Fed up with husband

Ay! I really do not know what to say. I am so far away and belong to another culture so I sometimes think that my positive thoughts don’t cross ‘the puddle’ and that I am the last in line for the group hug.

All I want to say is that it has been sad reading these stories. Such wonderful caring women, inteligent and sweet having to go through this tipe of abuse.

I pray that you find men good enough for you. They exist, we have Chuck and Instinc as proof.

Big hug, huge hug, I hope you beautiful women feel the positive thoughts and enery.

Karin and Brandilee, only you can fully assess the situation. But the marriage really comes down to a litmus test: are you better off with him, or without him? In both of your situations, it sounds to me as if your marriages aren’t passing the litmus test.

I was divorced by my husband (who was not abusive at all). I was lucky enough to have my brother, 500 miles away, willing to have me move into their basement long enough to get a car, find a job and get my own place.

Some time after that, I relocated 300 miles away with a boyfriend. I didn’t have a car. Big mistake! I eventually found temp work I could get to on public transportation, but it was a city not well designed for public transit. He got to be more and more controlling, and more and more emotionally abusive. I finally left, with only a week of planning. My brother, his wife, and my best friend brought a truck, a trailer, and a tiny car to move me, what little furniture & books I had, and my cats. Again moved into my brother’s basement for a short period, got transportation and a job, then found an apartment for me and my cats.

It *can* be done. You *can* get out. Part of the insidious nature of controlling & emotionally abusive behavior is convincing the person that they can’t change the situation, that they’re helpless, hopeless, and worthless. You need to do what you need to do to preserve your own self-respect, because it’s apparent that he’s damaging your self-esteem.

It will not be easy; it will not be fun. But eventually you will find yourself in a much more content frame of mind, not being second-guessed, not being interrogated, not having to deal with his insecurities and issues.

You can do it. You are worth it.

You have your whole life ahead of you. Do you want to spend it struggling to change someone who doesn’t want to change?

Good that you aired your concerns ! Sorry to hear it lead to name-calling. If you are “equally bad to each other” it’s my opinion that you need to call it quits. It sounds to me, from what you have shared, that neither of you are in a place where you want to work things out. One more opinion… once you are married, it’s not “my” credit card bills and “his” loan payments. They become ‘ours’ at that point. Marriage is a partnership… or should be.

Take what you will from my comments.. I’ve been divorced twice 😉

That’s a really rough situation. I’m so sorry you are going through this. Can you two share the apt as ‘friends’ as opposed to ‘husband and wife’ until one of you can afford to move out?

Karin–Sorry for cutting in here–May I suggest another list? How about a list of why the two of you fell in love and got married? Seriously. It sounds as if the two of you could try a little bit of tenderness with each other instead of only going at things angrily or clinically. It looks as if I’m the heretic here, but I do not believe that such a recent marriage should be tossed aside so easily. Show your husband the same soft side that you show us on this site. I’ll bet that is one of the reasons why he fell in love with you. Unless there is unquestionable abuse involved in your marriage, I think it’s worth bringing your relationship back to life.

Can I get a TDK perspective, too?

Nine years ago, I married a man with a tested IQ of 72 who lived with his parents, then alone with his mother after his father’s death, until he was 44 years old. At that time, his mother had a disabling stroke and he was thrown into independent living with no preparation whatsoever. A community agency (which has since closed) assigned him a caseworker who oversaw the payment of his bills, etc. I married him to give him a chance for a normal adult life with dignity. For the first two years, things went well enough. Since then, though, I’ve had the feeling that I’m watching him kill himself. He is addicted to television; he has it on day and night. (He has obsessive-compulsive disorder and I think this is one manifestation of it.) He spends 90% of his life on the living room sofa drifting back and forth between sleeping and watching the ever-present television. He has type 2 diabetes and the only thing he does for it is to take an oral medication; no dietary adjustments or exercise. He has severe sleep apnea and has a CPAP machine, but he has never used it for even one night. He complains about physical symptoms, but won’t go to the doctor. He makes appointments and repeatedly cancels them. On the occasions when he does go, he won’t follow the doctor’s instructions. He used to be a marvelous homemaker, but now the house looks like a trash heap. (I’d rather live with that than work at my full-time job, then go home and clean house while he’s spent the day on the sofa.) Because of his reputation as a noncompliant patient, no psychiatrist in two counties will see him. I am our sole financial support. Divorce is not possible because I can’t afford to pay him spousal support; besides, I’m too stubborn and self-righteous (my pastor’s words) to break the vow I made to join with him and share all that is to come until death parts us. (When I made that promise, I sure didn’t see what was coming.) We’ve been to counseling, but it didn’t help; he treated that pretty much like he treats his medical care. Because his IQ is 3 points above the clinical cutoff for a diagnosis of mental retardation, he’s not eligible for any social services.

So, my TDK friends, how does one cope with watching one’s husband destroy himself?

Eileen, I have been where you are in some ways…my now ex-husband was not DD when I married him but after a severe on the job injury wound up that way. Unless he gives you SOMETHING like emotional support or physical fulfillment, RUN do not walk away from the situation. I too believed in my marriage vows of death ’til you part until I realized that it was MY death that I was planning. I left 8 years ago–we are now friends and he thanks me for bringing him back from the brink of suicide–my feeling is that he would have let me lead him down the path of despair until it was too late–he didn’t deal with anything until I forced him into it.

It might be worthwhile to talk to an attorney, Eileen, to find out whether or not you could be required to pay spousal support in the event you decide to end your marriage. Marriages are built on all kinds of considerations. Hopefully, mutual emotional support is one of them. It sounds like you are shouldering all the responsibilities in this relationship and none of the rewards that marriage can bring. Maybe just bringing up the topic that you don’t know how much longer you can live in this manner with him will wake him up. You have lots of support here. Please keep posting. {{{hugs}}}