Relationship It Might Be Time To Throw In My Cards....

[glass half full]

FWIW I believe this is the way it should always be.

I don't use the words should or always lightly....

Friday- thank you for sharing your thoughts. I appreciate your points about the differences between sacrifice and compromise and your point is well taken. I'm not sure that I've really been sacrificing in the usual sense though. He works overseas and has been isolating via lack of email/text/skype contact for seven weeks- well, one brief email three weeks ago- said I'm OK thank you. During this time, I've believed in "us" and in him that when he was ready to de-isolate we'd do what we need to to work through it. I believed in his previous pattern of much shorter periods of isolation repeating themselves and him coming back as he has before. But the longest before was two weeks- this is seven. I've lived my life pretty much as I always do since he's rarely around anyway- its been six months he since was last home.

In this time I learned a lot about PTSD and PTSD relationships. I wanted to be prepared for a future with him. Because I believed in us. That belief crumbled in the past two days. I don't know why, it just did. And I just let it rather than doing the work to shore up my confidence and belief in us- seven weeks with only one four word email is a long time to be strong. My belief may come back, and it might not. Only time will tell, but I just don't believe in us- or frankly, I dont believe in him and his love for me as I did. That may be more looking reality hard in the face than sacrifice.

 

[Deleted member 17302]

I'd love some feedback on this, please. Its been seven weeks since my sufferer went dark. He sto...

Love is a choice, not a feeling alone. There will always be times in a marriage where you don't feel the love but forge forward anyway. Isolation times can be a day, week, month, months, year, years. Many people say around 2 months, 3 months, 6 months, and 12 months from all the stories I've read through. After over a decade of time and not talking to my ex wife, I remember why I liked her so much but didn't until I had reconnected communication with her. Still happy for her but that wasn't the point of the statement. Don't always trust your emotions. They betray most of humanity.

That however doesn't change anything. You can move on, stay waiting, or whatever. Your life, your choices, your outcomes.

 

[glass half full]

Love is a choice, not a feeling alone. There will always be times in a marriage where you don't feel...

Thank you, Mr. Smith. True words and I appreciate the reminder. I don't intend to walk away, nor walk the other way should he de-isolate. I'll still be here. I think more than anything I needed to be able to admit to myself that I'm tired of being strong, dammit. I'm tired of being ignored- I've never had the personality that tolerates being ignored very well- LOL! I do realize that this is not the same kind of ignoring, tho..

This is hard and I am tired. And I am grateful to have a safe place to say it and great people who have provided me the feedback I needed. I have so appreciated the viewpoints that have been shared with me here. It will help me get my head back on again. I am going to date myself here, but when I was in college there were these cheesy posters in so many dorm rooms- If you love something set it free, if it comes back to you love it forever. If it doesn't, it was never meant to be. I am going to let it go for awhile and see if it/he comes back. For my own sake, at least for a few days- I need to lighten up.

Thanks again for your words of wisdom. I needed to hear that.

 

[Olivia2016]

Love is a choice, not a feeling alone. There will always be times in a marriage where you don't feel...

I relate to what you said here. I think it is important to distinguish between our true desires and temptations. Life IS very short, and I would not want to live it so that when I looked back I would be upset and ashamed that I could not have strength and resolve to stick with my principles and my true path in life. The expression "life is short" does not imply to me that we need to have all the fun and happy time in the world, it means that I don't want to go wrong, because there may be not enough time to do it over next time. PTSD is a very deceitful illness: my opinion about the reasons why my husband walked away from a perfect marriage changes several times a day, from blaming it all on the illness to blaming it all on him. It is very hard to keep faith and hope, but I am doing it for myself, not for him or for the relationship, because not doing so would definitely crush my spirit and soil my soul.
As to going out for a dinner, I think "glass half full" is absolutely right, dinner is just a dinner. I am going to a dinner with my girl friend too tonight, there is nothing wrong with living your life while waiting for something that may never happen! I am just watching not to confuse temptations of our very limited popular view of life purpose with my true desires and directions.

 

[Deleted member 17302]

The expression "life is short" does not imply to me that we need to have all the fun and happy time in the world, it means that I don't want to go wrong, because there may be not enough time to do it over next time.

Well said.

 

[glass half full]

I relate to what you said here. I think it is important to distinguish between our true desires and t...

Thank you Olivia. Just for clarity, my sufferer and I do not have a long history together. We met a few days before he departed for the contract job he's currently working in the Middle east, so we're just about a year, but not really a year together..
Because of where he works, we largely got to know each other via email/text/skype. He was home for three weeks in August/September. I shared him for two of those weeks, we had one week of just us- the whole week before he went back. Neither of us are kids and by this time in life we all have or should have a pretty good sense of who we are compatible with and who we should run from whether or not we actually run when we should. This was a relationship that should be nurtured. We're very compatible - but he had been doing well for quite some time. I knew about the PTSD. I tried to educate myself. I didn't understand it and in fact didn't even recognize it the first time I got smacked upside the head by it, although I suspected it might be a factor. (dont take the word smacked too literally, zero aggression of any type toward me)

I strongly suspect that working in the Middle East has caused him to have exacerbated symptoms and there's not a lot he can do about it. Frankly, he's living in an isolated housing compound with a couple of hundred other guys who are also experiencing PTSD symptoms to varying degrees. YIKES!!!! He's a vet and of course his employer hires other vets who can't or don't feel ready to come home yet. He downplayed the environment, but I'm not dumb.

My point here is that we don't have a long history. While I've believed our relationship and connection was strong enough to get us through this year- I have no idea what his living environment has done to him, but as I set out above, I do not believe its been positive. This, combined with seven weeks of silence- with the exception of one short email- I really have no idea where he's at emotionally right now. The continued silence says to me that he's not in a good place though. This scares me. While I strongly believed he would pop up again as he has before, I try to be a optimistic realist. And the realist has been more vocal the past couple of days- I do not know what I'm dealing with and whether he will feel healthy enough to come home, stay home or try to renew our relationship. I just dont know any of that. I want to believe that he will and that we can. But I not only have no control over that, I am not sure I even have any influence over that. I probably dont. That's scary as hell for me right now. I'm not walking away, but I'm scared. And I want to protect myself from being hurt even more than I have been already at the same time, I want to be ready to do what I can to support and help him, if he'll let me. Its a heavy load to try to balance and its kicked my ass these past couple of days.

 

[Olivia2016]

I do not know what I'm dealing with and whether he will feel healthy enough to come home, stay home or try to renew our relationship. I just dont know any of that. I want to believe that he will and that we can. But I not only have no control over that, I am not sure I even have any influence over that. I probably dont. That's scary as hell for me right now. I'm not walking away, but I'm scared.

I really sympathize with your situation. I understand so well what you feel. I have been married to my husband for 7 very happy years (and we are not spring chickens, we do know what we need and what we have, too), and I could have written your exact words here. I don't know what I am dealing with, I don't know if he will get better, I don't know whether he will try to continue our relationship. Saying this just to let you know that this is not only your recent relationship, but something that has been tested and proved that is also crumbling due to PTSD. I feel hurt and am afraid to be hurt even more, but I decided for myself that it is better to be hurt than to sabotage the relationship and just move on. However, these decisions are very personal, and circumstances are all unique, so I wish you to figure out what to do and to be happy with your decisions. Just know that you are not the only one who is going through exactly same hard time, it all is just a typical PTSD situation and not anything particular about your relationship. As I said above, it feels so personal and so hurtful that I keep changing my mind about the situation constantly: sometimes I am sure this is PTSD, and it will get better, and we will be together again; other times, I feel that this is a clear mind decision, and there is nothing to fix it. What helps me is remembering how our relationship and our time together looked and felt before he went through the traumatic experience and his PTSD started, this gives me strength to hope for the best in the future too.

 

[EveHarrington]

Please take care of yourself.

I think that all relationships require give and take on both sides. When one person refuses any sort of engagement? There's nothing that the other person can do to make everything alright.

 

[Sweetpea76]

I second @EveHarrington... You can't make a relationship work all by yourself. You have you give yourself as much love and consideration as you give him.

 

[glass half full]

I really sympathize with your situation. I understand so well what you feel. I have been married to m...

Olivia, thank you for sharing your situation with me. I am obviously trying to make sense of my reality right now and anyway I look at it, it comes down to - whatever the reason, he has decided not to communicate with me and has decided not to respond to what i have said up to now. Some while back he told me that even when he doesn't respond he does read what I have to say. At the time I thought that was weird and as I started learning about PTSD I began to think well, maybe it wasn't weird after all. At least he was not totally isolating. But the bottom line is- if he can read it he can do more than one four word email in seven weeks. I've tried to find explanations and then make excuses. There may be legitimate explanations for some of this, but there is still the fact of choice here and his choice to continue not to respond. I dont like that at all. I don't deserve that.

 

[glass half full]

Please take care of yourself.

I think that all relationships require give and take on both sides...

Eve and Sweetpea- thank you. As hard as it is to see the words that he is refusing any sort of engagement with me- that's exactly what it is. He is refusing. I have to sccept that and let go. You are right- I can't fix it. And I'm wearing myself out trying to figure out how to. I can't. Thank you for saying what I needed to hear.

 

[Deleted member 17302]

Olivia, thank you for sharing your situation with me. I am obviously trying to make sense of my...

I might be able to explain this a bit. When I have a terrible thing in life, I dread people asking "hey, how you doing?" because I hate lying so my answer tends to be, "pretty terrible" or "good, bad, and ugly". Then they follow up with "oh, what's wrong?" to which I then have to lie, say don't worry about it, or actually tell them the horrible things I just don't want to talk about.

Conversation is a flow that is predictable and when you feel like shit, you really don't want to keep talking about it and so the alternative is to just ignore those messages all together so you don't have a chance of having a conversation you just are not equipped to deal with at the moment. When I'm depressed or pissed off, I know that I can't respond rationally and that when forced to, it is just going to make things worse for the relationship, for myself, or for the other party.

Not replying cuts off any chance of shitty fall out that can be blamed on that reply or conversation. Not replying does have shitty fall out sometimes but it can't be blamed on what was said so is seen as a better option. When you have no good options, the best option is the least shitty option and that is the one you pick. Much like if you are very depressed, killing yourself vs staying alive, you pick staying alive because even if staying alive is miserable at the time, it is the least shitty option.

I've had days where I don't reply to people because it would just make my depression worse and the only way to get out of the depression hole was to destress, do something happy, and not do anything that could cause more frustration such as hearing things like, "aw, well it will get better", "just pray about it", "just stop being upset, because it doesn't help" (seriously wtf on those last two), and hearing other things that you already know and have thought about or are already doing. Frustration doesn't help get destressed.