Good man?

Thanx FF. But I don't identify, for some reason.

Hmmm,

Needy man?
Confused man?
Scared man?
Emotional man?
Avoiding man?
Careful man?
In love man?
Ignorant man?
Foolish man?

Maybe I'm just
Trying to do what's right man.

In MY book that reads a good man. Besides, we know from your posts here what your children mean to you. That rates high in my book too. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

Aphelion

Today has brought a new light-bulb moment to me, and it's thanks to you resurrecting that old thread.

Reading through my own words of two years ago, I remembered a lot of facts that got kind of buried in the general mess. And the words of other posters, that I wasn't quite ready to 'get', suddenly made sense. I remembered a lot of things H said in MC, or came back from IC puzzling over, or argued with me about. A lot of things rearranged themselves and fell into place, especially with the more recent Renters/Buyers stuff.

It's always worth posting here!

This is what I realised...

From the very beginning, H and I have had profoundly different models for what a marriage should look and feel like. So far apart, in fact, that we had no understanding of how adrift we were. And we're still miles apart.

I begin to see that H believed a good marriage was a Golden Dream - no discord, no arguments, no conflict - just sweet lovingness and acceptance. He would be the Prince, and I would be the Perfect Princess, and all would be joy. All of his relationships had fallen short of that before, but with me, he thought that it should work. It was the male equivalent of the paperback romance.

I, on the other hand, was a grim uber-realist. I went into marriage with a clenched jaw, believing that it wouldn't be easy to fit two people into one relationship space, and that an awful lot of flexibility and compromise would be needed. I expected and welcomed conflict, because I saw it as a necessary way for us to learn to fit together. I was, at that point, a Buyer.

You can see what would happen when the inevitable conflict arose. To H, it would be disaster - a sign that the Golden Dream was about to disintegrate and go the way of other relationships. And, instead of recognising this threat to our Perfect World, I would 'make it worse' by wanting to negotiate a compromise that accepted that we weren't the same people, and had different needs.

So far, this sounds boilerplate Freeloader behaviour on H's part - wanting a relationship that isn't any work. But H has never wanted to bale out of the marriage because of these 'glitches'. Instead, what he wanted was to force me back into Princess position - and he'd do it by withholding or telling me I was a witch or 'seducing' me with compliments. He had no idea of working through the conflict; he just wanted it to go away so he could go back to being my Prince.

And that's where I failed. Instead of sticking to my guns - even to the point of losing the marriage - time and time again I gave in, giving up the fight and just allowing myself to be seduced back into that damnably attractive Princess role. It's so nice, after all, to be treated as if you're a kind of goddess. And I was already primed to be 'flexible', to feel that I was being a good spouse if I compromised and fitted in.

In effect, I became a Renter, and sacrificed, and grew increasingly resentful.

Except I didn't do it all that well, and H started looking for alternative sources of Princess material - women who would fulfill the dream more sweetly than me. Even now, he still wants to be the Prince to my Perfect Princess.

This explains why H can't quite get his head around why no-one else sees his affair with SOW as romantic. (If everyone is entitled to a sweet, golden life - why would anyone begrudge him a period of getting what he deserved and craved?) He has, I think, reached the point of accepting that marriage is not hearts-and-flowers all the way, but he still thinks that two loving people should agree with each other at all times, love the same things, be together at all times, never express negative emotions, be wildly passionate about each other every single minute.

The fantasy of an affair is exactly what he wants from the marriage.

So I see why he still can't cope with conflict. He's moved a significant way into the real world, but he still sees conflict of any kind as bad and to be resisted at all costs.

Whenever I fail to be a Princess, he still tries to force me back into position. But now, even telling my I'm an ugly witch with warts on my nose, doesn't work. I will not be put back into Princess mode, no matter how seductive the temptation.

My contribution to the ongoing problem is that I haven't recognised how desperately anxious he feels when conflict arises. Instead, I get tougher and more pugnacious and make him retreat further.

The next step, presumably, is to establish with him that conflict is inevitable and healthy. That seems so obvious to me that I've always assumed he understood that. But I don't think he does.

Sorry, Aphelion, this has been all about me. But you've no idea how much you've helped me! <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

TA

"Sorry, Aphelion, this has been all about me. But you've no idea how much you've helped me!"

Me, me, me... lol. Hey, it's your thread. Happy to help stimulate the old neurons.


I have some things to reply to, but they can wait for manana. I'm heading for the barn.

With prayers,

Aphelion, To the barn! Good for you ! I guess, that is, if you are a fellow horseperson. Funny, that has wrought a lot of damage in my M, resentfulness from H of me being happy with the horses...Ah well, another story, another time.

TA,

Wow, besides the consistent insults, you H really does sound a lot like mine. My H does insult, just much more subversive about it...




Yes yes!, That whole scenario..At the very beginning, no matter how I said it or if I was just venting..conflict was/is bad for him.I became a Renter also, after years of not having ENs met, even after beggin,pleading, bi*ching.. Almost had an A myself, couldn't do it. Told H THAT night, and told him that we had real probs that we needed to get to work on. Guess what, no real response, just an "I would be really hurt if you did that" from him and then on with the same life and same M.



My H still believes this, he punishes me with guilt more than insults. I am the bad guy ALWAYS for messing up that vision.



This one is hard for me to wrap my brain around. My H was married twice before..so other Rs disintegrating, yeah. But come on, when does someone realize that there is a lalaland and a real world. What does it take?





Oh boy, That is so us..I play right into the bad guy thing, and he becomes more the martyr. And I get guiltier and madder. But I have done very well, until recently, at not playing as often or as tough. It never changes from his end tho, no matter how I handle it.

Not trying to threadjack, TA, just really empathize with this. That is why I love MB. Sometimes I don't post much at all, just try to soak it in.

Keep up the insights, guys, I'll shutup for awhile now!

jls

Some things you have me thinking about (hope they don’t bore anyone too much):

“From the very beginning, H and I have had profoundly different models for what a marriage should look and feel like. So far apart, in fact, that we had no understanding of how adrift we were. And we're still miles apart.”

Same here, to a point. FWW married me without knowing much about what makes a marriage work. She even admits it now. I should have caught this during our Engaged Encounter. She thought everything we did and heard that weekend was such a waste of time. She was scathing in her putdowns of the priest and the other couples - couples that were very much in-love. She thought it was all rues that didn’t apply to her or just plain saccharine.

But like you, I rolled up my sleeves and got to work the night of the wedding. But, as it turns out, I wasn’t very good in the clinch. I CA’d way too much. I caved on everything way too much. I can write down a long list of things FWW did or things she wanted that were very bad for our M in just the first couple of years but that I rolled over on every time.

About two years after our wedding a friend of FWW complemented me on the fact we were still married. She said FWW told her a short time before the wedding she was marrying me only because she was afraid I was the last boat leaving. This friend was pleased we were still together, I guess. This hurt a lot at the time, but I CA’d it as usual.

Are FWW and I still miles apart? I don’t know. Less than before. We definitely were very far apart. I can’t assign percentages of the trip to such legs as her first A, the LTA, her general married singles lifestyle, certain addictive behaviors or she was not in-love with me in the first place. It’s all so balled up. FWW herself has called it a plate of boiled spaghetti.


”I begin to see that H believed a good marriage was a Golden Dream - no discord, no arguments, no conflict - just sweet lovingness and acceptance. …It was the male equivalent of the paperback romance.”

FWW just wanted to be married, I think. Not much more to it, really. But I didn’t know that. I was in-love and she sounded sincere to me. Funny thing, I never once lost that in-love feeling for her. Not even when I was detaching at times due to her treatment of me. She could be mean as a scorched hornet for long periods – years at a time. Often, I didn’t even know why. But I always accepted the blame for everything. In hindsight I sure acted p*-whipped and emasculated. But I thought I was being a good H! In today’s parlance, I thought sacrifice was part of being a good buyer. The more I sacrificed, the more I hoped she would love me. Eventually, I sacrificed me in there somewhere.


”You can see what would happen when the inevitable conflict arose.”

Yeah. I gave in, of course. After both LTA DDays FWW blamed me, as usual for everything. The usual BS made WS do it fogspeak. But, the majority of the few LBs she could come up with were the times I stood my ground for longer than usual before caving in to her want of the moment. And most of these wants were things she secretly used to further her LTA!

Freeloader behavior indeed. But FWW never wanted to bale out of the marriage either. She was getting all her ENs met by me. OM was entirely on the side. And she controlled him too. OM told her he would never leave his family which was fine with FWW. Kept her in control. Allowed her to test him like she was testing me.


”If everyone is entitled to a sweet, golden life - why would anyone begrudge him a period of getting what he deserved and craved?”

If is the operative word. Both your H and my W and I suspect 99% of all WS need to learn no one is entitled to a sweet golden life. That’s not even close to the reasons God put us here. I am so surprised whenever I see that attitude. I had that part of the plot figured out by the time I was in junior high school.


”The fantasy of an affair is exactly what he wants from the marriage.”

The difference here is the LTA and the M were always totally separate to FWW. She didn’t want the M to look like the A and she didn’t want the A to look like an M. That would have ruined everything for her, I think.


”So I see why he still can't cope with conflict. He's moved a significant way into the real world, but he still sees conflict of any kind as bad and to be resisted at all costs.”

So why do I read of so many CA’ing WS when I am one of the top 10 CA’rs that ever lived and I had no A? What’s really wrong with me, lol?


“The next step, presumably, is to establish with him that conflict is inevitable and healthy. That seems so obvious to me that I've always assumed he understood that. But I don't think he does.”

Allow me to rephrase this paragraph:

The next step is to establish with me that conflict is inevitable and healthy. And, how to conduct healthy conflict.


I am a personal recovery work-in-progress. It’s kind of exciting and fun, in a way. My M is just along for the ride at the moment.

With prayers,

yep, just change genders.

I was reading a book about affairs, and it described several types. One was the person who displays addictive behaviours, and has multiple affairs because they are searching for the golden glow. It described my H perfectly, and fit all the other spouses described on this post. It also described the person who marries that type of wayward. We are enablers, we allow ourselves to be pushed aside or pushed around, and we can always see the good in a person which makes it hard for us to leave them.

Beware. You are likely to fall for the same type of person again.