advice please

iVillage Member
Registered: 11-21-2004
advice please
28
Tue, 11-08-2005 - 9:20am

My DH and I have been together for a little over 4 years and been married for a little over one year.

cl for Ask Fit By Friday

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iVillage Member
Registered: 05-29-2003
In reply to: ihappy1980
Tue, 11-08-2005 - 10:58am
Sorry, but I'm with your husband on this one. You say that you discuss your husband and your marital relationship with friends, and you imply that everyone does this. No, everyone doesn't do this. Most women I know don't do this. I don't do this. I don't even discuss my husband or marriage with my mother with whom I have a close relationship. This is a terrible violation of trust and a transgression of your union with your husband.
Be honest now. How would you like it if your husband yakked about you and your problems to all of his friends and co-workers? How would you like it if he relayed every conversation, every arguement, and every pissy mood you were in? How about your oddities and eccentricities? You would feel betrayed, and rightly so.
If you need to talk to someone about your marriage, talk to your husband first. If that doesn't help, talk to your clergy or a marriage counselor. DO NOT broadcast the ups-and-downs and the intimacies of your marriage to the outside world.
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
In reply to: ihappy1980
Tue, 11-08-2005 - 11:17am

Welcome to the board, Ihappy1980 ~


I disagree with Ivdarian (which is unusual), but in my experience most women do discuss problems they're having with their friends and I don' t think looking for a place to vent those problems or look for suggestions in resolving them is wrong.








"Ignoring the facts
does not change the facts"
iVillage Member
Registered: 11-21-2004
In reply to: ihappy1980
Tue, 11-08-2005 - 12:16pm

I guess I gave the wrong

cl for Ask Fit By Friday
iVillage Member
Registered: 10-13-2004
In reply to: ihappy1980
Tue, 11-08-2005 - 6:03pm

I've been following your post and was going to reply...however, upon reading your reply to 2nd life, I've got a couple of more questions. At this point, there are a few things that don't quite add up.

I can understand why ivdarian made the assumption that you were telling ALL your friends and co-workers about your marital problems. It was because your husband won't go to ANY social events. Which brings me to the question: If you are only discussing these problems with a close couple of friends, why won't he see your other friends?

I completely understand you asking for advice on domestic repairs. (I do it all the time) However, asking for advice on, say, plumbing is not even remotely similar to disucssing marital concerns. How did your husband come to be aware that you were discussing actual marital problems?

2nd life said >>Was there a bad experience that involved talking to your friends about problems or did you have a particularly difficult problem that he was uneasy with them knowing about?<<

Thanks for sharing with us the discussion topics that you raise with your friends. What I'm wondering (and I suspect cl-2ndlife is wondering too) is: has anything *which your husband didn't like* happened in your marriage as a result of your conversations with your friends?

Sorry to hit you with questions rather than answers, but it's so important to get a clear view of the situation you are in.

Dress Up Games, Doll Makers and Cartoon Dolls @ The Doll Palace
iVillage Member
Registered: 08-09-2005
In reply to: ihappy1980
Tue, 11-08-2005 - 8:06pm

The best advice I ever got

~MissApril
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
In reply to: ihappy1980
Tue, 11-08-2005 - 10:03pm

You're going to hate me, Ihappy, because again, I have more questions than anything else.


First of all, based on what you've said, I just don't get where his big upset is coming from and secondly, it sounds like there may be more than one problem involved here. His refusing to see any of your friends because you asked for home repair advice makes no sense, unless he's the controlling, dominating type that has to prove he knows everything and can do everything and by asking for advice you indicated he's "incapable". Is it possible that because of the one conversation he's aware of he's blown it up and believes you tell everyone everything? Is he judgmental? Is it possible that assuring him you don't share *everything * with your friends (and specifically this money issue), that you'd alleviate his fears and make him more open to seeing your friends? When did the money issue occur?


You said this changed after about a year of marriage, did anything else in your relationship change drastically at or around that same time? You said you're working on your communication problem, what things are you doing to work on it?


You said you have trouble communicating because you don't want to be insulting. Do you have problems with everyone or just him? Have you always had problems communicating in a non-insulting manner in a relationship or is it just in your relationship with him? Is it possible that it's his interpretation rather than something you're actually doing? Does he get upset, offended or misinterpret easily? If so, with everyone or mostly you?


While I do agree that this is a problem, I think that if he's always had the attitude of "you can come along if you want to but it's not necessary" it's pretty clear that he sees the "couples appearance" as much less important than you do. I think that may be a part of why he's not interested in seeing your friends, do you?







~ cl-2nd_life

"You can't control the length of your life,
but you can control the width and depth."

~ Author unknown

my signature exchange partner:








"Ignoring the facts
does not change the facts"
iVillage Member
Registered: 11-21-2004
In reply to: ihappy1980
Wed, 11-09-2005 - 7:13am

"I think that if he's always had the attitude of "you can come along if you want to but it's not necessary" it's pretty clear that he sees the "couples appearance" as much less important than you do. I think that may be a part of why he's not interested in seeing your friends, do you"

cl for Ask Fit By Friday
iVillage Member
Registered: 10-11-2005
In reply to: ihappy1980
Wed, 11-09-2005 - 10:00am

Ihappy, I would like to say that I tell my girlfriends (and some guys friends) pretty much everything about my life. In return, they tell me pretty much everything about their lives. I know all about their arguments, acts of kindness, menstrual cycles, fantasies, hopes, failures, the size of their husband’s penis, etc. That is why we are friends. They can tell me anything, I don’t repeat it to another soul and I do not hold it against or pass judgment on their SO’s as a result of their confessions. A friend is someone who knows all about you and likes you anyway ;-)So when one poster says:

“””””“You say that you discuss your husband and your marital relationship with friends, and you imply that everyone does this. No, everyone doesn't do this. Most women I know don't do this. I don't do this.””””””

Well, that is just one persons opinion. I do this and everyone I have ever known does this too. Another poster says her Grandmother told her to “keep your man private”. How old is her grandmother 60? 70? 80? Things were VERY different in her grandmother’s day then they are now. Her grandmother may have vacuumed in a dress, high heels and pearls. I have never done that. Or held cocktail parties and offered “one for the road” to all her guests. I have never done that, I offer a cab ride or a comfortable bed to anyone who drinks at my home. And I’ll bet her grandmothers children never came home from school with information they had learned in school about “stranger danger” or “good touch bad touch” or drinking and driving or the harmful effects of drugs or any of the subjects that we now accept as normal topics of conversation in this generation. Quite possibly, if more women (as well as men) of past generations spoke openly about their feelings, less would have resulted in divorce and/or we could have prevented some of the mass over use of anti-depressants and other pharmaceuticals drugs that mask problems. In past generations, women swallowed “mothers little helper” and kept their mouth shut. Sad. I think things are very different today.

Anyway, just my two cents, if I went to my clergy or a therapist every time I wanted to vent or brag about the up’s and downs of my relationship I’d be broke and nothing else would get done at my church! Lol I don’t think it’s that terrible of a violation of trust. Sometimes, by talking about these issues, we realize we are normal;-)

iVillage Member
Registered: 11-21-2004
In reply to: ihappy1980
Wed, 11-09-2005 - 10:23am
Thank you imakatybug!
cl for Ask Fit By Friday
iVillage Member
Registered: 09-21-2005
In reply to: ihappy1980
Wed, 11-09-2005 - 11:03am

Friends are for confiding in, yes they may harbor little secrets other peoples H's might never suspect they know about them but I've also walked around knowing my SO's friends or family might know things about me too...I say so what. There are always two sides to a story and I'll keep showing my face even if what has been said of me may make me want to run and hide.

I think we have to be careful about what we disclose and to whom but for the most part we need people to talk to and we go to the people we trust the most and there's nothing wrong with that.

I'm not trying to be presumptuous here but it almost sounds like your H is looking for an excuse to not be around people to socialize. And this wedding invite...was he planning on going and just telling you you could choose to not go if you didn't want to even if he was going?

Is he a homebody? Does he like to socialize with people?

If he isn't generally a social person he's probably like I said just looking for an excuse to not be around people.

If he normally is a social person, his irrational fear of what people are going to think about him all the time is blown out of proportion. I remember feeling like that before but I learned I can't live in a shell just because my SO might confide to others about me. They can choose to see who I am based on how I act around them and not just what my SO says. They can choose to judge me however they wish but there's not much I can do about it and I won't run and hide from them just because of it.

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