Guest Posted June 5, 2006 Posted June 5, 2006 Please help me. I am an independent, strong-willed woman, and I think that for this reason my husband is constantly trying to control me. He doesn't want me to go out with my friends, but I must go and visit his friends. If I have a glass of wine, he says "Oh, drinking are we?" But the fact that he drinks his whisky non-stop isn't an issue. If I try to tell him how his manipulation makes me feel, then he sulks for days, so I just keep quiet now. Easier and less painful. He doesn't want me to work, and I was comfortable with that. My job as a mom to 4 children is important to me, and one I take seriously. But now he doesn't miss an opportunity to tell me how he is the bread winner, and I live in HIS house and eat HIS food etc etc etc. When I got married, he was so different, but more importantly I WAS DIFFERENT. I have often asked myself what I have done or said to make him think that he can treat me this way, and I'm a firm believer in the adage that you teach some-one how to treat you. So I accept responsibility for my part in this mess. I've allowed him to treat me like a child, but this has to change, or I will end up doing something I will no doubt regret. The question is: How do I change it? How can I find the person I married, and have I lost the person I once was, or is she simply misplaced?
JadeStar Posted June 5, 2006 Posted June 5, 2006 Please help me. I am an independent, strong-willed woman, and I think that for this reason my husband is constantly trying to control me. He doesn't want me to go out with my friends, but I must go and visit his friends. If I have a glass of wine, he says "Oh, drinking are we?" But the fact that he drinks his whisky non-stop isn't an issue. If I try to tell him how his manipulation makes me feel, then he sulks for days, so I just keep quiet now. Easier and less painful. He doesn't want me to work, and I was comfortable with that. My job as a mom to 4 children is important to me, and one I take seriously. But now he doesn't miss an opportunity to tell me how he is the bread winner, and I live in HIS house and eat HIS food etc etc etc. When I got married, he was so different, but more importantly I WAS DIFFERENT. I have often asked myself what I have done or said to make him think that he can treat me this way, and I'm a firm believer in the adage that you teach some-one how to treat you. So I accept responsibility for my part in this mess. I've allowed him to treat me like a child, but this has to change, or I will end up doing something I will no doubt regret. The question is: How do I change it? How can I find the person I married, and have I lost the person I once was, or is she simply misplaced? IMO you have three options here. One, you talk with him about how this makes you feel and you suggest marriage counseling. If he wont go you go for yourself. Two, you continue to live in the mess you are in, in hopes that things will change, which chances are they wont. Three you get out of the marraige all together. I'm a firm believer in people trying to make things work if possible. However, he has to be willing to change his ways. he needs to be willing to want to work on or help salvage the marraige. No it wont happen over night, and it will take time. But people have to start somewhere if they want to see a change. Marraige counseling would be a great start, as would individual counseling for him. If after you have tried all you feel you can do and things still have not changed, then in the end it will probably be your choice as to what to do. Staying in a situation that wont change, or getting out. JMO. Jade
Outcast Posted June 5, 2006 Posted June 5, 2006 How can I find the person I married It's entirely possible that this is the man you married. People with major flaws learn to hide those flaws during courtship. Some can manage to do it for longer, but eventually the true person will out. I agree you should try counselling but the drinking is a major problem and your other problems are unlikely to end until he stops that. If he doesn't recognize or acknowledge that he's got an alcohol problem, then I don't know why you'd stay. Having an alcoholic in the home is not good for the kids, much less for you.
Love Hurts Posted June 5, 2006 Posted June 5, 2006 Deeper rooted issues from his past are emerging. The childood foundation we each have lived through, helps to make us who we are today. The older we get in life... that child in us never goes away. The childhood in us is the foundation we stand on today. It helps make us who we are today. An unfavorable childhood with issues of abandonment, abuse _ verbal or physical. Or experiencing the *death of a parent too early in life. (Also is a symbol of *abandonment to a child.) If the child in us was not nurtured, loved and cared for in a loving way. If the child watched dad verbally abuse or physically abuse mom. This is a learned pattern. The adult male will emulate these negative attributes and act them out. He becomes his father. If the mother was the abuser of the child. A male will seek revenge against the woman that loves him now and is closest to him. He has taken the role of his father. The way his father treated his mother. Some negatives from his childhood are carried out against you now that he is an adult. Drinking to numb his demon, has an adverse effect, it helps to release the demon of torment within him and lash out at you. Often times these men are not certain what they want and why they want it... This makes them angry. They seek to maintain I am the man. While inside they do not know why they are angry or resentful of you. They simply must control you. You need to know and feel the pain he experienced, and you do. He needs counseling... both of you together. Someone to take him back to his childhood and talk about the pain in the childhood. Through counsel talk to you as you are his mother or his father (sexless at this moment) and say you hurt me. Why did you do this to me or that to me. How could you. You hurt me. He needs to go back and relive the unhappy moments. To realize what it has made him today. His issues are deep rooted. If he does not get help. He can grow violent. Right now he is accustomed to feeling he has a sense of control. If you try to live life doing the things you want, against his will. He can become angry to the point of violence. Particularly if he is drinking. This man needs help. Trying to get him to go to counseling will be difficult. He will admit how perfect he is and your the problem or that there is no problem at all. You may have to threaten to leave him or actually seperate from him for a while until he knows you seriously want change. He loves you and at times he knows what he has done to you. At times he is remorefull. At times he enjoys where he has you extremely. He is a mixed nut right now.
menchi Posted June 6, 2006 Posted June 6, 2006 well you do have a job. your job is raising the kids, which is the most respectable job out there in my eyes. Its is NOT his house and his food because that is not how a marriage is supposed to be. my suggestion is to put your foot down and talk to him about it. why does he feel that his job is somehow more worthy than yours? also, if you somehow taught him to treat you this way, RE-TEACH him. let him know that you will not be HIS. that you are your own person and that you contibute to the house just as much as he does.
cuddlycuddlebum Posted June 6, 2006 Posted June 6, 2006 This is what disgusts me about women. Are you honestly coming on here to complain that you husband,who works hard to provide food and shelter for you so you can sit home, does not allow you to abandon him and your 4 kids so you can go bar-hopping with your girlfriends? Puh-lease lady. Try a little less griping and a few more "thank-yous". Perhaps his "controlling" ways will disappear.
JackJack Posted June 6, 2006 Posted June 6, 2006 This is what disgusts me about women. Are you honestly coming on here to complain that you husband,who works hard to provide food and shelter for you so you can sit home, does not allow you to abandon him and your 4 kids so you can go bar-hopping with your girlfriends? Puh-lease lady. Try a little less griping and a few more "thank-yous". Perhaps his "controlling" ways will disappear. So you are disgusted by all women then? Personallyms the OP has a ligit concern. No one said he wasn't a good provider etc, hell anyone can be a good provider and put food on the table and a roof over their head, and I don'' think thats her gripe. Herripe is how he controls her. He wont let her go out wirh friends etc. he doesn't rule the roost, nor does she. It should be a shared thing in all areas. My guess is if he is controling in his ways and wordsit was probably a learned tacticm childhood. If he saw his father treat his mother that way for example, then he feels its how he should treat his wifeetc. NOT! This is not the 1950's. Hopefully they will seek kind of counseling for these issues.
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