Partner so defensive (why?) - i'm feeling really low

[AintMisbehaving]

Dear all,

Can I ask for some help/comments ? I am very open to anything I could do better.

My wife reacts with what appears to be anger at the drop of a hat, and its beginning to get me really down.
Anything I bring to her which she finds hard to deal with is met with a response of anger towards me. Over the years, once i figured this out, i avoided bringing things to her with a view of working things out myself would be easier knowing that help/support was not really there (from hard things like daughter being bullied, to stuff like cooking/shopping, organising/supervising play dates)

However, my daughter's bullying (over 3 years), recovery and helping her rebuild her self esteem proved to be hard to manage by myself - the problem is it would help so much to discuss what to do with someone as I often end up going round in circles in my head which is unproductive and exhausting - when things were bad I would not sleep all night. Doing the shopping/cleaning/cooking was easy than compared supporting my daughter through the dark times of depression.

I hope is that if I coped with the harder/boring stuff then things would get better as I could avoid difficult issues and keep the bulk of my wife anger away.

However, today i just mentioned if she had put oil in pan for pancakes and she responded with anger - apparently I should not talk to her when she is cooking - "that's a normal thing people know" - I have to admit I was not aware of that / i don't think it is true? Anyway, surprisingly, I felt really bad and later politely requested that if she could react without anger in that situation as it was impacting my health. The response was not positive (she took the impact on my health as me making a 'threat' to her??? ....I remembered why I stopped asking for things like that, things that would help me.

I have not spoken to anyone about this as i don't think it would change anything. In the past when things were really dark (daughter bulling and not going to school) I phoned the Samaritans, which helped, just talking about it cleared my head.

Socially my wife is seen as a happy person, only myself (and children) has seen the other side.

PS: I also was diagnosed with a minor cancer (but fortunately am clear to date :) ) However I knew immediately that telling my wife was pointless (for me) as she would focus on the impact on her. Perhaps others are in same boat too on that?

Your wife is emotionally abusive and you all need to get away from her. This behaviour isn’t normal and she’ll only be a negative influence on your daughter. Please speak to someone. She will only get worse. I hope you manage to sort something out

It doesn’t sound like she likes you very much. I’m sorry op

She sounds like my mum

Always thinking about the impact on her and with anger.

I went NC after she told me how hard my divorce was on her. How embarrassed she was to tell friends, my marriage was the one thing I had done that she was proud of (exh abused and eventually raped me) and I should have stayed no matter how hard. I was selfish for letting the kids come from a broken home (says the woman on her third marriage).

I can only advise leaving her. It wont change. You wont get support ever.

However, the one example you gave of telling her she should use oil when making pancakes, I think is a poor example. That wasnt you taking something difficult to her, that was you interfering when she is cooking. Alot of people would be annoyed about that. Like I said, I think that probably just a poor example. I am sure there are others. But it does make me wonder how you talk to her. You see that as being helpful, she probably doesnt.

You urgently need couples counselling to help communicate. Perhaps she is emotionally abusive (in which case counselling together is not recommended) or perhaps you are treating her like a child and shielding her which is enabling this behaviour. Did your wife not know for 3 years that her daughter was being bullied and had depression? How does your daughter feel about that? I totally understand the dilemma this places you in as DH has a personality disorder and can react in a similar way before he has time to process. I have stopped covering for or hiding things from him after a major event (near death of our newborn due to hospital negligence) brought all of this to the surface. You need to bite the bullet and start working on these issue or end the marriage.

What exactly was the pancake scenario?

What did you say to her and what did she say back?

How old is DD? Neither you nor DW sounds happy. COuld you separate?

Menopause?