Cat, when you have addressed me, you come across as confident. But you describe yourself as being insecure. What was it that gave you the courage to express your views so assertively with me? Can that same ingredient be cultivated in your marriage so you can function without feeling threatened?

LOL, PF, what you really mean is I come across as a know it all! <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

BTW, have I apologized sufficiently for telling you what to do? I feel like I came to this place, a newbie, and just started spouting off wisdom as if I owned the place.

No, seriously, I've been reading about all this stuff for a good 15 years, nodding my head, and saying, yep, I'm gonna go right home and do it. And then I get home, and my mom kicks in in my head, saying "don't you know you can't talk to people that way; what gives you the right?" and I just turn and walk away.

It's just something I have to work on, convincing myself I have just as much right to live as anyone else. But it's hard to get to there, when you're here, you know?

what you really mean is I come across as a know it all!

I really didn’t see you that way. But was that how you saw yourself?

kicks in in my head,
Can you describe how your mom does this ?

what gives you the right?"
Can you come up with an answer for this ?

I just turn and walk away
Would you really rather stay and engage?

Cat,

So you believe in yelling and being yelled at, is that correct?

Would you consider that you allow yourself to verbally abuse and be abused? Wanna change that boundary? Doesn't sound to me that's who you really are...sounds more like you permitting yourself to abuse your partner from habitual permissions when a certain level of feeling is reached in you.

Reacting to your feelings, not acting from your beliefs.

Act, don't react.

And you told H that DD17 doesn't like him when he shouts and he stopped...yet you permitted him to continue with you, and you with him...setting the example that DD17 is the most important person in your family...not your marriage, not respect and that you believe what you won't do to one person, you'll do to another and that's okay?

So DD17 will not believe the waiter story. If her boyfriend abuses the waiter at a restaurant, she'll feel protected and relieved she's not a waiter. And shocked when he abuses her. After all, she's not his waiter.

Just see where you are not aligned to your beliefs here.

You believe yelling at DD17 is not okay...and yelling at you, is, is that correct?

From what you described, it isn't a matter of your H expecting DD17 to be wrong...he expects rejection, exclusion, to be found inadequate and unacceptable. If he can be right, then he's acceptable, included, adequate...so being right is more important than anything else.

Very much about living right/wrong instead of a living being.

You can see where he generalizes to DD17. Can you see in your post where you generalize him? I'm not saying this to say "Hey, you're doing it, too!" I'm saying this because what gets to you most in others is in you. Look up the "Owning All Your Villagers Thread"...it's a human thing, not a Cat thing, 'k?

What we do to others, we will do to ourselves...two-way street, no one is exempt due to status or location...we are all humans. This is a human thing.

Great part is when you change what you do, revoke permissions and implement other permissions...then everything changes, too...upward spirals are real. Just like downward ones are.

What I get from your other posts is that you feel like a victim, he feels like a victim and DD17 feels like a victim.

Chosen perspective...find the false payoff...and you'll stop wanting to choose this victim perspective.

Which sets a new, honest and open example...you change, everything changes...because the interaction between the three of you changes...the dance changes when you change your steps.

"My depression: What I feel is that, because I have no self esteem, and have lost any confidence to weather his outbursts over 30 years, I have centered my life around not being the cause of any outbursts."

Your therapist have you working on knowing the difference between a feeling (an emotion) and a belief? In reality, you're saying What I choose to believe is that, because i did not build my self-esteem, I do not feel confident enough in myself and my choices to draw healthy boundaries around how others treat me. I have chosen to abandon and degrade myself by making my highest priority to avoid conflict in any form. I understand I have a lot of amends to make for all I've done to myself through my choices."

Reasonable you don't feel confident in yourself...you've been brutalizing you for decades. When you stop, you're gonna feel dizzy. Please choose to stop. Do you know what conflict avoiders fear most? You'd think conflict...it's not. It's connection. We connect through conflict, too. God gave us many ways...that's one of them. Fear of connection, fear of true intimacy, well, it's what we avoid...just like fear of abandonment...and every day, in each choice we make, we are reacting to those two fears...living reactively, feeling out of control, done to and wronged...signals we really are doing them to ourselves.

Get your signals. They are coming to you from love...real love of yourself.

"I plan my day to be available to him so as not to be chided on NOT being available, based on 30 years of him saying "why couldn't you have done that at lunch; why do you have to go now, when I'm home?"."

Reality: "I choose to plan my day to be available to him, abandoning myself, so I can manipulate him into not choosing to chide me, though he may chide me anyway. His choice. I have made this same choice for 30 years, expecting different results. I've felt crazy for a long time. I want to be right (righteous) more than loved. I'm safer being in the right than vulnerable to just being loved. I hear in his requests for consideration, control. He hears them in mine. He fears abandonment, and I know this, as much as I fear intimacy. I fear being rebuked, chastised, guilted, shamed...so I choose to believe I can make him not do or say any of those things. I choose to lie to myself, to live in fantasy, that I can make him and he makes me. It's not working for me anymore."

"If I hear him come home, I get off the computer before he can see that I'm on it,"

Reality: "I lie to my H regularly. I lie by omission and commission. I gaslight my H and blame him for making me gaslight him."

"based on 30 years of him saying "What have you been doing all day?". If I sense one of his frustrating days coming on, where he's going to be touchy about something, I warn my daughter not to talk back to him; and then hate myself"

Reality: You hate yourself for many things. Loving yourself is not your highest priority. Your daughter cannot learn her power and limits because you don't own yours. He's not the one abusing her...you are. You are teaching her to be a victim, to manipulate others, to avoid conflict, to be the cause, control and cure for OTHERS' actions. You have taught her distorted power (she can CAUSE and CONTROL and CURE)...with no respect to her real limits...where her power ends and others begin. She is not separate and equal to everyone else...she's more or less, and it fluctuates.

Does for you.

Change your stuff and she WILL learn her power. First, you gotta know your own.

"for perpetuating the abusive cycle in front of her and for not being a better role model. If I have to tell him something he doesn't want to hear, like how I really want to pay off our credit cards from the money when we sold our house instead of him investing it in a retirement fund, I try to say that someone else thinks we should pay them off, an authority,"

Reality: You lie directly to your H, negate and abandon yourself abusively and blame him for doing it to you. You are not honest with yourself enough to own your own ideas, desires, wants, needs and goals. You lie a lot and it's your pattern for more than 30 years...pleasing is equal to earning love...pleasing well enough keeps you safe...when every single time it's a lie, disrespectful and DISCOUNTS your partner and yourself. Can't do one without doing it to the other, right?

"because if an idea comes from me, it's wrong (that one didn't work, though, he just started yelling at me about the accountant who I said told me the same thing; although I DID tell him he didn't have the right to yell at me about her)."

Reality: I continue to lie by saying he doesn't have the right to yell at me because...which means I choose to believe he has the right when it's appropriate, which gives me the right to yell at him.

Change your beliefs...yelling tells another person you don't feel heard without stating your stuff. It's acting out your stuff instead of owning it. Not right for anyone...happens when we're kids and don't yet know our stuff from others' stuff...very often it's what adults choose to do, to act out or in, because they DIDN'T learn their emotions come to them, from them, about themselves.

You now know. Yelling is as offlimits as hitting (it's verbal arm wrestling, isn't it?), as unacceptable as sarcasm, sneering, mocking, cursing, forgetting, silent treating (don't know how to conjugate that one right now), defining others, name-calling, labeling, lying, discounting, assuming...correct?

You do not allow YOURSELF to do these things...because they are not a right (has NOTHING to do with right/wrong)...they are a choice.

You are now aware these are abusive and will not abuse. If you do, you own your choice immediately, you say what you did, why you did it and why you will not do it again.

And you do so for YOU...so you can live in real freedom and love...in reality. Verbal abuse is participating in fantasy...pretends to communicate and doesn't...acting out/in does NOT communicate. Stating does. Owning your own stuff and using "I" statements...that's reality.

No fantasy. Lots of intimacy though...you may feel terrified...just before you feel liberated. You liberating yourself.

My depression was anger turned inward...was from my repeated choices to please to earn love (and punishment), to self-negate and erase, to manipulate others 24/7 to get what I needed...without a shred of respect for myself or others...and to know God made in me a whole, complete, equal, separate, and marvelous human being. Not a human doing.

Until I found how DISRESPECTFUL and harmful I was to others by doing for them, managing their stuff, abandoning my own, I did not stop. Know you are doing damage to yourself, your H, and your DD17.

I don't believe you want to damage...I believe that's the one thing you do not intend to do...never to be selfish, self-centered or harm others through neglect. Oh, except yourself. Okay to neglect, beat, berate, yell, speak sarcastically and degrade yourself. As long as you don't do that to others.

How close am I?

Depression can result from harming yourself for years through your belief...for your authentic self didn't do one thing to deserve your ire, your punishments, your stuff. Your self-image, however, played a big part. Learn the difference. Learn your innocence...your trueness...and know you are both. Which means, so are others.

Two-way street.

I believe he's the center of your depression because you MADE him your center. You looked God right in the eye and said, "Your creation isn't good enough. It's broken and defective. I will live THROUGH H and HE will be responsible for my stuff. I'm killing your creation."

That's really gonna hurt inside...such incredible sadness...nearly to stillness...paralyzation...beating down what God's hand made...not only from love...OF love.

And you call it crap, deny and disown your very self...making someone else your idol, your god, worshipping so you will feel through them, experience and be defined through them.

Which crushes the other person...for they are responsible for their own feelings, experience and can only define themselves.

You are blaming someone else for you choosing make your H your god. I say this because I know I did this myself. My filter. The remorse...so painful...when I woke up.

Thank God I woke up. God is my center...he's in me, part of me...no replacement needed or required...learning every day how he made me whole, complete, not defective...no lost or bad parts...bringing all of me together, as I already was, in his hands. Already forgiven for it, too, btw.

So are you.

I had depression from age 8 to 32...chronic from 32 to 36. I know the physical parts and the emotional one...the mental and the spiritual...all affected...not all out of my control. I supplemented. Until I chose differently.

When we wipe ourselves out, we have a great deal of anger turned inward, toward ourselves. I also believe that the verbal abuse we do to ourselves feeds, substantiates, deepens and continues the depression.

The center of it is not your inabilities...you don't have inabilities. You have abilities and choices. You are capable.

You have courage...you don't act from it. You are brave. You don't act from your bravery for you react to your fear.

Choices, not condition.

And I only believe this because this was me, too. Choosing to believe I was defective, powerless, wrong...making my life as much about who is right and who is wrong...blaming, feeling blamed and blame-shifting.

You know you aren't a monster...nor is your H or anyone else. You know you are capable...what's different now is you choosing this belief all the way to your bones...and hearing all the other ones you adopted (you aren't capable, you're unable) long before you ever met your H.

You can choose to stop doing that which you will resent...be it chores, words or deeds. Anything. That's you and your own code. Your DD17 can do chores, too. I'm sure she does. And has them and doesn't. Why am I sure? I have three sons, youngest of which turns 18 tomorrow.

When you say you've taken steps and didn't change the outcome, you're telling yourself that your steps didn't matter because the outcome didn't change. Which do you have control over?

When you feel overwhelmed, that's a signal to you that you are requiring of yourself too much. You have over-committed yourself. Not up to him to get in the way of your consequences for your choices. Up to you to choose differently.

Do you cherish yourself enough to not do that which you will resent? To know fantasy from reality?

Do you know how to define and hold yourself to your real priorities?

Sounds like you're holding yourself to act affectionately even when you don't feel affectionate. Big kudos. Does it feel out of your comfort zone? Are you noticing if you feel pleased with yourself? Do you feel your act to connect gives you the feeling of connection, if you don't look at the outcome?

You haven't been trying...you've been doing. Difference between reality (I tried) and reality (I did this). You did it. What was your intent for acting affectionately?

You don't like yourself and you don't believe you like your H right now. What you do to yourself, you will do to others. If you continue giving to get, you continue the self-betrayal and disrespect. I think you're really sick of making those choices.

And I see where instead of focusing on your intent, your choice to act from your own choice, you focused on his response...you swung back to "most days he does" instead of staying on focus with what you chose to do differently. That sinks our boat every time.

Your chosen belief is that any time (like saying all the time) you share your stuff, he changes the subject. Does that mean when you share "I love summer. I love the light" and he says, "I'm hungry" he's changing the subject? Or sharing his stuff?

You judge his stuff...so you judge yours. You will tell yourself you speaking about yourself is a turn off to him...a raging DJ in your own head...not reality. If you cannot hear his sharing as his...how do you know you're sharing your stuff as yours?

Statements are not conversation...no subject. You acting to connecting, with intimacy, affirms yourself. Is not based on his possible response. Just like you yelling doesn't entitle him to yell...it's you verbally abusing and him verbally abusing. Each from their own choice.

Drive-by O&H helps you to act from honesty so you can live in it. Doesn't make you the subject of anything...shares who you are with your partner and you let the outcome go. You aren't sharing to get anything from him...you're sharing because humans are here to know and be known.

You're doing what is within your control, your half.

You choose to not share. You choose to not connect. There's a payoff in there. Find it. Find out if it's really valid for you or if it's more of you tricking yourself.

We lie in patterns to ourself...and self-deception is the hardest nut to crack. Well worth the effort, I promise you.

Why ask your H if he's sure about any choice he makes? What he says he will do, get out of his way. Respect he knows, he's sure, he's choosing. Then maybe you'll respect yourself, know when you're sure and when YOU are choosing.

Self-defense measures...how are they working for you? Feel protected? Defended? Safe? They are more fantasy. You believe you're covering your own tushie...which is nowhere near love or truth. Blame, like offense, has to be taken. Watch how much your hands scoop it up...and trace it to the belief...because at the base of taking blame/offense, is false power. If we are to blame, we have the power to fix it. If we are the cause, we are the cure, the control.

We are not.

CYA is about right/wrong...you not wanting to be wrong, be blamed...learn more about that fantasy in yourself. Where you are all the relationship or three-quarters...or nothing...it will fluctuate. Does change you have been, are, and will be only half. That's it. No more. No less.

You believe you can be included in your H's anger. His anger is his own...about him, from him, for him. YOU have to put yourself in there.

Your boundaries go around your code to not act out your emotions...state, not demonstrate. When you enforce these, you'll do the same with your H acting out on his. You won't until you change your choices. You'll respect his anger as his...at himself, about his own choices.

His anger is valid.

Him acting it out or in isn't.

No need to CYA yourself over his anger. See the difference?

Since the "When you do this, I feel this" isn't working for you...not keeping you honest and open...why not stop that for now? Why not listen and repeat...revoke your permission to say "you" at all until you're confident in your own "I" statements, from lots and lots of practice.

Why not amend your choice to parent your partner tonight? "I realize how often I am not looking out for our marriage, like over this camera incident. I didn't act from respect of your choice. I parented, not partnered. That's not what I want. I respect your choices."

Then if he yells, you can say, "I know I've yelled at you countless times. I've changed my permissions now and I will not yell at anyone again. Yelling is verbal abuse. Unless you lower your voice so I can really hear you, I will remove myself for 20 minutes until I can get my flooding feeling settled. Then I will return to listen to you."

If he doesn't, you remove yourself...and you make sure you're back in 20 minutes. You make sure you do not yell. And if he continues, you calmly say, "I hear you yelling again. I am removing myself now for two hours and will be back then to listen to what you're communicating."

And you make sure you do remove and return. Whether he speaks or not...may not have anything to say then.

Listen and repeat when he's not yelling.

What you have in your toolbox are coping strategies...I believe what God is pointing you towards are living skills...very different. Coping from fear; living from love. You're ready for the change, Cat. I know you are. I know you're ready for true freedom, authentic love and a thriving life.

This is like birthing pains.

Well worth it.

<img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />

Well, until they are teenagers.

Please consider you gave up your true identity in childhood...when you pushed aside the you handmade by God, to recreate yourself to be safe. You didn't know then that you were love...you changed yourself, constructed a new you, to get love. Not nuts or alone or wrong. You literally disowned parts of yourself, put there by God, and lost parts of yourself from focusing where you had no power. Now you're coming together, all of you, as you were originally...we come together by choice.

You did the best you knew how with what you knew then; when you know better, you do better.

What are you reading again to change your choice of perspective, belief, perception? What did you read 10-20 years ago which gave you such passion for changing your half of the marriage? All your efforts will be in vain when your intent is not within your control. If you were set on changing the marriage and not your half, you were doomed to fail, weren't you? If you were set to change yourself to make him love you enough to love yourself...you were doing different with the old intent and goal, weren't you? Where you had no control?

Wasn't you up disrespecting he was making his choices, and you making yours, was it? What is different this time?

I hear you saying you are educating him on the sly. Really? Being sneaky with him because you're sneaky with you? Beware the self-deception...you're missing the focus that you continue your choice to make him your center.

And you already said, you know he's not...you are.

Great catch, btw.

Listen to yourself...you are wise...you know everything I'm sharing with you...already in you...let your own knowledge come home to yourself. Your own homecoming.

You know you're making excuses...because you hate hearing his excuses. You can see in him more plainly, obviously, than in yourself. He is less to be afraid of than you. That's the core belief when we live through others, erasing our own identity. I know. I remember.

Change your core belief and you WILL change your experience.

Control is not respectful. Cause and cure are NOT real...not respectful of reality.

We often crave annihilating our existence when we symbolically annihilate ourselves daily...through sacrifice, choosing to do that which we will resent, DJing, AO'ing, the deception...and it's our urge to get our attention to stop making these same choices...to come home to our real selves, to cherish and know we ARE real, we are significant...we ripple around the world.

You know that. Your experience comes from all the unnecessary, unjustified bashing you have done to your innocent self...unravel those...do the amends to yourself...this alone will change your half of the marriage and your entire experience on this earth.

Choose to believe you are brave enough, dedicated enough, that you darn well ARE enough...for God didn't make no junk, no where, no how.

Choose your beliefs...they were always your own choice, even before you knew you had one.

Then act from them...for they determine your thoughts, which determine your words, which determine your deeds...which determine your destiny.

There's on fixing you, Cat. You're not broken.

You never were, are, or will be.

Sure can experience as if you are.

Feeling afraid is valid. You feel fear.

Acting from it is not.

LA

Thanks, I needed that today. Gonna take me about 30 more read throughs to soak it all in, but I get the gist. Will be enough to see me through tonight.

Hey, PF, just wanted to come back and respond, since I didn't yesterday - had a meeting all night and other stuff. Anyway, no, I don't see myself as a know it all, it's just that I felt like some of my responses to people have been pretty forceful, but I don't really have the success ratio to know if what I'm saying is really the right answer, so after I've made all these great answers all week since finding this place, I got to thinking, maybe I'd better become more familiar (i.e., finish reading everything, which will take a awhile) with MB before I tell you how to fix your problems. I was thinking that I may in fact be giving wrong advice, at least according to MB. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

As for my mom, she was the kind who patted me on the head and said something like, "That's a really good picture you drew; I'm sure you know what it's supposed to be, and that's all that matters." It was hard to have an answer to 'what gives you the right' when the person who's supposed to be believing in me pretty much doubted I could amount to anything. She loved me; she just wasn't a 'kid person'; never played a single game with me. That's why I've been trying to learn everything I can about why she would be that way and why I am my way. As for staying and engaging, isn't that the point? To learn to interact with your people and resolve conflict and be happy in a healthy way?

FWIW, following reading y'all's posts last night, I first apologized to D17 for not being the adult and keeping this type of thing from getting out of hand. I then went home after my meeting to find out that MrCat had taken the camera out of D17's bag and had it all the time. I didn't say anything, because I wanted to think about what everyone has written here. This morning, I told him what had happened; that we've been scouring the house and calling everyone she came in contact with. He asked why we didn't just ask him and I told him the truth, that we were afraid that he would get angry and we were trying to mitigate it if at all possible by finding the camera. We've had this talk before, probably 5 times in the last 10 years, that his anger is an issue with us and that we do things that we think will protect us from being the target of that anger; each time, he is surprised that we see him that way, and then he gradually forgets about it and goes back to being angry. (When I say angry, I mean that he is just generally mad at the world; you hear a news story, you just absorb it - he hears that story and he discusses how screwed up the people in the story are, how they must be crooks, how society is falling apart, how someone needs to go to jail...every conversation is like that. I'm guessing he feels better about himself by deciding that others are worse off.)

Anyway, when D17 came downstairs he brought it up, said we should have asked him...and then apologized! I think this is the second time in 30 years he has apologized. So this past week of paying attention to MB and making a conscious effort to not do the wrong things, and to do the right things, is a good step. And, LA, it didn't happen all that often, but I am determined to not yell again. Thanks again.

LOL, LA, just had to tell you since we talking about long posts, I printed out your post from yesterday so I could keep it with me and absorb it - 8 pages long!

catperson:

If what you are trying isn't working, try something else!

Why not hire a maid? Tell H that you can take no more, and that you had to have some help.

When he sees the bill, he may decide that it is "worth it" to help out more!

Hi Scott,
I actually am in the process of getting my house more organized, so that a housecleaner can do a good job; as it is, he/she would have to move stuff out of the way, dust around piles, etc. I could start now, but I'm frankly embarrassed at how the house looks. I couldn't do it before this summer, because (1) my husband got laid off 3 1/2 years ago, and I've been paying a lot of his bills and he only this summer finally got a great job, and (2) we moved out of our last house 4 years ago and MrCat just this spring got it fixed up and ready to sell and sold it, so we've been paying bills on two houses for 4 years. So we've been doing without a lot of stuff. The good side of that equation is that we were upper middle class before, and not having money the last 4 years has gone a long way toward ensuring D17 didn't turn out to be a spoiled brat, since she had to pay for anything she wanted! <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

But, thanks for the suggestion, and I am definitely planning to get one. It's one of the positive steps I'm taking for myself; I deserve it.

Cat,

I'm laughing with you about the length of my post. I trigger to anyone saying "I know this is long" because I really do long. I read and post long. Sometimes, I don't do short.

LOL

I'm sorry for killing trees. I feel honored you choose to put that much effort. I know I'm work.

Seems to me you're seeing how many assumptions you make, the time and effort those DJs consume in your life...I remember them taking up all my time...seriously. The difference in managing life and living it honestly.

You were really honest in your response to H. He was in his...he hears you...takes time for him to get his own stuff. I believe he loves you tremendously and working through his own P/A behaviors is difficult for him.

Could just be me projecting, of course.

<img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />

In your last post to Scott (hi, scott!) I perceive your marriage and family are hitting a new stride.

The other house is sold.
DH is working at a great job.
DD17 got to know different experiences
You still have a great job (is that correct?)
You're still married.

And you want to clean your house before you have someone in to clean.

I get it, btw.

Sounds like clean new slates for partnering. Fertile ground for changes. I like the way you guys sold your second house...we ended up in the same boat as you were in, only we sold it for a big loss. I'm glad you appreciate your H did that.

Prepare yourself to live in abundance, Cat. You're soaking in it.

((((Cat))))

LA

Anyway, no, I don't see myself as a know it all, it's just that I felt like some of my responses to people have been pretty forceful

The “force” came across as confidence. That’s actually a good thing.

but I don't really have the success ratio to know if what I'm saying is really the right answer,

It’s ultimately my job to decide what the right answer is. On this forum, none of us are councilors. Bad counseling can be a bad thing but we should not see each other as counselors, only peers. So you are not responsible for damaging me if you gave me bad advice. So if you believe in something your shouldn’t feel inferior because you might not be right, it’s how you believe and it’s okay. I the thread about my D TR is making a case for me to apologize to D. TR knows that she can be direct and persistent with me and it’s unlikely that I will get offended as long as she is respectful. I will listen to TR and consider what she says. But I hold onto to my beliefs unless I feel conviction or can gain insight about how my thinking is flawed. I do however carry holding onto my beliefs to the extreme, another term for this is stubbornness and it’s not necessarily a good thing.

I was thinking that I may in fact be giving wrong advice, at least according to MB.

It’s my job to read MB and to learn the concepts. If I have not done that I have no one to blame but myself.

It was hard to have an answer to 'what gives you the right'

LA, gave you a good answer. You are good and you have the “right” because God made you in the image of him and you are good.

As for staying and engaging, isn't that the point? To learn to interact with your people and resolve conflict and be happy in a healthy way?

Exactly.

Just wanted to share something. I've discovered that MrCat is most receptive (read: not grouchy) in the morning getting ready for work. So this morning, I commented that the time share company with which we had scheduled some vacation time is only open to call them between 8 and 5. (He needed to reschedule a vacation he set up because we found out D17 will be taking finals those days and can't miss school; our district changed schedule this summer, after he had booked it; anyway, he was supposed to have taken care of it all week but has never even mentioned it)

MrCat, as is typical, didn't make a single sound after I said that. He had been talking about his work (which is all he ever talks about), and I saw a break, so I mentioned the time share. He quit talking, went into the bathroom, came back in, continued getting ready for work. Then started talking about work again.

So I waited another minute or so, and said,
"Can I make an observation?"
"What?"
"I've noticed that whenever I talk about something not work related, you don't acknowledge that I've said anything."
"I acknowledged you."
"No. You didn't say anything. You walked out of the room."
"Well, I heard you. 8 to 5."
"But I don't know if you heard me, if you don't say so. And if I have to ask again if you heard me, you get angry. So I need to know if you heard me."

He didn't answer, but at least we had a decent discussion about it. Maybe not the most graceful, MB-proper way to do it. But it's a step.

Cat,

Just a quick observation but it might help you to ask a question of him if you're expecting a reply from him.

Commenting that the time share company was open from 8 to 5 sounded like a statement and doesn't necessarily require a response from him. Granted most spouses would acknowledge with some kind of gesture but yours doesn't appear to be one of them.

What were you looking for? Is it his responsibility to call this company? If it is are you afraid to ask something of him ... does he not respond well to you pointing out things he needs to do?

If this call is important then I see no problem in you coming right out and asking (in a nice way) when he's going to take care of it. Hold him accountable to his word but in a polite way.

Interesting that you should mention that today. My H does the same sort of thing, doesn't give any sort of reply when I say something or ask something. I've told him that I don't know if he heard me and that's why I repeat myself; I've told him I think it's a bad example.

Just yesterday, in the parent-teacher conferences, the teachers said the biggest behavior problem with our kids is that they don't reply when the teachers talk to them, and that is very disrespectful and unacceptable!

I looked at H and said "They get that from him." The teacher said "Oh, you have to stop! I scold my brother for the same thing! It is setting a very bad example for the kids. It's disrespectful. You need to get together on this and enforce discipline, don't let the kids have that attitude and don't do that yourself."

I think it is reasonable to expect the other person to give a response to a comment, even if it wasn't phrased in the form of a question. (This isn't Jeopardy!) For example:

"Oh, by the way, that company we need to call is only open 8-5."
--"Oh yes, I keep forgetting to call. I'll try to get to it today, thanks for reminding me."

or,
"Oh, by the way, that company we need to call is only open 8-5."
--"Oh I forgot! Look, I've got too much going on today, is there any way you could take care of it?"

or at least,
"Oh, by the way, that company we need to call is only open 8-5."
--"Uh-huh." (Think Tim the Tool Man - at the very least, a grunt.)

What's even worse, is when I *don't* repeat myself and something bad happens, he claims he didn't hear me. I really think this is passive/aggressive behavior.

The main reason I barely speak to him about anything besides his work, is we have this issue where he acts like I want something from him all the time. He has a big issue about that with his mom - she always demanded that he do everything for her, while the two younger kids never had to do anything. And even when he did do what she wanted, it was wrong, not good enough, the others could have done it better...This lasted up to about 2 years ago when he just cut ties with her.

We've discussed that he equates me with her; he kind of acknowledges it; but it doesn't change his defensiveness, any time anything needs to be done. And I mean anything. I've asked him to set up a VCR in our exercise room for over 4 years now; he just did it last week. He has never hung up the curtain rod from 4 years ago. He never hung up the flower boxes I asked him to hang 3 years ago. Even if I asked him to put his Q-tip in the trash (he leaves them everywhere), he glares at me and just leaves it on the counter, I guess to prove that he doesn't have to do what I want. When I ask him why he does that, he just pretends he didn't hear me. He's severely into avoidance - of anything he 'has' to do that relates to the family. Everyone else, he bends over backward to accommodate, and look good in front of.

So, yes, asking him a question gets a brusque, if not rude, reply from him. Maybe I should just order him around like his mom. I have to steel myself whenever I can find no other way to get something done, and have to ask him for something, because I know it's going to be a confrontation.

In this particular instance, we had already discussed that he needed to call them, as I didn't know if he wanted to change his reservation, and he didn't know until he talked to them to see what else he could get. That was Monday. Of course, by now, half of the other openings I had emailed him about on Monday are probably gone. Which is why we almost never go on vacation.

Ugh. Sorry he's that way. What a crappy thing to have to live with.

It sort of makes me wonder why you'd want to ... but I hesitate to ask that because that isn't going to help you through the conflict or improve the R.

You shouldn't enable his bad behavior. I know it's easier said then done but if it is something important, something he NEEDS to do, then you shouldn't let his bullying you around (afraid to deal with his own demons) stop you from asking him to do it.

Sorry, I know the correct answer is to have you ask and some how put a boundary around his horrible reaction ... I'm just not sure what you should do when he crosses that boundary ... other than getting angry right back at him (not helpful I know).

If he is an OCPD like I suspect, then he doesn't like to be told what to do. Mentioning the hours like you did is a good way to handle it. However, I agree with you that if they don't acknowledge that you said something, then later they will claim they never heard it (my DD14 does this!).
In his mind, saying "OK" might be the equivelent of saying "Yes I will do this today", so saying nothing is the same as not committing to anything which is what he would prefer.

Can you call the time share people?

Thanks for all the advice, guys. I have called the time share people, it's just that this particular decision revolves around whether he wants to keep the 4 days he reserved to go skiing, when D17 can't go. I offered for the two of us to go, romantic getaway and all, but he knows I really don't like skiing, so he said there's no point. I suggested finding a friend to go who skis as well as he does, and he says the only reason he wants to go is to ski with us (meaning D17). I couldn't get him to commit to whether we should just cancel it (one of his no-response things), so I told him he needs to call them and see what his options are, and decide if he's going to switch it or not.

But anyway, thanks for the advice. I was just kind of proud of myself for even bringing up the subject of him not acknowledging me, and it not turning into an argument.

As for staying, he's a great person aside from this kind of thing, he doesn't do these things out of malice but rather just dysfunction, so there are a lot of positives; so I really just need to fix myself so I can fix the R; there's no point to throw away a marriage when it's just that we need to change the bad behaviors. However, I am one of those people that has a plan for leaving when D17 graduates, if I can't get anything fixed by then. I just won't subject her to it when she's living with us.

Jyane, when I taught, I taught in South Florida, where we have kids from lots of different cultures. We were taught to respect the children's way of communicating, for example Ebonics. The example that they gave us was that Asian children are taught at home to look down when they are being reprimanded. So when the teacher gets cross and says,"Look at me when I'm talking to you!" the poor kid is just going to look down harder, as was ingrained in him to do.

I find it a BIG DJ that the teacher chooses to say that your H is disrespectful as opposed to saying that she finds it disrespectful. As a teacher, I would have asked for help with what I needed from your kids in my class, and left it at that. Thanks for typing this, jayne, because I "corrected" my H just the other day about the exact same thing. Why didn't I notice the DJ when I did it? LOL

Cat, I hope you find some ways that you can bring fun and family time into your life while you guys are working on this.

Oh wow, the example of a child looking down when reprimanded really got the point across to me. I can see how that would be a problem, but not the child's fault, just a culture difference.

I'm not sure exactly what the teacher said, it may have been phrased better and maybe I repeated it here in the form of a DJ given my present mood.

That's very wise of you, cat, to recognize H has a lot of positives and this is just his own particular way of interacting, and to concentrate on what you can do. I'll try to follow your example.

Thought I'd give you all an update. H finally called for plane tickets Saturday, so we ended up doing only the second 3-day trip to Colorado. I offered to have the two of us take the first 4 days so that we could have a romantic getaway (my words), and then have D17 meet up with us the second leg, after she finished her finals, but he elected to only do the second half. He says it's because he doesn't want to spend the money and that he's afraid he's too out of shape to ski for a whole week, so I'm trying to give him the benefit of the doubt and just be ok with that. But the days we'll be going are weekend and the two days we have off for Christmas anyway, so he's taking no time off from work. And he told me he couldn't take any more time off from work, cos everyone else already had time chosen, and he couldn't afford to leave with them gone. But he works independently of everyone else, so it wouldn't matter when he's gone. He's just into his "I'm going to spend 120 hours a week on my job" mode, like he does with every job. That was his excuse for not taking the Florida trip, it was 7 days; I offered to drive and then let him fly home halfway through; not interested. Most likely because he hates beach-type vacations, but he didn't say so; just said it was because of his work time.

So I don't know if I'm ahead or behind.

D17's been going to a counselor for a few weeks, and the lady said she wanted us parents to come the next time; so we made the latest appointment possible for Wednesday, 8:30pm, to ensure MrCat can't use work as an excuse not to be there (like he usually does with other things). He said he's going, but I'm pretty sure he has no clue that the reason she wants us there is because of D17's trouble dealing with him. And since D17 seems to like this lady, I went ahead and made an appointment for myself, because God knows I need to start going to therapy. I scheduled it for Tuesday, so that I could give the C a history of our family, and what she's likely to encounter with H, so that she can hopefully keep it from blowing up in our faces.

I know you guys are probably all thinking, geez she's being so disrespectful about her H. But I'm basing this on past experience. I got him to go to a C years ago, when I was seeing a C, because she said the exact same thing this one said to D17 - we need to have your family in (H, in the past) so that we can move forward. But what happened last time was that we went 3 or 4 meetings until the C said that she needed to start seeing H on his own, and that she wouldn't do any more joint counseling until he started coming in on his own. He blew up on her, furious that she was saying that he was the cause of any problems, and stormed out.

Anyway, Wednesday night at 10pm, I'll either be on top of the world or bawling my eyes out as he screams at me for ruining his life.