A Marriage In Crisis

[Poofycat]

My husband and I fell into a similar rut earlier this year. He was constantly on his phone. CONSTANTLY. I repeatedly told him that it made me feel like I wasn't there, but he never understood. It took me leaving him for 5 days to realize the severity of the problem (there was other stuff besides the phone of course, but that was the last straw). At that point we were both able to agree to go to couples counseling which quite literally saved our marriage and taught us to communicate and work as a team again.

You deserve to have a say in your relationship. You deserve the respect and support of your partner. She might be super stressed, but you are too, and if you work together as a team you might find it's easier to deal with the stress.

If you haven't been able to communicate your needs thus far, then you need to change up your communicate method. Maybe try writing her a letter. That way she can't interrupt you and can re-read it several times. I wrote my husband a letter when I left and he said he read it at least 100 times.

 

[bring em all in]

Thanks for the perspective desiderata:) She is dealing with physical and emotional issues of her own. By love do you mean sex? I can see that it is love/sex no matter who initiates it. But I don't think it is the same for affection. And I do ask. I ask her to massage my shoulders or forehead (I get terrible headaches). She does so for about a minutes and says, "How was that?"

Poofycat- I've been thinking about writing also. She spends 90% of her non-working, non-sleeping time on Facebook and I find out more about what's on her mind and how she's feeling by reading her page. I post less personal things that I think might be of interest to her on my page but she rarely responds. I did vent one day and the reply I got was, "Put a sock in it."

I guess what I can do for now is work on myself. I'm so messed up (nearly checked myself in-patient just before Christmas) and I'm starting with a new therapist next Monday. I think at this point anything I'd share with her wouldn't make much sense, or else it would come out too harshly (having been kept inside for so long).

 

[dulcia]

My husband and I fell into a similar rut earlier this year. He was constantly on his phone. CONSTANTLY...

This is great advice. Even if you don't feel comfortable letting her read the letter in the end, it can help some by just getting all of your feelings out. I have written a letter to my SO when we've needed to talk about something serious, because he tends to avoid serious conversations (by cutting off, changing the subject, escalating into an argument, etc.). I have also done the same thing with email when I haven't had time to sit down and write a letter. I tell him he doesn't have to read it and he doesn't have to respond, but that I needed him to know the things I was sending him.....but every time he has read it.

If the person doesn't want to pay attention to what you are saying, is it worth it to ask them to? My wife constantly cuts me off in mid-sentence or doesn't respond to something I've said at all. If she doesn't want to listen, should I try to over-talk her to be heard? Even when she seems to be listening and not interrupting I can sense her chomping at the bit for me to end what I'm saying so she can say what she wants- and oftentimes it isn't about what I was talking about at all.

You've got a tough situation on your hands. I don't really have any answers, unfortunately.

 

[bring em all in]

This is great advice. Even if you don't feel comfortable letting her read the letter in the end, it...

Thanks for the reply- writing a letter (even if I don't give it to her) is a great idea. It's not an idea that's new to me- but it never crossed my mind in this situation! That's what I love about these forums. Sometimes they offer new strategies and tools to use, and other times they remind us of what we already know but have forgotten in the fog of our current experience.