just some people (male AND female) who cannot understand what a mature normal relationship entails. They just aren't going to accept what they see as "questioning" or "complaining" or "lack of attention" without a fight, and they see no reason to control or change their behavior. And even if you could become that saint and suppress your personality and desires toward the goal of heading off all of her set points it wouldn't change anything because the problems arise from within her deepest self.

While I have said numerous times on this post I think you should split, I think it's worth saying again, as PP said, that either way it's worth you having some counselling for yourself, away from this relationship OP.

I'm starting to get to that place. Another terrible , argumentative, dare I say it, irrational phone call. Just awful. She's either carrying guilt or just wants to pull the plug- why not just do it herself? Any thoughts on this? Why seek to push me so I end it?

I just don't get so much of all this; she still is crazy about the Facebook thing (me looking up an ex- we did go out for 9 years) - but I didn't make contact nor wish to.

But I said to her that she is friends on FB with one ex (they dated for 6 years) and I (genuinely) have no issue over this. In addition, last Summer another ex (who she was engaged to but it ended messily) asked her to meet for a coffee- he sporadically contacted her while we were together and was clearly still interested despite her saying we were dating - and she wanted to meet with him! I said I felt uncomfortable about it ( not trusting his intentions) but it was her call, and she didn't meet him.

I just cannot fathom the inequality but she does not see it. She just justifies it all by saying it's her insecurity . Just barmy!

Why seek to push me so I end it?

Because that will make you the baddie and her the victim. That way she has no responsibility for the decision, and therefore no blame. I can't think of another reason.

Testing boundaries?

Any thoughts on this? Why seek to push me so I end it?
She just justifies it all by saying it's her insecurity.

I think you may have answered your own question. Insecure people can test their partners to the absolute limit, creating a no-win situation. If the partner stays, the abuse escalates. If the partner goes, the insecure person then gets validation that they're not good enough to hold onto a relationship: their inner belief about themselves is confirmed.

The reason the abuse continues to escalate is that the insecure person's trying to get impossible proof of their value. It's a bottomless chasm that occurred some time in childhood (or may have been inborn, depending on your neuropsychologist.) No amount of praise, tolerance or forbearance by others can fill it. But the person will keep on pushing for 'proof of how much you love me.'

The only way to fill this need in adulthood is by developing proper self-love. It takes years of heavy therapy - I've done it. To be honest, not many people choose this path and I don't blame them; it's hard going and never truly finished.

I'm really sorry you're going through this. It's not fair.

Do you feel like saying how her previous engagement ended?

It sounds like you both end up saying 'the wrong thing' out of frustration because you're both so tense. This seems to lead to a situation where what you mean to say and what she hears are quite different, often leading to a blazing row. As pp have said, both of you would probably benefit from individual counselling about your own issues (we all have them!) and some joint counselling around the area of communications. In the shorter term, and in a bid to save this, is there a third party (a trusted friend or relative maybe?) who could act as some kind of mediator and sit down face to face with you both? I don't think the phone is a great idea because you're missing out on the nuances of a conversation like facial expressions and body language.

There's a lot that rings true here JustHavinABreak and Gilrack; I am constantly having to say 'you realise I did not say that- these are your words that you are getting angry about - I don't even feel that'.

On the self worth thing, Gilrack, what I find hard is that I have to contrast this with an outwardly confident , assertive (in all the right ways) professional young lady. You would guess this of her. My sense is she knows the amount of jealousy/ insecurity is odd and that contributed to low self esteem.

Her past relationship; she contracted something from him . She never will know if he did it on purpose and ivdoblikectovtjnkni 'be played a key role in supporting her to manage this. She told me yesterday that this situation had recurred- I was worried of course and she'd if she wanted to talk about it. 'I don't need you to do this' of words to that effect was her response. I feel for her. No one should have to go through this . Do I think it adds to our broader picture . Her general angst. Yes . This and her father passing. I really do.

You would guess this of her. ... I meant wouldn't

Sorry- terrible predictive text error again - 'ivdoblikectovtjnkni' was supposed to read 'I like to think'

"I just cannot fathom the inequality but she does not see it. She just justifies it all by saying it's her insecurity . Just barmy!"

Hmmm....this goes to the heart of a conversation I have with my dp often.

How I feel is one thing, how you feel is another thing. Because you feel one way does not mean that I do, or should, feel the same way and I will not squish the way I feel to suit your preference.

So, with you it was this fb thing. You think that her feelings about it, driven by her insecurities, are 'barmy'. Does it occur to you that you could just accept how she feels and NOT consider her feelings 'barmy' just because they don't match yours?

I had an issue with dp's ex, they were in constant contact and it drove me mad, it took him a long time to accept that his behaviour was upsetting me and that I was entitled to my own feelings about it. For a long time his reaction was like yours "I don't mind if you contact your ex so why should you mind if I contact mine" - because I am me and you are you, and if you love me you have to love me for who I am and not try to make me be you!

(It was different - the ex of mine he was talking about I maybe contact once a year, he was speaking to this woman a few times a week, often for great long phone calls at 1am and she was commenting on every fb post he made and stuff like that!)

We are well past all that now (I didn't even blink when he told me a week or so ago that she had been in contact on Twitter) and he understands that I have my own feelings and reactions to things that don't match his and may even be outside his expectations - and he doesn't undermine me by thinking those reactions are 'barmy'.

Now and then we will talk through a reaction and agree it maybe wasn't necessary but you can only do that with respect and by recognising its validity in the first place.

I also saw some comment about Geordie Shores - it drives me up the wall when dp makes snarky comments about trash TV I watch. I mean, really, most TV is trash isn't it? I am intelligent, I have a professional job, earn a high salary, am well respected and have a law degree with first class honours - how has any of that got anything to do with what I watch on TV, and why does he somehow think Top Gear or football is more intellectually challenging? (he doesn't actually watch football to be fair) Again, I have made this point to him and we now joke about the TV show hierarchy, but it is a joke we both share now. If he ever said "I think you're intelligent even though you watch blah" I'd be furious. I have had exes who have tried "I can't believe someone as intelligent as you watches Eastenders", they are exes. ("I can't believe someone with so little emotional intelligence as you can have a girlfriend...").

I dunno, I feel like you need to stop judging her - accept her or leave her.