On a much, much happier note, I have the day of our anniversary off, and we are taking a weekend trip. She was buying presents for the kids for the trip last night.

And let me be perfectly clear here that I'm not being rebuked at home, I'm just feeling this way because I realize how wrong I was.

Well, don't beat yourself up...it is a learning process...

Sounds like you're doing well...

Not beating myself up too badly; I just need to make sure I seriously appraise what I have done and don't repeat it.

Love busters have never helped my marriage.

Ever.

They've never helped any marriage--that's for sure.

I think I did a pretty good job of telling her how I felt respectfully, that I didn't feel enthusiastic about making any permanent settlement to the issues that plague us because I don't feel like she wants to give my point of view a fair hearing. There's more than that, but I focused on just that point.

But I think she still probably feels like I berated her into counseling.

We just had our first session together with Steve Harley, and I think we are both feeling much more optimistic now. Our current assignment is to be reading and educating ourselves on Marriage Builders principles.

Steve asked my wife if she'd seen any difference in me the last few weeks, and she said that yes, she had. I told her that at the moment most of that is due to you guys here. Thank you all.

She's now aware of this board and of this thread, and has signed up for an account. You might see her some time.

Awesome Markos and Mrs. Markos...... Just remember baby steps and pace yourself for a marathon, not a sprint.....

I think my poor sweet wife has been on a major emotional roller coaster the past 24 hours.

She stepped far, far out of her comfort zone and opened up to Steve Harley on the telephone. She put herself in a situation that makes her feel completely vulnerable. I think she began to feel an incredible sense of hope and optimism for our marriage.

And then she read this thread here, and I think she was brought crushing back to the ground by some of my statements about the situation with my family. She asked me a couple of questions yesterday, and I told her I was willing to listen if she wanted to talk about the subject, but I'm not ready to talk to her again about my feelings right now. I don't think it's time for us to jump in to try to solve this. Our assignment is to be educating ourselves on Marriage Builders principles. I don't think we have the tools yet to start solving these problems, and this is an area that's serious enough to me that I don't want to mess it up.

Sorry, that's where I stand. I'm willing to follow the policy of joint agreement, which in this case says we should do nothing since we don't have an enthusiastic agreement on the subject. I see that as temporary and look forward to a day when we will have an enthusiastic agreement borne out of a marriage of love and having followed Dr. Harley's principles of negotiation. I don't think we can bring that about today, and I don't want to enter into trying because it'll just result in more hurt. I understand that doing nothing right now is going to cause her to feel some resentment. Quite frankly it leads me to some resentment, as well. But I see that as resolvable, in time. IF we follow the Marriage Builders plan.

Now that my wife is reading here, what should my practice be as far as posting about our issues? I've always posted with the knowledge that should could potentially read every word, and I've always assumed that one day she would. I don't want to be messing up our progress by talking about things here that we shouldn't be talking about yet, though.

Don't worry yourself much about it, markos. I don't think I'll be around here much. This is your support group, not mine. Talk about whatever you need to talk about here without fear of what I may say or do in response.

Hey, wait, what?

Prisca, I hope you don't go away. Please feel free to post on your OWN thread--this is a good place and people care.

Lots of couples have posted here in the past.

Welcome to MB. Glad to hear it was a good talk with Dr. Harley.

For the record, one of the things my wife asked me was "How come you agree with them on practically everything they say, except when they are talking about your parents?"

Basically I don't feel free to have a point of view on the subject at all.

Family is a tough deal Markos and judging from the POV you shared about your family on Page 15 this is going to be a struggle, a struggle that's likely not going to be resolved in the near future unless your family were to do a 180. So I think here you have to ask yourself, while y'all are working on fixing your marriage what actions will be best not to harm that progress....

And for the record that's a very legit question she asks.....

And the answer is, some of those answers expected me to violate the policy of joint agreement, by agreeing to something I am reluctant about. I just read the following statement:


I'm willing and ready to discuss the issue some day when we get to the point where I feel like my point of view is respected. In fact, I'm dying for that day to arrive. But it's clearly not here. Until then, the policy of joint agreement says we should do nothing.

So ... I can't see my parents or take my kids to them, right?

What's so wrong with that, for the moment?

To me this is where you need to be a little careful because in my humble opinion, based upon some conversations with you, it's not neccessarily a matter of respect and it's more of a matter that YOU BOTH aren't equipped yet to deal with conflict. To say she outright doesn't respect your POV well it's basically a DJ. She can respect it all day long but if y'all have no conflict resolution skills then respect and a dollar ninety-five will get you a cup of coffee. And I'm sure that can feel like she has no respect for your feelings but again that's going off the assumption that she's acting out of malice and I've yet to see that AT ALL. So watch those creepy little DJ's, they'll bite you in the butt my friend.


I'm confused by this, weren't you just talking about spending your anniversary wkend up there?

I'm not assuming she's acting out of malice. Nor am I saying that this is all her fault. I'm just saying we're not to the point where we can work on it yet. For me, the most important obstacle is the love busters she commits whenever I express my point of view on important subjects like this. There are other obstacles as well, including both some things I am going to have to change and probably some things she is going to have to change.

What I want to know is, why is the policy of joint agreement's default policy, "do nothing," not enough for now?


Up until that discussion, my wife has been telling me she was enthusiastic with me taking the kids to see the grandparents about once a month. She was picking out potential dates, reminding me to get in touch with my parents and make arrangements, etc. I don't think any of you guys ever really grasped why that discussion was shocking to me: the status quo was me taking the kids without her once a month to see my family, and she started a discussion essentially asking if I wanted to go or not. I had no reason to know she didn't want me to go because she hadn't told me how she felt.

So, the status quo is now changed: we're not going up there at all.

I don't think I'm being unreasonable here.

Part of the problem with that is that I don't want them to know anything about our problems. They would only misuse the information.

I don't think there is an easy, black and white answer for that. There is tons of grey in that doing nothing could actually withdrawl more love units than doing something different even if it's only temporary.


Haven't a clue to whether you are being unreasonable or not. I guess it would boil down to how the status quo was changed and what on going conditions about the changing of the quo are occurring.


You do realize at some point there is going to need to be a long conversation between you and your family and even then they wouldn't need to know anything about your "problems". They need to be brought on board as part of a "solution" because problems will be solved away.....

Markos, I've been reading through the thread and following your story and I am particularly intrigued with the FOO issues. I think I understand your wife's perspective on the conflict, but I'm not sure I really understand yours.

It sounds to me like your wife wants nothing to do with your FOO, in general. Is that correct? And she feels this way because she feels judged by their critiques and unsolicited advice, right?

For your part, I understand that you don't want to deal with this "big" issue while you both are still learning to use the tools. I am in that boat myself, taking baby steps as I get comfortable with the MB principles and practicing on little things so I won't get discouraged about the big things.

I also understand that you don't want to air your dirty laundry with your parents because you acknowledge that they judge you both and offer unsolicited advice. Given that you seem to acknowledge that, where is the disagreement with your wife?

I ask because I too have a VERY close relationship with my parents, who can be a bit controlling and offer a lot of unsolicited help and advice. My spouse hates it. He feels that they interfere in our lives. I hate to admit this, but he is right, so I have had to set some boundaries with my folks that are not comfortable for me. My dad is retired and would love to help out around the house with all my unfinished projects, and for my part I would love to have him around. But I have finally come to accept that this is disrespectful to my husband because of the way it makes HIM feel, regardless of my intentions. He would rather the living room be half painted than accept my dad's help. I disagree, but I have made an enthusiastic decision ON MY OWN, before MB, that I would be respectful to him. This is one case in my own life where "enthusiasm" does not equate with "I like it." My dad is a little put out, but that's his problem, not mine. He also understands that this is about respecting my spouse.

I am enthusiastic about having a healthy marriage. Frankly, I am not always enthusiastic about what I have to DO to achieve a healthy marriage. Why would I be enthusiastic about something that makes me so uncomfortable? So I focus on being enthusiastic about the goal, and accept the unpleasantness of the means, I own my feelings, but I don't let them control me. I take extra good care of myself by talking to a friend or doing something nice for myself until the "negative" mood passes. I try not to feed it.

I'm not sure if this helps at all, and really I'd love to know more about the situation, because I think I've missed it in the flurry of posts!