How to respond to hypervigilent wife's unfounded fear based accusations

[rekse]

My wife is often 100% positive I am looking at women inappropriately - but it is not happening. I admit I did occasionally when we were first dating but I worked very hard to learn to control where my eyes go as I do not want to disrespect or wrong my wife. While I have improved my end of things she seems to have gotten much worse and we have constant arguments with her insisting I did look and me saying I didn't. I have tried to steer away from explaining and denying and instead focus on demonstrating that I hear where she is coming from and showing her I understand how it much feel but when I do that she accuses me of blame shifting. Does anyone have suggestions on how I can respond in a helpful manner when this happens?

 

[Movingforward10]

If she's causing you of doing something you aren't, that needs addressing.
What's making her think you are when you think you aren't?

My ex accused me of looking at men walking past and I wouldn't have even noticed someone walked past never mind what sex they were. I resorted to looking at the ground only to avoid arguments. Which is NOT the way to deal with the situation.

It's not okay to keep accusing someone of doing something when they aren't.
It's not okay to not believe you and tell you that you are when you say you aren't.

Couple's counselling?

 

[rekse]

She was previously married to a man who leered at women constantly right in front of her and when we first started dating she called me on doing the same thing but to a much lessor degree. I did not realize I was acting inappropriately but once made aware I worked hard to control my gaze - and I now do and have for years now whether I'm with her or on my own. She says I have gotten "much better" but still believes I am doing it. And like you said, I often didn't even see the person she thought I looked at. When we go out in public I do look down and am pretty stressed out myself worrying about whether it's going to look like I looked at someone and when a scantily clad woman does cross out path I feel danger and panic myself and I know my nervous behavior makes me look suspicious and her more anxious.

 

[Movingforward10]

You're experiencing coercive control.
It's not okay.

This is her issue she needs to address.

 

[Dark.Green.Feathers]

You not leering is enough, feeling you have to always make her believe you and like this:

When we go out in public I do look down and am pretty stressed out myself worrying about whether it's going to look like I looked at someone and when a scantily clad woman does cross out path I feel danger and panic myself and I know my nervous behavior makes me look suspicious and her more anxious.

Is a very dysfunctional, stressful way to live.

You shouldn’t have to feel threatened by her potential perception of random people walking past you. You can’t control that. You’re already controlling what you can. Being anxious every time you go out in public isn’t good for you.

 

[rekse]

Thanks. You are preaching to the choir. I know it's unhealthy and I know it's her issue. She is going to counseling for it but she still sees me as being a major part of the problem and any time I try to talk about hyper-vigilance being a significant part of it and angle we need to discuss, try to understand better and learn how to both deal with - she balks and says I am blame shifting and not taking any responsibility. We have been to several marriage counselors but either they take my side or take her side or have nothing helpful to offer. In desperation I suggested we use CoPilot AI as a marriage counselor and we started that last night. Any suggestions on anything I can say or do to have a more positive result when these things happen would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Movingforward10]

Hypervigilence isn’t inventing things, so what she is doing is not that.

I’m sorry to say that this is not about you doing something different. This is about her wanting to change. Or not.

Have you given her boundaries: that she needs to address this once and for all?

 

[rekse]

I'm not sure how to do that in a way that would be helpful. She balks and insists I am blame shifting and says I don't take any responsibility when I try to talk about the role her hyper-vigilance plays. She says she is reliving her past with her ex and doesn't want to live like this and can't take it much longer - even though I'm not ever looking at other women. I very much fear she will end our marriage.

 

[Movingforward10]

I'm wondering about your sense of self worth and why you accept her decisions about what you are doing. That is the impact of coercive control. You take the responsibility for someone else's problem .

Perhaps you can't raise the issue in a way that she can hear. Not because you haven't found the right words , but because she is abusive and doesn't want to hear it.

 

[rekse]

I don't accept her decisions about what she thinks I'm doing. There were a few times early last year when I did slip up for a second but I always owned it and worked hard to control the impulse to look - and succeeded.

I do feel like she is abusive but I am sure it is not intentional and she does not realize it.

She shares bits and pieces of things her counselor says e.g. "what if he never changes?' and "he could be gaslighting" that makes me think she is paying someone to agree with her point of view and not consider mine - which make things worse. Her counselor offered to have me join a session and I have asked my wife to let me come but she doesn't want to do that. I asked her last week if she could ask her counselor in her next session about what role hyper-vigilance plays in the conflicts we have where she thinks I am looking and for advice she could pass on to me on how I can respond in a more helpful manner - but she said should couldn't remember what my questions were so she didn't ask.

Also, something huge with her is she says that she can't stand lying and deception and she says I lie to her. There are a handful of times that she has asked me something I was not expecting, I felt a bit intimidated and caught off guard and answered "no" when I should have said "yes" but within a few minutes acknowledged I should have said "yes." e.g. a few nights ago I was telling her about advice I gave to my adult son who is having issues and she asked "did you get that from CoPilot?" I took that as a disapproving question and my knee jerk response was to say "no" and my intent was to explain parts that I thought of myself and then add the part I got from CoPilot but before I could finish she cut me off and said if she looked on my phone she bet she would see where I had asked CoPilot. Then everything shifted to how I had told yet another lie, trust is broken and if she can't trust me about little things how can she trust me about big things. "A lie is a lie - it doesn't matter what it's about." But all of them are like this - where I am afraid to be truthful about something that I know she will not approve of that I don't see anything wrong with and have a momentary knee jerk denial followed by an admission that I was wrong.