"I'm sorry I can't make you happy."

"Oh, you can. You make me happy every day...when I hear your voice, when I smell your skin. Wow, you have greater capacity than anyone else on this planet to make me happy. It's the whole reason why I want more of you...cause it feels so fantastic."

This isn't a T/J! It's very much on-topic.

I gotta go though, time to pick up kids. Will be back later. I def. want to make a plan, figure out if and how and what to say.

It is hard for me to respond to that (when he says it), because I feel I have told him what I need. I feel he CHOOSES not to. He feels I make him choose between being good at his job, or making me happy. I do not feel it is a contest. I have 100% faith in my heart he can do both. I am just impatient getting there.

Jayne I am sorry you are having troubles. I can relate in that many many days go by without my husband and I talking about anything but work, scheduling, TV shows, other people, our cats and thier needs, etc.

One day I realized the TV had replaced all talking. The computers also. I was feeling overwhelmed and NEEDED TO TALK to him or i felt i would go crazy with stress.

I had to STOP him from watching TV, almost TURN his head away from the TV, and almost demand he talk with me.

After we talked, he demonstrated he did not understand why i was so overwhelmed. That made me cry. In talking with him there were 1000 things overwhelming me but i started with the first thing, the cats skin issues.

He said: If those cats are giving you stress, I will "remove" them from the houshold and your stress will be gone !"

I started crying since all I needed him to do was listen and offer to take them to the vet or something.

I then had to spend 1/2 hour calming him down before we could continue.

I asked him if he wanted to hear the next thing bothering me (number two out of 1000 things) He said OK.

I went on about that for a minute. He got agitated. I told him to listen and I would just list all the things and not talk about them to him. I did that and it was still not good.

I found out later that he had been tired and it was the wrong time to talk to him. I also ended up taking the cats to the vet Derm and it was a problem, he did not help with this after all they are my cats.

I really think if we talked about some of these things before I was totally overwhelmed and frustrated then it would not overflow like that.

But it is difficult.

Jayne, here are some questions for you (and help me maybe too):

1. People only do what they want to do and consider important. do you think husbands tend to downplay talks about anything but needed stuff?

2. Do husband's hate to talk because it is unpleasant and stressfull?

3. Is there a better time to talk, or a worse time?

4. Does talking to our men make our men stressed out?

5. Do our men NEED NO TALKING but WE NEED IT so they do not recognize that need since they do not have it themselves?

6. Do we wait too long to bring up issues until we are frantic, crying, or almost crazy...and then we bring them up so the talk is very unpleasant for the man who has to listen?

7. Do men recognize types of conversation?

a) needed talking about the days plans
b) Emotional talking/venting where they listen
c) Loving emotional conversing with each other for each other and in order to creat intimacy?
d) Straight pillow talk about sexual things?

There are many other categories of conversation but if a man does not recognize the different types he may think he is talking ALL DAY LONG and then he does not need to talk even 5 minutes more.

Would a man feel better if there was a written agenda placed in front of him 1 hour before the "talk"?

1. Talk about the day
2. Any gripes or happy times
3. How we love each other
4. Our plans to show our love more to each other

You can develop your own agenda as I can. I am tempted to try this with my husband. If I wait until I am almost dYING to talk to him, then it comes out badly and makes him want to speak wiht me less.

How have you women told your men what you needed:

1. Talk to me 5 minutes every night this week
2. Please listen to me for a while
3. I need more conversation


How have you communicated your needs to your men? Can we learn to do this better so the men not only understand us but listen and respond by giving us what we need?

Bubbles. You are a genius! How about you do this, I do this and Jayne does this? I can try this!

In my sitch (and I have permission from Jayne to comment here, as it is relevant to us both), I would have to say YES. Yes, I have communicated my needs to my H. Not in a SD way, either.

I agree we need to figure this out. Please tell me HOW you gals ask your husbands for the time and the conversations.

Exactly HOW do you ask? Write it out for me. I am not good at asking for ANYTHING.

Oh. Um. Bahhhhh. I guess I am not good at (verbally) asking for anything, either. If I ask (verbally), I whine. Total turn off.

I have to write it out, letter form. It is the only way I have courage to speak up.

I have saved some, let me go back and see if I can copy and paste.

OK!

I am just wondering if we three gals do not realize we are not asking for our needs to be filled in a way the men understand. Or there could be another reason we are not seeming to get thru to them.

We can do it! We can learn to ask in the right way, the most effective way and a POJA way too!

I know we can learn this, lets not give up! We want a happy marriage and needs filled.

Wow. Ok. I am totally looking in the mirror right now, and it ain't pretty (well really it is, but anyway haha). I am not even going to cut and paste here, because it is sad. So very sad. I justified it when I wrote it, thought I worked hard to make my point without being.. demanding and I failed. Ugh. I have my work cut out for me.

but yes, I agree, Bubbles (Stella?). We can do it. I am still here after 2 years, right? I am invested. So are you. So is Jayne. Flawed, but invested.

ooo, but as I am reading through the back and forth between us, I become much more of an MBer than I thought (or a product of our MC):

What I am hearing you say is that you are torn between me being angry if you do not give me your time, and parents being angry of you do not give them your time. Is that correct?

What I am hearing you say is you feel I am pushing, so you have disengaged. Is that correct?


Him telling me how he feels, and the above are my replies.

Hi,,that is interesting. But you need and want way more than just his time! You need him on every level and the students/parents only need the 'surface level" of him.

What if you knew how to ask for his time in a non angry way?

My first thought is to pretend you are a student, a teacher, or a parent. With your husband.

Just make a joke of it. Say: "I am JOJO's parent and I need to speak with you, Mr Principle, for an hour today"

Then go from there. I cannot do that with my husband because he is not a principle...!

Well, it sounds like a Disrespectful Judgement, but I wouldn't say that, because it might not be.

He might honestly feel that he is incapable of meeting your expectations.
He might be blaming you for being impossible for anyone to please.

Ask him what he meant. Do it in a nice way. Don't dispute his answer. You surely don't want it to launch an argument. Just accept the answer, and let it sink in for both of you. Then maybe you can make it a topic for a short discussion later.

Another point, not just about your husband but a lot of those who don't enjoy conversation with their wives: maybe they feel they are not good at it. Did it ever occur to them to read a book about how to be a good conversationalist, and practice? The key is listening, anyway, so they don't to talk much.

YES, we are invested! Flawed but invested!!!!I like that!

I say "I miss you" a lot. LOT, LOT. When I am hugging him, holding him. He misses me, too. He tells me, I feel it. Nothing really changes, though.

Mine hates letters and emails. Big lovebusters. And I hate asking face to face. So let me know if you come up with a good idea!

((((Jayne)))))


Listen and repeat doesn't work for me, either.

I really like LA's approach. Don't settle for crumbs. It is *not* a SD to request that one of your top ENs be met by your husband!