# Completely Lost at this point



## njpca (Jan 22, 2010)

Hey All,

I probably have a doozy of a situation here, but to preface it, I truly do love my wife and want to make efforts to correct this problem:

We met a year ago and started building a good relationship together. I was working full time and she was finishing her bachelors and planning on grad school. At the time, she was still living with her dad to save money. Also I was commuting very far to work. Six months in to our relationship, she got accepted into a grad program that was close to where I worked. I came up with the notion that we should live together, as a way to foster our relationship further.

She had only lived with a previous boyfriend once before and it had been an abusive relationship, so she prefaced our moving in saying that she would not do that again without the notion that there was guarantee that she would be engaged. I knew that it could lead to that but I didn't immediately want to make a commitment.

Just after we signed our papers and put money down on our apartment, she found out that the grad program was not going to be able to guarantee her money for the school year. She completely relied on that for all her finances as she would refuse to work because of stress. She subsequently decided to switch to another program, only this was going to involve more commuting for her. She said she could work it out between trains and such, etc.

We moved in together but immediately it was a struggle find a balance between us. We had some arguments on certain things such as food, storage and such but it seemed like we made it work.

She had a hard time grasping with me being away from work and her staying home all the time, except for her at school. We discussed getting a dog to have as a companion. We both talked about the kind of dog we wanted. We hunted around and found one to adopt.

As things moved along, it was clear she was extremely upset about the fact that I hadn't proposed to her. We argued some more about it and eventually I understood our situation and subsequently we became engaged.

Our plan was to get married after she was done with grad school. We began the planning process. My family wanted to be fairly involved in the process but we wanted things to be done our way (destination wedding, color schemes and such). She had her opinions about my family previously and how they can be "immeshed" too much in I and our lives. After discussing it further we decided to elope without them knowing.

We began planning a small elopement gathering with our friends only. We created a website and somehow my mother ended up finding out about it. She got emotionally distraught over the whole situation. My brother started commenting nasty things on my wife's facebook page.My family thought that she was manipulating me into these things. My wife started getting very upset. I couldn't believe what was happening, having never had any direct arguments with my family. We had several email exchanges back and forth trying to tell them how we all felt. We decided we needed to go to a family therapist to help us deal with our issues about this problem and we continue to do so. We decided to stop all contact with them and try to just move along with our plans.

We tried to keep our costs down for the party to not strain for any money we hadn't saved. There were a lot elements that dragged down the whole event. We had to switch venues at the last minute because of weather conditions. We had to scramble to get elements such as cake, etc. together.

At the same time she was starting to get extremely depressed about school and the commute. She decided that she would drop the school and reapply again for the next year. Because she was living off her loans and such, she was forced to apply back to the school she had graduated from one more semester to be able to have some money from loans. In the end, I agreed I would try to pay all of the rent in order for her to get by.

Amazingly, the wedding worked out and all our guests were able to make it. It was a good time, although we kept out hard alcohol to keep it from being a party. However, some of our guests who were staying at our rental house, decided to bring hard alcohol and it made it much more of a house party then a wedding.

After the wedding, things just kept spiraling. My wife was upset over the whole ordeal. She didn't want to be friends anymore with most of the people involved in the wedding. One of her friends made an comment on facebook about marriages that may have been construed towards us and she subsequently cut off all contact with her. She hated our dog and put me in a situation to have to get rid of it.

As she was applying to new grad school programs, many of them were being considered at other parts of the country. We had more arguements over that because it would have limited my job opportunities. At the same time, she was getting emotionally distraught about a young cousin (5 year old) who was possibly going to be taken away to foster care unless someone was a guardianship. She had developed a very special relationship with her. She didn't apply to any out of state schools because we talked about us being guardians for her. I was reluctant, but saw how much happiness it brought my wife to have her around and agreed that would move forward to taking guardianship of her.

Now, my wife is starting her new school semester and getting to the point where she cannot put up with me anymore:

She feels our wedding has been ruined by what happened and believes that I did not take the steps to prevent it from happening

She thinks I dragged her into this whole moving situation so I could be close to work while she had to commute and ruin her schooling and that I would not be accommadating to her needs. By this, she also thinks by us living together, she thinks that I don't fit any of her stuff into my life or make room for her, including the difficulty I have had in planning for bringing this child in.

She feels I have not dealt with my family situation properly. She feels that I have not been supportive enough of her emotions, even though I have tried to stay firm on not talking to my parents and continue to go to therapy on the situation.

She thinks that I have only cared about myself and not her at all.

She thinks I am overcommitted at work.

She says things like she never really wanted any things I have done for her (moving, dog, eloping) because they were only for my best interests and that I would not see it any other way/

She wants to at this point leave me and has even talked pretty openly about suicide. She cannot move out because she has no money and her parents don't have room in their house for her.

There is probably a bunch more I don't know even know how to easily write to put in this post. I know that I have emotional issues that I need to work out on my own in therapy and maybe stuff she needs to deal with too. But, she has made it abundantly clear that I am the only problem to her.

I love her so much and I have tried so hard to please her and do things that way she would want to make her happy, but I feel it's been one thing after another and I feel so lost. What on earth can I do?


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## turnera (Jan 22, 2010)

Your wife needs professional help. There is nothing you can do because SHE has to be responsible for herself. She seems to be running completely on emotion, and none on logic. Very dangerous. Has she ever been to counseling?

If she continues to say that YOU have to change, then I would advise rethinking the marriage. Sorry, but people with emotional issues just don't get better on their own. And they don't get better if their spouse keeps taking on more and more of the onus of the issues. Help her by telling her she has to help herself.


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## njpca (Jan 22, 2010)

She had some counseling after her abusive relationship, but only to transition her from the experience. She got validation from the courts with restrainment and such, so she didn't feel like she needed anything extensive.

She says the only thing that therapy and counseling would do for her is put her into a facility or they would medicate her and she does not want to do either. She believes that would only make matters worse.

I have told her that when we go to see our family therapist, we will stop talking about my family situation that had previously occurred and instead focus on my problems in our relationship one on one with the same or different therapist. I don't know if we will dive into any of her issues, but it's last hope we may have to salvage anything.


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## turnera (Jan 22, 2010)

The best thing I can tell you, then, is that you have to set some boundaries to protect yourself. She will suck you dry with her emotional issues and unwillingness to accept responsibility. A boundary would be something like "you are welcome to have your own view of who is at fault for your unhappiness. However, I will not agree to your view that I can or cannot make you happy. If you tell me that, it will not change what I do. I'll continue to work to make this a good marriage, but I won't stop being who I am and mold myself to your image of who I should be."

btw, her sicking suicide on you is a mind play; odds are good she's just using it to get what she wants - it's probably all she knows. If you tell her at the beginning that you won't take it seriously, she'll probably drop it as a ploy. If you keep NOT taking responsibility for her feelings, she'll have to learn how to be responsible on her own. Kind of like you shouldn't spoil a 3 year old by giving in to their tantrums.


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