Hello... I hope someone can help out there!
(Sorry so long)

My husband and I have been together for 3.5 years and married for 3.5 months. We have been fighting constantly... both before marriage and now and it only escalates. He blames all the fights on my inability to be accepting or fair with him. Because he thinks I'm constantly knit-picking, he is unable to take any of my complaints seriously and they never get resolved. We have both reached a peak with our frustration levels and any love we had for eachother is dissappearing fast - if not gone already.

Our most recent argument is about whether or not it is okay to be friends with ex's. I don't think it's appropriate. However, he wants to maintain two friendships he has with two ex's. One is local and married with a new child (they were together for 4 years & their relationship ended about 7 years ago). The second lives in Seattle and married with no child (they dated off/on in college and were friends ever since - their relationship ended about 15 years ago).

He says his friendships with his ex's consist of a couple emails and phone calls a year. For some reason, even though the one in Seattle lives so far away, I feel the least comfortable about her. She's been married 5 years and still mails my H a holiday card every year - only from her (not her husband). I told him if she continues to send a card after we're married she should address me on the card also. He disagrees that's necessary. The day after we returned from our honeymoon, she called him during work hours on his cell phone... apparently she congratulated him on his marriage... they exchanged new email addresses and will continue to be in touch. The local ex was the original "mom" to "our" dog and a cat that died a year ago. He called her to tell her when the cat died and I'm sure will let her know when the dog dies. This is hurtful to me because I feel like they are (or were) my pets now and I care for them and cared for him when he was sad about his cat dying... but he still wants to inform his ex.

He tends to be the kind who hates throwing anything away... from newspapers to junk. I asked him to throw away any cards/letters he had in a box from ex's prior to us getting married. After much argument and battle, he reluctantly agreed to get rid of it and still holds it against me. So now he's holding steadfastly to these friendships.

I try to be understanding and realize he will not budge. So I try to compromise and come to an agreement of what is acceptable with these friendships. He says it should be okay for him, if/when given the opportunity, to meet up with either of them for dinner to catch up like any friends do. I say meeting up with them is unacceptable, but to compromise, I say - I have to be there - it's not appropriate to meet up with either of them without me. If they are your friends, they would want to meet your wife. This subject has been put on hold because he says due to all our arguing I have not earned the right to tell him who he can be friends with.

I get the impression that he doesn't feel me or our marriage are worth compromising anything for. As though our marriage did not signify anything.

I was impressed that he was willing to complete the EN Quest. last night, although I don't know how productive it was. I realized after asking myself those questions that he does not meet any of my most important emotional needs, which is why I constantly feel insecure in our relationship and am constantly looking for reinforcements of his love for me - hence, the constant knit picking and fighting.

We have reached such an ugly point in our marriage. I can't believe I feel no love for him. In his anger he has said such horrific, cruel things to me that I can't picture us ever being loving towards each other again.

I'm on the brink of walking out. It's quite a sad story. If anyone can provide and insight or advice, I would greatly appreciate it.

Why did you marry him?

Do you have children with him?

How old are you both?

merrily. To answer your question, it's not appropriate, and he knows it. I found out my wife had been in contact for a very long time with her old lover from college days. When she got caught she acted like she hadn't done anything wrong, "he's just an old friend." In our case, to save herself, she supposedly cut him off, and I believe she did. If not, I would have divorced her. With 30 years of marriage and three kids, I decided to try to save my family. But I put up with a lot during those 30 years. It's your business, but life is too short for this type of stuff. very surprised

Dr. Harley says there shoud never be contact with old lovers- he sas to th point of not attending class reunions if they might be there.

There are so many of us who are here because our spouses had affairs with old loves.

Read the Book His Needs/Her Needs- I think he talks about it in there, too.

Thanks so much for everyone's comments... my response is below...

It's been a week since our big fight ended (worst fight ever and I never felt so ready to walk out). It mainly ended because we had a big talk about restoring love in our marriage. I need to work on not knit-picking so much and he needs to work on attending to my EN's. He's been doing really good and things have been great lately.

However, we have not gone back to discuss the topic of ex's. I highly doubt he is willing to change those friendships for me. He uses examples of other people he knows who have spouses that are okay with them being friends with their ex's. I tell him we shouldn't compare ourselves to other couples and attend to what is acceptable in our marriage. It's a very difficult topic. I try to compromise, but then feel uncomfortable with it all over again. This has happened before when I felt uncomfortable with bachelor parties and he wouldn't budge or compromise.

Worthatry: To answer your questions - I married him because aside from this major disagreement we have a lot in common and balance each other out in many great ways. Overall, I know he is a sincere and genuine person. He has firm beliefs on this because he firmly believes there's nothing wrong with them... or that there SHOULD be nothing wrong with them. I guess I don't have many other guys to compare him to so I figure he's not much different from others (that's what he tells me too). He was my very first serious relationship. No, we don't have children. I don't think I would feel confident having kids until these issues are resolved. I think he sees it as - after we have a family these friendships would naturally dissipate but he can't make any guarantees. He would feel like a "moron" telling them he can't be friends with them anymore. I am 27 and he is 36.

Verysurprised: Thank you for sharing your personal story. It is good to get a male perspective on this. I agree - life is too short. I was feeling torn... would I be ending this marriage prematurely, or is this a legit reason to leave...?

By the way -
I have been asking many people their thoughts on the subject - is it acceptable to be friends with an ex after marriage? All have said without a blink of an eye - absolutely not acceptable - time to move on - there should be no question those friendships end where the marriage begins. But my H feels imprisoned and he would not stand for it. I am trying to be understanding (even though he lacks any sensitivity or understanding in my direction).

I still don't agree that it is acceptable in MY marriage, however, if I married someone who is like this - I either have to decide it's a dealbreaker for me OR I need to strike a comfortable compromise/agreement and make it known that I would prefer for these friendships to dissipate over time since they are alreay minimal.

My discomfort lies in the fact that I am not included in these friendships and since the contact is so minimal (a couple emails or calls a year) it would be an exherted effert to suddenly include me. So perhaps a compromise would be (1) If the ex contineues to send holiday cards to my H, she needs to address me also; (2) If the opportunity arises for them to meet in person to "catch up" I MUST be present to meet them as well. No meetings to take place without me.

Also, maybe I need to work on my confidence, security and trust in our relationship and my husband...? Not want to be so controlling.

Any thoughts?

One more thing -

This is my plan for now -
We had a good conversation about choosing to restore love in our marriage; committing to making it work; stop pointing fingers and looking within our own self to see what lessons we need to learn; taking responsibility for what is 100% within our power to change and improve upon; paying attention to eachother's EN's.

It's been really great since then. He really is a wonderful person and in many ways I feel very lucky. However, when I think about he won't budge in this area when I have every right to feel uncomfortable with it - it easily takes every good thing away about him.

My plan is to go a month with no knit picking... just restoring love in our marriage and working on what I know I need to change - and him the same. After a month of bliss, we will re-visit the topic of ex's.

Any thougts???

merrily. You're being too hard on yourself. Initially, I did the same thing. I thought maybe I was being too possessive, jealous, insecure, etc. Baloney. No one is supposed to maintain a relationship with an old flame after marriage, and everyone knows that. A marriage is between two people, not three. In my case, my wife's old boyfriend was not welcome in my marriage. I felt my wife pull back from me during the marriage. Now I know why. Your compromise is very generous. Maybe you can be okay with this if you're involved with every contact. But it has to be okay with you. Do what's best for you.

Merrily --

How about when the holidays roll around, you address the card to the woman that sends a holiday card to your husband and send it to her and her husband and sign your and your husband's name?

This way, your husband is not being put in a position of having to say, "Um, please put my wife's name on your Christmas card," which would tell her more about your relationship than I think you'd be comfortable with or is necessary. She'll get the message that way.

I agree that your husband should let these friendships go, but it appears these infrequent contacts have become a huge power struggle in your marriage. And I think the bigger issues lie in better meeting each other's emotional needs -- once these are being met consistently, the issues (and the friendships) will likely fade.

Why, if you were fighting so much before the marriage, did you decide to get married?

My H and I counseled w/Steve Harley on meeting emotional needs and he was helpful. If you can afford it, he may help you get on the right track.

Take care,
Shellybird

It is SO nice to get responses!!!

Verysurprised: I couldn't agree with you more. Thank you for making me aware that I am being generous in my compromise as he wouldn't see it that way. When you say "involved with every contact" do you mean that he should make me aware of every email/call? -- I can't say I notice any changes in him when he's been in contact with one of them. But you never know what's going on inside someone. Then I hear about people cheating with their spouse's best friends, or with the spouse of a couple they were good friends with, etc. So I guess - if it's going to happen, it's going to happen. Part of marriage is a risk whether we want to admit it or not. And we can drive ourselves crazy with constant reasons to worry. My thing is, with marriage being a somewhat fragile thing to begin with, why allow anything into your marriage that would just increase that risk? An old flame can definitely increase that risk. Especially after learning about how emotional affairs occur all the time... and usually preceed a physical affair. I need to figure out what I'm okay with. But this helps - like I said - my thing was, "Is this a reason for divorce or a reason for compromise???"

Shellybird: Yes, I have thought of that exactly. Instead of forcing the card issue - just send a card addressing both her an her husband from both of us. I may just do that. Thank you! Your question on why we got married despite the fighting - I think we both knew the fights were over such minute things that just turned into big things. And when things are good between us, they're really good.. and we know that's the real part of our relationship. Now that I did the EN, I realize I've experienced constant frustration in our pre-marriage relationship over my EN not being met at all. The things I need doesn't come naturally to him and he's putting forth effort to work on that and I am putting forth some patience and understanding now.... instead of knit picking.

Thanks so much for taking the time to respond! This is so helpful and therapeutic for me. I am so lucky to have come across this site!!!

Hi Merrily --

At some point, your husband DID meet your emotional needs -- at least enough of them -- that you fell in love with him. If he hadn't, you wouldn't have.

What was he doing then when you very first fell in love with him that he's not doing now? Be very specific in your thoughts and answers, because often that's like a lighthouse for you two to work your way back. That's a question that Dr. H asked me and I had to think back -- waay back -- because I was in such a state of withdrawal from him, that I had a hard time pinpointing those things.

Once I re-engaged with my H, we then went into a similar "conflict" mode as what you are in now. Then, we worked "up" from there. Engaged with this each other, but not always in conflict.

One questionnaire we filled out that was crucial was a lovebusting questionnaire. For me, if there were a lot of LBs going on, he couldn't meet my needs no matter what. It was a huge block for me. Obviously, the contact w/the old GFs is a big one for you.

Would he be willing to do a few counseling sessions with Dr. Steve Harley or someone else there? It may help you both see the conflicts from a new perspective. We did this, then moved to a carefully chosen marriage counselor who really helped reduce the conflicts.

Hang in there. You're very smart to start working on this NOW instead of letting things slide. Much smarter than I was!

Shellybird

You gave me a few things to think about. I will go waay back and think about that. I am a very emotionally expressive and giving person and he is the extreme opposite. While he admits to enjoying my affection and expressiveness, it's not something that comes naturally for him. So I find I crash and burn from doing it on my own. Also, he is unable to come from a place of empathy and understanding instead of anger and annoyance at something that bothers me... which is a big LB for me.

We didn't do the LB Q yet.. but will do... thanks.

He would be reluctantly willing to do counseling. He thinks if we need counseling and can't resolve things on our own at this point, we're in big trouble.

How much did Dr. Harley cost?

Thanks for sharing your story!

OK, you've gotten some of the lovebusters down. Now, what were some of the things he did that made you fall in love with him?

I know people are sometimes reluctant to do counseling -- not to be disrespectful, but I see guys not wanting to counsel more often than women, I think because it's common they think they should be able to fix things on their own -- BUT these are SKILLS you can and should learn. Good counseling is about teaching you the skills you need to make your love last a lifetime. And these skills are rarely inherent in people, at least not after the first few years of marriage.

You have a gift -- a huge red flag -- that is a warning to you both that some things need to be taken care of. Take care of these issues now, before the problems are worse, the hurt is much deeper, the repair more difficult. You BOTH are at risk for an affair.

When we counseled w/Dr. H, it was $85 a session. Expensive, yes, but much cheaper than a divorce down the road. Maybe some others can also chime in with their thoughts on the value of Dr. H's counseling.

Hang in there!
Shellybird