Ok, I am still not getting the problem, BB. Your vagueness can't be accidental. And I know I cant help if you are vague. What you are saying is that your wife walks into the room and announces:

�you are not doing something!!� and then REFUSES to tell you what? That sounds to me like she might either be insane or falling down drunk. This just makes no sense, BB.

I am lost and I don�t know how to understand the problem but I am NOT GETTING IT. Did you see the list of questions I asked? Did she say those things?

Can you write out an EXACT dialogue that would demonstrate the problem, because I just do not get it. If the rest of you DO, can you explain it to me? I may just be slow on the uptake, but I don�t have the SLIGHTEST idea what the problem is or WHY BB is even here.

I really, really want to help because I know you are a friend of neak's but I am just lost.

Can you please answer this post? In addition to writing out an exact dialogue of a recent conflict?

I'm going back to your original post. What specifically do you want . . . .

. . . from us?

. . . from MB?

. . . . from your marriage?

. . . .from your wife?

Also, can you tell us about how you met, fell in love, etc.? Maybe there was something that you did when you were dating that has fallen by the wayside?

I get the sense that you don't really want to share about your own story. If that's the case, I totally get that. That was why I lurked on here FOREVER before starting to post. And when I did start to post, it was on the threads that were about CONCEPTS rather than specific stories. It took a long time for me to make my own thread, and that was really just to fill people in on my back story because they were asking. In fact, when I first came on, I made it a point not to reveal even my gender!

If you're feeling a little overhwlemed by the folks here, definitely do some lurking and get to know us quietly. That's what I did and it really helped. It is hard to open up to a group of strangers with strong personalities, and we definitely have some strong personalities here!

No, I guess I'm just not comfortable yet with being transparent on an open discussion board. I would feel more comfortable in a more controlled environment.

BB, you don't have to give your identity or identifying factors, but obviously you have to tell us WHAT the problem if you want help. It makes no sense to ask for help and then refuse to say what the problem is.

I was extraordinarily reticent to copy and paste from private emails between my wife and I to this discussion board.

However, afterward both I and she were incredibly pleased by the results.

And I think I preserved my anonymity.

Try MelodyLane's suggestion: see if you can post as verbatim a transcript as possible of a recent conflict.

Really, this will help!

[/quote]

I'm going back to your original post. What specifically do you want . . . .

. . . from us?

. . . from MB?

. . . . from your marriage?

. . . .from your wife?

Also, can you tell us about how you met, fell in love, etc.? Maybe there was something that you did when you were dating that has fallen by the wayside?

[/quote]

From you I believe my subject was about it - where to start, and I feel that I have been given several good suggestions there.

From MB....it is hard to say since I have not had a lot of time to explore.

MY marriage....I want to be happy and one that I am not wondering when I will be homeless, or when I will be left wondering what it was I said or did.

From my wife....someone who can give positive feedback and affirmation....and not verbally abuse me when something happens that is not what she wanted or expected.

I have to admit I feel very vulnerable right now, and it has been a big step for me to come here. I appreciate everyone's desire to straighten me out! I apologize if I seem vague or unwilling to share some "vital" pieces of information...I'm sure over time if you are patient with me it will come out.

Wouldn't we all

Seriously though, I think that is a very revealing statement about your need to control things. (Before you get defensive, I acknowledge that we ALL have that drive, it's part of the human condition.)

I'm going to suggest that you read the article on the Policy of Radical Honesty first.

http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi3900_honesty.html

It's a long one, but worth the read.

Sounds like, in Marriage Builders terminology, you would say one of your top emotional needs is admiration, and one of the worst love busters your wife is committing is either angry outbursts or disrespectful judgments toward you. Am I right?


Three cheers for Bugs! Like I said, I can tell you are a committed husband and father wanting to work toward the best. There really is something better waiting for you in your marriage, if you follow this plan.

Funny...never thought I would be labeled as a control freak. Maybe that is a problem and I just don't see it.
I consider myself a person who takes a situation and adapts to deal with the issues at hand. I'm not trying to avoid tough ?'s, I think I'm just really low on the trust scale right now.

Markos - you seem to at least understand my position right now. I'm not much of a lurker, and I know I can't fix everything in a day....just needed a place to begin.

As far as a verbatim account goes....that is not a strength of mine. When I need things verbatim I have to write them down. For those of you who are frustrated with the vagueness of some of my answers, you can understand how I feel when I ask my wife to be more specific in her concerns and I get vague responses from her. Ihope you don't think I am trying to blame my wife for all our problems. I am far from perfect, and hope to start a journey to fix some of my imperfections.

Thank you!

Dear Mr. Bugs Bunny, if that is your real name, sounds like you shouldn�t have taken that left turn at Little Rock but I�m glad you�re here. A couple of things I�d like to address and the first one is the whole �time commitment� thing. Well here�s the deal on that, if you chose not to make/take the time to do something now then you�ll have all the time in the world when you�re a homeless, unemployed divorcee to study up�lol� I half joke, but seriously, I�ll break some anonymity and tell you that I am a Recovering Addict, there are actually quite a few of us on this board. I also have a wife, two kids under 4, 3 teen agers, and my last baby cooking in the oven. My days, nights, weekends, and any other time that could possibly be are pretty busy. But here�s the deal, if I chose not to take the time to do what I need to do to stay sober, then I lose all the rest so it is a priority for me. Becoming an awesome husband should now become a priority for you and that may require you stepping out of your comfort zone.

Now on to what you�ve posted. You�ve painted a pretty dark picture of your relationship and I�m sure that represents how you feel about it right now. Further, for whatever reason it seems that you feel that your wife is unwilling to do anything to improve it which would either lead me to believe that she�s in serious withdrawal right now or she�s an intense Alpha female. Eitherwhichway, against some of the grain here I�m going to suggest, much like I did for Markos, that you first squarely focus on you. I mean if your wife is unwilling, that is what it is and you only can control one thing here and that is you. You said that your wife�s chief complaints were that you don�t listen, don�t understand her, and don�t respect her. OK let�s look at these one at a time.

Bugs Doesn�t Listen: What can you do make an improvement in that area? I�d highly suggest you go read through Markos thread entitled �Is it right for her to NEVER��.�, there are some excellent suggestions in that thread about ACTIVE LISTENING. I can tell you right now that you could benefit greatly from that. Granted this is a forum and you share what you wish but if what you�ve typed is anyway similar to how you communicate then that is an area where you could use some tweaking. I�ll tell you right now that if you learn and consistently use active listening technique�s that a lot of these side problems will simple vanish.

Bugs Doesn�t Understand Her: OK, well that is a little too vague to even address. But I�m going to give it a shot. Google �The Five Languages of Love� and skim through it. It will be real easy for you to pick out the top two ways that you show love to your wife. But that�s that what I want you to do, I want you to identify the Top two ways that you think she shows love to you and to others. That would be her love language, so your next task would be to start speaking her love language. For example, my top love language is Words of Affirmation and my wife�s is Gifts. So we spent some time with me writing her all these poems and constantly commenting her and her buying me all these stupid little gifts before we called TIME OUT. We were both speaking our own language and wondering why neither of us felt the others love. So we learned each others love language and the difference is 900 million times better. I must admit that many years later it�s still not �natural� for me to think the way of a �Gift Giver� but I step outside my zone and do it for my wife and it works.

Lastly, Bugs Does Not Respect Me: Again, really hard to do without more information which only you possess. I mean can you throw us a bone here?....lol�. I know for me, that times when I felt not �respected� a lot of that stemmed from either Independent Behaviors or Communication Styles both of which can easily be addressed. Judging by what lifestyle descriptions you�ve given I�m going to assume it�s communication styles that you�ve learned from your upbringing and environment. For the time being I�d go back to the Active Listening and see if this works itself out.

I guess in summarizing I�m asking you to do a little Rambo here with the hopes that when you affect change in the ways that you show your love and communicate to your wife that all of a sudden the programmed responses she�s learned through the years of marriage will no longer apply and thus she will be forced to implement change. As you two begin to draw closer then maybe she would be more willing to fill out the questionnaires as others have suggested or counsel with Steve�..


And PS..... If you feel more comfortable sharing details offline you can email me at wbill70@yahoo.com

LOL.....I tried to register 5 times and for whatever reason it was not working. Finally, out of pure insanity I used Bugs Bunny just to be funny - and it went through??? (So I left it.)
I don't think I can throw you a bone....but maybe a carrot(LOL)! I will try to e-mail tomorrow since I have to get supper going now and by the time bath and bed times are met it will be time for me to crash myself!

You sound like a great husband, Bugs. Keep up the good work. We'll see you tonight or tomorrow.

I don't think I called you a "control freak," just pointed out what was not obvious to me until someone pointed it out to me . . . that you may have issues with control, just as we all do. I think it is a good idea for EVERYONE, no matter how helathy they think they are, to look at this issue. It's not whether we DO control, but HOW.


I'm gonna give you a small 2x4 here. Please don't take it as anattack, because that is not at all the intention. I know that for me, when I can't recall the details of a conversation or situation, that is part of my way of avoiding accountability. If I can't remember it, I'm not accountable for it, or at least that is what is going on in my head. I can't say that's what you are doing, but it jumps out at me and I'm projecting my own experiences. Take it for what it's worth.

I totally get you on the trust thing, and I applaud you for jumping into the deep end head first. You're brave!

If she has ever said any of these things, it could be very relevant.

Bugs, if you can make time to take in all the info here, you'll be able to see positive results. You sounds like a very caring person who wants your marriage to improve. Your wife is in withdrawl, but you can turn things around!

I'm gonna give you a small 2x4 here. Please don't take it as anattack, because that is not at all the intention. I know that for me, when I can't recall the details of a conversation or situation, that is part of my way of avoiding accountability. If I can't remember it, I'm not accountable for it, or at least that is what is going on in my head. I can't say that's what you are doing, but it jumps out at me and I'm projecting my own experiences. Take it for what it's worth.

I totally get you on the trust thing, and I applaud you for jumping into the deep end head first. You're brave! [/quote]


I actually have been diagnosed with ADD. It is not an excuse for not paying attention, but I learned that if I want to remember exactly what was said I have to write it down because my brain will remember general ideas for the most part but not word for word verbatim unless I spend a lot of time on memorizing it. It does not mean I never remember what people say, but believe me I wish I had the memory to recite back a conversation.
One of the other issues with listening is that my wife talks so quietly sometimes I simply don't hear what she said, and when I ask her to repeat it she gets upset and tells me if I didn't listen the first time then why should she bother repeating it (sorry not word for word)?

Neak,
1. She has said she doesn't love me.

2. She has been unhappy for years, and I have been trying to meet her "stated" needs, but when I do the things she says will make her "happy" it is not enough, which says to me that what she is saying is not really what will make her happy.

3. She has never said she needs her space - I'm the one who usually needs space and that is simply to cool down and not say something that would totally end our relationship.

OK, that makes sense.

So her complaint is that you can't remember or hear what she says. Your complaint is that she doesn't speak loud enough. Have you told her about the ADD problem? Have you told her about not being able to hear her?

It seems to me that if you have told her about these two things and she is unwilling to accomodate her actions, then what she gets is what she gets However, it seems to me that she is using these things to justify her dislike of you instead of making accomodations (speaking louder and having patience) which would result in you being able to meet her needs. And unfortunately, you can't change her or make her make those accomodations.

What you CAN do is make it very clear to her that unless she is willing to communicate with you until you DO hear and understand, then of course you're not going to understand her.

BB Wife: "I shouldn't have to repeat myself."

BB: "Do you want me to hear you and understand you?"

BB Wife: "Of course I do."

BB: "Then you may have to repeat yourself until I understand. I can't control my ADD, and I'm doing the best I can. It's your choice what you do to help me hear and understand."

This is incredible, Bugs ... my wife does the same thing!

I think part of the cause is withdrawal, although she's just naturally a quiet person.