This is probably a bit off MB topic but it is effecting us so I came here for help.

My W has anxieties. For years she had a huge fear of storms. She was doing well the last couple of years but this year she is back to feeling very fearful of them. I try to help, be as supportive as I can. Always there to hold her and try to help calm her fears. She says I do a great job there. Trouble is I can't always be around. I have to go to work ... and while I could I'm not sure I'm enthusiastic about cancelling all plans that exclude her. Plus she isn't enthusiastic about me spending time with her, her sister and her horses. So we inevitably will be apart from time to time.

She recently upped her meds to help with her anxieties. Hence she�s really frustrated that the increase isn�t helping as much as she�d like.

I'm trying to brainstorm things we can do to help. I've mentioned getting professional help again. She�s stressed about a trip to Texas next month (to see my brother and his family) so I�ve inquired about cancelling.

Does anyone know of a good way to help?

To give more details she had seen a counselor a few years ago who made a difference. That counselor is no longer an option. We�ve discussed some ideas but she seems intent on sacrificing. She said we can�t afford the counseling. I disagreed and told her material things we�ve planned can wait or be cancelled. Her health is priority #1. �No sense purchasing them sweetie if you aren�t going to enjoy them�. She said she doesn�t want to cancel our trip because everyone is looking forward to it. I said it makes no sense to go if you aren�t going to enjoy it.

I�ll keep working POJA with her on a solution but anything anyone has that thinks can help I will be your new best friend if it does. Her world gets turned upside down when her anxieties increase like this. It�s hard on us all.

We live near the Twin Cities (MN) so if anyone knows of an expert on anxieties in the area I�ll be sure to look them up. I may email Dr. Harley to see what his recommendation would be but I�m not certain he�d have a suggestion outside of the MB principles.

MrAlias, my wife has a lot of anxieties as well. What I've done is focus on being with her as much as possible. If at all possible, I'll leave work early to be with her when something goes wrong, etc. Sometimes I can finish out the day working from home or work a longer day the next day. She is always incredibly appreciative.

I give her a full veto on anything we're going to do, and try to make it easy for her to cancel at any time. If you can dig through the Marriage Builders radio show archives around Oct or Nov of 2011, I was on the show, and Dr. Harley talked about Joyce practically having a nervous breakdown the one time they went to a baseball game together. She was willing to try it; she got there and she HATED it!!! If you can't find it in the archives, you might be able to find it linked to in my posting history around that time.

That is what I would do. I have heard him give advice on anxiety in a situation like this, but do not recall the show to post for you.

Another good point is to make sure, primarily, that you are never the source of anxieties, and that you are her source of support for the anxieties. Let her drive the process; don't drive it for her. Respond to what she brings up, rather than bringing up the issues yourself. Don't take the lead in tracking down solutions unless she asks you to do so. Be the friend that she talks to and confides in about these things, not the coach who offers advice. In so doing, you will make massive love bank deposits, and this really does need to be the priority. She can have quite a happy life, even with anxieties, if she has a lot of good, personal conversation with you.

You need to do everything possible to avoid letting your relationship get cast in this light:

My wife has anxieties; I do not; I help her learn to deal with anxieties because I don't have this problem.

Because if you are not careful, your relationship will cease to be a relationship of equals.

Lots of people have anxieties. It's very normal. Be sure to treat it that way. She may feel like a social pariah because she doesn't want to get out -- make sure you never treat her like one, though!

Rule of thumb: if your wife says something that would be disrespectful if you said it about her, don't reinforce it, don't agree with it.

Here's you a great counter-example, MrA:

http://forum.marriagebuilders.com/ubbt/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2728748#Post2728748

Wife is anxious about lots of things, and her husband tries to stop her feeling anxious by calling her fears "ridiculous" and "silly." Make sure you don't do that, or anything that your wife might perceive as being like that.

Thanks you two. That is very helpful.

I have always tried to do what I can to be there for her if she needs it. Including apologizing to my boss but explaining I have to leave. Fortunately I've had very understanding bosses and they've been willing to work with me.

Per my W's requests we've done some specific things around the home to provide her as much relief as possible. Our basement has a "safe" room that we've set up to make it feel like a normal hang out so as not to make it feel our escape to it is a "safe" room.

As far as her taking the lead, I guess in years past I failed in that regard. Today I still make suggestions which sounds like is another no-no. I�m trying to get my head around my W making statements that sound like she�s sacrificing to appease everyone else.

This trip, she�ll go because everyone else wants to. That�s how she says it. She says �I�ll just have to get through it.�. I know she�d like to go too. She wants to see the Gulf. She loves being next to big water. But if she�ll be so scared the whole time � Wow I wouldn�t want her to experience that.

I want her to know she has options and I�ll support her decision despite it creating angst for others (our children). I suspect she feels she�s between a rock and hard place. She knows others will be disappointed if she says let�s stay home and damned if she goes cuz she�ll be extremely nervous and upset leading up to and maybe even including the trip. I want her to be happy with the decision we make. I�m not sure there is one for her in this case.

Do I put my brainstorming hat on? Wait for her to ask?

Here was our latest exchange:

Am I doing too much steering? Should I just be asking more open ended questions?

Going to dig into your link now Markos.

I get what his intent was but yes I agree he needs to state this differently.

That doesn't sound like me BTW. I would have replied to a statement like this from my wife with something along these lines:

"Is that how you see yourself? As a failure? Oh my, I don't see you that way at all. I think you are a very successful, intelligent person. If I make you feel that way in any way shape or form please let me know and I'll change the behavior.".

I have a lot of anxieties. About a year ago, I needed a change in my medication which helped drastically. Rather than going to my family doctor, I went to a psychiatrist. They are very well educated in medicines for this type of issue. I was very pleased with the results.

Do you know if there is something from her past that has led to the fear? What is it about the storms that frighten her? What stresses her out about the trip? Could you address the specifics about her fears? Keep tabs on the radar, if a storm is coming go shopping or stay put for the night.

I can understand her sacrifice. I have felt that sometimes if I don�t sacrifice and face the anxiety the walls of anxiety close in further and make the next thing even harder to overcome. Finding out what the details are around her anxiety and what her internal dialog says to her and addressing that even if it is just over the phone might help.

Does she have friends that can help with this internal dialog when you are unavailable?

The fact that you've picked up on this improvement you could've made shows that you are on the way to learning how to handle this with real finesse!!

A couple things I would add:

Hold all planning conversations privately, outside of the children's earshot. That way they don't get a chance to think "Dad is okay with us going, but Mom doesn't want us to." You just show up and say "Mom and I have talked it over, and we are not going to ... this year."

Don't mention to your wife that not going might create angst for the children. That makes additional pressure for her.

There are lots of fun things to do in life, many of them are in your area. Start filling your life up with them together. You can find plenty of things to do that make for great moments with the kids and make both you and your wife happy. I would not even mention a connection to the other plans. Just "Hey, how would you like to ... ?"

So, in our case, we like to take a trip to the beach once or twice a year. If Prisca suddenly told me she doesn't feel like going any more, I'd be looking for lots of fun activities to do instead. With our kids, frequent trips to the zoo are great; shorter trips to Dallas are good; and there are lots of fun things to do in our area.

She has only seen our family doctor but he claims to be well educated on forms of A/Ds and anxiety. The Dr. just upped the dosage. She takes Zoloft(sertaline).


She had a frightening experience when our 1st son was very young. She was still dealing with postpartum and a storm hit. She was in the basement with him, I was trying to get home to her before the storm arrived (didn�t make it on time), the wind blew water in around our sidelights and the water poured into a vent which started to drip into the basement. She thought the top half of the house must have been blown off. By the time I got home, drove while a tornado was in the area, she was in the basement, frantic and sobbing uncontrollably. She calmed down a bit after I held her.


Death to either herself or someone she loves.



Yes. We�ve already discussed this and what we would do if it appeared we�d be driving into a storm. We simply would stop where it won�t be storming or where we�d be safe (aka a shelter).


I suspect that is what she is doing now. Which is probably why Markos and Prisca are right when they say let her drive the bus. Let her dictate what the next steps are, what extra precautions are needed, etc.


Sort of, but she likes to hold things close to the vest. She�s always said she doesn�t like airing her dirty laundry even with family. So, as of today, she can talk with her Mom but her Mom won�t necessarily be helping with the dialogue. Just someone she can talk with.

Even though some may say this isn�t the best option she can and has talked about this stuff with our oldest boy. He�s pretty mature and he is very empathetic. If she needs a sounding board he�ll be that and he knows how to comfort her. He helped some last night when she arrived home from her day trip.

I think it helps her knowing there is someone else there that will be company during the situation and provide assistance should the worst happen.

This sounds a bit disrespectful.
You laughed at her request. She thought that "lots of hugs" could help get her through it, and you "educated" her that it would probably not be enough.

It's not unusual to want to do something but be anxious about it at the same time. She says she would like to go, but is scared.
If it were me in this situation, what I would want from Markos is for him to ask me what he could do for me to ease my fear. And then brainstorm from there.

And whatever you decide, make sure she has the right to back out of that decision at the last minute. Be prepared to brainstorm again and come up with something else to do.

I�ll do my best but she�s already laid the ground work on that. The kids already know she�s uneasy about this trip to Texas. She already told them all she was excited about the trip but that she was really scared. They give lots of hugs and encouragement � the little rascals.

Mind you they are soon to be 11, almost 13 and 15.5 years old so they aren�t so small they can�t handle the truth. We try not to leave them in the dark most of the time. They all knew about their Mom�s fears, our MB phone counseling, they know Mom and Dad are trying to spend more UA time together, etc. They like our openness and honesty � or at least they say they do. The only thing we try to keep from them are fun surprises � which drives them nuts. LOL.

If we change our plans we will definitely still take a family vacation. However I suspect we may agree to wait until August so they don�t have to miss any of their ball games.

The kids would argue there aren't fun things to do around here � because everything they�ve wanted to do we�ve already done. They�re all excited about our little adventure � even the thought of a 20 hour car ride hasn�t deterred them.

The absolute most important thing is for YOU to be her friend she talks to about these things. And she needs a friend, a peer, an equal, not a counselor.


That sounds like a real problem to me. This is acting like mom has a "defect" or "handicap." I think you need to take the approach that anxiety is perfectly NORMAL. This is setting up for son to view his mother in a very, very disrespectful way. It's setting him up to parent his own mother.

I'm not concerned about your kids not being able to handle truth.

I'm concerned about passing off mom as abnormal. That's not truth.

If I want our kids to do something and Prisca does not, then that is not a truth we need to pass to our kids. Not to protect the kids - to protect US! In that situation, Prisca needs to be protected from appearing to be the "bad guy" to the kids. And when the tables are reversed, I need to be protected from being the "bad guy." It has nothing to do with kids' ages and developmental scales or whatever. It has to do with kids learning the value of thoughtfulness and respect for other people in the family.

Actually it�s a bit worse than that. Here are the texts:
The fact she posed it in the form of a question I think she was sort of kidding around. I'm pretty sure she knew I wasn�t laughing at her or her pain. We�ve been down this road and I have always tried to be very empathetic. I�ve never scoffed or laughed at her pain.

However, I�m sure I come across as educating to her. It�s one of the LBs that others have pointed out to me here on the forum so thank you for pointing that out. Next time I�ll be sure to say �If that�s what you need you can have as many as you�d like�.

My W has never once said she hates that I educate her. So I sent her a text asking her just that.
Her response: �Sometimes you do, maybe I need to get better at telling you when you are doing it so we can work on it together.�
�Thx. I appreciate your honesty. And heck yeah clue me in. But please no bats against the melon OK? :-D �.

Ya'll are doing great.

Interesting. I mean I get the whole protect us thing, however, the anxiety about the trip is already out there. That ship has sailed. So for this situation we may not have a choice. I�ll deflect and redirect the best I can.

We want to teach the kids what it means to be truthful, to be open and honest. It is one of the big things we�re working on with our daughter who has a history of lying. We accept and still love each other despite our flaws/struggles/skeletons.

I know Dr Harley says the following in regards to M and it doesn�t necessarily apply to our children but he states him and Joyce hate keeping secrets. They are so open they don�t even like to give surprise presents on birthdays and holidays. They are open books and want to share everything with each other. I am much the same way. I have nothing to hide so I tell almost all truths especially where I think the children can learn a life lesson. I suspect, with our children, my W feels the same � otherwise why tell the kids anything?

They�ve already heard the truth. If they get it that it is more important to protect those we love then it is for personal gain then we�re doing it right. They�ll learn the lesson of care and protection.

I will discuss this with my W tonight. I�ll ask her how she�d like it to go down if her and I decide it�s best to stay local for our vacation.

Thanks for talking this out with me.

Maybe, but I know my W is having a very hard time with her anxieties. I so wish we could make it better for her. What she's experiencing right now seems very, very stressful and thus painful.