My husband is dealing with his emotions and feelings for the first time probably in his life. He has moved out of our home and feels that because our marriage has been so bad over the years that he is not comfortable with me any more. He says that he loves me but every time he is with me he dosn't feel in control of himself & can't deal with that.

I want my husband to come home to me & our daughter but I don't know how to convince him that I wll not hurt him. We both made some mistakes in our marriage. I was depresesed & withdrawn & he is afraid things will go back to the way they were. I feel like I am losing him & I don't know what to do. We have been married for 6 years, together for 10 and have a one year old daughter.

[Ed]

Are you in counseling? If you are not, I would recommend it.

There is not much you can do for your husband. From what you have described, he is just beginning to find out who he is, what he feels and why. There is no telling what conclusions he may come to. He will have to work this out on his own. Some people can do this while still maintaining a marriage and some can't. I guess that remains to be seen.

One thing you can't do is MAKE him feel anything. You can do things and say things, but he will feel what he feels and he will decide how to react to or deal with those feelings. Anyone who believes they can make others feel something is living a life of self-deception and manipulation. Besides that, who wants to live life with the burden of maintaining their own feelings AND someone else's? Just be yourself and do what is good for you and your child. Let him decide if that is something he wants to be a part of.

You need to concentrate on your health and well being and that of your daughter. Make your choices and decisions based on that alone. Stop worrying about where he is going to land. Mulling over past mistakes will not help the situation any. The past is the past, you cannot undo it, just get over it. Forgive yourself for the mistakes you have made and be prepared to forgive yourself in the future, because as long as you remain to be a human being, you will likely mess up again in somebody's eyes.

Good luck!

[Tony T]

Ed's 100 percent correct in everything he says. I do hope your husband will consent to counselling. That's your only hope. This problem has formed over many years and it will take some serious work to straighten out.

Basically, you and your husband will be starting out from scratch. That means that, once again, you've got to be the person he wants to spend the rest of his life with.