# NOW he wants to change? The power of ILYBINILWY



## TheRealMcCoy

We see it ALL THE TIME here:

Wife starts a thread. Husband was neglecting her for years. Playing video games and/or smoking weed and/or hanging out with the boys too often and/or has a bad temper and/or a little porn issue. She'd been telling him for YEARS, until she's blue in the face, that it bothers her. NEXT TIME I'm leaving you. If you don't stop, I'm leaving you. She TOLD HIM flat-out for 20 freakin' YEARS!!! 

But he doesn't change. Or changes for a few weeks then he's back at it. So she gives up. Falls out of love with him. Comes here asking what to do. "He's an awesome husband and dad otherwise... I tired for YEARS and nothing worked". 

"Leave the monster".
"What a horrible man. Call social services".
"What's the matter with YOU that you want to stay with him"?

And on it goes. Rightly so. So she lets him know that she's given up. It's over. "I love you but I'm not IN love with you" any longer. Only he gets it this time. His life flashes before his eyes. He is in shock. His marriage is over. His wife...doesn't love him? How can this be? His marriage was GREAT! Sure, it had a few problems and he has some improving to do, but... OVER? 

He cries, begs and pleads until the reality sets in. And...wait for it...determines to never be the kind of man that would drive away the most important thing that ever happened to him. He changes. And it's not temporary this time. It's real. My DNA changed when I realized what had happened to me. Oh, I knew everything that bothered her. Remember, she "told me" for decades. But I didn't listen. Sure, there were a "few problems" in my marriage, but I had no idea...

Yes, now he DOES want to change. And can. Possibly already has. You're seeing results already. Sure, he can slip up, and probably will. He's human. He'll make mistakes too. The likelihood of you taking him back at this point and keeping him are near zero. The only way I've ever seen this work is for the wife to truly be gone. And the crying and pleading didn't help. You've moved on. It's over. 

Rinse, repeat. Again and again and again.

So why am I posting this tale of woe in the "Men's Clubhouse"? So that every time you men see this tale unfolding, and the gals whip up their "YOU GO GIRL, leave the bastard, screw him he deserves it" hysteria, I would request that you pocket your self-righteous indignation and realize that you are telling wives to leave men JUST LIKE YOU!

That's right boys. She married a great man she loved, just like your wife did. He's a great father and husband, just like you are. Everyone loves him, just like everyone loves you. And he's not perfect and has problems, just like you.

What? You ARE perfect? That's awesome. Just one problem. Perfect should be the rarest of all people. But SO MANY men seem to be here. You could all NEVER be like that, right? Imperfect, I mean. How did we get such a huge concentration of perfection here? Well, please just try to understand there are still a lot of us that are NOT perfect. We have problems. We just didn't know they were dealbreakers. 

Sure, I have a temper. It's pretty bad but it's pretty rare also. But we love each other so much. We share these wonderful kids. And it is SO rare. Even rarer to happen in front of the twins. So we're still good. I know we are. I just need to deal with this temper thing. And/or,

Sure, I smoke a little weed. VERY rarely. I know she hates it, but I hide it pretty well. And it's SO rare. She's caught me once or twice, but we love each other so much. We share these wonderful kids. And it is SO rare. Even rarer to happen in front of the twins. So we're still good. I know we are. I just need to hide it a little better. And/or,

Sure, I look at a little internet porn. Who DOESN'T? It's pretty soft stuff and they're all adults. But some of those popups that I forget to close sometimes. Some gross/young stuff. She KNOWS I'm not into that stuff. And anyhow, we love each other so much. We share these wonderful kids. And it is SO rare. Even rarer to happen in front of the twins. So we're still good. I know we are. I just need to deal with this popup thing thing. And/or,

Sure, I need to sniff my armpits sometimes. It's not that I like the odor, it's just that I need to know what they smell like. Usually when I'm working and dirty-sweaty. It's pretty harmless. Kind of gross, and I know she's grossed out by it. And I try to do it alone, but sometimes... But we love each other so much. We share these wonderful kids. And it is SO rare that she see's me do it. Even rarer to happen in front of the twins. So we're still good. I know we are. I just need to deal with this temper thing. And/or,

Sure, I have a temper. And I hit her once. It wasn't hard, And I was SO sorry. And we cried in each others arms after it happened. But we love each other so much. We share these wonderful kids. And it is SO rare. Even rarer to happen in front of the twins. So we're still good. I know we are. I just need to deal with this temper thing. And/or,

I hope you get the point.

Anyhow, I want all of you perfect men to understand that some of us have weaknesses and or problems that you can't imagine. Maybe we didn't have the perfect 1950's TV dad coming in the door at 5:30 every day to a sober mom with dinner on the table. Maybe we were bullied mercilessly in school and it's the only way we know how to treat women. Maybe we had a dad who beat his sons and diddled his daughters. Or maybe mom or dad just weren't there for some reason and we had few to no roll models. Or our roll models hit the alcohol/drugs hard. Or maybe we were just scared little kids from a good home who just struggled with socialization our whole lives. 

Women will never understand this dynamic. They THINK they do, but they CAN'T. The reaction is consistent. Time and time again. Something to the effect of...HUH? The best I'll ever get with this debate would be for a few men to do a little self reflection before they throw a brother to the wolves.

And back to the gals. "NOW he wants to change"? Yes, he does. He really does. But you don't love him any more. That's too bad. It would have been nice to have him "get it" before you were gone. You loved him at one point, right? YOU can't be happy that it's gotten here. Sure, he "deserves it", but you still share children with this monster. It wold be nice if you could have gotten that change BEFORE you were gone for good, wouldn't it? Then see a change that sticks?

And the men NEVER see it coming. How could any of you POSSIBLY know if you're not next? That she's not already gone? You CAN'T. So a little more "There but for the grace of god go I" and a little less throwing stones from your glass house before you reply.

Please


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## Emerging Buddhist

If you could put that into one paragraph of advice, what would that be?


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## Ursula

TheRealMcCoy said:


> What? You ARE perfect? That's awesome. Just one problem. Perfect should be the rarest of all people. But SO MANY men seem to be here. You could all NEVER be like that, right? Imperfect, I mean. How did we get such a huge concentration of perfection here? Well, please just try to understand there are still a lot of us that are NOT perfect. We have problems. We just didn't know they were dealbreakers.
> 
> Anyhow, I want all of you perfect men to understand that some of us have weaknesses and or problems that you can't imagine. Maybe we didn't have the perfect 1950's TV dad coming in the door at 5:30 every day to a sober mom with dinner on the table. Maybe we were bullied mercilessly in school and it's the only way we know how to treat women. Maybe we had a dad who beat his sons and diddled his daughters. Or maybe mom or dad just weren't there for some reason and we had few to no roll models. Or our roll models hit the alcohol/drugs hard. Or maybe we were just scared little kids from a good home who just struggled with socialization our whole lives.
> 
> Women will never understand this dynamic. They THINK they do, but they CAN'T. The reaction is consistent. Time and time again. Something to the effect of...HUH? The best I'll ever get with this debate would be for a few men to do a little self reflection before they throw a brother to the wolves.
> 
> And back to the gals. "NOW he wants to change"? Yes, he does. He really does. But you don't love him any more. That's too bad. It would have been nice to have him "get it" before you were gone. You loved him at one point, right? YOU can't be happy that it's gotten here. Sure, he "deserves it", but you still share children with this monster. It wold be nice if you could have gotten that change BEFORE you were gone for good, wouldn't it? Then see a change that sticks?
> 
> And the men NEVER see it coming. How could any of you POSSIBLY know if you're not next? That she's not already gone? You CAN'T. So a little more "There but for the grace of god go I" and a little less throwing stones from your glass house before you reply.
> 
> Please


Perfectness: no one is perfect. We're human, which makes us all inherently NOT perfect. I was married (and still am, technically) to a man who grew up with a mentally unstable sister, and was told by his Mom that he was the perfect child. He probably was in her eyes, but when he told me that he thought he was perfect, I laughed. No one is perfect.

I'm not sure which dynamic you think that women can't possibly understand, but I can assure you that we also have our own childhoods and upbringings to fall back on, and maybe those weren't fantastic in all cases either. Some women out there and on here have been abused by parental units, had alcoholic/drug affected parents, parents that weren't present, etc., so we get it.

And often no, men and women don't see it coming. My own husband was blindsided when I asked for a separation, saying that he wished I had told him of my unhappiness earlier. But see, I did. In the last year, I had gone to him about a half dozen times, saying that I was unhappy, that we needed to start working on our relationship, and that I was scared that we wouldn't make it as a couple if we didn't start putting in the effort. Half a dozen times, and that was just in the last year; we had been married for nearly 4 years, and I had mentioned it to him a few times each year. But he still didn't see it coming, and that will forever baffle me. As for whether or not men finally get it after being his with a separation, I'm not sure. Personally, I haven't talked to my husband in a number of weeks (no contact separation), and have no idea how he's feeling or what he's working on. I'm working on me. Do either of us "deserve" this? No. We got married too quickly without really knowing each other, and both of us still deserve to find happiness with someone. 

Long story short, some things that you said, I agree with; some I do not, and I don't think it's fair to lump ever female (or male for that matter) into little categories of "she'll never understand this" or "he just doesn't get it".


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## Bananapeel

It's very hard for a person to view things from someone else's perspective, especially on an internet board where we are only getting a small slice of the story. If some people are taking advice that you don't like it is hopefully after they have carefully weighed out their situation and decided on the best course of action for them.


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## Married but Happy

TheRealMcCoy said:


> And the men NEVER see it coming. How could any of you POSSIBLY know if you're not next? That she's not already gone? You CAN'T. So a little more "There but for the grace of god go I" and a little less throwing stones from your glass house before you reply.


There's a lot of observational truth in you post, OP. In our first marriages, our partners never "got it" until it was far too late. We're much better off in this relationship, and think that often the best solution IS to leave when you're not being heard, not getting the changes you need to remain happy together.

There are ways to communicate that reduce this pattern, though. But this only works if you truly care, and want your mate to be happy. So it won't work for everyone. Rather than just acknowledge the problem, and maybe try to fix it - and usually fail within a few weeks - you need something to reinforce or trigger the improved behaviors, whatever they may be. We came up with a trigger word that we use when we feel the other is slipping. Instead of just saying, "I would like you to do X," we say, "I need X - *Now*!" "Now" always triggers our focused attention - it did take a short time to develop that habit, though. However, we looked at the issues, negotiated this solution, and agreed to always respond when a request included "Now!"

It works for everything from taking out the trash, to focusing on the conversation and being involved, to getting laid - Now!

I'm confident I won't be next, and vice versa. Things are great ... now!


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## Emerging Buddhist

So... what I heard you say @Married but Happy was, casting aside "expectations" is effectively replaced with "acceptance with boundaries "?

That and communication clarity because... well, speaking the same language helps.


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## cc48kel

I'm still waiting.. I can only tell him so many times about how I feel about 'us'. He doesn't care about anything I have to say. He only wants to talk about kids, cats, sports. Then when I keep myself busy with going out with friends, he wonders why... About every 3 months he tries to 'grab' a boob or something which I literally jump away from him. All I ask is him to be open to therapy and possibility of his anxiety meds. Once I get strong enough to leave, I'm sure he will FINALLY wake-up. Or maybe not, I guess we'll see.


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## chillymorn69

social media plants the seeds of so your unhappy its all the partners fault. you deserve happiness. so kick him/her to the curb and go find someone who will make you happy.

But happiness come from within. and if your relying on someone else to make you happy the well when the newness wears off your back to being unhappy.

the good enough marriage. Where you accept each others faults and as you mature you realize that I could do this better for her/him. or I was a jerk sometime and now that I'm older and wiser I know better.

When both partners realize this and try more is when marriage becomes worth it. too bad that half or so never make it to that stage. mostly because of selfishness. lack of listening to each other, and resolve yep thats the biggest factor RESOLVE. instead we have the grass is greener and many fall for it.

I don't mean to say that there are not good reason for divorce....cheating,abuse, financial infidelity, chemical dependency,


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## Satya

People are within their right to decide if they give 2nd, 3rd, 4th, etc., chances to a partner. That is true whether the partner is male or female.

One previous poster on this board used to say "flip the script" and I'd say the same. There are plenty of things men are encouraged here to leave women over if they don't improve (weight loss/fitness, house cleaning, limiting expenses, are but a few examples).

If it takes 20 years of attempts at communicating her needs for a woman to reach her limit because the man won't see how serious things are, that's all on her. If she'd acted more swiftly and decisively in regard to her boundaries and needs, then she wouldn't have posted here. Heck, there wouldnt be so many posts here in general... Because people would have acted sooner and moved on.

People can only change when they decide to. The change has to come from within for their betterment and no one else's, else it is not genuine. The world does not owe it to them (just as it does not owe anyone else) to stick around and wait with baited breath for the promised results. The idea is, if you are truly changing/improving for YOURSELF, then it won't matter if you have an audience or not.


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## SunCMars

Emerging Buddhist said:


> I*f you could put that into one paragraph of advice, what would that be?*


"The Ark of the Covenant."





Containing-

The 'Married Man's" Thou Shall Nots.

Once tied....those knots never can be undone.


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## Diana7

This is why its SO important to marry a decent, moral, honest person of integrity. So many times we see people here or elsewhere who are dating or engaged to awful people presumably hoping they will dramatically and miraculously change once they are married. You just know that they will be here a few years down the line telling stories of their cheating lying, drug taking spouse.

IF you hate drugs, don't marry a man who takes them. If you hate porn, don't marry a man who watches it. If you hate cheating, don't marry a man who has already cheated while you are dating. It's not rocket science.


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## Taxman

Diana7 said:


> IF you hate drugs, don't marry a man who takes them. If you hate porn, don't marry a man who watches it. If you hate cheating, don't marry a man who has already cheated while you are dating. It's not rocket science.


. 

Unfortunately, my practice is littered with women/men who thought they could CHANGE the person they married. There is no changing, what you see is what you get. I have made this speech way too many times. I can count on the fingers of one hand how many cases of true change I have witnessed, and those cases involved a monumental event that precipitated change.


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## Vega

Diana7 said:


> This is why its SO important to marry a decent, moral, honest person of integrity. So many times we see people here or elsewhere who are dating or engaged to awful people presumably hoping they will dramatically and miraculously change once they are married. You just know that they will be here a few years down the line telling stories of their cheating lying, drug taking spouse.
> 
> IF you hate drugs, don't marry a man who takes them. If you hate porn, don't marry a man who watches it. If you hate cheating, don't marry a man who has already cheated while you are dating. It's not rocket science.


Yes, I agree that IF you already know about these qualities WHILE DATING/ENGAGED, it's probably a good idea not to marry them, let alone stop dating them.

On the other hand, many of those lying, cheating, porn-using, drug-using men as well as cheating, lying, spend-thrifty WOMEN can HIDE these...qualities...until well-after the honeymoon. 

While I understand that it's important to marry a "decent, moral, honest" person of integrity, it seems that many people have no idea how to make that determination. 

Maybe the moral of this thread should be, that the FIRST time someone exhibits one of the more obvious 'red flags', should be the LAST time that you have anything to do with them....?


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## Rocky Mountain Yeti

Satya said:


> People are within their right to decide if they give 2nd, 3rd, 4th, etc., chances to a partner. That is true whether the partner is male or female.
> 
> One previous poster on this board used to say "flip the script" and I'd say the same. There are plenty of things men are encouraged here to leave women over if they don't improve (weight loss/fitness, house cleaning, limiting expenses, are but a few examples).
> 
> If it takes 20 years of attempts at communicating her needs for a woman to reach her limit because the man won't see how serious things are, that's all on her. If she'd acted more swiftly and decisively in regard to her boundaries and needs, then she wouldn't have posted here. Heck, there wouldnt be so many posts here in general... Because people would have acted sooner and moved on.
> 
> People can only change when they decide to. The change has to come from within for their betterment and no one else's, else it is not genuine. The world does not owe it to them (just as it does not owe anyone else) to stick around and wait with baited breath for the promised results. The idea is, if you are truly changing/improving for YOURSELF, then it won't matter if you have an audience or not.


I was struggling with how to respond to the OP. I knew conceptually what I wanted to say, but couldn't quite put it into communicative words. Then @Satya did it for me. Well said.


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## Anon Pink

Taxman said:


> .
> 
> Unfortunately, my practice is littered with women/men who thought they could CHANGE the person they married. There is no changing, what you see is what you get. I have made this speech way too many times. I can count on the fingers of one hand how many cases of true change I have witnessed, and those cases involved a monumental event that precipitated change.


You know that old saying; men marry and think their wives will never change and women marry and think they can change their husbands.

It needs to slightly reworded.
A wife's needs will change but her husband won't.


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## anonmd

Anon Pink said:


> You know that old saying; men marry and think their wives will never change and women marry and think they can change their husbands.
> 
> It needs to slightly reworded.
> A wife's needs will change but her husband won't.


I like that, a corollary to the great quandary - was I just a fool or a sucker?


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## Spicy

Uh yeah...this is exactly what I went through in my first marriage. For fifteen years, every few months sitting him down, telling him how I felt, and what needed to change. He was in the "change for two weeks, then go back to the same ol crap" camp. And yes, I did say those awful words ILYBINILWY at the end. Guess what? They were true, and they still are.

He was completely blindsided. Still is to this day he doesn't understand, while I am happily remarried. Chalks it all up to everything else he can imagine it might have _really_ been, besides the true cause and effect which was him. He was so positive I would never leave, and he was very wrong. Once I hit that point, nothing on heaven or earth could have made me fall back in love with him. I was done, it was long since over. 

On my side of things, I learned a lot from that relationship. I learned what I absolutely was looking for in a husband, and I learned all the things that I couldn't tolerate too. 

Is my second marriage perfect? Of course not. Plus we could practically still be considered newlyweds. No telling what challenges are ahead of us. My approach to the things that we get in a snit about, is very different. I have made it clear from the beginning, that I used up the part of me that can put up with nonstop crap from a husband. That I did leave the first one, and that I would do it again if need be. It's not empty threats, it's just what I can and cannot accept in my life. 

I hope that men and women that are reading this, whose spouses are not yet to this point, may receive a wake up call and be able to save their marriages. Excellent post OP.


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## EleGirl

Diana7 said:


> This is why its SO important to marry a decent, moral, honest person of integrity. So many times we see people here or elsewhere who are dating or engaged to awful people presumably hoping they will dramatically and miraculously change once they are married. You just know that they will be here a few years down the line telling stories of their cheating lying, drug taking spouse.
> 
> IF you hate drugs, don't marry a man who takes them. If you hate porn, don't marry a man who watches it. If you hate cheating, don't marry a man who has already cheated while you are dating. It's not rocket science.


You are right. Do not marry someone who you know does things that you hate. Do not marry someone who exhibits behaviors that are not acceptable. You are not going to change them after marriage. It will only get worse after marriage.

But this does not address other realities. Sometime people hide their true self until married. The more abusive people among us seem to often be able to hide a lot of their abusive behavior until after marriage. And sometimes people change after marriage for one reason or another.

Not all people in troubled marriages marry someone who they know has serious problems and with the intent to miraculously change them.


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## EleGirl

Anon Pink said:


> You know that old saying; men marry and think their wives will never change and women marry and think they can change their husbands.
> 
> It needs to slightly reworded.
> 
> A wife's needs will change but her husband won't.


I don't think this is true. Men and their needs do change after marriage. Very often they put a lot of effort into dating, romancing and courting before marriage.

After marriage, the men settle in the 'husband' mode. They stop courting and romancing and dating.

And the woman is left with a guy who no longer romances and courts her. Now she has a guy who wants her to work full time, clean the house, and cook, etc., while he watches TV, plays computer games and hangs out with his friends.

I know that's not every guy. But it's extremely common.


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## Rocky Mountain Yeti

EleGirl said:


> Sometime people hide their true self until married. The more abusive people among us seem to often be able to hide a lot of their abusive behavior until after marriage.


"a lot" certainly, but it's hard even for the most accomplished chameleon to hide it all. 

It's easy, when being treated well yourself, to to overlook how someone is treating others. You just don't see it. Mostly because you don't want to. How does a man treat his mother? The other women in his life? Coworkers? Friends? These all help reveal character. How does he behave when he doesn't know you're looking? How does he handle money? How does he deal with others?
Fairly? Don't overlook these things!

Of course there are exceptions, but in most cases, the indicators are there, even if they are not directed specifically at you. That's why I liked Diana's opening statement: 



Diana7 said:


> This is why its SO important to marry a decent, moral, honest person of integrity.


It's not just about making sure he treats you well--it's about the totality of his character. While there's no guarantees, eyes wide open to all things, not just those you want to see or just those which are easy to see, improved odds dramatically. Just because "he never treated me like that before we got married" doesn't mean you didn't receive some kind of warning.


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## EleGirl

TheRealMcCoy said:


> We see it ALL THE TIME here:
> 
> Wife starts a thread. Husband was neglecting her for years. Playing video games and/or smoking weed and/or hanging out with the boys too often and/or has a bad temper and/or a little porn issue. She'd been telling him for YEARS, until she's blue in the face, that it bothers her. NEXT TIME I'm leaving you. If you don't stop, I'm leaving you. She TOLD HIM flat-out for 20 freakin' YEARS!!!
> 
> But he doesn't change. Or changes for a few weeks then he's back at it. So she gives up. Falls out of love with him. Comes here asking what to do. "He's an awesome husband and dad otherwise... I tired for YEARS and nothing worked".
> 
> "Leave the monster".
> "What a horrible man. Call social services".
> "What's the matter with YOU that you want to stay with him"?
> 
> And on it goes. Rightly so. So she lets him know that she's given up. It's over. "I love you but I'm not IN love with you" any longer. Only he gets it this time. His life flashes before his eyes. He is in shock. His marriage is over. His wife...doesn't love him? How can this be? His marriage was GREAT! Sure, it had a few problems and he has some improving to do, but... OVER?
> 
> He cries, begs and pleads until the reality sets in. And...wait for it...determines to never be the kind of man that would drive away the most important thing that ever happened to him. He changes. And it's not temporary this time. It's real. My DNA changed when I realized what had happened to me. Oh, I knew everything that bothered her. Remember, she "told me" for decades. But I didn't listen. Sure, there were a "few problems" in my marriage, but I had no idea...
> 
> Yes, now he DOES want to change. And can. Possibly already has. You're seeing results already. Sure, he can slip up, and probably will. He's human. He'll make mistakes too. The likelihood of you taking him back at this point and keeping him are near zero. The only way I've ever seen this work is for the wife to truly be gone. And the crying and pleading didn't help. You've moved on. It's over.
> 
> Rinse, repeat. Again and again and again.
> 
> So why am I posting this tale of woe in the "Men's Clubhouse"? So that every time you men see this tale unfolding, and the gals whip up their "YOU GO GIRL, leave the bastard, screw him he deserves it" hysteria, I would request that you pocket your self-righteous indignation and realize that you are telling wives to leave men JUST LIKE YOU!
> 
> That's right boys. She married a great man she loved, just like your wife did. He's a great father and husband, just like you are. Everyone loves him, just like everyone loves you. And he's not perfect and has problems, just like you.
> 
> What? You ARE perfect? That's awesome. Just one problem. Perfect should be the rarest of all people. But SO MANY men seem to be here. You could all NEVER be like that, right? Imperfect, I mean. How did we get such a huge concentration of perfection here? Well, please just try to understand there are still a lot of us that are NOT perfect. We have problems. We just didn't know they were dealbreakers.
> 
> Sure, I have a temper. It's pretty bad but it's pretty rare also. But we love each other so much. We share these wonderful kids. And it is SO rare. Even rarer to happen in front of the twins. So we're still good. I know we are. I just need to deal with this temper thing. And/or,
> 
> Sure, I smoke a little weed. VERY rarely. I know she hates it, but I hide it pretty well. And it's SO rare. She's caught me once or twice, but we love each other so much. We share these wonderful kids. And it is SO rare. Even rarer to happen in front of the twins. So we're still good. I know we are. I just need to hide it a little better. And/or,
> 
> Sure, I look at a little internet porn. Who DOESN'T? It's pretty soft stuff and they're all adults. But some of those popups that I forget to close sometimes. Some gross/young stuff. She KNOWS I'm not into that stuff. And anyhow, we love each other so much. We share these wonderful kids. And it is SO rare. Even rarer to happen in front of the twins. So we're still good. I know we are. I just need to deal with this popup thing thing. And/or,
> 
> Sure, I need to sniff my armpits sometimes. It's not that I like the odor, it's just that I need to know what they smell like. Usually when I'm working and dirty-sweaty. It's pretty harmless. Kind of gross, and I know she's grossed out by it. And I try to do it alone, but sometimes... But we love each other so much. We share these wonderful kids. And it is SO rare that she see's me do it. Even rarer to happen in front of the twins. So we're still good. I know we are. I just need to deal with this temper thing. And/or,
> 
> Sure, I have a temper. And I hit her once. It wasn't hard, And I was SO sorry. And we cried in each others arms after it happened. But we love each other so much. We share these wonderful kids. And it is SO rare. Even rarer to happen in front of the twins. So we're still good. I know we are. I just need to deal with this temper thing. And/or,
> 
> I hope you get the point.
> 
> Anyhow, I want all of you perfect men to understand that some of us have weaknesses and or problems that you can't imagine. Maybe we didn't have the perfect 1950's TV dad coming in the door at 5:30 every day to a sober mom with dinner on the table. Maybe we were bullied mercilessly in school and it's the only way we know how to treat women. Maybe we had a dad who beat his sons and diddled his daughters. Or maybe mom or dad just weren't there for some reason and we had few to no roll models. Or our roll models hit the alcohol/drugs hard. Or maybe we were just scared little kids from a good home who just struggled with socialization our whole lives.
> 
> Women will never understand this dynamic. They THINK they do, but they CAN'T. The reaction is consistent. Time and time again. Something to the effect of...HUH? The best I'll ever get with this debate would be for a few men to do a little self reflection before they throw a brother to the wolves.
> 
> And back to the gals. "NOW he wants to change"? Yes, he does. He really does. But you don't love him any more. That's too bad. It would have been nice to have him "get it" before you were gone. You loved him at one point, right? YOU can't be happy that it's gotten here. Sure, he "deserves it", but you still share children with this monster. It wold be nice if you could have gotten that change BEFORE you were gone for good, wouldn't it? Then see a change that sticks?
> 
> And the men NEVER see it coming. How could any of you POSSIBLY know if you're not next? That she's not already gone? You CAN'T. So a little more "There but for the grace of god go I" and a little less throwing stones from your glass house before you reply.
> 
> Please


Maybe the advice here should be for anyone, male or female, to actually pay attention to what their spouse says. Pay attention to their needs. Pay attention and address the issues then and there.

If you have ignored the problems that they have brought up over and over, then deal with it. Do not put your spouse in the position of having to threaten divorce before you wake up.

I have a large garden. I check it daily. My plants let me know what is going on.. I can look at them and tell when they are complaining that they don't have enough water, or fertilizer, or when they need to be pruned. I can tell when they are unhappy because they are being attacked by insects. I would not wait 20 years to address it. I address it then and there and learn from each experience. 

Tend your marriage like you would your garden. Treat your wife/husband with the constant care a good gardener spends on their plants.

My husband refused, and I mean refused, to spend any time with me. He flat out said that he would not. He only saw a point in spending time together with our son. I told him that this was not acceptable. Blew got angry and ignored what I said. Then he was surprised, shocked when I left. If I have to beg my husband to spend time with me, I'm not sticking around. And even if he was suddenly shocked into agreeing to spend time with me--yea it was too late. The damage was done. How would I ever get over the fact that for years he refused to spend time with me?

You are putting all the responsibility on the person who is being neglected to, or other wise mistreated, to somehow save the marriage. The other person has responsibility too, as did my husband to tend the marriage before it to the point of no return.


----------



## EleGirl

Rocky Mountain Yeti said:


> "a lot" certainly, but it's hard even for the most accomplished chameleon to hide it all.
> 
> It's easy, when being treated well yourself, to to overlook how someone is treating others. You just don't see it. Mostly because you don't want to. How does a man treat his mother? The other women in his life? Coworkers? Friends? These all help reveal character. How does he behave when he doesn't know you're looking? How does he handle money? How does he deal with others?
> 
> Fairly? Don't overlook these things!


Of course there are a lot of people who show their faults in ways as you describe. But there truly are others who do not. There are a sizable number of people who treat everyone well except for their spouse. 

I could go through the behavior of my son's father and my step children's father.. they both treated their mothers very well. They treated everyone very well. 

I dated my son's father for 5 years and never say the level of anger and abuse that he metered out starting a few years after marriage. And, after we married, no one be me saw the abuse either. It was always behind closed doors.. as is most abuse.

My step children's father was a loving, hardworking man raising 2 children on his own. He had spend 10 years in the military. Then married, supported his wife and 3 children for 14 years at a very good job. He had a very good, responsible job. We dated 2 years before we married. We spent every hour we could together. There was nothing to predict that after we married he would lose his job and spend the rest of his life playing computer games and ignoring his children, me and everything else.



Rocky Mountain Yeti said:


> Of course there are exceptions, but in most cases, the indicators are there, even if they are not directed specifically at you. That's why I liked Diana's opening statement:
> 
> It's not just about making sure he treats you well--it's about the totality of his character. While there's no guarantees, eyes wide open to all things, not just those you want to see or just those which are easy to see, improved odds dramatically. Just because "he never treated me like that before we got married" doesn't mean you didn't receive some kind of warning.


I completely agree that a person has to look at all aspects of how a person treats not only them, but treats other people. This is important. Paying attention to this helps weed out a lot of undesirable potential mates. But it sadly does not weed them all out.


----------



## arbitrator

*More often than not, ILYBINILWY is little more than a deceptive ploy offered up by the spouse who is either actively cheating or is giving credence to cheating on their spouse! *


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

Ursula said:


> I'm not sure which dynamic you think that women can't possibly understand...






Ursula said:


> But he still didn't see it coming, and that will forever baffle me.




You and every other woman. EVERY other woman.


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

cc48kel said:


> I'm still waiting.. I can only tell him so many times about how I feel about 'us'. He doesn't care about anything I have to say. He only wants to talk about kids, cats, sports. Then when I keep myself busy with going out with friends, he wonders why... About every 3 months he tries to 'grab' a boob or something which I literally jump away from him. All I ask is him to be open to therapy and possibility of his anxiety meds. Once I get strong enough to leave, I'm sure he will FINALLY wake-up. Or maybe not, I guess we'll see.




I already covered your scenario. 





TheRealMcCoy said:


> We see it ALL THE TIME here:
> 
> Wife starts a thread. Husband was neglecting her for years. Playing video games and/or smoking weed and/or hanging out with the boys too often and/or has a bad temper and/or a little porn issue. She'd been telling him for YEARS, until she's blue in the face, that it bothers her. NEXT TIME I'm leaving you. If you don't stop, I'm leaving you. She TOLD HIM flat-out for 20 freakin' YEARS!!!
> 
> But he doesn't change...


----------



## Amplexor

About 10 years ago, I heard those words too. I spun around in my shoes from the 2x4 that just cracked me on the temple. My wife had been complaining for years about the state of the marriage. The lack of my emotional attention and distancing from her. She wasn’t asking me to change who I was, but back into the man I was when we dated and married. We were 20+ years into the marriage at the time. Over the last couple of years she slowly shut down emotionally and got to the point of not caring anymore. 

But there was a reason for my withdrawal from her. Her lack of physical and sexual intimacy that I required to be happy in the marriage. It had been effectively a sexless relationship for over a year. I too went through a slow emotional burn out. I quite pursuing sex from her, I quit caring too. I could weigh the chicken and egg paradox all day and couldn’t come up with a definitive, “Who shot the first volley?”. Did my lack of attention lead to her shut down of the sex life or the reverse?

When we hit that stage, the arguing stopped. I misperceived this as, things aren’t great, but they’re OK. I had no intention of divorcing her. So in a stereotypical way, I continued walking down a path of doom, dragging my knuckles and clubbing the occasional mastodon along the way. Oblivious to the fact she had fallen in love with someone else in a long term emotional affair. 

I won’t rehash the whole recovery process, it is stickied in the reconciliation forum. It took a year and a half to kill the EA. Another 6 months after that to restart the sex life. Nearly a year after that to hear her say, “I love you.”. And almost another to consider the marriage fully whole again. Three and a half years passed by.

When your wife gives you the ILYBANILWY line, she’s done. She has built an emotional wall between the two of you and will keep it there to protect herself from you. She’s likely been disappointed and hurt too many times. My wife built hers very well. It took 3.5 years of a steady, patient pull from me, a lot of self-examination and discipline, love and support. And probably most important a confident husband who supported her and the marriage. She finally quit pushing away from me and began to draw closer feeling comfortable that I wouldn’t hurt her and would do whatever I could support her and help her along the way.

This doesn’t end well for most, but it did for us. We were lucky but also found a lot of resolve between us to make it work.


----------



## Diana7

Vega said:


> Yes, I agree that IF you already know about these qualities WHILE DATING/ENGAGED, it's probably a good idea not to marry them, let alone stop dating them.
> 
> On the other hand, many of those lying, cheating, porn-using, drug-using men as well as cheating, lying, spend-thrifty WOMEN can HIDE these...qualities...until well-after the honeymoon.
> 
> While I understand that it's important to marry a "decent, moral, honest" person of integrity, it seems that many people have no idea how to make that determination.
> 
> Maybe the moral of this thread should be, that the FIRST time someone exhibits one of the more obvious 'red flags', should be the LAST time that you have anything to do with them....?


In these days where nearly all couples live together for a few years before they marry, its hard to understand how they didn't notice that the man they were living with wasn't a druggie, or didn't drink too much, or wasn't out clubbing meeting other women etc etc.


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

Satya said:


> If it takes 20 years of attempts at communicating her needs for a woman to reach her limit because the man won't see how serious things are, that's all on her. If she'd acted more swiftly and decisively in regard to her boundaries and needs, then she wouldn't have posted here. Heck, there wouldn't be so many posts here in general... *Because people would have acted sooner and moved on*.



You're so close and so completely wrong at the same time. She DID act swiftly. 20 years ago. AND 19 years ago. AND 18 years... Or, she THINKS she did anyhow. But he never heard her. We never do. We hear, but we don't HEAR.





Emerging Buddhist said:


> If you could put that into one paragraph of advice, what would that be?



Somebody figure out how to make men HEAR their partners. Somebody take the "shock" part out of this. That's the key. 

Somebody needs to figure out how to make everyone understand this phenomenon. Someone needs to figure out how to make this not be the case in almost EVERY breakup. But it happens ALL THE TIME. 




TheRealMcCoy said:


> Only he gets it this time. His life flashes before his eyes. He is in shock. His marriage is over. His wife...doesn't love him? How can this be? His marriage was GREAT! Sure, it had a few problems and he has some improving to do, but... OVER?
> 
> He cries, begs and pleads until the reality sets in.



I see it all the time. How can that possibly be when she told him until she's "blue in the face"?


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

Vega said:


> On the other hand, many of those lying, cheating, porn-using, drug-using men as well as cheating, lying, spend-thrifty WOMEN can HIDE these...qualities...until well-after the honeymoon.



Yes, of course it is the evil intent of these evil people. But you know who will be just as shocked? The dream man that all the girls wanted. He dresses so well, is so polite, does ALL the cooking". Perfect dad, the works.

But maybe he's a little TOO perfect. The cooking all the time is getting annoying. ALWAYS running the bake sale. And although she always SAW he was a little effeminate, it's really starting to grind on her now that all of these other character traits went into full time hyperdrive, 24-7 now, since marriage. He's changing, and she's not sure she can love him any more...

Same EXACT scenario as all of those horrible people you condemned. Same thing.

No more finger pointing.


----------



## Ursula

TheRealMcCoy said:


> You and every other woman. EVERY other woman.


That would be like me saying that EVERY man out there is blind and just doesn't get it when their woman says that she's unhappy. That's wrong and an unfair judgement. There ARE some men out there who I'm sure do get it, and want to work to fix things before their spouse walks away. There are some that don't get it at all. Just like there ARE some women out there who DO understand, and there are some who do not. It's not right for you to lump us all into 1 category. I'm sure you wouldn't want to be lumped into a generic category, so maybe don't do that to others.


----------



## EleGirl

TheRealMcCoy said:


> TheRealMcCoy said:
> 
> 
> 
> We see it ALL THE TIME here:
> 
> Wife starts a thread. Husband was neglecting her for years. Playing video games and/or smoking weed and/or hanging out with the boys too often and/or has a bad temper and/or a little porn issue. She'd been telling him for YEARS, until she's blue in the face, that it bothers her. NEXT TIME I'm leaving you. If you don't stop, I'm leaving you. She TOLD HIM flat-out for 20 freakin' YEARS!!!
> 
> But he doesn't change...
> 
> 
> 
> I already covered your scenario.
Click to expand...

So what you are saying is that women (you are talking about women) should just leave as soon as a problem shows up if the guy does not address the issues immediately.


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

EleGirl said:


> You are right. Do not marry someone who you know does things that you hate. Do not marry someone who exhibits behaviors that are not acceptable. You are not going to change them after marriage. It will only get worse after marriage.






TheRealMcCoy said:


> But maybe he's a little TOO perfect. The cooking all the time is getting annoying. ALWAYS running the bake sale. And although she always SAW he was a little effeminate, it's really starting to grind on her now that all of these other character traits went into full time hyperdrive, 24-7 now, since marriage. He's changing, and she's not sure she can love him any more...
> 
> Same EXACT scenario as all of those horrible people you condemned. Same thing.
> 
> No more finger pointing.



I realized I posted this clarification AFTER you made this post. But hopefully you see it as the same answer. Nobody is hiding ANYTHING in this very plausible scenario I wrote. She married him BECAUSE of the traits she now finds annoying. No evil intent on ANYONE's part. There are no bad people here. But she's not in love with him any moreand he has NO CLUE. He is literally the perfect husband. And he'll be shocked. Just like the rest of us. Right on up to the guy that beats his wife monthly.


----------



## Emerging Buddhist

TheRealMcCoy said:


> Somebody figure out how to make men HEAR their partners. Somebody take the "shock" part out of this. That's the key.
> 
> Somebody needs to figure out how to make everyone understand this phenomenon. Someone needs to figure out how to make this not be the case in almost EVERY breakup. But it happens ALL THE TIME.


I find it amazing that we can take a piece of machinery and navigate it to the corners of the globe, paying close attention to the gauges for every little hiccup and discrepancy yet in our marriages the gauges are ignored and all the signs of failure present yet there is no attention to maintenance until it is completely broken down to failure.

The shock is that the maintenance schedule in one manual is preferred over another... and that is choice.


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

Ursula said:


> That would be like me saying that EVERY man out there is blind and just doesn't get it when their woman says that she's unhappy. That's wrong and an unfair judgement. There ARE some men out there who I'm sure do get it, and want to work to fix things before their spouse walks away. There are some that don't get it at all. Just like there ARE some women out there who DO understand, and there are some who do not. It's not right for you to lump us all into 1 category. I'm sure you wouldn't want to be lumped into a generic category, so maybe don't do that to others.


I stand corrected. I meant only to imply that it happens A LOT. And please stop accusing me of something unseemly just because I'm only talking from the husband's perspective. I do not understand women. And to presume I know how this same scenario would work out if I "flipped it around" is pretty silly.


----------



## EleGirl

TheRealMcCoy said:


> I realized I posted this clarification AFTER you made this post. But hopefully you see it as the same answer. *Nobody is hiding ANYTHING in this very plausible scenario I wrote. * She married him BECAUSE of the traits she now finds annoying. No evil intent on ANYONE's part. There are no bad people here. But she's not in love with him any moreand he has NO CLUE. He is literally the perfect husband. And he'll be shocked. Just like the rest of us. Right on up to the guy that beats his wife monthly.


Yes, in your scenario, no one is hiding anything. There is just some guy who is not listening to his wife when she tells him that there is a problem, over and over.

I was addressing someone who was making the assumption that it is always, 100%, the case that a person can be judge accurately prior to marriage.


----------



## Blondilocks

It's a simple truth - you can only shine someone on for so long with the attitude of 'it's not that bad' or 'they'll get over it' before they really do get over it and you. 

For the lack of a nail a shoe was lost...

Take care of the little things and the big things will take care of themselves.


----------



## EleGirl

Diana7 said:


> In these days where nearly all couples live together for a few years before they marry, its hard to understand how they didn't notice that the man they were living with wasn't a druggie, or didn't drink too much, or wasn't out clubbing meeting other women etc etc.


I lived with a man most of 5 years before we married. Not once in those 5 years did he yell at me. Not once did he put me down. Not once did he hit me.

Fast forward a few years after marriage and all he did was yell at me, put me down, and every so often was pushing, shoving and throwing things, etc.

Some people do not feel secure enough to let their inner demons out until they are in a marriage, feel safe enough and behind closed doors.

Oh and he also cheated most of our marriage. Very often when a person cheats, the cheater is very good at hiding it. 

This is actually a very common thing to happen in marriages where this is this type of problem.


----------



## zookeeper

If it were "so rare" why would she want to leave you in the first place? 

What does she already know about you that would leave her taking the advice of strangers on the internet vs trusting your sincerity?

Own your actions. No woman leaves a man because of advice she receives here. She leaves because she is unhappy. How did she get that way?


----------



## EleGirl

TheRealMcCoy said:


> I stand corrected. I meant only to imply that it happens A LOT. And please stop accusing me of something unseemly just because I'm only talking from the husband's perspective. I do not understand women. And to presume I know how this same scenario would work out if I "flipped it around" is pretty silly.


It does work out the same way if you flip it around.

If a man is unhappy in the marriage and he keeps telling his wife this, and she just keeps ignoring it, he is most likely going to leave.


----------



## Holdingontoit

EleGirl said:


> It does work out the same way if you flip it around.
> 
> If a man is unhappy in the marriage and he keeps telling his wife this, and she just keeps ignoring it, he is most likely going to leave.


Or shut down and stop caring how she feels. Stop making an effort to meet her needs. And then she starts complaining that he doesn't meet her needs. And she can't understand why he keeps ignoring her.

Often it is chicken and egg. Which started first? The kids arrived and they got busy and had less time and money for dating. Did she stop feeling cherished before she stopped having sex with him, or did they stop having sex after the pregnancy and she never saw any reason to restart because he was ignoring her? Did he tune her out because he thought she was "his" once the ring was on her finger so he could relax and stop romancing her? Or did he tune her out after the 50th request for sex wa rejected and he figured if she doesn't care about my most important need then I sure as heck am not going to care about any of hers?

Very hard to pull out of that downward spiral. requires communication and commitment and effort on both spouses' parts. Often one or both is lacking.


----------



## Married but Happy

TheRealMcCoy said:


> Somebody needs to figure out how to make everyone understand this phenomenon. Someone needs to figure out how to make this not be the case in almost EVERY breakup. But it happens ALL THE TIME.


We found a way. It's in post #5 of this thread. However, it doesn't work for everyone, and for those for whom it doesn't work, they may as well get out _now!_


----------



## Vega

Holdingontoit said:


> Often it is chicken and egg. Which started first?


In many cases, there are subtle signs and 'red flags' WELL BEFORE the couple got to "I Do". 

But a lot of people want to give the other person the benefit of the doubt. He yelled at me and called me names because he's stressed out at work...she was flirting with that other guy because she said I've been ignoring her lately...
He lied to me because he was afraid that I'd leave him if he told me the truth (!)...

After all, people make "mistakes"...right? Nobody's perfect...right? Everyone's selfish and disrespectful once in a while...right? 

Wrong.

A lot of people don't know what the red flags mean, especially if they are subtle. 

I'll tell ya, if I could do 'it' all over again, I would have dumped the men I was with the FIRST time a 'red flag' reared its ugly head. Sure would have saved myself several decades of heartache and financial difficulties if I did.


----------



## JustTheFacts

I always shake my head when I hear somebody say (concerning porn) "well, everybody does it". What everybody else does is irrelevant. You should know whether or not your SO considers watching porn as cheating or hurtful. If they do, then you shouldn't do it. Some SO's don't care. You should consider their feelings regardless of what everybody else does. Find out before you indulge. I had a girlfriend get very upset at me and accuse me of cheating because I looked at porn. I was floored. I had no idea that she considered it cheating. Lesson learned.


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

EleGirl said:


> So what you are saying is that women (you are talking about women) should just leave as soon as a problem shows up if the guy does not address the issues immediately.



In a nutshell, yes. But I use "leave" as a generic term for make REALLY SURE he knows that it's almost over. I don't know if it can be done. The only time I EVER see it sold is when the wife is already gone. THEN he gets it. But then it's too late. Look at the title of my thread again. 

If you have "talked" to him once and doesn't stop. Then "talked" to him again, forcefully, and he doesn't stop. He's not going to stop and you have a problem. "Talking" to him again won't work. Yet that's what you do. Till you're "blue in the face". And it doesn't stop. And it goes on until you're gone. Out of love. That's when he "gets it" usually. When it's too late. I just wish we could somehow get that kick in the gut to happen BEFORE it's too late.

I'll tell you right now, BLINDLY, that I can find 5 threads in the general section. First 25 threads. One in FIVE threads where a wife is gone and the dumbass husband doesn't know it. EASILY. I see it almost every time I read a new thread here. I can sometimes tell just from the title. 

I can spot toupes, trannies and fake news from a mile away. But I get my first scents of a yet to be uttered ILYBINILWY speech from 3 miles away.


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

The very first one.

http://talkaboutmarriage.com/general-relationship-discussion/386394-changing-recurring-dynamic.html


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

Two out of three.

http://talkaboutmarriage.com/genera...iance-suggested-you-get-personal-trainer.html


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

This is getting awkward. Three out of five so far. 

http://talkaboutmarriage.com/general-relationship-discussion/387066-im-so-confused-hurt.html

And one I DIDN'T count was by a woman who seems to love her husband but wants to go clubbing again. She's looking for SOMETHING hubby can't give her. But I'll give her the benefit of the doubt for now.


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

Four out of six.

http://talkaboutmarriage.com/general-relationship-discussion/382473-feels-like-i-am-sex-prison.html


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

Five. It took me EIGHT threads. I said it would take 25. Silly me. 

http://talkaboutmarriage.com/genera...filed-divorce-husband-wants-marriage-now.html

This one is TEXTBOOK. Short and to the point, and covers EVERYTHING I talked about here.


----------



## EleGirl

TheRealMcCoy said:


> In a nutshell, yes. But I use "leave" as a generic term for make REALLY SURE he knows that it's almost over. I don't know if it can be done. The only time I EVER see it sold is when the wife is already gone. THEN he gets it. But then it's too late. Look at the title of my thread again.
> 
> If you have "talked" to him once and doesn't stop. Then "talked" to him again, forcefully, and he doesn't stop. He's not going to stop and you have a problem. "Talking" to him again won't work. Yet that's what you do. Till you're "blue in the face". And it doesn't stop. And it goes on until you're gone. Out of love. That's when he "gets it" usually. When it's too late. I just wish we could somehow get that kick in the gut to happen BEFORE it's too late.
> 
> I'll tell you right now, BLINDLY, that I can find 5 threads in the general section. First 25 threads. One in FIVE threads where a wife is gone and the dumbass husband doesn't know it. EASILY. I see it almost every time I read a new thread here. I can sometimes tell just from the title.
> 
> I can spot toupes, trannies and fake news from a mile away. But I get my first scents of a yet to be uttered ILYBINILWY speech from 3 miles away.


I don't know what the answer is.

Again talking about the dynamic you have brought up here, even if the woman leaves early not, not years later, but early on, it often makes little to no impact if she takes him back. In my experience few men will change even after their wife walks away and then comes back because he is making changes.

Some men will make changes, some will not. I don't know how to tell the difference on who will and who will not until it's tried.

Generally, both parties in a marriage are contributing to the problems. As Amp said, it's hard to tell which came first, who did the first wrong move. It becomes like a dance. To me, the major issue is when one wants to work on the marriage and the other refuses. 

How many of these threads that you talk about are from women saying that they have been asking for their husband to go to counseling with them. They have been asking to work together to fix it. And their husbands just ignore them, tell them that they are nagging, they refuse counseling, refuse to talk about it.

At some point you just have to cut your loses and move on.


----------



## EleGirl

TheRealMcCoy said:


> Five. It took me EIGHT threads. I said it would take 25. Silly me.
> 
> http://talkaboutmarriage.com/genera...filed-divorce-husband-wants-marriage-now.html
> 
> This one is TEXTBOOK. Short and to the point, and covers EVERYTHING I talked about here.


What do you suggest that she do?


----------



## Diana7

JustTheFacts said:


> I always shake my head when I hear somebody say (concerning porn) "well, everybody does it". What everybody else does is irrelevant. You should know whether or not your SO considers watching porn as cheating or hurtful. If they do, then you shouldn't do it. Some SO's don't care. You should consider their feelings regardless of what everybody else does. Find out before you indulge. I had a girlfriend get very upset at me and accuse me of cheating because I looked at porn. I was floored. I had no idea that she considered it cheating. Lesson learned.


Also believe me, everyone doesn't do it. Many of us think porn is incredibly damaging.


----------



## Martins97

It's very hard for a person to view things from someone else's perspective, especially on an internet board where we are only getting a small slice of the story. If some people are taking advice that you don't like it is hopefully after they have carefully weighed out their situation and decided on the best course of action for them.


----------



## Satya

TheRealMcCoy said:


> Five. It took me EIGHT threads. I said it would take 25. Silly me.
> 
> http://talkaboutmarriage.com/genera...filed-divorce-husband-wants-marriage-now.html
> 
> This one is TEXTBOOK. Short and to the point, and covers EVERYTHING I talked about here.


She's been dealing with an emotionally cruel man for years who browbeat and mentally frightened her with constant threats of abandonment, to the tune of her canceling much needed surgery for herself because he told her he wouldn't help pay for it or support her during recovery and that he was sick & tired of all of her health problems. 

And she'd stayed to try and work things out, meanwhile it sounded like he got crueler and kept threatening her with divorce... Tearing her down more at every turn until her love totally died.

You tell her on her post to give him another chance and not to give up on him. I just can't agree with that advice @TheRealMcCoy. She is incapable of giving him the professional help he clearly needs. More than that, I think she really needs to get clear away from him for her own well-being.

It's one thing to cite in this post, examples of women who feel they are voicing their grievances and simply not being heard or validated, then decide to end the marriage because they're fed up. I believe that it was Michelle Werner-Davis who recommended that women NOT give up when they're at the end of their rope, because that's when sensible men not only GET IT, but then CHANGE. I think we have ALL been through some flavor of that experience, from one side or the other, especially if any of us married young. I learned many things in my first marriage I vowed to never repeat, and I haven't.

However, once you cite cases of severe mental and/or physical cruelty, then you're dealing with variables that simply cannot fit into your neat solution. I'd never tell a woman or man to stick by a partner who is toxic, plain and simple. I did it myself for much longer than I should have and although I have few regrets in this world, I can say with honesty that that is one of them - not leaving sooner.


----------



## john117

EleGirl said:


> So what you are saying is that women (you are talking about women) should just leave as soon as a problem shows up if the guy does not address the issues immediately.


If the legal system wasn't so much screwed up in favor of one side, or screwed up in general, as in Copper Top's case, yes.


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

EleGirl said:


> What do you suggest that she do?


I responded to her in her thread.

But in a nutshell, the same as I tell everyone. Crush his world. Scare the crap out of him. "Leave" him. Make him work at winning her back. MINIMUM one year. Surely more. Marriage is hard. There are no easy fixes.

I know what this guy is going through. I was him (in spirit, I forget his individual issues). He is FREAKING OUT about something he has ZERO control over. And it wasn't a gradual thing. Think ALS ice bucket challenge. He will do ANYTHING to save his marriage at this point. And it's only been a few weeks.


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

Satya said:


> You tell her on her post to give him another chance


My point is the OPPOSITE of "giving another chance". They need to EARN another chance.


And all of those threads I posted? You are all going into the individual details like they are different. They are not. The husband is pushing the wife away and has NO IDEA he's doing it. The wife will give him chance after chance after chance. And it will do NOTHING. We all know that.

And EVERY ONE of those men will be "shocked" when he realizes she's gone. SHOCKED. They will turn into crying whimpering babies begging for another chance. Then they change and it's too late.

Rinse, repeat. 

Yes. The husband is an ass. They ALWAYS are. But the wives all presumably wanted to fix it when they gave them all of those chances, so they must WANT to salvage something, right? I'm just giving advice on how to do it. 

Seeing another "shocked" husband is routine. Seeing that the wives were shocked that he was shocked still...shocks me. In this day and age? 

A lot of people are still missing something. And I aim to get to the root of it. Work out a plan. Write a book. Become a billionaire.


----------



## musiclover

I talked and talked about how unhappy I was for YEARS. Big joke until I said I was done. Then and only then did he agree to stop drinking hard liquor. But it was a little too late. If he couldn't do it for me when he thought I wasn't going anywhere, then that's pretty much telling me he had zero respect for my feelings.

And yea he was completely shocked.


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

musiclover said:


> If he couldn't do it for me when he thought I wasn't going anywhere, then that's pretty much telling me he had zero respect for my feelings.



I don't kid myself that I can change anything. But if I COULD, I'd like to stop demonizing these men. You have NO IDEA what went on in his head. Any more than he knew what was going on in yours.





musiclover said:


> And yea he was completely shocked.



Were you shocked that he was shocked? You shouldn't have been. You should have EXPECTED it. But you didn't. THAT'S what needs to change. That's the point of this thread. How can people not understand that this goes on? Why can't we harness the power of this for the betterment of humanity?


----------



## EleGirl

TheRealMcCoy said:


> I don't kid myself that I can change anything. But if I COULD, I'd like to stop demonizing these men. You have NO IDEA what went on in his head. Any more than he knew what was going on in yours.
> 
> 
> Were you shocked that he was shocked? You shouldn't have been. You should have EXPECTED it. But you didn't. THAT'S what needs to change. That's the point of this thread. How can people not understand that this goes on? Why can't we harness the power of this for the betterment of humanity?


Most people do not spend a lot of time reading about what causes marriages to break up. So most women do not know that if they their husband falls into this category, that the will be shocked if she leaves him. How would she know?


----------



## 3Xnocharm

Hey Macho, where you been hiding?


----------



## MEM2020

The hard part about this is: 

If you really love me, than you are generally aware of my emotional state. It just isn't possible to love someone and also be unaware that they are consistently unhappy around you. Or even consistently lacking in happiness. 

So when you allow or facilitate that bad feeling for a long time - THAT DOESNT FEEL LIKE LOVE. 

And when you FREAK out and go completely ape-**** over me leaving - THAT FEELS LIKE NEED. 

Love is about me, need is about you. Just one more selfish ****ing reaction. 







EleGirl said:


> Most people do not spend a lot of time reading about what causes marriages to break up. So most women do not know that if they their husband falls into this category, that the will be shocked if she leaves him. How would she know?


----------



## EleGirl

MEM2020 said:


> The hard part about this is:
> 
> If you really love me, than you are generally aware of my emotional state. It just isn't possible to love someone and also be unaware that they are consistently unhappy around you. Or even consistently lacking in happiness.
> 
> So when you allow or facilitate that bad feeling for a long time - THAT DOESNT FEEL LIKE LOVE.
> 
> And when you FREAK out and go completely ape-**** over me leaving - THAT FEELS LIKE NEED.
> 
> Love is about me, need is about you. Just one more selfish ****ing reaction.


This is a profound observation.

When, after years of neglect and maybe even abuse, suddenly freaking out because your spouse leaves you it not about you loving your spouse. It's about your need to have your spouse around for whatever it is that you get from them. 

This is why the left spouse seldom changes long term if the leaving spouse gives them another chance.


----------



## 3Xnocharm

EleGirl said:


> This is a profound observation.
> 
> When, after years of neglect and maybe even abuse, suddenly freaking out because your spouse leaves you* it not about you loving your spouse. It's about your need to have your spouse around for whatever it is that you get from them. *
> 
> This is why the left spouse seldom changes long term if the leaving spouse gives them another chance.


Agreed. If the real love had been there all along, things would never have been allowed to get to this point. When you have real love for someone, the way they feel is important to you, and if you find out you are causing feelings of unhappiness in them, you acknowledge and make an effort to fix it. 

And as for your last statement, I instinctually KNEW there would be no permanent change, thats why there was no way in hell I was going to stay once I made the decision I was done.


----------



## Openminded

They want you to love them but that doesn't mean they will love you -- at least not the way you want them to. That was my experience anyway. Sure my ex-husband promised over and over and over for decades to change. And to -- finally -- work hard on our marriage. But he didn't. He was shocked when I said I was done and there would be no more chances since there had already been too many. He moved on very quickly -- just as I expected he would -- because he was terrified of being alone. I didn't look back.


----------



## ReformedHubby

I think for me the saddest part of relationships that end because of ILYBINILWY is that often times its not the fault of the person being dumped. We just live in a society where people don't want to appear selfish, so they look for reasons to leave or excuses, often minor stuff. Its perfectly ok to dump a boyfriend because you're bored, or you just want to be single. But dumping a husband because you just feel things have run their course is viewed as extremely selfish. After all vows are supposed to be forever. I think boredom and just wanting a fresh start is behind a lot of the ILYBINILWY speeches. Nothing wrong with that, because why would anyone want someone that isn't into them anymore anyway. I just wish people were honest about it so the person being left doesn't blame themselves.


----------



## MEM2020

Ele,

I agree with that. And it would feel depressing to me if I had to begin the process of divorce to get my partner to just treat me decently. 





EleGirl said:


> This is a profound observation.
> 
> When, after years of neglect and maybe even abuse, suddenly freaking out because your spouse leaves you it not about you loving your spouse. It's about your need to have your spouse around for whatever it is that you get from them.
> 
> This is why the left spouse seldom changes long term if the leaving spouse gives them another chance.


----------



## EleGirl

ReformedHubby said:


> I think for me the saddest part of relationships that end because of ILYBINILWY is that often times its not the fault of the person being dumped. We just live in a society where people don't want to appear selfish, so they look for reasons to leave or excuses, often minor stuff. Its perfectly ok to dump a boyfriend because you're bored, or you just want to be single. But dumping a husband because you just feel things have run their course is viewed as extremely selfish. After all vows are supposed to be forever. I think boredom and just wanting a fresh start is behind a lot of the ILYBINILWY speeches. Nothing wrong with that, because why would anyone want someone that isn't into them anymore anyway. I just wish people were honest about it so the person being left doesn't blame themselves.


This thread is really not about a marriage where one spouse just gets bored and so they end the marriage.

This thread is about marriages in which one spouse is not getting their needs met and often is even being abuse. So they talk to their spouse about it for years trying to get their spouse to work with them to fix the marriage. And their spouses refuses to do this.... for years.

So then the person leaves the marriage for good reason.


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

EleGirl said:


> How would she know?


I don't know. It's not my job. But the reason for this thread is is exactly that. Do you have any idea how many men are walking around thinking they are in a great marriage, yet the wife walking next to him hates him? I'd lowball at 20%. 

HOW would they know? I have no idea. But NOBODY should be shocked to hear it goes on. Yet everybody is.


----------



## Livvie

Maybe the shock the men experience (deep down in an honest place) isn't so much that she is profoundly unhappy, but more that she is actually finally getting the balls to end the relationship over it.


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

EleGirl said:


> When, after years of neglect and maybe even abuse, suddenly freaking out because your spouse leaves you it not about you loving your spouse. It's about your need to have your spouse around for whatever it is that you get from them.
> 
> *This is why the left spouse seldom changes long term if the leaving spouse gives them another chance*.


You have very little trust that people (men?) can change. 

And you're probably right. The BIG problem with my theory is that I have only seen it work when it's already OVER, over. I've always said that in my my golden moment I realized three things (among others): My wife doesn't love me, hasn't for a while, and NEVER WILL AGAIN. I don't know how I knew it it was over, but I did. I don't know if it could have worked without the last part.

Anyhow, there are some traits I could never go back to. As soon as I realized that what I was doing had caused me to push her away forever, (she told me until she was "blue in the face, remember?), I stopped. IMMEDIATELY! My DNA changed. I couldn't go back to being that person if I WANTED to. And I'm working on the rest. They're harder (think temper). But it all goes back to NEVER being a person that would do that kind of thing to the most important person in his life.


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

Livvie said:


> Maybe the shock the men experience (deep down in an honest place) isn't so much that she is profoundly unhappy, but more that she is actually finally getting the balls to end the relationship over it.


Maybe. But I put this in the men's clubhouse for a reason. I'm asking MEN not to hate. I can't expect women not to. Not until I get into the women's section, anyhow. But I would TRULY love this conversation to stay away from finger pointing. And so far it has, actually. Quite amazing.


----------



## EleGirl

TheRealMcCoy said:


> I don't know. It's not my job. But the reason for this thread is is exactly that. Do you have any idea how many men are walking around thinking they are in a great marriage, yet the wife walking next to him hates him? I'd lowball at 20%.
> 
> HOW would they know? I have no idea. But NOBODY should be shocked to hear it goes on. Yet everybody is.


How would they (the men) know? Because their wife has told them a thousand times that there are problems, serious problems.


----------



## EleGirl

TheRealMcCoy said:


> You have very little trust that people (men?) can change.


It's people. It is very hard for any person to make fundamental changes long term.

In my personal experience with my exes, there was no change. There was taking behavior underground to try to hide it. There was passive aggressive way ways to try to mask the bad treatment and even abuse. But there was no change that was actually trying to work on the marriage or fix anything.

Some people can change. We have posters here who talk about how they have. One posted on this thread. So surely some people can change. But I doubt that most can.

And as MEM said, if you have to leave your spouse and seriously threaten divorce, it does not sound like someone I'd want to be with. Really? 

You know the old thing about accepting your spouse for who they are and not tying to change them. Doesn't that apply here? If your spouse does not want to spend time with you, shows you great disrespect all the time, abuses you and who knows what else, is it really our place to try to turn them into someone that they are not? They are being themselves. They are happy with themselves. Is it really our place to bully thing with divorce threats into being someone who they do not even want to be?



TheRealMcCoy said:


> And you're probably right. The BIG problem with my theory is that I have only seen it work when it's already OVER, over. I've always said that in my my golden moment I realized three things (among others): My wife doesn't love me, hasn't for a while, and NEVER WILL AGAIN. I don't know how I knew it it was over, but I did. I don't know if it could have worked without the last part.
> 
> Anyhow, there are some traits I could never go back to. As soon as I realized that what I was doing had caused me to push her away forever, (she told me until she was "blue in the face, remember?), I stopped. IMMEDIATELY! My DNA changed. I couldn't go back to being that person if I WANTED to. And I'm working on the rest. They're harder (think temper). But it all goes back to NEVER being a person that would do that kind of thing to the most important person in his life.


I guess it was her walking away that shocked you into being who you are now. Perhaps you can take the two you into a new relationship and have a better marriage this time around.


----------



## Ursula

TheRealMcCoy said:


> I stand corrected. I meant only to imply that it happens A LOT. And please stop accusing me of something unseemly just because I'm only talking from the husband's perspective. I do not understand women. And to presume I know how this same scenario would work out if I "flipped it around" is pretty silly.


I never presumed that; you did that yourself in your previous explanations. I was just going by what you had already stated. I'm sorry if I misunderstood you, but when someone uses words like "always", "never", etc., I take them at their words.


----------



## musiclover

TheRealMcCoy said:


> I don't kid myself that I can change anything. But if I COULD, I'd like to stop demonizing these men. You have NO IDEA what went on in his head. Any more than he knew what was going on in yours.
> 
> I know exactly what was going on in his head. He told me that I wasn't going to tell him what to do and to deal with it. It's kind of obvious when im being verbally abused by a mean drunk that I didn't find it fun. If he couldn't figure that out then I don't know what to say.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Were you shocked that he was shocked? You shouldn't have been. You should have EXPECTED it. But you didn't. THAT'S what needs to change. That's the point of this thread. How can people not understand that this goes on? Why can't we harness the power of this for the betterment of humanity?


No I wasn't surprised he was shocked. He is all about him and too bad if I was unhappy. I was supposed to just deal with it ;(


----------



## Blondilocks

The premise of the OP smacks of blame-shifting. She should have done this or did that so that the poor guy really had a chance to 'get it'. A guy doesn't want to take responsibility for not 'listening' so he has to find his scapegoat - it is all her fault because she failed to find a way to make him 'get it'. Frankly, a guy with a leetle hygiene problem; a leetle porn problem and a leetle weed problem is probably not going to 'get it' without a ball-peen hammer to the temple. Because he just doesn't give a ****.

Ya know, this argument sounds awfully familiar. Didn't we go around about this in the not too distant past?


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

EleGirl said:


> I guess it was her walking away that shocked you into being who you are now.



You "guess" it was? How did I not communicate that it was EXACTLY what changed me. It is a major premise of my thread. I almost don't understand this statement. 




EleGirl said:


> Perhaps you can take the new you into a new relationship and have a better marriage this time around.



I'm with my wife 'til death we do part. But I said it changed my DNA. I take the "new me" into everything I do in life. Even my marriage. It's the new "me", after all.


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

Blondilocks said:


> The premise of the OP smacks of blame-shifting. She should have done this or did that so that the poor guy really had a chance to 'get it'.


Another hater. Female. Even though it's the men's clubhouse, I'll respond to the hate.

Sorry that it "smacks of blameshifting". Maybe because a little bit of the blame for our marriage falling apart can be blamed on her. Is that blameshifting? Maybe.

But I'm admitting flat-out to being a piece of poop husband that destroyed his marriage and nearly destroyed his family. So let's PLEASE stop finger pointing.


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

I am a different man than I was 4 years ago. A better man. Had I been able to make this shift 10 years ago, it could have saved my marriage. That's all I'm saying. I think it could help some marriages. Maybe I'm wrong. Pretty much the only thing I've NOT heard are stories of men who went through the same thing. Learned what I learned the way I learned it. Maybe I was an aberration. 

I still think I'm on to something though. Look for me promoting my book on Oprah. You'll know it's me.


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

musiclover said:


> No I wasn't surprised he was shocked. He is all about him and too bad if I was unhappy. I was supposed to just deal with it ;(


Wow. How is it possible that you can read his mind but your marriage still fell apart? Fascinating.

You have NO IDEA what was going through his mind. Can you admit THAT at least?


----------



## Blondilocks

Au contraire, finger-pointing is exactly what this thread is about. BTW, I don't hate you or any man (or woman, child, cat, dog, squirrel, octopus...). 

If you're looking for vindication for your actions, see your clergyman.


----------



## ReformedHubby

EleGirl said:


> This thread is really not about a marriage where one spouse just gets bored and so they end the marriage.
> 
> This thread is about marriages in which one spouse is not getting their needs met and often is even being abuse. So they talk to their spouse about it for years trying to get their spouse to work with them to fix the marriage. And their spouses refuses to do this.... for years.
> 
> So then the person leaves the marriage for good reason.


I didn't misunderstand the thread. Its just my opinion that some people exaggerate or completely rewrite the history of their marriage when they want an out. It does happen.


----------



## MEM2020

McCoy 
I hope you take this in the helpful spirit it is intended. 

I don't know you or your frame of reference. All I can see is what you share. 

Thing is, it all seems self focused. The three things you noticed about her not loving you - were all about how this impacted you. 

The precursor to her not loving you was a WHOLE LOT of stuff she was seriously unhappy about with you for a LONG time. 

So - riddle me this - why do you think those wives stop overtly transmitting the ‘I'm unhappy signal’?

My guess is that their partners either: got defensive, blamed their wives, ignored the feedback, etc….

In short, the response they got to expressing unhappiness just made the wives feel - worse. So they gave up / checked out. 

And fwiw: for a guy claiming a total DNA rewrite: you are coming across as defensive and quick tempered 




TheRealMcCoy said:


> Another hater. Female. Even though it's the men's clubhouse, I'll respond to the hate.
> 
> Sorry that it "smacks of blameshifting". Maybe because a little bit of the blame for our marriage falling apart can be blamed on her. Is that blameshifting? Maybe.
> 
> But I'm admitting flat-out to being a piece of poop husband that destroyed his marriage and nearly destroyed his family. So let's PLEASE stop finger pointing.


----------



## Ursula

MEM2020 said:


> McCoy
> I hope you take this in the helpful spirit it is intended.
> 
> I don't know you or your frame of reference. All I can see is what you share.
> 
> Thing is, it all seems self focused. The three things you noticed about her not loving you - were all about how this impacted you.
> 
> The precursor to her not loving you was a WHOLE LOT of stuff she was seriously unhappy about with you for a LONG time.
> 
> So - riddle me this - why do you think those wives stop overtly transmitting the ‘I'm unhappy signal’?
> 
> My guess is that their partners either: got defensive, blamed their wives, ignored the feedback, etc….
> 
> In short, the response they got to expressing unhappiness just made the wives feel - worse. So they gave up / checked out.
> 
> And fwiw: for a guy claiming a total DNA rewrite: you are coming across as defensive and quick tempered


^^^ I agree with this. And I can also say for certain that this is what happened to my marriage as well. For almost 4 years, I tried to talk to H about fixing things, that our communication styles weren't jiving, that I wasn't one of his students who needed to be taught things, that we needed to work as a team, that we each needed to contribute 100% to the marriage. You know what? He got defensive, he tore me apart because he was offended by my tone of voice, my words, or both. The only time he wasn't offended was when I upped the register of my voice to match his Mom's and used her sweet as honey, condescending tone to talk to him. I found out in our first couple's counselling session a month ago, that he wished I'd have come to him about being so unhappy, that when I did come to him, he thought I was being "overly emotional", even though there were to tears and no yelling, no emotion other than trying to understand. After about 3 years of this, I gave up and became the resigned wife, I checked out, mentally, emotionally, physically. I put up with sex, and prayed for it to be over soon, I cringed when he touched or kissed me, I looked for reasons to avoid. And I felt worse than ever. So, was I supposed to just continue on feeling that way? Should've I just bowed down to my H and gave him whatever he wanted? Yes dear, you're right dear, I'm not nearly as highly educated as you dear, I'm stupid dear, please teach me how to reform myself to better please you dear. Yeah, no thanks! And by the way, no one can rewrite DNA; that's something you're born with. You can change personality traits, but you cannot change your genetic makeup.


----------



## EleGirl

Ursula said:


> ^^^ I agree with this. And I can also say for certain that this is what happened to my marriage as well. For almost 4 years, I tried to talk to H about fixing things, that our communication styles weren't jiving, that I wasn't one of his students who needed to be taught things, that we needed to work as a team, that we each needed to contribute 100% to the marriage. You know what? He got defensive, he tore me apart because he was offended by my tone of voice, my words, or both. The only time he wasn't offended was when I upped the register of my voice to match his Mom's and used her sweet as honey, condescending tone to talk to him. I found out in our first couple's counselling session a month ago, that he wished I'd have come to him about being so unhappy, that when I did come to him, he thought I was being "overly emotional", even though there were to tears and no yelling, no emotion other than trying to understand. After about 3 years of this, I gave up and became the resigned wife, I checked out, mentally, emotionally, physically. I put up with sex, and prayed for it to be over soon, I cringed when he touched or kissed me, I looked for reasons to avoid. And I felt worse than ever. So, was I supposed to just continue on feeling that way? Should've I just bowed down to my H and gave him whatever he wanted? Yes dear, you're right dear, I'm not nearly as highly educated as you dear, I'm stupid dear, please teach me how to reform myself to better please you dear. Yeah, no thanks! And by the way, no one can rewrite DNA; that's something you're born with. You can change personality traits, but you cannot change your genetic makeup.


McCoy is not suggesting that you should have bowed down or gotten used to it. He is suggesting that you should not have put up with this for all that time. Instead you should have left and maybe even filed for divorce very early on. That leavings/filing is the only way to get the attention of a man who is behaving this way. You have to destabilize his world and let him know that if he wants to keep you in his life, he has to change and work on the marriage. And then for you to remain separate for a year or so while your husband works on fixing himself and changes. Only then get back together.

That's what McCoy is suggested.. go nuclear very early on.


----------



## EleGirl

ReformedHubby said:


> I didn't misunderstand the thread. Its just my opinion that some people exaggerate or completely rewrite the history of their marriage when they want an out. It does happen.


Absolutely, there are people who exaggerate and rewrite history to justify leaving, to justify cheating, etc. 

And there are people who also are not exaggerating at all.


----------



## Ursula

EleGirl said:


> McCoy is not suggesting that you should have bowed down or gotten used to it. He is suggesting that you should not have put up with this for all that time. Instead you should have left and maybe even filed for divorce very early on. That leavings/filing is the only way to get the attention of a man who is behaving this way. You have to destabilize his world and let him know that if he wants to keep you in his life, he has to change and work on the marriage. And then for you to remain separate for a year or so while your husband works on fixing himself and changes. Only then get back together.
> 
> That's what McCoy is suggested.. go nuclear very early on.


ah gotcha. But see, to me, going nuclear so early is really silly. What's the point of being married or in a serious relationship of any sort if the two people in it cannot settle differences and resolve anything? Get in one disagreement and serve them with papers?


----------



## EleGirl

Ursula said:


> ah gotcha. But see, to me, going nuclear so early is really silly. What's the point of being married or in a serious relationship of any sort if the two people in it cannot settle differences and resolve anything? Get in one disagreement and serve them with papers?


And that's exactly why few women go nuclear early on. There never seems to be the right time to pull the rug out from under their husband--until you are at the point of no return.

And as MEM says, do you really want to be in a relationship with a person who has to have the nuclear treatment before they will treat you with love and respect?

I am sure that there is some point between the first fight, or first realization that he's not treating you well, and that point where you are just so done that you walk out that a nuclear destabilization might work. But where exactly is that point? How does one recognize it?


----------



## 3Xnocharm

TheRealMcCoy said:


> I am a different man than I was 4 years ago. A better man. Had I been able to make this shift 10 years ago, it could have saved my marriage. That's all I'm saying. I think it could help some marriages. Maybe I'm wrong. Pretty much the only thing I've NOT heard are stories of men who went through the same thing. Learned what I learned the way I learned it. Maybe I was an aberration.
> 
> I still think I'm on to something though. Look for me promoting my book on Oprah. You'll know it's me.


So, you "learned" and you made the changes. So what about your wife? The one who I assume was done and walking out the door when you had your sudden DNA change... where is she at? Is she in love with you now? Is she all in? Does she treat you like a worthy partner, all is good?


----------



## musiclover

TheRealMcCoy said:


> Wow. How is it possible that you can read his mind but your marriage still fell apart? Fascinating.
> 
> You have NO IDEA what was going through his mind. Can you admit THAT at least?


I never said I could read his mind. I only know what he told me. Fascinating that my marriage fell apart? You have NO idea what I put up with. Binge drinking ex who would get verbally and emotionally abusive. I was called names, smacked around, had things thrown at me, took off and slept in my car once because I was afraid to go home. Yea that's normal. 

My 3 threads here are just a piece of what I put up with. So honestly, I could care less what he was thinking. If he loved me as much as he claims, he would have stopped drinking and got it together. 

I walked away with a clear conscience. I'm not taking any responsibility for his actions.


----------



## MEM2020

Deep sigh. 
There are a short list of behaviors which reflect where on the love/hate/indifference spectrum you are. 

Claiming that the solution is the woman has to take a super aggressive posture instead of the man has to learn to actually pay attention - well - that seems like suggesting when I get a headache, first step is I go to a neurosurgeon and he cuts my head open to perform exploratory surgery. 

Simplest gauge in the world - you come up behind your partner, put your arms around her, does she melt back into you? 







TheRealMcCoy said:


> I don't know. It's not my job. But the reason for this thread is is exactly that. Do you have any idea how many men are walking around thinking they are in a great marriage, yet the wife walking next to him hates him? I'd lowball at 20%.
> 
> HOW would they know? I have no idea. But NOBODY should be shocked to hear it goes on. Yet everybody is.


----------



## MrsHolland

MEM2020 said:


> Deep sigh.
> There are a short list of behaviors which reflect where on the love/hate/indifference spectrum you are.
> 
> Claiming that the solution is the woman has to take a super aggressive posture instead of the man has to learn to actually pay attention - well - that seems like suggesting when I get a headache, first step is I go to a neurosurgeon and he cuts my head open to perform exploratory surgery.
> 
> Simplest gauge in the world - you come up behind your partner, put your arms around her, does she melt back into you?


Thank you for putting it so succinctly. 

The premise of the OP is blame shifting and shirking one's own responsibility.


----------



## InspiralImplode

"Omnipresent" She will always be there, no matter what ... but someday she may just walk away and never look back. When you ignored the issues, you better hope you meant to.


----------



## musiclover

The name of this thread should have been "why didn't I take my spouse seriously when she said things needed to change" 

You admitted you were a little angry, hit her once, a little porn, a little pot, and she talked till she was blue in the face. 

But it's her fault for not leaving you earlier. Then you would have realized how serious she was. Blameshift much ? 

How about owning up and facing the facts you smoked too much, were angry too much, etc etc till she got sick and tired of talking about it. 

Then and only then did you take her seriously. When you realized she had the balls to walk away. 

This kind of crap pisses me off.


----------



## TheRealMcCoy

musiclover said:


> You admitted you were a little angry, hit her once, a little porn, a little pot, and she talked till she was blue in the face.


I admitted to none of these things. I used them as examples. I have never spoken about what I did to drive my wife away. I won't. That will take away from the point of my discussion. What I did was moot. 

Women fall out of love with their husbands. For WHATEVER reason. From serious physical and emotional abuse to "why won't he take out the freakin' garbage JUST ONCE"! And yes, there's a little "how did I marry this boring slug"? But the husband doesn't know. Why? If the consensus is that it's just because men are stupid and will never get it, fine. Let's just end the discussion here. But is anyone is as intrigued as I am about how men can go on for YEARS thinking they are in an amazing relationship, but the wife hates him... 

I guess it's just my little hobby. You gals can go on hi fiving each other when the pig gets dumped and all you guys can go around pretending that it could never happen to you. Because you're perfect. 

And the divorce rate will continue to hover at around 50%.

You guys win. You beat me. I'm just a pig who can't deal with it and is blamshifting. I'm out.


----------



## 3Xnocharm

Well, you lived it, why dont you tell us why? Why didnt you know? Why didnt you pay attention and take her seriously? Those of us who did the walking would love to know.


----------



## MEM2020

Summary,
So far I've been posting as a fellow citizen and not a mod. That continues here. 

I am going to try to refrain from being judgemental - and instead be pragmatic. Here goes:

The primary theme on this thread - is actually about awareness. The OP believes that in many (at least 20%) marriages:
- The husband thinks the marriage is great and
- His wife hates him (but he has no clue this is the case)

1. It CAN NOT be a great marriage if you are completely unable to read your wife's emotional state - both in general and as it relates to you. 
2. Marriage is largely about connection - you cannot claim true connection while simultaneously insisting that you have absolutely no idea how your wife feels in general and about you in particular. 





TheRealMcCoy said:


> I admitted to none of these things. I used them as examples. I have never spoken about what I did to drive my wife away. I won't. That will take away from the point of my discussion. What I did was moot.
> 
> Women fall out of love with their husbands. For WHATEVER reason. From serious physical and emotional abuse to "why won't he take out the freakin' garbage JUST ONCE"! And yes, there's a little "how did I marry this boring slug"? But the husband doesn't know. Why? If the consensus is that it's just because men are stupid and will never get it, fine. Let's just end the discussion here. But is anyone is as intrigued as I am about how men can go on for YEARS thinking they are in an amazing relationship, but the wife hates him...
> 
> I guess it's just my little hobby. You gals can go on hi fiving each other when the pig gets dumped and all you guys can go around pretending that it could never happen to you. Because you're perfect.
> 
> And the divorce rate will continue to hover at around 50%.
> 
> You guys win. You beat me. I'm just a pig who can't deal with it and is blamshifting. I'm out.


----------



## EleGirl

MEM2020 said:


> Summary,
> So far I've been posting as a fellow citizen and not a mod. That continues here.
> 
> I am going to try to refrain from being judgemental - and instead be pragmatic. Here goes:
> 
> The primary theme on this thread - is actually about awareness. The OP believes that in many (at least 20%) marriages:
> - The husband thinks the marriage is great and
> - His wife hates him (but he has no clue this is the case)
> 
> 1. It CAN NOT be a great marriage if you are completely unable to read your wife's emotional state - both in general and as it relates to you.
> 2. Marriage is largely about connection - you cannot claim true connection while simultaneously insisting that you have absolutely no idea how your wife feels in general and about you in particular.


Add that according to the OP, she told him for years that there were problems that needed to be addressed. She told him that she was seriously not happy with the marriage.

But he was happy with the marriage.

So how can he be happy in the marriage when she keeps telling him that she is not?

How can he not know that she is not happy when she kept telling him that she is not?


----------



## EleGirl

To me, the answer is not that the woman needs to go nuclear on the guy earlier so that he will stop disprespecitng her and treating her badly. 

The answer is that he should know better than to ignore her needs and treat her badly.

So the book that you are going to write... in the book tell men to pay attention to the wife's needs. Pay attention to it when she complains and address it. Tell them, as MEM says, that it is their job as a husband to be aware of their wife's emotional state. And it's their job to work with their wife to meet each other's needs.

In your book you could also suggest "Love Busters" and "His Needs, Her Needs" because these books teach a couple how to address this sort of thing.

{NOTE: You can switch the genders on this and it still applies as there are women who are just as clueless.}


----------



## Blondilocks

Those imagined 20% of men think their marriage is great because the 'nagging' (however you want to phrase it) STOPPED.

When kids are playing in a room and Mom doesn't hear a peep, that's when she gets worried. Men (whose wives previously had issues with their behavior and then stopped voicing their concerns) would do well to learn that lesson.

There is no cosmic force at play here. There is no fairy running around sprinkling pixie dust in the mens' eyes.


----------



## Holdingontoit

It works in both directions. I spent 8 years telling my wife I was unhappy. We went to MC. Licensed ST. After 8 years of open and honest communication, with no change as regards my complaints, I stopped complaining. 

Am I now content? Have the issued been resolved? No. I just stopped voicing my complaints. How is it that my wife could listen to me complain for 8 years and do nothing? Her fear of addressing her PTSD was greater than her fear that I would leave. Would she have been shocked if I had left? Maybe. Hard to say. Maybe she would have been shocked because she figured my fear of alimony and child support and living alone would have outweighed my unhappiness with our marriage.

It would be so fascinating to get an honest answer from my wife today about whether she thinks I love her and am in love with her. It is entirely possible that she thinks I do on both counts. Regular readers of this forum might scratch their heads wondering how that could be. Well, because Shakespeare was correct: There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy. The world is a magical and unpredictable place. More fun than if it were entirely deterministic.


----------



## Amplexor

Blondilocks said:


> Those imagined 20% of men think their marriage is great because the 'nagging' (however you want to phrase it) STOPPED.
> 
> When kids are playing in a room and Mom doesn't hear a peep, that's when she gets worried. Men (whose wives previously had issues with their behavior and then stopped voicing their concerns) would do well to learn that lesson.
> 
> There is no cosmic force at play here. There is no fairy running around sprinkling pixie dust in the mens' eyes.



*Bingo! I am a walking, breathing 20 percenter*



Amplexor said:


> When we hit that stage, the arguing stopped. I misperceived this as, things aren’t great, but they’re OK. I had no intention of divorcing her. So in a stereotypical way, I continued walking down a path of doom, dragging my knuckles and clubbing the occasional mastodon along the way. Oblivious to the fact she had fallen in love with someone else in a long term emotional affair.


----------



## Buddy400

MEM2020 said:


> Summary,
> So far I've been posting as a fellow citizen and not a mod. That continues here.
> 
> I am going to try to refrain from being judgemental - and instead be pragmatic. Here goes:
> 
> The primary theme on this thread - is actually about awareness. The OP believes that in many (at least 20%) marriages:
> - The husband thinks the marriage is great and
> - His wife hates him (but he has no clue this is the case)
> 
> 1. It CAN NOT be a great marriage if you are completely unable to read your wife's emotional state - both in general and as it relates to you.
> 2. Marriage is largely about connection - you cannot claim true connection while simultaneously insisting that you have absolutely no idea how your wife feels in general and about you in particular.


I have seen stories where men and women in the same session take a secret vote rating their marriages and the men generally rate their marriages far better than the women.

So, it seems that, in general, men need to look a lot harder for potential problems and women need to realize that men aren't as subtle as they are.


----------



## Rowan

I have heard it said that integrity is doing the right thing even when no one is looking. The dynamic the OP describes seems to me to be a failure to pay attention and a failure to do the right thing even if you don't think you'll be punished for doing the wrong one. Ignoring your partner's needs and complaints in a marriage because you don't think they're important is dismissive, and smacks of a deep lack of respect for both your partner and the marriage. Changing your ways only in the face of negative consequences for yourself, smacks of a general lack of integrity. 

Relying on your partner to have a bottomless well of patience, grace, forgiveness, and love for you in the face of your continued disrespect and lack of integrity, seems the behavior of either a child or a narcissist.


----------



## aine

TheRealMcCoy said:


> I admitted to none of these things. I used them as examples. I have never spoken about what I did to drive my wife away. I won't. That will take away from the point of my discussion. What I did was moot.
> 
> Women fall out of love with their husbands. For WHATEVER reason. From serious physical and emotional abuse to "why won't he take out the freakin' garbage JUST ONCE"! And yes, there's a little "how did I marry this boring slug"? But the husband doesn't know. Why? If the consensus is that it's just because men are stupid and will never get it, fine. Let's just end the discussion here. But is anyone is as intrigued as I am about how men can go on for YEARS thinking they are in an amazing relationship, but the wife hates him...
> 
> I guess it's just my little hobby. You gals can go on hi fiving each other when the pig gets dumped and all you guys can go around pretending that it could never happen to you. Because you're perfect.
> 
> And the divorce rate will continue to hover at around 50%.
> 
> You guys win. You beat me. I'm just a pig who can't deal with it and is blamshifting. I'm out.


Real Mc, you have started a similar discussion before. I know men can be really obtuse, I am married to one but to say that somehow it is the woman's fault for the man not listening is far fetched.

It is well know that for the majority of marriages, the woman is the one who takes the responsibility of the emotional temperature of a marriage, organising things, date nights, etc. However, when she seems to be shouldering all the burden it gets old especially after so many years. Why can't the guy romance her the way he used to, how difficult to surprise her with a dinner etc. 
The reasons why he man gets blindsided is because

1. He is too comfortable to do anything about her 'nagging'
2. He is sure she would never leave, in fact he is so sure that is why he will not change either

e.g I was told by my H the reason why he went out all the time, drank, didn't give a **** what i thought because in the back of his head, I was stuck, I wasn't going to go anywhere I had kids, no job, depended on him, etc. Well the tables have turned and I have actually brought this up to him and told him, that that really hurt me and was actually one of the things to motivate me to get more qualifications, and a job and possibly leave him. The jury is out on that one, now he is doing major changes (though we will see).

3. To ignore your SO and not listen is disrespectful and taking them for granted and anything that happens to you, you deserve it basically as you had the opportunity to do something about it.
4. What does it say about a H who does this? It says they are self-centered and don't GAF about their wife only to the extent they provide domestic support or whatever.

Hence the 'walk away wife'


----------



## Rowan

musiclover said:


> But it's her fault for not leaving you earlier. Then you would have realized how serious she was. Blameshift much ?


My ex-husband once told me that if I had left him earlier in our marriage, he would have had a chance to be a better man, a better partner, a better husband. That I could have fixed all of our problems if I'd only have thrown him out in that second year of our marriage - when the serial cheating, that I didn't know about and wouldn't find out about for another 13 years, started. That way he would have had a chance to realize what he was doing, straighten up and be a good husband. But I didn't, so really I was responsible for our marriage breakdown. I should have stopped something I didn't know about from happening and saved him from himself. 

:slap:


Crazy people be crazy....


----------



## InspiralImplode

TheRealMcCoy Your post confuses me really. Seemingly understanding both sides. Possibly taking accountability? Or not? Sad or cynical? I can't tell. Angry with other posters? I am curious about your intention...


----------



## Satya

He bowed out of his own post.


----------



## EleGirl

Rowan said:


> My ex-husband once told me that if I had left him earlier in our marriage, he would have had a chance to be a better man, a better partner, a better husband. That I could have fixed all of our problems if I'd only have thrown him out in that second year of our marriage - when the serial cheating, that I didn't know about and wouldn't find out about for another 13 years, started. That way he would have had a chance to realize what he was doing, straighten up and be a good husband. But I didn't, so really I was responsible for our marriage breakdown. I should have stopped something I didn't know about from happening and saved him from himself.
> 
> :slap:
> 
> 
> Crazy people be crazy....


Clearly, it was all your fault... :surprise:>


----------



## naiveonedave

I think I can summarize this thread simply: Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus. Often we communicate to our spouse in our native (male speak or woman speak), but the spouse doesn't understand that language and they don't get the message. IF (and I think this happens a lot), neither partner addresses the other in the others language, you really never know what is going on.


----------



## jb02157

Diana7 said:


> This is why its SO important to marry a decent, moral, honest person of integrity. So many times we see people here or elsewhere who are dating or engaged to awful people presumably hoping they will dramatically and miraculously change once they are married. You just know that they will be here a few years down the line telling stories of their cheating lying, drug taking spouse.
> 
> IF you hate drugs, don't marry a man who takes them. If you hate porn, don't marry a man who watches it. If you hate cheating, don't marry a man who has already cheated while you are dating. It's not rocket science.


I definitely agree, however, in my case anyway, you think you've met someone who is truly a person of integrity only to find out later what they've been hiding and what they truly are. If I knew before hand my wife had a problem with telling the truth and she was the person she turned out to be, I certainly wouldn't have married her. I think that's true for many others to.


----------



## EleGirl

naiveonedave said:


> I think I can summarize this thread simply: Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus. Often we communicate to our spouse in our native (male speak or woman speak), but the spouse doesn't understand that language and they don't get the message. IF (and I think this happens a lot), neither partner addresses the other in the others language, you really never know what is going on.


There is some validity to this. But I also think that part of being married is to learn to listen to your spouse in their language.

It think that what you are saying is that a man will only listen to a woman if she takes a 2x4 to him. Clearly because men only respond when beaten with 2x4's (verbally and through actions).

The funny thing is that while men are from Mars, I don't see most men beating each other with 2x4's. At work I see men interacting with each and in the vast majority of the time, the men use words to settle issues, to negotiate problem solutions. 

So why is that some men can only hear women (Or their wife) if she brings out the 2x4 and smacks him soundly in the head by leaving him?

I think that this might be true, not because men do not understand it when women speak words. I think it's true because many men are taught from an early age that women nag and that they should just ignore the nagging. The guys watch their father threat their mother and other women in their lives this way, so this is how they learn to treat women.

Maybe if those 20% of men were instead taught that it's important to listen to what their wife says, that 20% would shrink segment of the male population will shrink dramatically.


----------



## naiveonedave

EleGirl said:


> There is some validity to this. But I also think that part of being married is to learn to listen to your spouse in their language.
> 
> It think that what you are saying is that a man will only listen to a woman if she takes a 2x4 to him. Clearly because men only respond when beaten with 2x4's (verbally and through actions).
> 
> The funny thing is that while men are from Mars, I don't see most men beating each other with 2x4's. At work I see men interacting with each and in the vast majority of the time, the men use words to settle issues, to negotiate problem solutions.
> 
> So why is that some men can only hear women (Or their wife) if she brings out the 2x4 and smacks him soundly in the head by leaving him?
> 
> I think that this might be true, not because men do not understand it when women speak words. I think it's true because many men are taught from an early age that women nag and that they should just ignore the nagging. The guys watch their father threat their mother and other women in their lives this way, so this is how they learn to treat women.
> 
> Maybe if those 20% of men were instead taught that it's important to listen to what their wife says, that 20% would shrink segment of the male population will shrink dramatically.


While men do use words, they are typically much more direct than women... 

There is a lot of truth to your post, though. Part of it is nature, part nurture, part only hearing what you want to hear, etc. Something I learned along the way, is to be a good communicator, it is essential that the listener actually hear and the teller ensure their message was heard. What I get out the OP is that, in general, when you see posts like, how did he not know for the past 20 year (from the W) or I never saw it coming from the man, it is clear that communication didn't take place.


----------



## EleGirl

naiveonedave said:


> While men do use words, they are typically much more direct than women...
> 
> There is a lot of truth to your post, though. Part of it is nature, part nurture, part only hearing what you want to hear, etc. Something I learned along the way, is to be a good communicator, it is essential that the listener actually hear and the teller ensure their message was heard. What I get out the OP is that, in general, when you see posts like, how did he not know for the past 20 year (from the W) or I never saw it coming from the man, it is clear that communication didn't take place.


If we define communication as one person speaks and the other actually hears what is said, the perhaps communication did not take place because either the one speaking or the one who was hearing failed on their end.

But in having lived this. And in having read hundreds of threads about this issue, I think that very often the women are very clear as to the problems they need addressed. And yet their husband just blows it off.

We have a thread here once where women talked about exactly what they stated. They were pretty clear, pretty direct. 

Perhaps on this thread, women who have lived through this could state what they told their husband so we can see how direct that they were.

Also, I know that there are women who do not listen to their husband when he tells her about a problem. Perhaps those men could also share what they have told their wife that the wife just ignores or does not care to address.


----------



## naiveonedave

EleGirl said:


> If we define communication as one person speaks and the other actually hears what is said, the perhaps communication did not take place because either the one speaking or the one who was hearing failed on their end.
> 
> But in having lived this. And in having read hundreds of threads about this issue, I think that very often the women are very clear as to the problems they need addressed. And yet their husband just blows it off.
> 
> We have a thread here once where women talked about exactly what they stated. They were pretty clear, pretty direct.
> 
> Perhaps on this thread, women who have lived through this could state what they told their husband so we can see how direct that they were.
> 
> Also, I know that there are women who do not listen to their husband when he tells her about a problem. Perhaps those men could also share what they have told their wife that the wife just ignores or does not care to address.


When I read the same threads, I got a totally different perspective. Part of it, I think, really depends on the specifics. There are some threads where the guy is clearly wrong (or at least that is what the rewritten marital history says from the woman, you only get one side, so it is hard to really validate them all). Some threads, it appears that the lady was clearly re-writing marital history to validate her dumping on him. Clearly, it goes both ways on the extreme ends. there are some crappy people out there and D is probably the best for getting rid of them....

I do think that there are many a marriage that could be saved through better, early and more clear communication. I think that is where the OP of this thread was going. And it is *not* the fault of the man or the woman, it is how humans are. It is partially the fault of both (barring true more one sided issues like physical, mental abuse or infidelity).


----------



## Rowan

One of the most difficult things for me to come to grips with in my marriage was that the issue was *not* that my then-husband didn't "get it", but rather that he got it just fine. He was simply unwilling to actually do anything about it. He liked the status quo. Our marriage worked for him as it was, and he had no desire to change either it or himself in any way. He understood that I was unhappy and he understood why that was so. What he did not do, was _care_ enough about me to work with me to make it different.

Modern marriage counselling is almost entirely focused on improving this apparent communication gap that seems to so plague the OP. The assumption being that the couple is not "hearing" one another - that is, they aren't communicating effectively so that both are clear regarding what the other party wants and/or needs. If the communication gap can be corrected, then both parties will fulfil those wants/needs and address the issues that one or both have with the marriage. 

The problem with that, however, is that there is an underlying assumption of goodwill, good intent, and willingness - even perhaps eagerness - on the part of both partners to change in order to better accommodate their spouse. If only they could understand one another. In many cases, I think that willingness might actually exist, or have existed at some point. In other cases, though, that willingness to change to improve the marriage has either eroded away or never really existed at all. It's too often the case that the partner who doesn't seem to "get it" actually does "get it". It's just that whatever "it" is, is something they don't want to, care to, actually address in any meaningful way.


----------



## EleGirl

naiveonedave said:


> When I read the same threads, I got a totally different perspective. Part of it, I think, really depends on the specifics. There are some threads where the guy is clearly wrong (or at least that is what the rewritten marital history says from the woman, you only get one side, so it is hard to really validate them all). Some threads, it appears that the lady was clearly re-writing marital history to validate her dumping on him. Clearly, it goes both ways on the extreme ends. there are some crappy people out there and D is probably the best for getting rid of them....


We would have to look at specific threads to know whether or not you and I few the same thread differently. So I cannot really address this.

I do know for a fact that there are cases in which women have very valid concerns, state them very directly and clearly, and the husband just blows her off. And I know that in these cases, when the women does finally leave the guy is shocked and acts as though he never hear her very direct words. I also know that the genders can be reversed on this too. These are the cases that I and the OP are talking about.



naiveonedave said:


> I do think that there are many a marriage that could be saved through better, early and more clear communication. I think that is where the OP of this thread was going. And it is *not* the fault of the man or the woman, it is how humans are. It is partially the fault of both (barring true more one sided issues like physical, mental abuse or infidelity).


I agree that there at a lot of marriages that can be saved if they couple could learn to communicate. This is why I suggest the books "Love Busters" and "His Needs, Her Needs" so often. I have no clue how many people actually get the books and actually work on their marriage. I wish I did.


----------



## EleGirl

Rowan said:


> One of the most difficult things for me to come to grips with in my marriage was that the issue was *not* that my then-husband didn't "get it", but rather that he got it just fine. He was simply unwilling to actually do anything about it. He liked the status quo. Our marriage worked for him as it was, and he had no desire to change either it or himself in any way. He understood that I was unhappy and he understood why that was so. What he did not do, was _care_ enough about me to work with me to make it different.
> 
> Modern marriage counselling is almost entirely focused on improving this apparent communication gap that seems to so plague the OP. The assumption being that the couple is not "hearing" one another - that is, they aren't communicating effectively so that both are clear regarding what the other party wants and/or needs. If the communication gap can be corrected, then both parties will fulfil those wants/needs and address the issues that one or both have with the marriage.
> 
> The problem with that, however, is that there is an underlying assumption of goodwill, good intent, and willingness - even perhaps eagerness - on the part of both partners to change in order to better accommodate their spouse. If only they could understand one another. In many cases, I think that willingness might actually exist, or have existed at some point. In other cases, though, that willingness to change to improve the marriage has either eroded away or never really existed at all. It's too often the case that the partner who doesn't seem to "get it" actually does "get it". It's just that whatever "it" is, is something they don't want to, care to, actually address in any meaningful way.


I agree with this. It's not that they do not hear what is said. It's that they do not care enough about their spouse do anything to address the issues. And yea, it's why most marriage counseling does not work.


----------



## EleGirl

Here is the thing ... looking at my marriages. I truly believe that it was not that I was not clear enough or direct enough, it's that my husband did not care.

Here are some examples.

I worked 40-60 hour weeks. He was not working. So I ask him if he could please keep the kitchen clean daily and have dinner ready every night. Seems to me that is pretty clear and direct. He said sure. For about 5 years I asked this often and he did not do it.

Then I told him that I would no longer support him financially if he did nothing. So he started keeping the kitchen clean one or two days a week and he cooked dinner one or two days a week. Most of the time, when I can home, usually late, I'd ask him where was dinner. He's say that he was not hungry. I would cook for me and the kids (2 of them his kids, 1 of them my kid). And then suddenly he was finally hungry.

I do not know how much more clear I could have been. I could give you pages of examples like this.

Maybe other women will share how direct and clear they were with their communication.


----------



## Don't Panic

EleGirl said:


> *I suggest the books "Love Busters" and "His Needs, Her Needs" so often. I have no clue how many people actually get the books and actually work on their marriage. I wish I did.*


We did! Thanks for the recommendation EleGirl :smile2: 

And while I wouldn't dream of discouraging OP in his endeavors of becoming a successful self-help author, meeting Oprah, and making his millions...IMO the two fine books above are the gist of what he is conveying. Learn the lessons early, reap the rewards. Ignore at your own peril.


----------



## Quality

EleGirl said:


> Maybe the advice here should be for anyone, male or female, to actually pay attention to what their spouse says. Pay attention to their needs. Pay attention and address the issues then and there.
> 
> If you have ignored the problems that they have brought up over and over, then deal with it. Do not put your spouse in the position of having to threaten divorce before you wake up.
> 
> I have a large garden. I check it daily. My plants let me know what is going on.. I can look at them and tell when they are complaining that they don't have enough water, or fertilizer, or when they need to be pruned. I can tell when they are unhappy because they are being attacked by insects. I would not wait 20 years to address it. I address it then and there and learn from each experience.
> 
> Tend your marriage like you would your garden. Treat your wife/husband with the constant care a good gardener spends on their plants.
> 
> My husband refused, and I mean refused, to spend any time with me. He flat out said that he would not. He only saw a point in spending time together with our son. I told him that this was not acceptable. Blew got angry and ignored what I said. Then he was surprised, shocked when I left. If I have to beg my husband to spend time with me, I'm not sticking around. And even if he was suddenly shocked into agreeing to spend time with me--yea it was too late. The damage was done. How would I ever get over the fact that for years he refused to spend time with me?
> 
> You are putting all the responsibility on the person who is being neglected to, or other wise mistreated, to somehow save the marriage. The other person has responsibility too, as did my husband to tend the marriage before it to the point of no return.


There are generally 3 states of marital relations:

1. marital intimacy,
2. marital strife/discord/conflict, and
3. marital resignation.

Husbands, GENERALLY, want #1, but are quite content in #3 ~~ #2 drives them nuts.
Wives, GENERALLY, want #1, are comfortable with #2, and #3 drives them crazy.

The problem is the path to #1 from #3 must go THROUGH #2 {no pun intended}, and, it must do so BEFORE "yea, it was too late".

Another problem is that when the wife resigns and quits complaining, the husband often thinks things are actually better because there is less #2.

Elegirl posted a stat on another thread indicating that a significantly large percentage of women initiated separations result, ultimately, in divorce.

Take that stat and combine it with the overall premise of this thread how frustrating it is that it often takes a separation, divorce petition {or an affair} to wake a husband up and the "NOW, he wants to change" frustration or Ele's ~~"And even if he was suddenly shocked into agreeing to spend time with me--yea it was too late. The damage was done. How would I ever get over the fact that for years he refused to spend time with me?" You can see where the marital issues and conflict must be addressed and brought to a head much earlier and more effectively by the wife {generally ~ she's the one hating resignation so much and obviously all the talking, fighting, complaining, criticizing, sharing of feelings, and the silent treatment aren't working ~ she needs a better strategy} while it also MUST be taken far more seriously by the husband {generally ~ he's the one avoiding the conflict and needs to really listen and address his wife's feelings of neglect before his wife blindsides him with a divorce petition, demand for separation or, likely, an affair}. We can try to hash out blame between the sexes all we want about who is more wrong than the other {prior to an affair}, but, that accomplishes absolutely nothing. It's a relationship problem ~ both can do better.

So how should spouses address the conflict more effectively in a productive manner that their spouse MIGHT actually hear, engage in and address before it's "too late"~~

I found this little gem of an article over at marriage builders dot com that just sums it up better than I ever could:

*When to Call It Quits - * Part One LINK 

*When to Call it Quits - *Part Two LINK

*When to Call It Quits - *Part Three (for Men) LINK


----------



## Buddy400

EleGirl said:


> There is some validity to this. But I also think that part of being married is to learn to listen to your spouse in their language.
> 
> It think that what you are saying is that a man will only listen to a woman if she takes a 2x4 to him. Clearly because men only respond when beaten with 2x4's (verbally and through actions).
> 
> The funny thing is that while men are from Mars, I don't see most men beating each other with 2x4's. *At work I see men interacting with each and in the vast majority of the time, the men use words to settle issues, to negotiate problem solutions. *
> 
> So why is that some men can only hear women (Or their wife) if she brings out the 2x4 and smacks him soundly in the head by leaving him?
> 
> I think that this might be true, not because men do not understand it when women speak words. *I think it's true because many men are taught from an early age that women nag and that they should just ignore the nagging. The guys watch their father threat their mother and other women in their lives this way, so this is how they learn to treat women.*
> 
> Maybe if those 20% of men were instead taught that it's important to listen to what their wife says, that 20% would shrink segment of the male population will shrink dramatically.


At work, men are used to other people telling them explicitly what they need / expect.

It's not that men treat women this way, men treat other people this way.

Personally, I excel at listening to my wife and believe that all men should endeavor to do so. But, men do (in general) communicate differently than women


----------



## Buddy400

Rowan said:


> One of the most difficult things for me to come to grips with in my marriage was that the issue was *not* that my then-husband didn't "get it", but rather that he got it just fine. He was simply unwilling to actually do anything about it. He liked the status quo. Our marriage worked for him as it was, and he had no desire to change either it or himself in any way. He understood that I was unhappy and he understood why that was so. *What he did not do, was care enough about me to work with me to make it different.*
> 
> Modern marriage counselling is almost entirely focused on improving this apparent communication gap that seems to so plague the OP. The assumption being that the couple is not "hearing" one another - that is, they aren't communicating effectively so that both are clear regarding what the other party wants and/or needs. If the communication gap can be corrected, then both parties will fulfil those wants/needs and address the issues that one or both have with the marriage.
> 
> The problem with that, however, is that there is an underlying assumption of goodwill, good intent, and willingness - even perhaps eagerness - on the part of both partners to change in order to better accommodate their spouse. If only they could understand one another. In many cases, I think that willingness might actually exist, or have existed at some point. In other cases, though, that willingness to change to improve the marriage has either eroded away or never really existed at all. It's too often the case that the partner who doesn't seem to "get it" actually does "get it". It's just that whatever "it" is, is something they don't want to, care to, actually address in any meaningful way.


The bolded is the actual problem.

That's why I always say that the most important part of a good relationship is finding someone who genuinely cares about your happiness (and manages to, from time to time, actually DO something about it).


----------



## Buddy400

EleGirl said:


> Also, I know that there are women who do not listen to their husband when he tells her about a problem.


Maybe some of those men in sexless marriages who have "the talk" with their wives?


----------



## EleGirl

Buddy400 said:


> *At work, men are used to other people telling them explicitly what they need / expect.*
> 
> It's not that men treat women this way, men treat other people this way.
> 
> Personally, I excel at listening to my wife and believe that all men should endeavor to do so. But, men do (in general) communicate differently than women


And yet, in the types of situations that this thread is about, even if the wife tells her husband explicitly and clearly what she needs, he ignores it. That's my point.


----------



## EleGirl

Buddy400 said:


> EleGirl said:
> 
> 
> 
> Also, I know that there are women who do not listen to their husband when he tells her about a problem.
> 
> 
> 
> Maybe some of those men in sexless marriages who have "the talk" with their wives?
Click to expand...

Maybe it is that men who are in sexless marriages are ignored by their wives when they have 'that talk' with their wife about the fact that they are seriously not happy with the sexless state of their marriage.

I will bet that it is exactly the same situation as when a woman tells her husband that she is not happy with the sexless state of their marriage, and he ignores her request of fix the sexless state of the marriage.

Yep, I'll bet it's exactly the same.


----------



## lifeistooshort

ReformedHubby said:


> I didn't misunderstand the thread. Its just my opinion that some people exaggerate or completely rewrite the history of their marriage when they want an out. It does happen.


 How do you propose distinguishing between what you call rewriting and a different view of the relationship?

I have to wonder if there's a correlation between people who claim their spouse rewrote history and people who don't take their spouse's view seriously because they don't agree.


----------



## MrsHolland

EleGirl said:


> If we define communication as one person speaks and the other actually hears what is said, the perhaps communication did not take place because either the one speaking or the one who was hearing failed on their end.
> 
> But in having lived this. And in having read hundreds of threads about this issue, I think that very often the women are very clear as to the problems they need addressed. And yet their husband just blows it off.
> 
> We have a thread here once where women talked about exactly what they stated. They were pretty clear, pretty direct.
> 
> Perhaps on this thread, women who have lived through this could state what they told their husband so we can see how direct that they were.
> 
> Also, I know that there are women who do not listen to their husband when he tells her about a problem. Perhaps those men could also share what they have told their wife that the wife just ignores or does not care to address.


IMHO this issue is more to do with shirking responsibility that communication. When someone has to ask over and over and over again for their needs to be met the the denier of those needs hears but chooses to not take action. When they eventually get hit with that 4 x 2 then all of a sudden it becomes a shock. What is really happening is that they are hiding their own guilt for their appalling failure behind this shock. 

Number one advice to my girls, find a man with a high IQ and EQ,


----------



## Buddy400

EleGirl said:


> Maybe it is that men who are in sexless marriages are ignored by their wives when they have 'that talk' with their wife about the fact that they are seriously not happy with the sexless state of their marriage.
> 
> I will bet that it is exactly the same situation as when a woman tells her husband that she is not happy with the sexless state of their marriage, and he ignores her request of fix the sexless state of the marriage.
> 
> Yep, I'll bet it's exactly the same.


Sure.

But you seemed to be making the point that not paying attention to your partner's needs was due to men being "taught" to ignore what women say. I was pointing out evidence from posts here on TAM that women were known to occasionally do the same thing. 

I'll be EleGirl here and say that ignoring your partner's needs is probably a gender neutral problem.


----------



## Satya

To me, it is really, really simple. Maybe too simple. 

It's true for anyone, not just men... Although comparatively I find men to be very logical in terms of need, incentive, and wants.

If a husband/partner wants to do something, like listen to his wife, he'll do it. 

If he wants to do the laundry, he'll do it. 

Or if he wants to change a diaper, he'll do it. 

Or... If he wants to clean the oven, he'll do it. 

Mow the grass? He will if he wants to. 

Make the bacon instead of playing video games? If he wants to. 

Fix the roof? If he wants to. 

Be emotionally supportive? If he wants to. 

If he's not doing it, he probably doesn't want to, for whatever reason. 

Men that want to do stuff, get stuff done. Men that don't want to do stuff, avoid it like the plague. The motivator might be love, family, personal satisfaction, sex, or anything that he feels will motivate him, even when it's not his favorite thing to do. He just gets it done when he finds a reason to want to.

Some men can't find reason enough to get motivated, and thats the stuff of weaksauce women find unattractive and repulsive. Instinctively, women just want men that want to get sh1t done so she can keep finding him attractive and look up to him as someone she wants to journey with through life. JMO.


----------



## Holdingontoit

Rowan said:


> Modern marriage counselling is almost entirely focused on improving this apparent communication gap that seems to so plague the OP. The assumption being that the couple is not "hearing" one another - that is, they aren't communicating effectively so that both are clear regarding what the other party wants and/or needs. If the communication gap can be corrected, then both parties will fulfil those wants/needs and address the issues that one or both have with the marriage.
> 
> The problem with that, however, is that there is an underlying assumption of goodwill, good intent, and willingness - even perhaps eagerness - on the part of both partners to change in order to better accommodate their spouse. If only they could understand one another. In many cases, I think that willingness might actually exist, or have existed at some point. In other cases, though, that willingness to change to improve the marriage has either eroded away or never really existed at all. It's too often the case that the partner who doesn't seem to "get it" actually does "get it". It's just that whatever "it" is, is something they don't want to, care to, actually address in any meaningful way.


Not always a lack of caring. Sometimes what spouse #1 desperately needs from spouse #2 is something that spouse #2 is simply unable to provide despite a high level of caring about spouse #1. Asking an addict to give up drugs or alcohol. Or asking a rape victim to provide more sex. Asking a 50 year old person who just got laid off from their union manufacturing job to continue making just as much money as before.


----------



## Holdingontoit

Quality said:


> There are generally 3 states of marital relations:
> 
> 1. marital intimacy,
> 2. marital strife/discord/conflict, and
> 3. marital resignation.
> 
> Husbands, GENERALLY, want #1, but are quite content in #3 ~~ #2 drives them nuts.
> Wives, GENERALLY, want #1, are comfortable with #2, and #3 drives them crazy.
> 
> The problem is the path to #1 from #3 must go THROUGH #2 {no pun intended}, and, it must do so BEFORE "yea, it was too late".
> 
> So how should spouses address the conflict more effectively in a productive manner that their spouse MIGHT actually hear, engage in and address before it's "too late"~~


Easy.
Advice to women: keep complaining. When you can't take complaining any longer, file for divorce. Never just silently resign yourself to an unsatisfactory status quo.
Advice to men: when your wife complains, address her complaints. When you can't stand her complaining any longer, file for divorce. If your wife silently resigns herself to an unsatisfactory status quo, she hasn't decided to accept it. She is saving up money for the divorce lawyer's retainer.


----------



## EleGirl

Buddy400 said:


> Sure.
> 
> But you seemed to be making the point that not paying attention to your partner's needs was due to men being "taught" to ignore what women say. I was pointing out evidence from posts here on TAM that women were known to occasionally do the same thing.
> 
> I'll be EleGirl here and say that ignoring your partner's needs is probably a gender neutral problem.



Yes, I have been saying that " ignoring your partner's needs is probably a gender neutral problem."

Could it be that some men are taught to ignore what their spouse says? And also be true that some women are taught to ignore what their spouse says? I'll bet both are true in some cases. And of course some people just chose to do this all on their own..


----------



## turnera

Skipped everything but the first post, since I saw McCoy got banned, but I just wanted to comment on one thing. He talks about perfection. I contend that women don't want perfection. Nor need it. What they want is earnestness.


----------



## EleGirl

turnera said:


> Skipped everything but the first post, since I saw McCoy got banned, but I just wanted to comment on one thing. He talks about perfection. I contend that women don't want perfection. Nor need it. What they want is earnestness.


He was banned because he's a previously banned member.

The discussion is however a good one so this thread is being left open.


----------



## musiclover

Rowan said:


> My ex-husband once told me that if I had left him earlier in our marriage, he would have had a chance to be a better man, a better partner, a better husband. That I could have fixed all of our problems if I'd only have thrown him out in that second year of our marriage - when the serial cheating, that I didn't know about and wouldn't find out about for another 13 years, started. That way he would have had a chance to realize what he was doing, straighten up and be a good husband. But I didn't, so really I was responsible for our marriage breakdown. I should have stopped something I didn't know about from happening and saved him from himself.
> 
> :slap:
> 
> 
> Crazy people be crazy....


Lol my ex told me I should have told him
how bad the verbal abuse was then he would have taken me seriously. As if being mildly abusive was a good time for me. You can't make this this stuff up.


----------



## Openminded

I'm a very direct person. Nothing subtle about me. I wouldn't begin to know how to hint or be vague or whatever else women are often said to be. I had many discussions with my husband over the decades about the problems in our marriage. He made lots of promises but no real changes until the day I said I was getting a divorce. Suddenly he was totally focused. Too late.


----------



## Blondilocks

EleGirl said:


> He was banned because he's a previously banned member.
> 
> The discussion is however a good one so this thread is being left open.


Wow. Thought he was MachoMcCoy. Member 'pineapple' had a thread in April 2016 "I wonder how many spouses are just clueless?" where the same 'theories' and suppositions were put forth and dissected. Macho got a little heated in that one, too.


----------



## EleGirl

Blondilocks said:


> Wow. Thought he was MachoMcCoy. Member 'pineapple' had a thread in April 2016 "I wonder how many spouses are just clueless?" where the same 'theories' and suppositions were put forth and dissected. Macho got a little heated in that one, too.


Apparently he's a work in progress.


----------



## Holdingontoit

EleGirl said:


> Apparently he's a work in progress.


Aren't we all?


----------



## BetrayedDad

TheRealMcCoy said:


> She'd been telling him for YEARS, until she's blue in the face, that it bothers her. NEXT TIME I'm leaving you. If you don't stop, I'm leaving you. She TOLD HIM flat-out for 20 freakin' YEARS!!!


Yeah or maybe she was just thinking it in HER HEAD.

Maybe she said nothing because she's a poor communicator.

Maybe she said nothing because she hates confrontation.

Maybe she said nothing because it wasn't an issue until she met Chad.


Then one day the fountain exploded. 20 years of horded resentment comes spilling out and you were supposed to be a MIND READER who should of known.

"How are you surprised?" "Wasn't it obvious?" "I shouldn't of had to say anything." Any of that drivel sound familiar men? There's two sides to every story dude.


----------



## lifeistooshort

The now banned OP isn't wrong in that women should speak up when something bothers them, just as men should speak up. 

But what's always bothered me about his attitude is that it assumes men are children who can't be expected to know how to behave like adults and need mommy (wife) to teach them. It's always a wife's job to teach her poor, 2 year old mentality having husband how to treat her. And if he throws tantrums along the way... well that's ok because he's really just a 2 year old in a man's body and can't be expected to know better.

What????? You mean if i abuse my wife she might not love me? How unfair that she didn't spell this out for me! 

In that sense he has a low opinion of men and in my opinion does not give men as a group enough credit for knowing how to behave like adults. Most of the men I've had the pleasure of dealing with know how to behave like adults. I would be insulted by the idea that I need my spouse to teach me how to treat him like a human being. 

We hold people to standards that most reasonable people understand. If you're upset that your spouse didn't do the dishes when you wanted you need to speak up because it's not reasonable to think that would upset someone.

But if you yell at your spouse, refuse sex, name call, criticize, ignore them when they're unhappy,, or otherwise abuse.....reasonable people know that's not ok. It's not up to your spouse to teach you how to treat then decently, you should already know that as an adult.

If it takes a threat of divorce for you to care about what bothers your spouse you aren't marriage material. And as MEM pointed out, if you're so out of touch with your spouse emotionally that you have no idea they were miserable you have bigger issues. One thing my father used to tell me was that he couldn't believe how little my ex seemed to know about the things that bothered me. He knew what bothered my mom, he just disagreed with her point of view (they divorced). But he never claimed ignorance and wasn't shocked when she left. 

Men deserve a lot more credit then OP assumes.


----------



## EleGirl

BetrayedDad said:


> Yeah or maybe she was just thinking it in HER HEAD.
> 
> Maybe she said nothing because she's a poor communicator.
> 
> Maybe she said nothing because she hates confrontation.
> 
> Maybe she said nothing because it wasn't an issue until she met Chad.
> 
> 
> Then one day the fountain exploded. 20 years of horded resentment comes spilling out and you were supposed to be a MIND READER who should of known.
> 
> "How are your surprised?" "Wasn't it obvious?" "I shouldn't of had to say anything." Any of that drivel sound familiar men? There's two sided to every story dude.


I am sure that this fits some case. I doubt that it fits all, or even most cases. Most women do not have a man on the side when they decide to end their marriage.


----------



## chillymorn69

EleGirl said:


> I am sure that this fits comes cases. I doubt that it fits all, or even most cases. Most women do not have a man on the side when they decide to end their marriage.


not so sure I think exit affairs a pretty common.


----------



## EleGirl

chillymorn69 said:


> not so sure I think exit affairs a pretty common.


Yes, exit affairs are fairly common among both men and women. About 20% of men and about 18% of women admit to having affairs. So I don't think that number is high enough to say that most men or women have exit affairs.

But I don't think that there are reliable statistics out there on how many people have had exit affair.

Of all the divorced people I know who divorce that I know well enough to know what was really going on, only about one or two of the women had any kind of affair at all. A lot of those women, myself included, were married to men who were cheating. But in just about every case, the man had no intention of ending the marriage... so they were not exit affairs. But, that's of course antidotal.


----------



## Blondilocks

EleGirl said:


> Apparently he's a work in progress.


Since MachoMcCoy isn't banned, does that mean that he's the 'real' McCoy? And, if the OP isn't MachoMcCoy, then just who was he in his past incarnation?


----------



## chillymorn69

the stats for cheating are so all over the place that quoting stats for it is just unreliable.

nobody knows. 

I know of my male friends who have been cheated on out number the females by a large number.

also subjective


----------



## EleGirl

Blondilocks said:


> Since MachoMcCoy isn't banned, does that mean that he's the 'real' McCoy? And, if the OP isn't MachoMcCoy, then just who was he in his past incarnation?


look again


----------



## MEM2020

I will say that the generalizations below apply very well to our marriage. 

And that (3) which is steady state apathy - is a reason that some men claim the marriage is happy. 

I am NOT defending that viewpoint at all. I am just going to describe a sequence. 
1. The beginning - things are good
2. Intense and prolonged strife as wife tries to get needs met and husband fights or ignores her
3. This FEELS like a big improvement for the man - as it represents the absence of strife

A man with even a modest EQ - recognizes the huge differences between (1) and (3). But a man who is insecure and competitive looks around for stories of unhappy/sexless marriages - declares his own marriage 'normal' and keeps on keeping on. Until he gets dumped. 




----------------


Quality said:


> There are generally 3 states of marital relations:
> 
> 1. marital intimacy,
> 2. marital strife/discord/conflict, and
> 3. marital resignation.
> 
> Husbands, GENERALLY, want #1, but are quite content in #3 ~~ #2 drives them nuts.
> Wives, GENERALLY, want #1, are comfortable with #2, and #3 drives them crazy.
> 
> The problem is the path to #1 from #3 must go THROUGH #2 {no pun intended}, and, it must do so BEFORE "yea, it was too late".
> 
> Another problem is that when the wife resigns and quits complaining, the husband often thinks things are actually better because there is less #2.
> 
> Elegirl posted a stat on another thread indicating that a significantly large percentage of women initiated separations result, ultimately, in divorce.
> 
> Take that stat and combine it with the overall premise of this thread how frustrating it is that it often takes a separation, divorce petition {or an affair} to wake a husband up and the "NOW, he wants to change" frustration or Ele's ~~"And even if he was suddenly shocked into agreeing to spend time with me--yea it was too late. The damage was done. How would I ever get over the fact that for years he refused to spend time with me?" You can see where the marital issues and conflict must be addressed and brought to a head much earlier and more effectively by the wife {generally ~ she's the one hating resignation so much and obviously all the talking, fighting, complaining, criticizing, sharing of feelings, and the silent treatment aren't working ~ she needs a better strategy} while it also MUST be taken far more seriously by the husband {generally ~ he's the one avoiding the conflict and needs to really listen and address his wife's feelings of neglect before his wife blindsides him with a divorce petition, demand for separation or, likely, an affair}. We can try to hash out blame between the sexes all we want about who is more wrong than the other {prior to an affair}, but, that accomplishes absolutely nothing. It's a relationship problem ~ both can do better.
> 
> So how should spouses address the conflict more effectively in a productive manner that their spouse MIGHT actually hear, engage in and address before it's "too late"~~
> 
> I found this little gem of an article over at marriage builders dot com that just sums it up better than I ever could:
> 
> *When to Call It Quits - * Part One LINK
> 
> *When to Call it Quits - *Part Two LINK
> 
> *When to Call It Quits - *Part Three (for Men) LINK


----------



## lifeistooshort

chillymorn69 said:


> not so sure I think exit affairs a pretty common.


I wouldn't be surprised. Basic laws of inertia.....Newton's first law, are always in play. It's a fundamental law of nature and could even be applied in a broader manner: a guy in a sexless marriage starts really noticing and thinking about other women. This then spurs him to leave, but in the end his wife can't compete with the fantasy he's spun can she? Or maybe he just rewrote marital history to suit himself. 

Maybe she'd have a different view of how bad their sex life was..... the other side to the story that was brought up in another post?

Or maybe he was already unhappy and fantasies of other women caused him to realize that his life might be better without his wife. These fantasies aren't all that different from at least an EA. Both are emotional and sexual energy not being devoted to the marriage.

It doesn't matter though because said guy has every right to decide what he'll live with. If he communicated that he wanted more sex and she ignored it that's her problem...assuming of course that she cares he's left. 

I see exit affairs much differently than cake eaters.


----------



## BetrayedDad

chillymorn69 said:


> I know of my male friends who have been cheated on out number the females by a large number.


As do I, myself included. This fiction that men cheat substantially more may have been true 30 years ago. 

The coping with infidelity forum alone, also other competitor sites, debunks this stat by a significant margin. 

Exit affairs, or at least side affairs, are a common coping mechanism for disgruntled spouses.


----------



## MEM2020

Life,

I think that's spot on. 

And I also think that there is a certain type of guy who hides behind gender stereo types. The thing is that most negative male stereotypes tie back to insecurity/unhealthy style of competitiveness. 

Sometimes though, when I hear the statement: He doesn't listen I wonder what is really meant by that. Sometimes it means:
1. Literally not listening to actual spoken words
2. Not paying attention to tone/body language, facial expression and subtext
3. A lack of compliance with what is being requested

In my experience - women are better at conflict. They have conflict - and it doesn't become combat - generally it sorts out. 

So - some H's will claim they didn't understand what was asked, rather than tussle over whether or not they are going to do it. 






lifeistooshort said:


> The now banned OP isn't wrong in that women should speak up when something bothers them, just as men should speak up.
> 
> But what's always bothered me about his attitude is that it assumes men are children who can't be expected to know how to behave like adults and need mommy (wife) to teach them. It's always a wife's job to teach her poor, 2 year old mentality having husband how to treat her. And if he throws tantrums along the way... well that's ok because he's really just a 2 year old in a man's body and can't be expected to know better.
> 
> What????? You mean if i abuse my wife she might not love me? How unfair that she didn't spell this out for me!
> 
> In that sense he has a low opinion of men and in my opinion does not give men as a group enough credit for knowing how to behave like adults. Most of the men I've had the pleasure of dealing with know how to behave like adults. I would be insulted by the idea that I need my spouse to teach me how to treat him like a human being.
> 
> We hold people to standards that most reasonable people understand. If you're upset that your spouse didn't do the dishes when you wanted you need to speak up because it's not reasonable to think that would upset someone.
> 
> But if you yell at your spouse, refuse sex, name call, criticize, ignore them when they're unhappy,, or otherwise abuse.....reasonable people know that's not ok. It's not up to your spouse to teach you how to treat then decently, you should already know that as an adult.
> 
> If it takes a threat of divorce for you to care about what bothers your spouse you aren't marriage material. And as MEM pointed out, if you're so out of touch with your spouse emotionally that you have no idea they were miserable you have bigger issues. One thing my father used to tell me was that he couldn't believe how little my ex seemed to know about the things that bothered me. He knew what bothered my mom, he just disagreed with her point of view (they divorced). But he never claimed ignorance and wasn't shocked when she left.
> 
> Men deserve a lot more credit then OP assumes.


----------



## BetrayedDad

lifeistooshort said:


> I see exit affairs much differently than cake eaters.


I'm not sure why you think they are mutually exclusive. You can be both.


----------



## chillymorn69

BetrayedDad said:


> As do I, myself included. This fiction that men cheat substantially more may have been true 30 years ago.
> 
> The coping with infidelity forum alone, also other competitor sites, debunks this stat by a significant margin.
> 
> Exit affairs, or at least side affairs, are a common coping mechanism for disgruntled spouses.




personally I feel women cheat on men much more frequently. its much easier for them and they are much more devious and secretive.


----------



## BetrayedDad

chillymorn69 said:


> personally I feel women cheat on men much more frequently. its much easier for them and they are much more devious and secretive.


In the social media world we live in, it's just SO much easier for them. 

80% women could find a suitable affair partner within a week for sex.

Throw up a tinder profile and they will have 25 messages in an hour.


----------



## MEM2020

Gents, 

Negative generalizations about other genders are frowned on. 

Links to peer reviewed research or mainstream articles is always welcome. 




chillymorn69 said:


> personally I feel women cheat on men much more frequently. its much easier for them and they are much more devious and secretive.


----------



## chillymorn69

MEM2020 said:


> Gents,
> 
> Negative generalizations about other genders are frowned on.
> 
> Links to peer reviewed research or mainstream articles is always welcome.


I indicated it was my personal opinion not a generalization.


----------



## MEM2020

I will confer with my peers and get back to you. 

While I will defer to my peer groups viewpoint - I will be surprised if they rule that 'prefacing' negative generalizations with: in my opinion 

Makes them ok. 






chillymorn69 said:


> I indicated it was my personal opinion not a generalization.


----------



## chillymorn69

MEM2020 said:


> I will confer with my peers and get back to you.
> 
> While I will defer to my peer groups viewpoint - I will be surprised if they rule that 'prefacing' negative generalizations with: in my opinion
> 
> Makes them ok.


you might be busy chasing down all the reporting.I hope the mods fairly assess each one instead of just wagging the finger because someone got their panties in a bunch.


----------



## lifeistooshort

MEM2020 said:


> Life,
> 
> I think that's spot on.
> 
> And I also think that there is a certain type of guy who hides behind gender stereo types. The thing is that most negative male stereotypes tie back to insecurity/unhealthy style of competitiveness.
> 
> Sometimes though, when I hear the statement: He doesn't listen I wonder what is really meant by that. Sometimes it means:
> 1. Literally not listening to actual spoken words
> 2. Not paying attention to tone/body language, facial expression and subtext
> 3. A lack of compliance with what is being requested
> 
> In my experience - women are better at conflict. They have conflict - and it doesn't become combat - generally it sorts out.
> 
> So - some H's will claim they didn't understand what was asked, rather than tussle over whether or not they are going to do it.



Yes, I think you're correct..... I'm sure there are women who did this as well. Though I think in those cases it's a woman who is conflict averse and does what her husband wants in order too avoid the conflict and secretly resents it. Women are more likely to feel emotionally intimidated.

But IMO this is disenguous and deceptive..... to attempt to avoid conflict by claiming you didn't understand. It's essentially playing dumb.

I deal with this in my marriage..... my hb is a great guy but he's very conflict averse. He'll ignore problems, then if I bring it up he'll play dumb and apologize. So not only is there no risk for him..... at best I'll let it go and at worst I'll bring it up and he'll play dumb.....it leaves it to me to address pretty much everything.

That is exhausting for me..... and it's insulting because we both know he knows what's going on. He's admitted as much..... he's just hoping it goes away. The fact that something bothers me is less important them him being uncomfortable with conflict.

The reason it hasn't been more of an issue is because we don't clash very often.


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## MEM2020

Edited to correct a misquote mentioned in the next post:


Chilly,

The mods conferred and there was a consensus which was negative generalizing about groups is against policy. Whether or not such views are bookended with the phrase: 'Personally I feel'. Making it a personal opinion. 





chillymorn69 said:


> you might be busy chasing down all the reporting.I hope the mods fairly assess each one instead of just wagging the finger because someone got their panties in a bunch.


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## chillymorn69

MEM2020 said:


> Chilly,
> 
> The mods conferred and there was a consensus which was negative generalizing about groups is against policy. Whether or not such views are bookended with the phrase: 'I feel'. Making it a personal opinion.





understood but my quote was.

"personally I feel "

Just like you I don't like to be misquoted.

But I understand your and the other mods position.


thanks for the clarification.


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