Sorry I'm a very literal person and I tend to debate things in literal terms. I do not have a temper at least in the dictionary sense of the word, but my wife gets offended when I hold things in rather than expressing myself, and then when she asks what it is I tell her not only the most current issue, but the previous 5! That is not fair to drop a bomb like that once a day or so I'm discontinuing that and not sweating "the small stuff".

Her reactions are Disrespectful Judgments.

Clear enough.

It's also not Ok for you to tell her how she should feel.

For instance;


This puts you in a DJ position with your wife. Because you are "literal and debate things in literal terms," you place the expectation on her to do the same. That is a Disrespectful Judgment.

You are here, this is your thread, you keep YOUR SIDE of the street clean, capice?

Additionally, you have to address a the "previous 5" things because you are a conflict avoider, and you have 5 unresolved issues digging at you as well as whatever the current issue is.


How has that strategy worked for you so far?

Not so well.

Hill, I'm a very literal debater as well, with the added bonus of NOT being a conflict avoider. I'm a flipping JOY to live with, lol. One piece of very valuable advice I got from Steve Harley was to SLOW DOWN--I can state my complaint, and even if I have a hundred workable solutions already figured in my head, I need to back off and give my H room to work out some solutions for himself. Perhaps this would be valuable to you, as well.

Complain, once. Then wait.

State your opinion. Then shut up.

What you are doing is "kitchen-sinking" your wife. You've both learned some bad habits over the years, and now is the time to start un-learning them.

One of the biggest is this idea that you either need to have an argument over something, or hold it in. There is a middle ground that CWMI described, and if she can do it (a woman who I can tell LOVES debate), then I bet you can do it as well.

Something that may help with this, is doing a drive-by. Walk up to her, say something nice, and then "honey, when you did X yesterday I felt really hurt. Could you please not do that anymore?" And then walk away. If she follows to argue, don't let it get started. Acknowledge anything that she says, but disengage.

If your wife is an arguer (as I am) she may try to give a reason (excuse) for her actions, but you need to stand firm without getting angry. Say "yes, I understand you have reasons for doing that, but I'm just letting you know that it hurts me."

The harder part of this is the reverse where she complains to you about something you've done. You need accept the information and let her know that you will do something about it. And no "yeah-butting". Yeah I did do that, but you deserved it because...

Rough night with grumpy baby tonight! We are trying to rally and get her down to hang out. We are fine just buying our time to get her down man!

T/J, borderline O/T;

I had a communication strategy passed on to me by one of my instructors.

The presenter was talking about communication in marriage, and the difference between her and her husband.

She was very knowledgeable and expressive, where he was succinct and fact-driven.

So, she could deliver a five-minute dissertation on a sink full of dirty dishes, the history of dishes, and how they affect society.

For him, it was simple; DISHES. DIRTY. STOP.

To facilitate communication between the two, the following advice was given - HE should; listen for five minutes. SHE should; get to the point, and avoid the dissertation on the social history of fine dinnerware.

Of course, this doesn't bleed into casual conversations and discussion - but, when communicating between two people, it's often best to bring a solution that facilitates both parties.

HHH, in our case, a problem was that I would complain, offer a soluition, and my conflict-avoidant H would agree to it, then PA'ly go against the solution be cause it wasn't his. So I had to back off and let him find his own. I don't much care how something gets solved, so long as it does, so this was quite effective for us.

Ah ha!

I get that.

Did you ever offer a solution before identifying something as a problem?

Drove me nuts when FWW would offer me solutions for things I was doing that she identified as a problem - it was usually because I wasn't doing it the way she would.

Ugh.

Don't miss that.

Night was good, wife offered oral sex, which was great, that led to real sex which was great. Immediately afterwards she saw the "stewing" look on my face and asked me to tell her what bothered me. I told her that a certain something fit too easily into something else for not having had sex for so long and that I questioned whether her orgasm was real. I insulted her and she'll barely speak to me or come back to this forum. She kept telling me, "you have problems". She is referring to me reading into every single thing which is probably true. Am I aloud to be suspicious of my wife? She seems to think not and told me so. Either you're all gonna blast me for being a complete a-hole last night and to stop reading into things or you'll use the power of suggestion and I'll be even more suspicious of my wife. I have no proof, just little things I've seen that I probably just read into. Some of you are so direct with my wife about the issue of infidelity that I can't help but assume you might be right. I don't think you're right but until I get past it I don't know we are gonna get there. How can we get past it?

Well. I would say this was a real downer for your W to hear! Talk about rating a performance!

Hilltopper, we do initially look for infidelity when a new poster comes on board. Because it is, sadly, normal to find out that there is an active affair that is creating the marital problems. When that is the case we have to advise the poster in a completely different way that requires some urgency. That's why we ask that first, as opposed to spending a lot of time on addressing what needs aren't being met. The affair becomes the primary target that needs to be attacked.

When there appears to be no affair we start working on ways the couple can come back together in harmony. I am assuming this is the case for you and tgrace.

Hilltopper, STOP making reference to an A. If you are suspicious then quietly snoop. Don't make her feel bad or feel under scrutiny. GOSH! She was trying to meet your needs and you should have rewarded that effort!!!!

Apologize for saying that and reassure her that you will stop bringing up an A.

I totally agree, I don't know why I got so paranoid. I take that back, I know why I got paranoid, but it is no longer relevant to our marriage. There is no affair period, never was. My wife kind of shut me out emotionally, with no affection nor sex. What I have a hard time with in this form is the suggestions you make. "If you are suspicious then quiely snoop?" Why? Geez, I told my wife this morning that there is a part of me that doesn't want to look like a fool so I wanted to be certain nothing is going on. I love my wife very, very much. She made an amazing effort early in the game to have sex with me which was awesome and I threw it back in her face. What a jerk! On another note, my wife keeps bringing up wanting to have "intervention" with either some parents or friends? I told her I don't get this at all. I thought maybe she was just trying to help and she would drop it, but she just sent me an email asking us to go speak with my parents, preferably my Dad? I'm of the opinion that this is a horrible idea, even worse than a marriage counselor. I think she feels wronged for having me be suspicious in the first place and wants to get it out on the table that she has never cheated on me. She also mentioned that a close friend of hers did something similar which is likely where she got the idea. I'd like to respectfully decline this idea, but I need some suggestions on how to approach it.
Its a good thing I got her a card yesterday afternoon and wrote some nice words in so that she can read this morning!

"You all?"


In both of your threads, most mentions of it go to you and the Mrs. there, mister.

Quite making asinine statements.


How do you get past it? You quietly observe for concrete evidence, and don't try to "call her out" for stupid crap like changing her underwear.

If you don't have concrete evidence? Well then shut your yap. Quit accusing her with such poor observations.

Not a subtle point you're making here, thanks! My wife shot me a note apologizing for making me "that insecure". I apologized back for behaving the way I did. It might take several hours for her to feel good once again about the progress we've made but I'm sure she'll come around.

Hill ... lets stop referencing an affair. I believe that your wife is faithful ok? I am pretty sure we have that established now.

In regards to questioning her "orgasm" WHY would you do that? You have been working very hard at achieveing some intimacy and you threw your recent efforts away. You SHOULD have complimented her and or rewarded her .. not berate her! I would have said something along the lines of "WOW, Honey that was great! Your an AMAZING wife! I really enjoyed your affection! Did you enjoy it as much as I did? Was there anything I could have done better for you to make it more enjoyable?"

By complaining about her performance, your only going to make her want to do it even less! I know this becasue I did it too! I understand your concerns about her being not as tight as you might expect, but GEESH man .. she JUST had a baby! Her body will not be totally repaired yet! SLOW DOWN!

Did you offer her Oral sex? Reason I ask is because more often than not .. women do not orgasm by intercourse alone.

I used to act just as you .. and if i felt my wife was not enjoying it .. I would get upset. I felt guilty like i was using her. But after much negotiation (and many arguments about sex and performance) we came to an agreement that if the sex is just for me .. thats fine .. because she gets enjoyment from my pleasure and she told me that she would tell me (radical honesty) if she wants an orgasm too so I do not put any pressure on her to have one. Women dont (often) need it as much as men do so please understand that .. and STOP with the pressure for her orgasm. Let her get comfortable being intimate first ... you need to get into her MIND and bond emotionally. She made a GREAT effort and stepped out of her comfort zone to work on intimacy with you.

I would apologize to her ASAP ... tell her your sorry for complaining about her performance and making her think her efforts were not good enough. Reassure her that shes the only one for you and that you now believe her that your the only one for her. She did AWESOME as far as I am concerned and you need to thank her for that and tell her how much you appreciated it. Do something special for her.

MNG

THATS GREAT HILL! Build on that ... thats great progress! Buy her some flowers on the way home from work today and then if its nice go and use those pointers on bike training i gave you in an earlier post and take some pressure off your wife to show your appreciation.

MNG

Thanks, apologizing feels good. I got her a card and wrote some nice words yesterday and there will be more of the same today. I don't care if I make obvious attempts to do nice things any more and furthermore I won't read into how it is received! How's that?

Excellent decision!

Being paranoid isn't an excuse, OK? You have folks posting to you that actually ARE recovering from an affair and many of us have good reason to be paranoid, and yet we follow the rule to refrain from bringing suspicions up no matter how paranoid we may be feeling. If we can do it, so can you!

As far as having an intervention for your W to air this issue out in front of family members, well, that's just a bad idea and going to inflame the situation. I would not agree to that. If she brings up the idea again, I would CALMLY ask her if the two of you can come to an agreement that you will not talk about an A anymore because it has become a drain on your LB$s.