# Need Feedback: Why Is He So Angry With Me?



## wifenumber2 (Jul 29, 2011)

I'm writing this while undergoing the silent treatment for about the 5th time in as many months. 

We are in our 50's second marriage for both. His ex was an alcoholic and this was a factor in their divorce. He states he really has no use for his parents. 

Friday: 
It's his birthday. He seems ok until his step daughter from his first marriage tells him she is picking up her car from his shop the next day. He seems a bit down after her call. As we drive home, I tell him that I made reservations for his kids to celebrate his birthday at one of his favorite restaurants. he thanks me and said that's nice. 

Saturday:
I find an unopened birthday card from his parents in the trash. We work a bit. He comes home and is in hip pain with leg spasms. I'm thinking a possible disc as sitting made it worse. I help him with medications. I see him looking at fetlife.com (he wants to see me flirt with other men and have sex with another woman as well as a threesome. I've told him in the past I can't as it would destroy me emotionally). Later he watches a show about a couple about to go to a swingers event. The wife described her desire to go further with any man she meets. I leave the room. He asked where I was going. I told him I didn't want to watch a couple breaking their marital vows. He asked me to come back and changed the channel.

Sunday: 
We wake up. He's curled next to me. He thanks me for taking good care of him he feels better. Two hours later, he asked what we were doing today. I told him why not take it easy given his pain yesterday, watch football until we have his dinner at 5 PM. 

At that point he tells me that he told his kids earlier in the month he didn't want them to do anything for his birthday and he would not do anything for their birthdays (in Oct) as we are going on a cruise in a couple of weeks and he will do something then. He really is not sure if he wants the dinner. I offer to cancel. When I asked him why he didn't share his plans with me, his wife. He gets defensive. Tells me I'm a better debater than him. Leaves the room. 

We go to pick up a car for me to drive as I know he is going to leave me for at least the day. On the drive, I'm silent for half of it. I then try to continue our discussion, try to explain that communication as a wife is important to me. I've been uncharacteristically vocal in our discussion today--speaking my mind when I usually try to be calm and reasonable. 

I told him a few weeks ago, when he and his brother had traveled to their parents for a serious discussion with them, his brother called his wife after the discussion to share with her how he thought it went. My husband didn't. In fact I learned of the trip from my sister-in-law. My husband phoned me 3 hours later--when his car broke down and he needed me to drive 30 miles to pick his brother and him up. I told him that his brother's call to his wife is usually what married people who view their relationship as a partner ship discuss. I only heard from him because he needed something from me. Ultimately, he said he doesn't like to talk to or share with me because he feels I'm manipulative.

When I hear what he said, I'm hurt because I realize he doesn't trust me. I told him I was sorry his mother and his ex were manipulative to him but it's been 13 years and I'm tired of paying for their manipulation. He pulls the car over and gets out and walks away. He's living at the house but not really speaking and in other areas of the house. 

What do you think is at play? Narcissism has been suggested as a possibility by a counselor who has not met him.


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## EleGirl (Dec 3, 2011)

wifenumber2 said:


> What do you think is at play? Narcissism has been suggested as a possibility by a counselor who has not met him.


Don't do this. The counselor only has your point of view to go on. It's so wrong to get started in giving what amount to mental health diagnosis through a 3rd party. 

Just look at how your relationship is going. If you do not like the way he's treating you then you have three choices:


Stay and be miserable and keep wasting your time trying to change him.
Stay and work on yourself.
Leave and work on yourself.

He thinks that you are manipulative.
He does not seem to really like you. Maybe I'm wrong but that's what it sounds like.

If you are not manipulative, then why would you want to stay with someone who has such a low opinion of you?


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## wifenumber2 (Jul 29, 2011)

EleGirl said:


> Don't do this. The counselor only has your point of view to go on. It's so wrong to get started in giving what amount to mental health diagnosis through a 3rd party.
> 
> Just look at how your relationship is going. If you do not like the way he's treating you then you have three choices:
> 
> ...


I'm between stay and work on myself and leave and work on myself. My plan at this point is to 180. We have a family cruise on 10/12 with all of his kids, his parents, his sister, and godmother. I'm trying to coast through the cruise and after it, I'm going to have a discussion with him about where we are headed.

For me, to consider staying I need: 1) communication (regular and during conflict) 2) emotional intimacy and 3) counseling (preferably joint and with participation--not just sitting there fuming etc.) Or he needs IC to deal with his past. He loved Al-Anon and did it during his first marriage and he did counseling with his ex. He did it one time with me over his experimental bariatric surgery in Mexico; however, he went only to provide the counselor feedback about me and didn't want any conflict or discussion about us. He told the counselor if she doesn't feel comfortable about my having the surgery I won't have it (he said it at the beginning of the session) of course my response was I'm not saying don't have it but why experimental and why not in the US but just wait the year for me to change my insurance plan to the one that would cover it. My counselor said he never intended to not have the surgery...Now isn't that an example of manipulative behavior?

Since I've been on TAM and with time, my ability to tolerate his behavior during conflict is getting less and less and I am pushing back more.

I don't think I'm manipulative; however, where he is concerned, does it matter? Isn't his perception his reality? Do we ever know 100% what others think we are? I don't think I am. I don't lie to get things/actions I want. I'm usually straightforward and transparent. The only time I'm not is when I have something that is bothering me with his son because even his shop manager who has to manage his son's work activities says that my H is ultra ultra sensitive and goes off in a drop of a hat over his son. I even told my H during a discussion when he told me that at his shop he is King but at the home he lets me make all the decisions. I said that it was not the case. He wanted an example. If I knew he wouldn't blow up I would have said "How about your son and his girlfriend living here for 9 months rent free? You knew from a conversation last year I didn't want her living here on a regular basis because that is not how I parent yet knowing full well how I felt your need to please your son superseded your need to talk things over with your wife--to add insult I pay all of the bills without any of his help! When I said "Not Always", he said what do you mean and I said that I've learned that with you there are some topics that are better not to discuss. 

I'm to the point where I really am asking myself: should it be this hard and is this relationship really a positive for my kids and me. 
Financially I can leave at any time as far as making ends meet. I actually initiated discussion with the bank that holds his commercial property loans that I do have some involvement on to initiate the process of my being removed, the house which is in my name and 1/2 the life insurance proceeds due me being removed as collateral from the loan. He doesn't know yet because I needed to find out if this is even possible first and it is but a hell of a lot of work.


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## wifenumber2 (Jul 29, 2011)

MissFroggie said:


> You gave 3 days of your keys points and twice you mentioned that he thanked you. That's not typical of narcissism, in fact it is very rare! I agree with Elegirl that getting a medical diagnosis from a third party is not good. I think some of it sounds PA (eg not talking to you or saying you're a better debater than him and leaving instead of talking it through) but tbh I think you might be skirting around what is really bothering you....is it because he doesn't trust you or is it the whole issue surrounding what he is watching and also wanting from you? x


It's both. The statement about not wanting to talk to or share with me because he thinks I'm manipulative was a first and was just made this past Sunday. That hit hard. When someone makes a statement like that, I feel he is closed off to being open with me because his defenses are way up. I had interactions with his ex to the point that I emotionally detached by not engaging with her and got a restraining order. I didn't want to deal with her calling me a sugar momma and asking me to ask him to pay for private school for his son ($10K +/year) when none of the other kids or us needed it and there were no safety issues. She would make hurtful statements to my husband and definitely alienated the kids from him during the early years after his divorce so he has emotional scars that make me understand putting up walls but he makes statements such as "all women are (fill in the blank with a negative trait of your choice) but not you". I think he doesn't have much use for women except for sex.

On the topic of sex...yes read my posts. He wanted to go to nudist retreats and swingers clubs. I told him I knew myself and I couldn't handle it emotionally. Maybe at first but it would eat me up alive. We went to a "BDSM" club once before we were married but we were dating and his attention was 100% on me. He mentioned that once that we went to clubs when we were dating so why is it a problem now? I told him that it was once and it's like having Indian food. You might want to have it once so you try it but by trying it, it doesn't mean you want it all the time. He did tell me that he went to swingers clubs with his ex. He claimed she didn't mind because after the bars or stores were closed and she still wanted to drink that they still served alcohol so she was good. They did have some form of sex (I didn't push) with other people there.

I told him what I could and could not feel comfortable doing (ex: yes I would be good with going to a "dungeon" and playing and trying new things there and at home but no third parties). For a while, he got a chastity device for him and he liked that he thought I was a stronger person as a result of denying him and he liked it. He tells me all the time that he loves the stronger me. But when we had recent fights the first time he trashed it but I retrieved it. The second fight he threw out both of them ($170 worth). 

After the last fight and when we were reconciled (since he jumped on top of me in bed) I said:

"Do you trust me to do this (sex)?" 

This fight was because I went into a room that his son and girlfriend were occupying that used to belong to my daughter. My daughter still had stuff in the room while she is at college. I was looking for Goodwill donations and went no fewer than 2 minutes in the room to look at her stuff in the closet. This was while my H was dropping off the first load and after he said it would be great if he could borrow his son's pick-up truck as it would make things easier. What was odd was moments before he thanked me for doing the Goodwill because he is a minimalist and hates clutter. He said to thank me, he put on his chastity belt. We hugged and got a bit playful so when he left, I'm thinking "This is good". I'm going to find a lot of stuff to donate!

When my H came back, I told my him that I happened to be in the son's room looking at my daughter's stuff for possible donations and when I left the room, I saw the truck keys on the bureau. What I didn't know was that while he was dropping off a load to Goodwill, he called the son and must have asked to borrow the truck but the son told him the keys weren't there. I didn't know that so when I told him about the keys and maybe he could borrow the truck for dropping off stuff to Goodwill, he got angry and said he was uncomfortable with borrowing it after his son told him the keys weren't there and he was uncomfortable about my being in the son's room. About 10 minutes later he demanded the key to the chastity device because he was done playing games. I asked for what he meant and he said I was snooping in the son's room and he didn't trust me. This even though: 1) I own the house, 2) my daughter's stuff was in that room 3) they weren't paying rent to live there 4) I went to every room of the house. I told him that that I went to every room looking for donations and why is what I did different from his son and girlfriend going into our room to get towels and toilet paper from our room?

When it seemed like the silent treatment was over, he wanted to have sex with me. I stopped and asked him "Do you trust me to do this? Then I asked him why would I be snooping in the room if I told him that I was there? If I wanted to snoop, I was in the room when he was gone and could have never said a word and what do I have to gain? It's not like they are 11 and I'm looking for drugs etc. Then I told him: "People who love one another just don't jump to conclusions and accuse the other. People who love one another learn to resolve conflict by talking calmly about the issues with one another and people who love one another tell the other party that they are sorry if they felt that they were wrong." For the first time, he said "I'm sorry". I was thinking WOW, I didn't walk on tippy toes, I stood up for myself (usually I would have just had the sex and been glad this was over).


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