Authentic

[beenburned]

skylarblue,

 

I enjoy reading the honesty in your posts!

 

I feel many MM are conflict avoiders or passive-aggressive. It is usually traits that are instilled through their family of origin. They carry this same behavior over to their wife after marriage.

 

Maybe it is their perception that they can't be different with the wife that is the problem.

 

After marriage, when both spouses have busy careers and children, it is not possible for everything to be about one person only. They are now a team that has to work together in all areas to be successful.

 

You XMM sounds very immature and selfish in wanting everything to be about him and his needs. It sounds like he missed being single with all the freedoms that come with it.

 

What about you? It doesn't sound like you were able to be your authentic self in this affair due to always having to jump through hoops to please him at all times.

Edited August 4, 2012 by beenburned
misspelled a word

[beenburned]

LG,

 

My H has always been passive-aggressive.

 

I think it is mostly because he likes to be a people pleaser, so he goes with the flow.(without speaking his opinion)

 

Then later on, he gets resentful/mad that he never gets to do exactly what he wants.

 

Nobody is a mind reader, he needs to learn to speak up when asked a direct question.(instead of saying it doesn't matter to him)

 

I've heard that cheating on a spouse is the ultimate way of getting back at them behind their back.

[beenburned]

LG,

 

Yes he is!

 

Example: when we have dinner out with family/friends they always ask where we want to go or what type of food we are hungry for. To this very day his answer is "it doesn't matter to me".

 

However, after we get in the car to go home, he will complain continuously about everything, the food, the prices, etc. It makes me want to strangle him!

And it always ruins the fun of getting out and enjoying ones self!

 

You have no idea how many times I have said to him "I am not a mind reader", speak up about what you think/want/feel.

 

I wonder if as a child he was never allowed to have his own opinion or choices about things.

 

My latest strategy is always let him pick the restaurant. Didn't work very well, as he still complains about all the things he didn't like.

 

You know, as I think about this more, his moaning and groaning has gotten worse as he ages to the point he is not even fun for me to be around.

 

However, he still puts on the life of the party act for everyone else, family, friends, co-workers.

[beenburned]

FS,

 

That is certainly likely to happen with a lot of people.

[beenburned]

LG,

 

No, his parents had no addictions.( But they were conservative Christians)

[Summer Breeze]

I think this is brilliant and rings true for me and my sitch.

 

Where there are no real expectations or obligations, no public life or worry, how freeing it must be to be able to be anyone you want.

 

And sometimes the anyone they may want to be is themselves.

[Silly_Girl]

LG,

 

No, his parents had no addictions.( But they were conservative Christians)

 

My exMM learned how not to behave and what not to discuss and when to 'be busy elsewhere' due to his very conservative Christian parents who put pressure on him to conform to idealistic standards. In addition his mum (SAHM) felt inferior (Dad had a good job at the bank and wide social circle) and so projected the opposite and was frequently angry.

 

ExMM had coping mechanisms for this and the FOOL took them in to his M. I'm a heart-on-sleeve, confrontational WYSIWYG kinda gal and it surprised exMM just what CAN be shared in a romantic relationship and rather than it lessen the love it promoted it.

 

I don't know if he'll revert now we're over. Part of me thinks it's most likely. And that's when I feel as though maybe he doesn't DESERVE to be happy. I bet that sounds mean, it's not meant to be, but I am a firm believer that life and relationships are what you make them.

[Summer Breeze]

i wonder if they really even know who they are themselves...maybe they don't.

 

maybe that happens in the stereotypical "mid life crisis" type affair, when a man or woman suddenly realizes they're getting older and maybe it scares them to think that there are so many things they haven't done that they had always wanted to do, etc.

 

Sometimes knowing who you are is really hard...maybe in at he above mentioned situation, the person really doesn't know and wants to find out...but at the end of the day when they are all alone with themselves, do they really know who they are?

 

As I said in the beginning of this thread there are a whole lot of reasons people get lost in Rs. Not just Ms. Radagast has put his whole life out and shown how he and his xW came together and how there was a struggle to keep 'himself' in all of it.

 

How about a BS. WS gaslights and explains things away. They make their BS feel like they're going nuts. BS tries to make sense of it and possibly changes certain behaviors and characteristics to try and find a way to make it right again. I lost myself to a degree when I was a BS. When I realized what was going on I pulled it back together again but what if I hadn't trusted my gut? What would I have been like in another year, or 5? I believe I could easily have lost part of me just trying to make everything ok again. So why can't that happen in every day life if someone wants to make things work. We all shift. We all grow and change. I know quite a few people who have put part of themselves to the side for a lot of reasons. As I said it's no excuse to cheat but it does happen and I don't think it's an issue of midlife crisis. I just think sometimes that's when people come up for air. The kids might be older and all of a sudden you try and find yourself again. I did that but I wasn't M at the time so it was more of a self discovery.

[Radagast]

i wonder if they really even know who they are themselves...maybe they don't.

 

maybe that happens in the stereotypical "mid life crisis" type affair, when a man or woman suddenly realizes they're getting older and maybe it scares them to think that there are so many things they haven't done that they had always wanted to do, etc.

 

Sometimes knowing who you are is really hard...maybe in at he above mentioned situation, the person really doesn't know and wants to find out...but at the end of the day when they are all alone with themselves, do they really know who they are?

 

I knew who I was, my family knew who I was, my friends knew who I was, my colleagues knew who I was, but I did not recognise what I'd become in my marriage. And neither did they. My family did not enjoy seeing me with my wife because they said I was like an alien around her, I wasn't myself at all. My friends said the same, that they did not like who I became in her presence. I vanished from sight, and became an apologist for her, like her PR person, always explaining away her behaviour even when it was rude and hurtful to them or otherwise unacceptable. I felt that I was the only one who truly understood how damaged she was and how she could not be expected to uphold the same behavioural standards as everyone else and it all became about her, I erased my own personality around her and I neglected the needs of my family and my friends in my desperate attempts to explain and excuse my ex-wife's behaviour. Now, looking back on it, I can see why they felt as they did. I would be angry if I were them and I am very lucky that they cared enough about me to maintain the relationships all those years in spite of my marriage, even though I neglected them.

 

I knew I was not myself around her, but to me that was less important at the time. What was more important to me was trying to help her, trying to get her to a place of security and happiness where she could normalise, and then everything would be OK (I thought). Of course that was stupid and naive and completely wrong, but it was what I desperately believed at the time. I had invested years, decades, in the marriage and I needed to cling to that hope because how else could I explain how I had wasted years of my life subverting my own personality and putting myself and my family and others through all that?

 

It was such a relief when I walked away from that struggle and could be myself again, could look at myself in the mirror and recognise that it was me looking back and not some desperate possessed being trying to achieve the impossible.