I don't understand this - what are you saying that she believes is "using anger as an excuse" and you believe is "opening up to her"?

When you are feeling frustrated, you need to relax - not vent to her about the frustration.


Oh no - I think this is a very bad idea. I had the same belief as you early in my marriage, and I'm convinced by my experience and by Dr. Harley's advice that taking our conflict discussions to text, writing, or email was a GREAT idea. You are really being disrespectful to your wife by trying to tell her that your way is best here and disregarding her wishes. PLUS you are throwing away a GREAT opportunity to make love bank deposits!!! She is being disrespectful by using phrases like "man up," but I would not let that stop you from taking advantage of this great opportunity to communicate with your wife.

My wife and I text all the time now and it is beautiful. She's with our girls at ballet class right now and is pinging me instant messages right now as I read this.

DO be aware that when you are frustrated you should not be texting your wife - you should wait until you are relaxed. Don't have a fight with your wife over text!!!

Dr. Harley often tells couples to try to discuss their conflicts in writing. I would suggest you try to discuss them in an email or letter rather than a text because you can be more expressive and because people typically take more time to think about what they are saying in an email than they do for a text. And you need to do that if you are to learn to resolve conflicts with your wife.

http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi3350_guide.html

Wait, why is this thread in divorcing? You don't want to divorce - get back in the other sections so you can get the attention you need to try to save your marriage.

You don't need to start new threads all the time - it will help people help you if you just stick to one thread so they can see your history all in one place.

It's been 15 days since your last post - have you listened to every Marriage Builders Radio show since then?

Markos, in general, I have no problem with texting especially with pleasant things like ballet. HOwever, when it is an emotional topic and she is blasting text messages every couple seconds, I can't keep up to respond. Then, it pisses her off that I'm not responding quick enough and it is frustrating all around. Plus, I feel like things get completely mis-interpretted over text message.

Dr Harley and Joyce just commented the other day on MB Radio about texting and how it wasn't a good idea for discussing or resolving conflict. Maybe it was for that specific scenario, but I agree in general.

I hate to close down a line of communication, obviuosly I realize that's a bad idea in my situation. However, it was just getting to be too much. Maybe I was wrong... :-/

Dr Harley has a brilliant solution for marriages that are experiencing fighting and anger: communicate through email. I had never tried that until recently and my H and I had some amazing results discussing an emotional topic over email. We first agreed we would not fight. [very important!] And then we communicated the issue via email. When you do that, the environment is much less emotional and it is so much easier to solve problems.


I want to also add that she is not entitled to abuse you. The conversation should end it becomes abusive.

Yes, I listen every day.

I put it in divorcing because W said she is in "Plan D". Thought I might get some advice over here given it has escalated to that point.

I will try email based on what you and markos are saying. My question is: where do I start with the emails? I have sent apology emails and "I'm changing" emails, but she told me not to send them. I also shared how the separation was impacting me (physically, emotionally, etc) in an email to her and she said it was an attempt to guilt her and get sympathy. I won't do that again.

So my question is: what do I email?

markos is right, I should have come back here. W is in "Plan D" and I started this other thread, but I don't want a divorce.

http://forum.marriagebuilders.com/ubbt/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2826085#Post2826085

If possible, I'd like continue discussion from other thread here...

When she sends you a text about a problem, tell her you will send her an email. Then, take a little bit of time to compose a nice email to her about it. Focus on not saying anything that she might find demanding, disrespectful, or angry, and then focus on completely understanding her point of view about the problem.

GOOD!

Yep. Just back away from such conversations till she calms down. Calm back with some ideas how to solve the problem that you think she would be enthusiastic about and that you know you would be enthusiastic about.

If it's the only way your wife feels safe with you, then she's not going to be happy about you enlightening her with your superior perspective that she shouldn't be communicating with this medium. Instead she's going to feel like you are shutting the only door she has.

I agree texts over conflicts is not the best - Prisca and I tend to move to email for anything more emotional. But insisting on in person or over the phone instead of written communication about emotional conflicts is practically guaranteed to make the problem worse. Written communication is much, much better.

Some people have a natural advantage over others in in-person communication. Your wife may feel that she is at a major disadvantage when she discusses a conflict with you in person or over the phone - she may communicate much better in written form. And the reason you may feel that people "should" communicate about such things in person may actually be because it feels so much better for you since you have an advantage.

I have witnessed a LOT of people lecture my wife Prisca about discussing conflicts in person. She has had family members and friends say truly nasty things to her about how she should "face them" or how she's a bad person for wanting to discuss things by email. But she's at a MAJOR disadvantage in spoken communication. She's much quieter, and people talk right over her, and that's the real reason they want to corner her so they can win a fight over a conflict. I'm grateful that Dr. Harley helped me escape from being one of those jerks who was doing this to her.

If your wife is sending you a verbal barrage of abuse via text, you don't have to listen to it. Shut it off for awhile. Take a break from the conversation until she calms down. She won't like that, but it's necessary in order to make sure that the two of you don't fight.

Didn't see an answer to this question.

Threads merged.

Thanks for the advice. I am really bad at being nice to my W in all forms of communication. In person, on phone, on text and on email, so this is a very good reminder. I am quite the opposite and I realize now that is one of the reasons she doesn't feel safe in addition to my anger. I am disrespectful, demanding, controlling and I interrupt a lot in person. In addition to anger, I know I need to work on all this "disrespect" too.

Good grief!
200 texts a day?
I had an employee years ago, and noticed his company phone was constantly beeping. I looked at the cell records and he was getting non-stop text messages from his wife!
I don't know how people can function with their phone constantly beeping.

For example, when she has a complaint and I feel frustrated or upset about it, then I try to explain how frustrated I feel and it turns into disrespect on my part (I interrupt her, I walk out of the room, etc). Then, I try to backpedal out of the disrespect by explaining to her how my frustration and disrespect all comes back to my unresolved anger management problem and that I'm trying to open up to her about my feelings. She says I'm using my anger management problem as an excuse in these situations to continue to abuse her. She thinks I should just "choose not to be angry" and "just stop". I agree with her and ideally I would choose to just stop, but there are times when I get frustrated, anxious, mad, nervous, etc and I think she should know about it. One thing I am learning is that I am a classic "stuff it" and forget about it person. It's not ok because it causes my frustration to build into all out rage over time. I am trying not to stuff my emotions when they are small and "walk away" (take a time out to relax) when they are getting too big. The end goal is to NOT stuff my feelings and express them in a respectful way. This is my current struggle. how do I address a conflict with respect and not let my anger make me stupid and disrespectful?

Also, when she recently claims that I have done nothing to save this marriage for the last 4 weeks, I demand that I have done something with anger management. I try to control her into thinking I have done something. I make the logical argument that I'm taking actions but I think I realized today that I've been wrong. I think she is talking about the fact that I have done nothing to heal her wounds and take care of her emotions.

After going through this anger program, I know that my anger goes way deeper than I ever realized and I have nobody to blame. I am responsible for it. It is a major struggle for me to overcome and yes I am dedicating a lot of energy toward stopping it. I use it as an excuse for taking away my attention from her since it is a huge challenge for me. I think I need to somehow find the balance with resolving my challenge (anger/disrespect) while taking care of her. Am I right? How can I do it?