I don't know what to do or what my part in all this is

[Mark Twain]

Hi, my marriage is on the brink, I'm not sure if that is a good thing or a bad thing, I am terrified of blowing up my life and losing everything I know.

My wife says she is done and that I need medication, that she has done everything she can but she is over it and cannot take any more criticism.

I feel like I cannot function with the way things have been and have been making changes and asking to work on things with her. We have been married a little over twenty years and have three sons. It seems like she doesn't like me and says so as well. I do see her trying and it gives me hope of change and I worry I am asking for too many changes in too short a time. I was a passive partner for too many years, I would complain and play the victim. I had no boundaries with my family and then I continued to not have any as an adult. I kept thinking I would get a seat at the table with the adults when I made enough money or had enough accomplishments or gained enough knowledge.

My wife was engaged when I met her, she said her partner was bad and kept cheating on her and treated her badly. He was 4 or so years older than her and they started dating when she was 15. Her parents did not seem to protect her and left her to defend for herself. I thought I could save her and love her and fix her, not realizing how broken I was. I was also looking for an escape from my family. I feel like I used her as a distraction from my life.

I joined al-anon last June. I think it has been helpful but she is not happy about it and mocks me and also says I am weaponizing it against her. I try to explain it is for me not for her and that I need to work on fixing me and treat people right.

She was cutting me down in front of friends or in public. I was never really comfortable with her drinking, it always felt like it was taking her away from the family and that more was falling on me while she escaped with her friends. I also know I was overwhelmed and needed a lot of work to be a father that shows up and carry more weight. I was resentful of having children so young and I blamed her. One of our children is on the spectrum and very difficult. There was never any break and between her parents and mine there was not really any chance for a break. My space I rented for work started leaking and so I started working out of the house full time. She did not like me being home and kept asking me to leave and work somewhere else or get the basement finished and work down there. Now that 2 of them are in college or out of the house it has opened up more time to work on things. I noticed one time she had a drink and then said some cutting remarks at a restaurant loud as we were leaving. I don't recall having said anything that might have sparked that. It seemed like she was drinking more and more nights. I asked her to stop putting drinks in her insulated cups, I couldn't tell whether she was drinking water or alcohol and then I would be sitting talking with her and realize she was intoxicated to some extent and feel uncomfortable, like we were there together physically but also not in the same place if that makes sense. Her mother was an alcoholic when we met but is now sober but I was beginning to really worry she was going to go down that path. I read and read and studied and finally came to the conclusion that how she treated me would not change while she was still drinking, that there was probably underlying issues that caused her to cut me down, and that as long as she was drinking, nothing could improve and nothing could be figured out as to what the root of the issue was. I also realized I didn't think I could handle being married to an alcoholic and that it would just be downhill. I told her I couldn't be around her drinking. She said ok but would still go out with friends and had alcohol in the house. We had found a new home that we both loved around this time and I asked if it could be a dry house. Then finally I said I didn't want to move unless there was no more alcohol. She came home one day and I was crying on the couch, she asked me what was wrong and I finally told her I couldn't handle the alcohol anymore at all and that meant our relationship was over because I couldn't handle it and I didn't think it would ever get better with alcohol involved. She said that's ok, I can stop drinking for a while.

She was a sahm and worked hard with the kids and making meals and laundry  and kids health issues and special needs, got us involved in a church and community and good schools, handled doctors visits, schedules. She was doing well and I was struggling. I was not good at cooking or self care and expected her to cook consistently and when I felt overwhelmed I would blame her. I had gotten a good job that had a pension available right when we first got married but it was far from home and we really needed to move closer but she didn't want to. We lived in a house her parents had bought rent free. I wanted us to get our own place but she was opposed. I finally quit the job and went back to college. I finished one semester and completed my associates but the next semester dropped out as my second son was born and her parents were paying our bills but nitpicking over things and given my experience with my family I did not want to be dependent on anyone else. My newborn son had some health issues and was in the hospital and I was struggling with depression and just feeling overwhelmed in life. My oldest had special needs and my wife said he would never live on his own. This was a low point but after 6 months or so I got another job and things started to improve. I found out later that in this period my wife had gotten the name of a divorce attorney and was considering ending things. She begged me to finish school but I didn't feel like I had enough support or independence and felt too vulnerable to continue, as well as not liking school though I had straight A's that last semester.

[ForeverDad]

Al-Anon is excellent but you would also benefit to seek out a few counselors to address both (1) your own issues as well as (2) the difficulties in your marital relationship.  Interview a few and determine whether you mesh well with any particular counselor and the perspectives described.

We have been married a little over twenty years and have three sons. It seems like she doesn't like me and says so as well...

I thought I could save her and love her and fix her, not realizing how broken I was.

My ex came from an abusive home and I too, as have others here, thought I could save her and the marriage.  But I couldn't.  The reality is that we can only save ourselves.  We can't fix the other, though of course we could support them in their own sincere efforts to work on themselves.  But does she really want to change and improve herself?

My wife was engaged when I met her, she said her partner was bad and kept cheating on her and treated her badly. He was 4 or so years older than her and they started dating when she was 15.

Many people with BPD traits (pwBPD) do describe all prior relationships as bad and the other's fault.  (BPD is a disorder known for Blame Shifting.)  She's already doing it with you even though your marriage hasn't ended.  Clearly your marriage is at least to some extent dysfunctional and unhealthy.

You are welcome to browse our boards and articles.  One board is our Tool and Skills Workshops board.  There you can educate yourself and learn better skills and strategies to both cope better as well as to decide where to direct your future.

[Mark Twain]

We moved a year and half ago to a new home that we bought together. Her parents had finally gifted us our old home as I was communicating my increased discomfort with the setup. She was very upset with how I moved us, that it was too slow and she was angry with how it all went. I asked her what else she needed from the old house to function as we were trying to not empty the old house for staging it for sale. She made a comment to me about she wished someone would give her a check so she could buy more land around our new house and also build another garage with an apartment above it. I asked what the apartment was for and she said for her mother once she was too old to live on her own and I said I think stairs could be an issue but I suspected she really wanted the apartment so she could have alone time.

Before we moved she was saying I was stalling on finishing the basement and finally said she wanted a divorce. I was shocked as I didn't understand what the problem was. She left for the day but then came back and said she wanted to stay. That was about 3 years ago and I feel like I hit bottom in my life. I was making good money but emotionally and physically I was at an incredibly low point. I started talking to some of my extended family that I trusted about the issues and they were supportive which was amazing. We had started some couples counseling but I would say I was pretty angry and entitled about some aspects of our marriage. She is not physically affectionate by nature. I was using sex to cope with my life and fairly demanded it every other day. I think I was having trouble getting my emotional needs met as well and that was one way as well but was not loving or fair to her. She finally told me she wasn't doing it anymore and I think that was a turning point in my life as I was forced to deal with some things in my life. I feel like I was compromising on things as long as she would have sex which is not healthy and I am ashamed to have been doing to her.

I would say I am anxious attached and she is avoidant. She seemed content for the most part in her life as long as I left her alone.
We had a pretty physical relationship early on. Before we were married, we had a fight and I wanted to break up but she wouldn't give me my new digital camera back and it was the only thing left for me to move out. I spoke with her parents about it as I was very exasperated and just wanted to move on with my life but had quite the attachment to the camera and her father clued me in that she didn't want me to leave and that is why she was not giving me the camera. We had other fights where she would get physical and she broke my windshield and threatened to stab me with a fork and would throw things at me, bite me, rip my shirt etc. She gave me a black eye once as well when she successfully landed a blow, I usually was able to block her. That seemed to get better as we got older and the kids got older but she would still lock me out of the house and then once she had a knife in her hand and I was too close to be able to escape had she wanted to hurt me which was fairly terrifying. I started talking to the couples counselor about her aggression. I found that I could engage at a lessor degree to stop her from going into a rage, and when she did that is when things got physical. The therapist told her to stop and that was helpful. When we moved to the new house I was really hopeful to not ever be locked out again and have those memories at the new house. Since the old house had been owned by her parents for the majority of our time living there I felt almost like she had a right to kick me out. I would sometimes look at other homes to buy so I had somewhere to go when she was so angry. Once we were at the new house though we were arguing about something and when she started lashing out at me verbally I would fall silent and that sent her into a rage. She would leave and roar out the driveway in her full size suv and peel out of the driveway and garage and I felt afraid she was going to drive through the house. I had told her I would leave if she was going to drink so she would threaten that she was going to go drinking or bring alcohol home. During an argument, I shut down, and she said she was going out drinking with her girlfriends and left the new house. We still had the old one for sale so I decided I would move into it so I gathered up some things to be able to stay for a few days but before I left she came home and saw me packing. She asked me when I was going to get the rest of my stuff and I said I needed a truck and a few days. I went out to the car and when I came back to get a few more things she had locked me out and her car was blocking mine in. I just happened to have a key to another vehicle that was not blocked in and was able to still go over to the old home. She called that night or the next day and was talking to me saying I was breaking up the family and this wasn't fair. I said I could not deal with alcohol. She then started talking cryptic and saying tell the kids I'm sorry etc. and hung up the phone. I rushed over to the new house and found her in the bathroom with her new kitchen knife from christmas. I called her friend and she came over to help. This happened again a couple months later in a similar fashion and so I called her mother and our therapist. She was very depressed and fairly suicidal for another couple months but then seemed to pull out of it. She then was about unapproachable about any issue, she quit the therapist. I started to realized she was binging and purging when we would go out to eat. I read all about that and what I came away with was to not judge or criticize in any way but to also not let it remain a secret of hers. I told her I was concerned and that I had noticed her going to the restroom after we ate out just about every time. She was very angry and said to mind my own business. I waited a few weeks and after the behavior continued brought it up again that I was concerned about her. She eventually said she had it under control and then she said she talked to her personal therapist about it and that with the frequency she was doing it at it was under control. As of lately it does seem to have gotten better but I think it was a coping mechanism there for a while. She started bringing up divorce and I told her I couldn't talk to her about that, I found it extremely upsetting and wanted to do anything to save the marriage. At one point she would not stop following me around the house and I went to grab a collard shirt so I could leave and she blocked me in the bedroom and started to engage physically with me. I jumped out the window and called my al-anon sponsor and a lawyer friend of mine. I ended up going to the police the next day and filed a report. I told her that night what I had done and she said that when I did this the marriage was over. I begged her to not end the marriage and I probably said I made a mistake but I didn't know what else to do. Since I went the day after the police never did anything but it remained an issue she will bring up that I did to her. I started to notice her buying more things, nothing crazy but when I asked her about some of the purchases she would say they were old or she didn't know what I was talking about. I asked that we put all the credit cards into the bank app so we could track all our purchases. She was very angry and resistant but finally complied. She also admitted that she would sometimes buy herself something when she was really angry at me. I said this wasn't ok and she agreed. I started to watch the purchases and ask her about things which she hated and told me I was financially abusing her and she would not discuss any purchases with me and she could buy whatever she wanted. She did not actually buy whatever she wanted but would threaten it all the time. She complained that her love language was receiving gifts and that she didn't feel loved. I finally told her I didn't feel like I could keep up with the lifestyle she wanted and asked that she get a job to help out financially since two kids were now out of the house and I could help more with the youngest. Her response was if she had to get a full time job she would divorce me. She kept telling me that that I had gotten her nothing and I was selfish and withholding love and that my gifts were cheap and my cards were cheap that she wanted a pretty card and I was too cheap to buy it for her. I tried to buy her flowers and she said they meant nothing to her and were just something she had to take care of and that I only bought them when I was already at the store for something else. She also said she had married too far down on the ladder. I stopped buying her anything for the most part, I would get her a card and candy and a stuffed animal or candle or like for our anniversary we went on a couples retreat. We have plenty of money but I am concerned about retirement and in that area we have a lot of work left to do and she is confident that her inheritance will come in time but I don't want to rely on relatives dying to not have to worry about working the rest of my life. I've been trying to communicate that trust has been broken in the relationship but she says it is all my fault and that I am controlling and steamroll her and she is afraid of me and miserable. She has given up on having any joy or happiness in this marriage and she was hoping for peace but that's not really a reason to try.

When I bring an issue up it would turn into the silent treatment or darvo, I have practiced jade, etc. validating language, the nicola method, I've realized my undealt with childhood trauma is causing me issues. I bought the high conflict couple book and have trying to get her to read it through with me which she has a little but won't attend any DBT sessions with me. She told me she would use her parents money to grind me into the ground and I would have nothing if I fought her in divorce.

I have been journaling and doing a better job of remembering what she says and then later I have confronted her on her language and that it isn't ok to talk to me like that. She admits every once in a while that she doesn't want to talk to me like that but that she is so triggered. Today she went further and even said that that still wasn't an excuse for her behavior. I feel like I am riding this line of trying to move my boundaries closer to where I want them without losing her from too much change too fast. I think she is noticing and feeling like it won't ever stop. She told he she filed for divorce in October and told the children as well. I begged her to please work on it with me. She said I needed to either let her start drinking again or give her total control of our finances. I told her she could have total control of the finances that drinking didn't work for me. She attended some more couples counseling and didn't really spend any money to speak of. She got a part time job with very little pay. She kept threatening to drink again and so I said if she started drinking that she needed to pay for her car insurance, gas, and health insurance since I didn't feel comfortable providing those for her as I felt like drinking was hurting her health. We have ended up at that whatever she earns is her spending money, that I will take the same exact amount as she earns as my spending money, and the other money I earn will pay for the house, cars, hair, nails, health, kids, college, etc. I bought her laptop since she has also started back to college and she has access to our main bank accounts with $40K in them but I have told her I want her to work on providing more for herself and she knows if she spends money on something she wants rather than needs that I will want to talk about it. I feel like this is necessary with how things have been going but I worry that I am too focused on her. I do support her making more money and going to school or whatever she needs. She has two cars, one is a convertible. I don't ever question her on gas or plants for outside and I encourage art and things which I think are positive and I ultimately want to be less involved in her spending like I was before but it seems like she was either using money to do self destructive things or she was using it to pull the family apart and demanding that I pay for everything the college child needs in addition to all the college bill and I wanted him to start contributing more for his own expenses as well. The children are now saying things like she says that I am so selfish and mean and only care about myself.

If I were wealthy my desire would be to get another home and that way be able to give her more space and we have a little more room to work out our issues but I am afraid of this not ever working out and being responsible for her financially for an extended period of time and I am not feeling strong enough to support the both of us. She said I am responsible for her since I broke her and caused her poor health and she is now unable to even work full time so I am responsible for her. I told her I was not responsible for her health and did not cause her illness and that I did not want to be fully responsible for her. She is pressing me for a smaller vehicle for her but wants a luxury car and it needs to be fully loaded out and not older as the older ones do not have the same technology as her current car. I said it seemed like she did not like me and that it seemed wrong to ask me to buy her something when she doesn't even like me. She said I owe her since she is my employee and I don't pay her. I said I was uncomfortable with that setup and asked her to work on it with me to change the dynamic. She said she would not as she would then be a slave.

Again, she has started cooking dinner most nights again, does all the laundry, I have started cooking a couple nights a week and we usually go out once or get takeout. I am driving my son to and from school every day and working on him practicing driving. I have helped with some laundry and told her I would help with anything she asks of me at the house. I empty the dishwasher and always load my plates and any others, take out the trash, etc. Help pick up. She says it doesn't help her at all when I help clean etc. because I don't do a good job but I told her I am open to learning to do better.

I have started to feel like this is never going to get better and I don't want to be old and in a miserable marriage and also seems like the relationship died and we just don't have anything any more. I am so stressed all the time and worry about losing work because of this and I am barely functioning. I also feel like surviving on my own without her to hold at night will be crushing. When she is sleeping or things are calm I am so happy and I just want things to be ok and not lose her and lose my children. Thank you for listening.

[Mark Twain]

...You are welcome to browse our boards and articles.  One board is our Tool and Skills Workshops board.  There you can educate yourself and learn better skills and strategies to both cope better as well as to decide where to direct your future.

I really do appreciate this board it has been so helpful and comforting. Thank you for your time and response. I just thought I could figure this all out and life would be ok.