Need help-is divorce the right answer?
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Need help-is divorce the right answer?
| Tue, 08-26-2008 - 1:07pm |
My husband and I have been married for 3 years. He is 6 years younger than I am. He has always been insecure, especially about other men-even the mention of a coworkers name or an old friend from my youth would send him into a ...fit, I guess. Lots of accusations, lots of sulking, lots of me apologizing even though I never knew why. Before we married I had a male coworker-a counterpart to my position. My husband was very insecure about this person, from the first day! It got so bad we fought about it every night, I would come home from work and all he wanted to know was if I talked to the coworker! Eventually I started lying to him, because the arguing about it was so drainign and i really didn't understand why. If I ever did go out with coworkers, my husband alwasy came along. He usually didn;t talk to anyone and for the most part, neither did I. Anyway, he found out I lied and would switch lunch with my coworker so he could eat with his girlfriend. Since then my husband says he can;t trust me(I'm not kidding,I have never cheated, nothing romatic ever happened with this person). So flas forward a few years, we are married.As I said, I am turning 35 and am having a little difficulty with the age. I recently got on myspace-my husband knows about it(actualyl has the password, felt it would make him more comfortable), it was supposed to be a couples thing but he decided against it-I think just so he could have something to be mad at me about because now he is mad at me about it, now that is what we argue about everynight. I started the myspace partly because of my therapy(started seeign a counselor for depression/anxiety). It is part of me trying to do things for myself and reconnect with who I am. I am having fun with it, I found a lot of old frinds from childhood and teenage years. My husband is fit to be tied-he has "asked" me not to add any of my male friends until he is ready(which will most likely be never) and has started critiquing my e-mails with old frinds, telling me that he has a problem with things I talk about(I am not supposed to mention him to anyone-why, who knows?) Alo, we are in therapy, only a few weeks but so far he has threatend twice not to go as it is too hard for him, he just wants to give up and be done. This is usually said after there is a myspace issue. There are other issues as well, I wanted to go to a movie with a girlfriend and he had a hard time with it(only my secodn move in 3 years,not like I'm out all the time). I also met a girl through my only non-myspace friend. We all went to lunch and I had a good time, we all laughed alot. I told my husband I thought we could be friends and I hoped we could hang out again. He can;t understand why I would want to be friends with someone I just meet. And lastly, he is an alcoholic. Not abusive, functioning, goes to work everyday but drinks at home to the point of passing out every night. We used to get along so well, he was my best friend. Now all we do if fight, he tells me that I am constantyl disprespecting him(because of issues stated above), that I am always crossing lines. I really don't think I am doing anything wrong, I am just trying to be happy, to find some joy in my life. Am I doing anything wrong?? can we work this out in therapy- I don't want to leave him or our marriage,but I can't keep feeling like I am on eggshells all the time.

Of course he doesn't want to go to therapy, because he doesn't want the therapist to tell him that he has issues that have to be addressed. It's easy in his mind to blame you for everything. First of all, I could not live w/ someone who drinks every night til he passes out--right there, that would be a major problem. Luckily for me, I have not had to deal w/ substance abuse issues, but I know there are some ladies on the board who have. Does he even recognize that he has a problem w/ alcohol (and I would bet depression also)? What is he willing to do about it?
Secondly as far as the trust issues, everybody who is married should be able to have friends of the same sex. Are you saying that he has no guy friends? Right there, I would think that is strange. I never had an issue w/ my 1st DH going out w/ his friends (my 2nd DH didn't have any friends, which to me was a problem that he had w/ relationships in general) and I have always had girl friends. I think that is normal, unless what you do w/ your girlfriends is go to bars & try to pick up men. What I usually do w/ my girlfriends is go out to lunch & shopping.
As far as being jealous of men at work, if you have never cheated or given your DH a reason to doubt you, then the problem is w/ him, not you. No matter how innocent you are, he will always be suspicious. I wouldn't play into it. You know that you aren't doing anything wrong, you gave him your password to myspace for that very reason, and yet he still criticizes you. Frankly, I wouldn't give this marriage a chance unless he is really willing to work hard on changing and working on his problems.
Believe me, the drinking is a HUGE problem for me! he does recognize the alcoholism- he is talking to the therapist about that but who knows if it will ever really change. He has an older brother who had the same issue and beat it through intense therapy but I don't know if my husband ever will. I used to have faith in him and wnated to be supportive but now I think I've almost give up. I say almost becasue I am in therapy with him, but I doubt his ability to change. He has talked about going to counseling alone but like I said,