My husband came by this afternoon to fix the outside faucet on the house. He was very rude, curt, and hateful to me. This started with him about a month ago. Up until that time, we were going out to dinner with each other once a week. Now, he has turned into a monster. I realize that is a something they do, and I hate this monster!! Does this last a long time? Today when he was telling me that he can't wait for the divorce to be over so he won't have to see me or talk to me ever again, I wanted to kill him and hug him at the same time. And then I thought, great, now I'm cracking up!
So, right now I am really depressed and discouraged. I do not believe in divorce. But, I think if he doesn't come out of this I am headed for one anyway. One thing I don't understand is how can they come out of this if they have cut off communication with their family, church, old friends, etc.? He is surrounded by people who are patting him on the back for leaving his wife. It's his new group of low life friends that he would have never even associated with before.
How have the rest of you midlife veterans coped with monster? This is pure hell on earth and I'm not sure I will be able to go through it all without some pointers from people who have gone before me! I have read all of the resources. Guess I just need some more help.
CK, do not take your H's spew personally. It really has nothing to do with you. Distance yourself from him. Do what you can to have no contact with him unless absolutely necessary. This is for you. The less you listen to his garbage the easier on you it becomes. Take this time to work on yourself and become the best you you can be.
Yes, they do pull away from everyone. They are running trying to escape their pain. They figure a new life with new people will 'fix' them. All it is is a band-aid. This stage is called Replay and they will remain in it until they stop running and examine themselves inside and start to resolve the issues that have been pushed way down. An ow if there is one will show up in this stage.
Please take care CK and know that you are not alone. We're all here to help each other through a sitch that none of us asked for. Patience is the key to this whole thing. It is not a short or easy roller coaster ride.
CK, yep, this is very typical behavior, nothing you can do to fix it or him. Best advice if you want to stick it out is set strict boundaries and distance yourself from hi. Focus on YOU, have only absolute necessary contact with him, don't make yourself available to him, don't take his calls, don't let him know what you are doing. Begging and sitting around waiting on him will only make things worse.
CK, he is acting this way because he is VERY confused..and confusion brings out all sorts of behavior.
DETACH and DISTANCE from his behavior. Don't take it personally..this is something HE has to figure out, not you. It has NOTHING to do with you, and everything to do with him.
Even though he is deep within this, his conscience is STILL nagging him, don't think it's not.
Most generally think a divorce is going to rid them of all the pain because they are thinking of the wife/husband as the one at fault, the MLC'er is looking at OUTSIDE influences instead of looking within where the problem really is.....it is NOT your fault, and don't buy into that....you didn't break him, and you cannot fix him.
He has to fix himself. There's NOTHING you can do to help him. The kindest thing you can do for him is to leave him alone and provide him with NO ways to justify his actions, which are WRONG..but he'll have to be the one who figures that out.
Focus on yourself..it's not that you can't ask questions, but the more you get sucked into his drama, the worse you're going to feel.
It doesn't matter what you do at this point, he's going to do what he thinks he has to do, regardless of how you feel about it..so, take the advice, and back away, working on YOU.
It's not easy to deal with, but act 'as if' things are ok..some say fake it until you make it.
The only way you're going to be able to deal is to step out of his drama, and stand on the outside looking in. And even then, you'll need to stop allowing his behavior to affect you.
The more upset and argumentative you get, the worse it will get, and the more it will feed his justification for what he's doing.
Take away the ammunition,(upset, arguments) and you take away his power to hurt you.
The funny thing is if you start agreeing with him, he'll most likely argue the other way..I saw that happen, not once but several times with my husband, LOL...I know it's not funny, but to see what happened, I started agreeing with EVERYTHING bad he said...the next thing I know we're aguing the OTHER way..and it was just as bad.
Let him go..it's the only way you'll be able to deal, let him go, let God deal with him. Get on with your life AS IF he's not going to come back into it.
Don't contact him unless you HAVE to, he needs to THINK about what he's doing on his own..nothing you say will make one bit of difference to him...YOU'RE the enemy right now, and you need to make yourself a smaller target. Or better, yet, remove yourself entirely from the equation for right now.
No crying, no begging; it's "needy" behavior, guaranteed to drive him further away from you. It will also increase his disrespect of you.
You are not going to be able to make him see reason, it just doesn't work..so stop, and regroup within yourself, take your journey to see where you need to improve within YOUR life, and leave him to his own devices for now.
I have been there, done that..the situation was different, but the actions, hateful attitude was the SAME.
Until I could detach and distance myself out of his drama, I suffered greatly because of it..and it was unnecessary suffering that I could have prevented if I'd just backed myself out of it in the beginning and let him go.
Pray for your husband; for God to work within his heart, and also ask Him to show you what you need to do within yourself to grow as a result of this trial.
When your husband put you on this path, he gave you an opportunity to learn about YOU.
Just let go and let God..
Much love, HB
Remember, as each person is different, every MLC/Transition is different..what works for one may not work for another. Most of the time it is trial and error for ALL involved.
Thank you. Reading this, I couldn't help but think that I know all of this. I know this is the best way to deal with this situation. And long, long ago I used this same technique on an old boyfriend and it worked like a charm. However, being with someone for 33 yrs. is a little bit different than some teenage crush.
I don't think it will be any problem distancing myself from him after this last time because he really cut to the core in hurting me. However, I did manage to state facts to him, which of course, he didn't agree with.
When I asked him to show me how to use the lawnmower (yes, I know I was a sheltered woman, because he never let me mow the lawn before!) he was making comments under his breath about how I didn't know anything. I told him that when he lived here, he took care of most of this stuff, but after abandoning me, I have to learn how to do it all. He said he didn't abandon me. I told him that he could call it whatever he wanted to, but the fact remains that he did in fact abandon me.
Later on he said something about only being my husband on paper. I said no, you are my husband in every sense of the word. I told him he must have forgotten the covenant we made when we said our vows. He just grumbled at that.
On Easter Sunday afternoon, I sent him a text message informing him that one of our sons was having some temporary financial difficulties and needed $200.00 bucks by Monday. I told him that I was going to give him what I could and my daughter would too. I said if you could give him a little, that would really help out. Well, this turned into a text war where he accused me of making the entire thing up only to get money from him. He told me I reminded him of the Queen of Egypt from the movie "The Ten Commandments". I laughed since I knew he must have watched it on TV recently. He then tried to tell me that my kids thought the same thing and wished I would just stay out of their lives. I was actually at church when I got this text from him. My daughter read it and promptly sent a text to her brother and asked him if he said anything about me. He emphatically told her no, he had not said a thing about me. Then my h sends me a text letting me know he drove to my house and put a check under the doormat with a note on it that I had requested this money. I told him I would give him the check back since I never asked for money for me....he should have given it to our son.
I am still amazed at how what I thought was a simple parent thing to help one of our kids was turned into WWIII. I am so sorry I ever mentioned a thing to him. I just thought he could manage to be civil about some things.
He also complained and said it was my fault the trial date for the divorce is not until November 9th. I laughed and said, I have no control over the judge's calendar. His attorney requested an entire day since he plans on bringing in all of my old employers to slander me. The only full day she had was in Nov. I told him I believed God was in that since I didn't want a divorce and wanted time. I reminded him that he kept telling me I had to go through the process. I said so don't complain now that you also have to go through the process. He said I could have agreed to go before a magistrate. I told him it was not in my best interest to do that, but it is much better to go before this judge. (a woman who my attorney said I was fortunate to be assigned to) I said just because you want a quick divorce does not mean that your wife is going to make stupid decisions about the rest of her life. He then told me his life was going to be ruined and he would have no money for himself ever again. I told him maybe he should have thought about that before he did all this! That's when he started spewing all the hate towards me. He looked like a kid having a temper tantrum because he was being told the facts.
It's hard to look at what my husband is now when it's so different from the kind, Christian man he used to be. I pray for him all the time and ask God to put a hedge of protection around him. I also ask God to give him favor and that he would prosper in everything he does. And, I have added in that I want God to put a hedge of thorns around him to keep away any people (mostly women-Ha!) that would try to harm him.
Do they remember doing any of this stuff when they come out of MLC?
I think they're mean to us b/c they have so much guilt. It's important to stay detach, so you don't get drawn into their warped view of who they think you are.
If you take the bait and argue and fight, it will justify what they maybe thinking at the time.
See he doesn't listen to me. All he wants to do is hear his own voice. What an a$$. I was right all we do is argue, this marriage will never work.
The two examples are what I learned from my W's MLC. As you will quickly see we do all the learning while they act like teenagers.
I think you need to listen to the advice that has been given to you. Your last post contains a fair amount of "defense statements". Trust me when I tell you that this is not going to help. Nothing you say or do will make him face HIS own issues - nothing.
Consider that right now you are dealing with a selfish teenage that has a sence of entitlement. You cannot change this - you can only has HB suggested let go and let God.
Work on yourself dear...enjoy your kids...let him be. God willing he will eventually deal with his issues and then attempt to come back to you. If that happens, you would have changed yourself and become what you so desire but you need to work on yourself and detach to do this.
Quote:
He looked like a kid having a temper tantrum because he was being told the facts.
Right now he is a kid and YOU are the adult.
God Bless you, Eric
"The difficulties of Life are intended to make us BETTER,not bitter". "Fear is a prison, where you are the jailer. FREE YOURSELF!" "Life is usually all about how you handle Plan B." - Jack3Beans
