Recent stuff:
I'm a techy and I work a manager level job so every laptop tablet and appliance in the house runs like quicksilver, but facing into weeding a lawn or clearing a drain on a saturday morning isn't my comfort zone. My wife works in finance and does not do manual labor at all. Over the years I've never been able to do anything manual around the house without criticism. I've built up a phobia at this point.
We had builders in two weeks ago and I rolled up my sleeves and helped them with the confidence that they were doing everything major, but we ran out of cash so some minor painting and hanging things was put off. Last week was month end so I was busy all week and looking forward to resting on Saturday, the first bank holiday weekend this year I had nothing planned. But early on saturday she turned on me and demanded I get all the work not done by the builders finished as well as cleaning up the garden. So Saturday, Sunday and most of Monday was me sweating and working hard. Conversely my wife watched football on Saturday, the F1 race on Sunday and slept 3 hours sunday afternoon, and then stormed out on Monday because I wasn't finished what she wanted and took the kids away for the day. When the kids went to bed I walked in to the kitchen to see her looking at the garden. She said a three year old would have done a better job and walked away. She didn't text call or email me all of Tuesday and I could feel she was going to come home and shout at me. I told the kids that when they went to bed that we were watching a movie so if they heard loud noises it was just the TV. It didn't really work. She stormed in and sent the kids to bed and immediately slammed the door and started shouting at me. after a few minutes our older son was crying outside the door. I told him go back to bed it would be ok but she swung up the door and screamed at him to get back upstairs. She said she wanted me out of the house by the end of the summer. She started shouting about our sex life and how shit I was at doing things around the house. I heard our youngest son crying and he said his stomach was sore. I guess the fighting and screaming was too stressful for him. I felt awful. It did cause a break in the fight. We got the kids settled back to bed and we came back to try and talk at a lower level.
She said we're beyond counselling, despite never having gone, but I asked her if we could just be civil to one and other while we worked this out. The following day she hadn't returned home at her usual time, I expected she was taking her time walking, so my son sent her a message on Hangouts. By the time she was home she was accusing me of manipulating the kids to message her to see what she was doing. Its not something I had even thought of, but I'm worried now that its a thought that going through her mind. I guess when I look back over the way she talks to me or tells me what she thinks I'm thinking its really just a reflection of the thoughts she's having about me, so I'm growing anxious again.
Older stuff:
Historically big fights were once a year maybe twice at most, but in the last two years every fight starts with her threatening to divorce me and dragging up every smaller fight since we got married. Its wearing me down. Nothing has ever been forgiven and nothing is forgotten. In 16 years I've only ever started a fight once where she was basically burning money on phone bills and hiding the bills from me. She was unemployed and relying on my wages at the time and When I found out and confronted her it ended with me eventually apologizing after she gave me 3 days of the silent treatment.
To end a recent fight I looked into couples counselling, arranged time off work, had the meeting booked, and then she backed down and wouldn't go. I was just happy it ended so left it at that.
After she attacked me again over something I immediately suggested counselling but this time she said it wouldn't work, and a few days later she calmed down again. She dragged up an incident we had a few months before but her recollection was different to mine so I decided to start making notes, like James Comey I guess. At this point I don't know whether her emotional state causes the memory problems or if she's manipulating me by changing the narrative on what happened, and hoping it was long enough ago that my memory was hazy, so the notes have helped.
This last year I've saved text and whatsapp messages too. She's strongly criticized me for doing things that she constantly does to me which I'm not allowed to mention because I know it would start another divorce threat fight.
I've really found myself in an awful place. There was love, there could be love, but I can't keep doing this. I've never made a large financial decision in the house. I've always had my family decisions double checked or rejected. My first thoughts at her leaving are always about what will happen to the kids. She wants me out now, but I'll have to live close so I can help with the kids. She won't cope. She has slept in for 10 years while I get up early, make the lunches and get the kids dressed. She is just back to work less than a year after 14 months stress leave. I know a lot of this is her anxiety and inability to deal with stress or anger but a part of me today wants to pull back and let her finally sleep in the bed she's making. Every other fiber in my body wants me to say the kids are moving in with me and she can have them at the weekend or some evenings. Where do we start, what do I do next, how do I cope. My world is literally falling down this week and I'm sitting her back in the office with 70 people expecting me to do my regular monday to friday job.
TL/DR every time she fights with me it starts with a threat to leave, but this time she's given me a deadline of the end of the summer
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