Hi AD,

I follow your story, although have never posted to you, I don't think.

It seems to me that it is not a question of love. You keep saying that your wife never loved you, had to marry you and so on and so forth.

What I get is that love is not the problem here it, is respect. She does not respect you because you let her walk all over you. And I think you do this because you are grateful that she married you at all, and because you feel sorry for her.

If I were you I would try and work on the respect part. Boundaries and consequences is what I am getting at. A woman needs to respect a man, she needs to view him as strong, and not willing to put up with her crap. Your wife loves you she just has no respect for you. And she takes her frustrations out on you and your little girl <img border="0" alt="[Teary]" title="" src="graemlins/teary.gif" /> If my DD's dad saw me treat my DD that way, believe me there would be hell to pay for me. She basically throws temper tantrums and is no more than a child herself emotionally. And the same with the way she treats you. She needs you to stand up to her and show her that you are a man.

I can't help in the boundary/respect dept because that is something I too am working on. But if I were you I would read everything I could on here and anywhere else in this regard.

I think that is what RAG was alluding to with the Plan B. You may not be interested in Plan B, however Plan B is all about putting boundaries in place and regaining respect, both for yourself and from your WS.

Plan B is not the only option for this I wouldn't think, if you can't do it.

I try to read whatever ARK and Pep have to say on this subject because they really, really get it. There are many others on here but I cannot recall any more names at the moment.

Wishing you the best,

AD:

I don't have much 2 add. I did note that you put back your original post after I'd first posted 2 this thread. Thinking about it, I agree that you sure could have handled the bag of trinkets a lot better than you did. My D is 25 and she and her fiance spend tons on Star Wars and Disney gizmos all the time. Their apartment is really cute, 2. It ain't me, but it is her. Try 2 be a little more sensitive when you deal with issues like that, is all.

I can't say much about her treatment of YOU, either. She doesn't seem 2 realize how hurtful her comments are. Not many not-quite-former-WSs do. You need 2 help her with that somehow. What am I saying? i still haven't managed 2 master this myself.

"And, it seems likely now that he only signed the divorce papers after he was already "involved" with her. All his story about how horrible his w was ... well, it's just his story as far as we know. I hope he's a basicly good guy just a little off track. I hope."

Like any WS, he might really be a good guy deep down. Point is that this R started as an A, and as such has the statistical 3% chance of lasting 5 years. Sorry, just the facts.

-ol' 2long

And to continue on 2long's line of thinking, the DJ's from you have got to stop.

I too would have been seriously humiliated if someone treated me like I was foolish in front of a clerk. She is very young I guess, and this must be respected...up to a point. When ever I am on vacation I get realy stupid with my money, it is all part of the fun I guess. But her response (tantrum) was overboard.

When I say act like a man now I don't mean to put the smack on her verbally or otherwise, but to not be a part of the drama.

Don't let her goad you or threaten you to draw you in. Easy to say, hard to do.

But yes, you can not treat her with disrespect and expect respect in return. You must show by example.

I still say I see quite a bit of love coming from her in your descriptions of what goes on. Three elements of a succesfull relationship - LOVE, RESPECT and PASSION. You have two but the third seems to be missing. Maybe a bit on both sides, now that 2long has brought that up.

Edited to add - the third being respect, not passion which you seem to have quite a bit of.

<small>[ January 10, 2005, 04:35 PM: Message edited by: weaver ]</small>

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">
My W was born in a war, and was the survivor of a massacre at the age of 5, then orphanage, adoption, abusive adoptive mother, sent overseas (here to USA at 17 to study), broke her back in a fall (actually she jumped because she didn't want to go to USA), married me at 19 when I was 40 (yeah, I know, stupid thing for me to do). </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Being nosy here ... a 20-year age gap is something important, as is your W's PTSD ... not to mention your W very likely has some degree of attachment disorder.

Here is my question... Why did you marry her? What attracted you to her initially?

Pep

Thanks to all for posting. I was getting lonely here.

Pep,

I'll answer you first, since you asked a question.

When we first met, I had no intention of dating her, since she was 18! and I was... uh, not 18.

When we first met, I had just returned from a visit to Ukraine, and had met her parents there, who asked me to bring something to her. I also made a videotape of her Mom saying things like "We love you and miss you (snif snif)". So, the day after my return from Ukraine, the guy who had been tutoring me in Russian called and said he was going back home (to Ukraine also, same little town) and there was going to be a going away party for him. He told me who to call to get myself invited. He also mentioned that my future wife (he called her by name, of course) would be there. So, I went, and I took the items for her from her Mom and a copy of the video.

She was very pleasant, but very young.

So... the people she was staying with said "Since you are losing your Russian tutor, maybe she can be your tutor." I just said, "yeah, that would be ok". I didn't follow up on it. I saw them again a week or so later, and they almost insisted that I get her to tutor me in Russian. I said "Ok, I'll come by your house twice a week - say monday and Thursday evening for an hour or so". "No!", they said, "pick her up and take her to your house." I figured it was OK, since my Mom lived with me at the time.

I realized later that they had just started hosting her for the summer and were trying to get her out of the house some time so they could have some private time.

Well, we started doing that - and future-wife and Mom hit it off really well. Sometimes, they spent more time talking than we spent studying Russian. Then, her hosts asked me to take her to church on Sunday nights, since I always went on Sunday nights and they didn't and their house was on the way. And after church, W would say she wanted to go by and see my Mom for awhile, and we would eat Sunday night supper. So, now she was there three nights a week, sometimes teaching me a little Russian, but mostly just talking to me and Mom. I enjoyed having her around. She looked forward to getting out of the house of her hosts (the lady had MS, had lost a daughter to suicide and a father to murder and was always in a sour mood).

At the end of the summer, she was going back off to college. I didn't really expect to see her again, but missed her. She started emailing, I drove down to visit (that was very weird! - going to pick up a girl at a dorm).

etc. etc.

What I saw in her was a very open, considerate, intellegent, young woman who very much enjoyed spending time with me. I was a lonely, almost confirmed, batchelor and I didn't know much about women - especially very young ones. I didn't realize how immature she was. I didn't realize that she was 19 going on 30, and that this was just a phase of her trying to figure out how to be a woman. I think she fell in love with me before I fell in love with her - and honestly, what man can resist that!?

etc. etc.

Does that answer your Q?

Oh, and I should say that if I could have that woman back - the one that I knew that summer, I would do anything for that! She was a wonderful person!

-AD

<small>[ January 11, 2005, 10:39 AM: Message edited by: AD ]</small>

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">What I saw in her was a very open, considerate, young woman who very much enjoyed spending time with me.</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Were you two sexually involved before marriage?

Pep

Weaver,


</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Originally posted by weaver:
<strong>I follow your story, although have never posted to you, I don't think.
</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Thanks for taking the time to read and post about my "case".

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"><strong>
It seems to me that it is not a question of love. You keep saying that your wife never loved you, had to marry you and so on and so forth.</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Have I written anything that would lead you to think that she loves me? She fears abandonment. She has been with me more than half as long as she was with her (adoptive) parents!

Honestly I don't want to abandon her. She has lost and lost and lost in this life and I don't want her to lose me unless she wants to.

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"><strong>
She does not respect you because you let her walk all over you.</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">How can I not "let her" walk all over me? I don't control her.

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"><strong>
And I think you do this because you are grateful that she married you at all, and because you feel sorry for her.</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">You are certainly correct that I feel sorry for her. I think that was always part of the equation. I thought I could "give her a place of peace". I didn't realize that the war is within her and there is nothing I can do about it.

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"><strong>
If I were you I would try and work on the respect part. Boundaries and consequences is what I am getting at. A woman needs to respect a man, she needs to view him as strong, and not willing to put up with her crap.
</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Hey, I'm ready! How do I start?!

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"><strong>Your wife loves you she just has no respect for you.
</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">I don't see any love from her at all. Zero! Actually, since she does respect me a tiny tiny bit, she respects me more than she loves me (IMHO). Am I missing something?

I will certainly re-read Cloud and Townsend (I have 2 or 3 of their books), and see if I can do a better job on the boundaries.

Last night, for example, she got frustrated because she couldn't log in on the university accounts from home - and accused me of changing her password (which I didn't do). She ended up by telling me to "Go to H*11!". I just took my daughter and went shopping for an hour. When she realized I was leaving (with D), she came out to the garage - to try to talk me into staying. D was being a pain about getting in the car seat (something she does sometimes). W got worked up about that, slammed the car door (with D inside), then went through the door to the kitchen and slammed it 4 or 5 times. When I got back from the store, she just mostly stayed away from me. I gave D a bath and put her to bed - fell asleep on D's bed. W came in later, woke me and I went to our bedroom and just went back to sleep without speaking with her.

I don't know if I was enforcing a boundary or what. I don't want to stand there and let her cuss at me in front of the child - so that's why I left. Do you think that was a good approach?

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"><strong>
Wishing you the best, </strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">And to you also,

-AD

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Originally posted by Pepperband:
<strong> Were you two sexually involved before marriage?
Pep </strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">No, but we kissed alot! Actually, I was the one setting the limits. One time after we were engaged, she was at my house - started kissing. I stopped her and said "This isn't want I want. I want to talk about our life together - how we will live, what we will do." She just cried. Of course, I didn't want to make her cry - so I didn't do anything like that again.

Edited to clarify. I didn't so much as touch her for the first 4 months I knew her - in which she was visiting in my house at least 6 hours a week.


-AD

<small>[ January 11, 2005, 01:20 PM: Message edited by: AD ]</small>

And.... why do you think she married you?

Pep

Pep,

She did love me at some time (before we were married) - and probably loved me when we first got engaged.

She tried to break the engagement or delay the wedding a couple of times - I think because her friends were telling her (and they were probably right) that I was too old for her and that she was not ready for marriage.

She says she married me because her parents insisted on it. I think she didn't want to lose me, but didn't know what to do with me. And her parents were very pushy - and she had never defied them in her life. Her Mom told her that if she didn't marry me, she would never speak to her again. (Wonderful lady! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Frown]" src="images/icons/frown.gif" /> ) I (foolishly) did not realize that an "American son-in-law" was some kind of prize - and that MIL had been bragging about the aquisition (sp?) even before the deal was done.

W says that she was standing in the back of the church with her dad and said to him "Papa, I can't!" and he replied "Go, like soldier!". Then the organ music started playing.

I was clueless (and happy).

-AD

I don't believe you were clueless. There were clues all over the place, and you are not stupid.

Try again ....

Pep

2long,

After guilting you into posting on my thread <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" /> I'm not going to drop you.

I've gotta work right now, but I'll post a reply soon.

-AD

Pep,

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Originally posted by Pepperband:
<strong> I don't believe you were clueless. There were clues all over the place, and you are not stupid.

Try again ....

Pep </strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Well said!

I was not clueless, but I certainly didn't understand. If I had understood what was going on, I would not have married her.

I believed that she loved me. I believed that she would make a great wife. I believed that she would make a great mom. I believed that she was intellegent and capable and would succeed in her studies - that her problems in the first years here were due to the difficulties of changing language and culture and separation from her family.

In short, I believed whatever allowed me to continue to believe that I had found the love of my life and would be happy forever. Usual foolishness, to be fully expected from a person with limited experience with matters of the heart.

Strange thing is, I still halfway believe all that - even as I teter on the brink of divorcing her.


-AD

<small>[ January 11, 2005, 11:31 AM: Message edited by: AD ]</small>

more to Pep...

While I am not stupid, I certainly was inexperienced with women - especially young women. I'm an engineeer. All the people I associate with (except my sister) are more-or-less rational. My Mom was the easiest person in the world to live with. (She moved in with me after she had a fall and broke her arm.) I foolishly expected my W to be like my Mom - positive, active, reasonable, straightforward... and w gave many signs of being like that.

W never spoke one disrespectful work to me (or to anybody in my hearing) before our marriage. She was always affectionate to me before our marriage.

But... as soon as we married, she turned into her Mom, who, it seems is her only model of womanhood - and who is a manipulative, angry, controlling woman.

-AD

<small>[ January 11, 2005, 11:42 AM: Message edited by: AD ]</small>

Now, I'm talking to myself.

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Originally posted by AD:
<strong>No, but we kissed alot!
</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Just to clarify...

The first time I kissed her was after I had known her for almost 8 months, and I think she gave me a signal. It was Christmas eve. Actually, I think she said "I could just kiss you." That's a pretty clear signal - enough for even an engineer. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="images/icons/wink.gif" />

-AD

<small>[ January 11, 2005, 02:00 PM: Message edited by: AD ]</small>

2long,

I've been thinking about what you wrote.

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Originally posted by 2long:
<strong>Thinking about it, I agree that you sure could have handled the bag of trinkets a lot better than you did. </strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">I was hoping somebody would dress me down about that.

The biggest weakness of this forum, when only one half of a couple is posting, is that only one side of things is presented.

If I'm blind to my faults and don't post anything that reveals them, you guys won't see it either.

I was thinking about my mistakes on our vacation - up until the point where she had the big Disney day blowout.

I made a lot of mistakes, and some of them are habitual. For one thing, I think I'm a bit controlling on the money front. We saw it illustrated here - and the way it played out, I really disrespected my wife in front of the cashier at the shop. Now, on this trip, I basicly cut a hole in the money bag and shook it vigorously for 7 days - so we probably spent about $4K or maybe $4.5K in a week. I even gave the taxi driver $80 to take us from Manhattan to Newark airport (the standard rate is $45).

Why did I begin to feel insecure and make this blunder in the Disney shop - over the same amount of money? Well...

1) I was sitting on the floor in that shop, trying to keep our child entertained for about 45 minutes while W swayed between buying this mickey locket or that one.
2) I was exhausted, having arrived at our hotel in Orlando at 1:30 the night before and having done the laundry (at W's request) until 3am in the coinop downstairs - followed by a little "intimate moment" - about which...
3) w felt free to say the next day that she imagined that she was with OM instead of me.
4) And, all my life I have had a contempt for that kind of trinkets.

None of those factors justified my disrespectful comment. Whatever the reason, I should have handled it differently - more respectfully. While that episode is behind us and cannot be changed, what can I do now to address this kind of situation more respectully? I don't know. Probably, I should look ahead a bit and anticipate the conflict coming. While I was waiting for her to shop, I could have been silently coaching myself.

Another fault I saw in myself on this trip is a little bit harder for me to describe. I don't know the name for it. We would be going somewhere, and I would have to figure out where to go - read signs, maps, directions - and meanwhile she would be talking to me incessantly and I would give her short answers. Agh! I figured it out for awhile and had a clearer view of my fault, but now I have forgotten. Actauly, I was feeling quite bad about it in NYC - realized that it was a serious fault that I had to correct - that it took a lot of fun out of being with me. I guess that's it. I'm a task-oriented guy. If I'm trying to get somewhere, that's my task, and I'm annoyed by chatter or discussion or anything that distracts me from my task. That behaviour can make me really not fun to go somewhere with. When I realize what I've been doing, well, I feel pretty bad about it. I hope I don't do it all the time.

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"><strong>
She doesn't seem 2 realize how hurtful her comments are. Not many not-quite-former-WSs do. You need 2 help her with that somehow. What am I saying? i still haven't managed 2 master this myself.</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Well, I would wish us both good luck, but that's not very helpful. Yeah, we gotta figure that out.

... and about our friend MOH...

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"><strong>and as such has the statistical 3% chance of lasting 5 years. Sorry, just the facts.
</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Well I've been looking for the orignal source of those stats - the actual study that studied a few hundred randomly chosen relationships and came up with that number. I don't think it exists. I suspect the odds are not great, but they are better than 3%.

Meanwhile, I will offer all the help I can to her BF/fiance (hopefully STBH) on immegration questions. That's the closest I can come to "accepting" him - and I do it only because I know it's good for her.

She needs the immegration stuff - and she needs a commitment that will at least lead to child support. She is our friend and we will in no case abandon her - even if we divorce each other. (although in that case, I expect she won't talk to me again).

I really don't think he is a bad guy at root - if we can believe all the other things he says about himself. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Roll Eyes]" src="images/icons/rolleyes.gif" />

-AD

AD, I am searching back through your posts to find something concrete in why I got such a strong feeling that she does in fact love you. And of course I can find no real words from you on her actions to show this, but I still get that.

I read a lot of posts on here where I get the sense that the BS should run like hell, but I don't get that from your posts.

How do your implement and enforce boundaries, this is someting that comes from having boundaries which are so strong that your spouse would not cross them.

Like I said this is not my strong area, it is my weak area also so I read posts from others on this topic, trying to learn.

One boundary I have is my daughter. As a single parent she comes first in my life, period. Although my ex fiancee treated me poorly, he treated my daughter like gold, never tried to be a disciplinarian, never crossed any boundaries what so ever as far as she was concerned. He would even get up in the wee hours of the morning regardless if he had driven most of the night to get home, to go to her various basketball games, etc. I said when we first got together what I expected of him in relation to my DD, that he was to be a good host and a good friend to her, nothing less and nothing more (as she has a dad), and he knew without any doubt that I meant it. This is a boundary which cannot be bent, crossed or broken. Now I just need some more. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Big Grin]" src="images/icons/grin.gif" />

She wants another child right? So when she treats you or your daughter poorly (shoving her when she comes looking for love is extreme abuse) you could use it like this - "wife, how can we bring another child into our family when the one we have is sometimes such a struggle? how can we bring another child into our life when our future is so precarious? You threaten me with OM and constantly I fear for our marriage. I will not entertain the idea of adoption (or pregnancy) until our marriage and home becomes a place of love and happiness for all."

Just some thoughts.

weaver,

I just wanted to make one point first...

I think I overplayed the incident where W shoved DD off of her. I don't call it "extreme abuse" - just not the best approach to discipline. At some point, the child has to get it - that Mom is not a piece of playground equipment - that an elbow in the breast is painful. Most of the time, I think DD simply wants some attention and is trying to "elbow in" to get some, but sometimes
I think our DD has a little anger at her Mom - and expresses it while pretending to play.

Right now, I seem to be the favorite parent - the "safe" parent - but I realize that things are not always what they seem. In any case, I don't want to be in a competition for the affection of our child. I want to support my w in parenting. I think Mom is still #1, but sometimes DD is angry with her - perhaps because she didn't get chocolate when she wanted it or ... the usual reasons that kids complain about their parents. Since I spend less time with my D than W does, W has more occasions to set limits or discipline her.

I'm not completely happy with W's parenting right now, but I would not call her abusive.

-AD

<small>[ January 12, 2005, 04:38 PM: Message edited by: AD ]</small>

In the middle of this "discussion", which took place in bed at mid-day, our 4-year-old came in looking for attention, and was climbing over W in the bed - which always annoys her more than seems reasonable to me. I know a sharp little elbow in the wrong place can be quite painful, but I am willing to endure that myself and can't quite understand W's (IMO) extreme reaction to it. So, W shoved our little one almost off the bed and was shouting at her that she does not like to be climbed on. (Little one has been told this many times, BTW, so W was not completely out of line here, I suppose).

Shoving a little four year old almost off of the bed and then shouting at her is abuse. In my house it would be extreme. But I don't believe children should ever be touched in anger, so perhaps we differ there.

I'm not judging your wife without even knowing her, I am sorry if it seemed that way. I wanted to show you where a good argument would be for trying to get her to improve her behavior if in fact she wants to adopt another child bad enough.

Wanting something badly enough is usually a good motivator for change. And maybe if she wants to change badly enough, she will do the necessary work involved in repairing the damage done to her as a child.

I'm no therapist, just throwing some thoughts out here, trying to be a sounding board more than anything else.

Your wifes story is heartbreaking and it would be wonderful if she could somehow heal from her past, and your home become what it could be and what you three deserve.

<small>[ January 12, 2005, 04:56 PM: Message edited by: weaver ]</small>