Male, married, unhappy, surely, uncommunicative, me

[jimmylimmy]

Hi
I have been reading the posts here for quite a long time, especially all the relationship stuff. My reason for signing up was to ask for advice, but as I'm fairly sure the reaction will be "you're a selfish cunt" I was thinking of asking something slightly different. I want to say what my behaviour is like and then see if I am normal (nope!), narcissistic (pretty sure my parents were), a bully, a child, a controller... a selfish cunt ?????

My wife and I have always had a cycle of very large arguments, about once every 2-3 months. She is very open, short-tempered and vocal whereas I am a bit introverted and clueless about her emotional state and my own - I can't really feel whether I'm happy,sad, or what unless I really sit down and think carefully, it just doesn't seem like a natural thing I have. So you can imagine a fairly quiet introvert and a fairly unstable extrovert are probably not a great mix to start with.
Anyway, I wanted to state what my reactions are to DWs outbursts and see whether I am really a bad person, or a person with 'issues' as they say. Examples:
When we have an argument, I initially try and ngage and usually feel like she's being overly picky or unreasonable, then I feel totally rageful. I want to throw the TV through the window, I physically shake but I don;t do or say anything. So what I do is walk out, with her shouting at me I need to talk, and I stay out for several hours, perhaps wonder round B&Q in a daze or just drive around in tears. During this all I can think about is how our marriage is over, she hates me, I am useless peace of shit, I should kill myself, I should leave her and find a more attractive woman, I should live as a recluse, I should try being gay, I should go with prostitutes, I should have kids by now... my mind swirls and swirls its mad shit. Eventually I go home and say I am sorry and we embrace and I think how lucky I am to have her and how she was right all along.

I think if she was to tell you what I'm like as a person she would say something like: good step dad, kind, good lover, funny, intelligent, solvent, poor communicator, terrible under emotional pressure, mean when confronted with a relationship issue, but basically a good husband (I think).

Blimey, I'm realising this thread is a bit vague... my question is, how odd do you think I sound, do you have or had partners like this - that would be very useful to know....

I should probably add she is not perfect. She is kind, an amazing mother, almost a councillor at times, short fused, temperamental, indecisive, uncompromising but basically a lovely person.

FInally, the real reason I have crated this thread (it's occuring to me as I go along) is that the last few times these episodes have happened, I haven't felt like making up and I almost feel content to leave for good. This has alarmed me as I never thought that would happen and since it has, my DW has become more reasonable an willing to compromise more, which I feel weird about as it almost seems like me being colder has made her more reasonable. Am I a controlling narcissist if so?

narcissistic (pretty sure my parents were)
This jumped out at me and, imho, I believe may be the originating seed of your problems. This is where your counselling should begin, imho. Your parents, if narcissistic, failed to give you a foundation in social intelligence because everything had to be about them which probably rendered you invisible (emotionally invisible). This would leave a nurturing/guidance gap in their parenting of you. I am only guessing, of course, but perhaps it rings some bells?

Being emotionally numb could be an entrenched coping mechanism that was useful to you as a child around narcissistic adults. But that was then and this is now, so it isn't working for you as an adult. Even with contented solitude, you still should want to like yourself to not suffer self-imposed social exile.

But you are not entirely numb, yet, as there is the anger. I believe anger is a choice. She isn't making you angry...You choose that reaction (letting your lizard brain be captain and your thinking brain doesn't get a chance at all) . Emotional flooding (from the Emotional Intelligence book referred to up thread). Respond rather than react.

As the Americans say, do the work. You could try everything from counselling, books, accountability friends, a retreat (geographic, not emotional). Ultimately you kind of need get a better handle on what's shaped you to believe what you do (esp about yourself), pick who you do, act how you act, make the choices you do. If you both did this you might get somewhere stop reacting off each other. Nothing more attractive than a couple where the individuals have peace with and self control over themselves, despite their vulnerabilities.

AndBandPlayedScotlandTheBrave - yes it does ring bells, and yes I was ignored, tho not abused in any way. I have done a fair bit of reading and counselling too, but I am wondering if we have just gone one argument too many, the straw that broke the camels back so to speak. I know this sounds cliched bollocks, but I do love her in that I care, but I don't really feel in love now.

Thanks all. Next step is a frank discussion. How awful ! :)

Have a read of Dr Jonice Webbs stuff about childhood emotional neglect.
You sound a bit like my DH and we are struggling, partly because he cannot recognise the emotional baggage/ damage his childhood has left him with.

For what it's worth I think you've done good in posting and thinking about it all.

And to answer your original question, I have all kinds of "mad" thinkings when emotionally disturbed. It's within the broad scope of "normal".
Insight is key and I think you're trying to develop that from what you have said.

Just in case anyone is interested... and really just for my own benefit I'm writing this stuff down...
I spent several days being quiet, keeping myself apart, as I couldn't seem to deal with what I was thinking or feeling. Eventually I came home from work and my smiling beautiful wife came to me to say she'd missed me. I couldn't take any more lies so I said I was sorry but I thought we should split. She was not as upset as I thought she'd be, but after explaining that I was serious, the big wet eyes appeared and all the 'why's?'. To cut a long sad story short, after several hours of talking, me explaining I wasn't in love... we agreed to try to carry on and improve. This was not what I wanted, but the only alternative was to ignore her and walk out. I can't do that. I felt like either one of us might die. So, we are still a couple. We are still good friends. We are still not lovers. I am very confused.
I don;'t want any advice or sympathy, I just want to see what this looks like written down. It looks shit. I don't know why but being told 'I don't love you' just didn't register. If she said that to me, I would be very upset, but also a bit relieved I suppose. But as I said it to her and she still wants to carry on, I struggle to understand what is going on in her mind. Perhaps she doesn't believe me and thinks i'm having a funny turn, or maybe she feels the same. Or maybe she is frightened. I don't know but all of them scare me and sadden me.

I'm glad you have updated.

I think you feel you have reached the end, as have no coping skills however it feels so sad as your issues should be fixable.

What jumps out for me is your feeling of being controlled..your wife giving feedback about her needs feels controlling to you? I suspect you use this as an excuse to detach emotionally.

Earlier feedback was that your anger and thoughts (thoughts generate emotions) were not rational or reasonable.Have ypu heard that?

Do you want to change this? I suspect it feels easier to walk away but separating is very hard and you are putting yourself on a tougher path long term.
If you had narcissistic parents you will not have healthy thought patterns.

I think the two of you have managed to get yourself into a fankle with your very different styles of communicating and quarreling.

And to be frank - neither of you seem to do well in this respect, but splitting over that is probably not the way forward either - you simply end up at some point in the same place with someone else, but by that time you will be older, bitterer and less resilient than you are now to either fix things or do yet another new start.

We had marriage counselling and our counsellor described some of our fairly predictable patterns of quarrelling as a well rehearsed dance - we always do the same repeated steps and it ends in misery. The secret is to learn to realise you are going to be in the by now very familiar tailspin very soon and step back from it and do something to break that pattern. It is not actually that hard, but requires both of you to want that. Does not mean giving in each time - just realising how you trigger each others' malfunctional responses and avoid doing that.

FWIW, a quiet introverted wife instead of the current volatile one would likely be poison for you. As it is you two have the potential to be a blessing for each other by challenging each other to grow.

This sounds eerily similar to the situation myself and my DH got into about 6 months ago. We had both been under a lot of stress and not communicated properly – he, like yourself has always bottled up and struggled to understand emotions, I, like your wife am a bit more fiery and I want to discuss/argue when we have disagreements. Eventually my DH also reached the point where he snapped and couldn’t take anymore. He admitted he wasn’t sure he loved me anymore and I refused to believe it. Everything you have said about feeling controlled, etc echo my husband’s words.

We separated for a couple of months and started going to Relate. For a long time he said he was confused and couldn’t feel any positive emotions. Eventually he went to the GP and was diagnosed with severe depression and anxiety – he is now having treatment and individual counselling. I have also been working on myself and improving the way I communicate – mainly dealing with my anger and ‘nagging’ behaviour.

We are back together now and at a much stronger position than we ever have been. We have reached a point where we no longer need the relationship counselling and are doing well on our own. We have both made an effort and we are spending quality time together, enjoying each other’s company and making plans for the future. It has been the hardest and worst 6 months of my life and although we both still have the occasional wobble and probably still have a way to go, we are so glad that we put the effort in to make it work. You may not feel like it right now but hopefully this shows that if you both want to make it work, there is still hope.