30 years married

[Murdock]

Hello, I’ve been married for 30 years. I’m 55. When we started dating it was fantastic! Like all relationships. After we got married, she started to suffer from PTSD from being abused as a child. This led to Depression, suicidal attempts, Bi -polar personality disorder and a host of other things to numerous to type. I am no saint and not the easiest to live with. BUT, I have stayed true and faithful to her. But there is no closeness or affection. No physical intimacy for over 4 years. Yet, I’m still faithful. No easy. She is always complaining of something. Nothing I ever do is right and everything I say is taken wrong. Like I said I am not perfect. I have a temper, not violent but loud. I also joke when I shouldn’t. I never worry about tomorrow and Honest to God, more times than not, I wake up singing. Then she’ll tell me, not ask, tell me to stop because she doesn’t want to hear it. I am just so fed up and miserable. I just want to know I’m not a Disney villain. You know? I don’t care about her. All I do is yell. I’m always wrong ect. ect. Anyone else deal with this?

 

[JJW]

Anyone else deal with this?

Similar. She has to have what she wants. Never a notion to what I might want. It's not that she thinks I'm always wrong. I never get a full sentence. How could it be wrong?

Make choices for yourself. If she can't cope with that, let her make the next move.

One thing. If you control your anger... if you stop giving her your power, she'll have to deal with what's wrong between you. It's hard to argue one sided. You do your thing, let her do hers. Don't let her get under your skin. See where it goes.

Advice is free. And it's everywhere. Find all you can and use what makes sense. Ignore what doesn't. I'll deny this conversation ever took place. This post will self destruct... well, when it needs to. Good luck.

 

[Murdock]

Lol understood! What post?

 

[vauxhallastra]

30 years, that’s pretty amazing.

Me and you and JJW seem to all be in similar relationships (although I’ve been married for only 6 years).

My wife has borderline personality disorder (and depression), which I have read a couple of books about, and seems to be a ‘catch-all’ term for when someone (usually female) behaves ridiculously unreasonably, and then doesn’t/can’t/won’t acknowledge it.

Without bothering to go into too much detail, my wife can be absurdly difficult at times (like when she blamed me, repeatedly, for her taxes, even after I had filled out the forms and paid them for her). I don’t have a temper though - if anything, I think it might even help if I did. I let her get away with far too much.

While I am by no means advocating for a return to the ‘traditional’ marriage, where men were in charge and women did as they were told, I do think that if women are indulged, they become entitled emotionally, the same way men become entitled sexually. Personally, I think that corporations and governments should be run by women, and households should be run by a man, but that’s a different subject (might start a thread about it).

I think one of the ironies is that what women say they want in a relationship - security - is that when they have it, it ruins their relationship.

As soon as a woman feel ‘secure’ in a relationship, she lets rip (not all women, I’m talking about my experience here). Once she’s confident that her partner won’t hit her back, that she won’t get arrested, that he won’t leave her, that she won’t be censured by her peers - basically, that there are no consequences for her actions - she’ll start to behave contemptuously towards him whenever she feels like it. This might be true of men too, I guess.

If she wants to call her bf/husband an ******* who doesn’t care about her feelings, then, well, why not? If he yells back, he’s proving her point.

(Not all the time, I hasten to add - in fact, I doubt it’s ever really an every day occurrence - but this kind of thing only has to happen a few times and then ‘negative sentiment override’ kicks in - no matter how good things are from then on, she’ll always be the person who threw a saucepan at you for no reason and still maintained it was your fault, or whatever. The trust is gone).

 

[JJW]

I don’t have a temper though - if anything, I think it might even help if I did. I let her get away with far too much.

Amen

If she wants to call her bf/husband an ******* who doesn’t care about her feelings, then, well, why not? If he yells back, he’s proving her point.

Damned if we do, damned if we don't.

I'll add, while we (the men) are talking about our wives, this is a personality issue, not a gender one. There are women with the same complaint about their husbands.

 

[vauxhallastra]

Amen

Damned if we do, damned if we don't.

I'll add, while we (the men) are talking about our wives, this is a personality issue, not a gender one. There are women with the same complaint about their husbands.

Louis CK: "Men do damage like a hurricane, damage that you can measure in dollars. Women leave a scar on your psyche like an atrocity."

Neither is good!

 

[user 181674]

I wasn't married, but was in a 4 year relationship. Two of the years we were living together. What you guys describe here is very similar to what I experienced. When I had a heart attack about a year ago that almost killed me, that's when I finally had had enough when she picked a fight with me when I was in ICU. So now, I'm a lonely guy but at least I'm not getting my face ripped off for no apparent reason.

 

[Just_another_one]

I really can't figure out why you all continue with such sad marriages that do harm to both you and your other one.
Sometimes you must find the courage to put an end to it, for your and you other's sake.

 

[vauxhallastra]

I really can't figure out why you all continue with such sad marriages that do harm to both you and your other one.
Sometimes you must find the courage to put an end to it, for your and you other's sake.

because of love. For me, anyway. If she would just make an effort to control her self-centredness (and not just towards me, to everyone, her family as well) and not lash out whenever she feels like it, our relationship would be good. Most of the time it is. It's the completely needless tantrums that ruin everything.

I read in a book recently (a book written for women) that it is really important to understand that your partner's feelings are just as important as yours, that it is 50-50 - just because you are dealing with something, doesn't mean that you are allowed to make your partner suffer, they are not obligated to 'deal with your bad feelings'. That is all my wife needs to do.

 

[vauxhallastra]

I really can't figure out why you all continue with such sad marriages that do harm to both you and your other one.
Sometimes you must find the courage to put an end to it, for your and you other's sake.

I tell you another story - a friend of mine got married, and had a child. After only about 2 years of being married, his wife started telling him "I could do much better than you", "you don't treat me well enough" (he did), "I want a divorce" etc. So they split up.

They both got remarried. My friend is again unhappy with his current wife (he had an affair, but that's on him, and a different story). He stills sees his first wife because they have a son together. She also got married, again, and got divorced, again.

Now, 10 years later, she tells him that she made a huge mistake in treating him this way, that he took care of her, that she wished she had stayed with the 'nice guy' and been nicer to him. And he has to tell her, "I'm sorry, it's too late. I tried to tell you this at the time, but you wouldn't listen." Now they are both in other bad relationships and miserable.

My wife is a little bit like this. She gets angry, she sulks, and she can be impossible to live with. But most of the time she tells me that she can't live without me, most of the time we are good together. Most of the time. But then she loses her temper about something stupid, and she won't back down, she won't take responsibility..............I know that if we split up for good, we would both regret it in future. But I can't see an alternative, as she makes my life impossible.

 

[Just_another_one]

I tell you another story - a friend of mine got married, and had a child. After only about 2 years of being married, his wife started telling him "I could do much better than you", "you don't treat me well enough" (he did), "I want a divorce" etc. So they split up.

They both got remarried. My friend is again unhappy with his current wife (he had an affair, but that's on him, and a different story). He stills sees his first wife because they have a son together. She also got married, again, and got divorced, again.

Now, 10 years later, she tells him that she made a huge mistake in treating him this way, that he took care of her, that she wished she had stayed with the 'nice guy' and been nicer to him. And he has to tell her, "I'm sorry, it's too late. I tried to tell you this at the time, but you wouldn't listen." Now they are both in other bad relationships and miserable.

My wife is a little bit like this. She gets angry, she sulks, and she can be impossible to live with. But most of the time she tells me that she can't live without me, most of the time we are good together. Most of the time. But then she loses her temper about something stupid, and she won't back down, she won't take responsibility..............I know that if we split up for good, we would both regret it in future. But I can't see an alternative, as she makes my life impossible.

I would say that your friend's ex wife didn't much miss him but she missed the idea of him... Cause after a lifetime when things are over and you start new ending up in a worse situation you just remember the good times. But neither he nor she were happy in their marriage.

If most of the time you're happy together, you don't have a bad marriage. I don't think flawless marriages exist...

 

[vauxhallastra]

I would say that your friend's ex wife didn't much miss him but she missed the idea of him... Cause after a lifetime when things are over and you start new ending up in a worse situation you just remember the good times. But neither he nor she were happy in their marriage.

If most of the time you're happy together, you don't have a bad marriage. I don't think flawless marriages exist...

Ah, but this is my point - my friend did not want to end his first marriage, he wanted them to stay together, but she was absolutely adamant (and this was after they had been married only 2 years). I don't think his first wife was 'unhappy' either, she just thought she was, because the grass is always greener, she thought she deserved more, etc.

Then when she has been married and divorced again (for the third time, I think, or maybe even fourth - and she is only age approx 40), she realises that she made a mistake with my friend. She still thinks this, as far as I know. But he has now moved on, and I think she has 3 children by 3 different fathers (and my friend has 2 children by 2 different mothers - complicated!).

 

[Just_another_one]

Then when she has been married and divorced again (for the third time, I think, or maybe even fourth - and she is only age approx 40),

Sorry but this one is pathologically unsatisfied I wouldn't consider her as an example of bad marriages since I have a feeling that every marriage would be a bad one with her