My H and I were on the MB Radio show today. I don't want to thread-jack my H's thread on the forum here, but I have a couple questions.

One of the problems I've had in my M in the past is that nothing I say has credibility or value to my husband. POJA doesn't happen because whenever we try to negotiate, my H dismisses my position, ignores a compromise, and re-emphasizes his own, and so we end up in a stalemate. In my H's thread, he made reference to a negotiation we had years ago regarding his son (my step) setting the dinner table and the consequences if he didn't. We negotiated for months, unsuccessfully, until finally I just starting setting the table myself to put an end to the discussion. Some time later, my H discussed the issue with our pastor, and the pastor agreed with my position. Suddenly, my H was all in agreement. (Another poster explained why he was wrong to take the pastor's opinion over mine.)

Well, now after talking with Dr. Harley, I feel like I'm in the same boat again. Except rather than it being a 6-month battle finally settled by our pastor, now it's a 20-year battle finally settled by Dr. Harley. I'm still in the same predicament, just with a different "third party."

On the program, one of the primary topics discussed was my H's lack of attention when I try to discuss a problem with him, or even pleasantries like when we would go out to dinner. He sees nothing wrong with lack of eye contact, picking up and reading a piece of mail, responding to a text, even studying the bottom of his shoe. I've expressed repeatedly that I find this behavior disrespectful and ask for his full attention, but he defends it saying there's nothing wrong with it and continues doing it, sometimes getting angry at me for complaining about it. He still held this same position even after reading Dr. Harley's books and claiming to be "all-in."

Today on the program, Dr. Harley discussed it with my H and personally explained that it was wrong. He gave my H the instruction to practice maintaining eye contact during any discussion with me and report to him via email everyday for a week. He described it as "changing a habit" and compared it to training oneself to put their socks in the hamper. But in my mind, there's a big difference between developing a habit for something you want to do, vs. developing a habit for something you disagree with fundamentally. I equate it to what Dr. Harley refers to as "serial cheaters." Regardless of going through the motions of M, eventually they will be unfaithful because they don't buy in to the idea of being monogamous.


So I have two questions/concerns:
1. What have I gained in the relationship if my H is doing this because Dr. Harley requested it rather than because it's important to me? I feel like if there are any love units deposited because he changes his behavior, it's for Dr. Harley, not for my H.
2. Is it reasonable to believe that my H has instantly changed his 20-year belief system just because Dr. Harley talked to him? Why wouldn't I believe that my H will eventually revert back to his core belief when Dr. Harley stops monitoring him (just like he has done with other counselors)?

JDD, his behavior on dates is not a "belief system;" it is just bad date behavior. And bad habits surely can be changed with practice and commitment. It is just like a smoker quitting smoking. At first, it is very hard to quit, because smoking is such a deep, integral part of the smoker, but through practice and commitment, that all changes.

Whether or not your husband wants to change his behavior will be backed up by his actions. We will see if he follows through.

An important guiding principle in this program is "feelings follow actions." Once he breaks that bad habit, he will enjoy the fruits of his new behavior which will reinforce his changes.

He may do this. Just like a reformed smoker might start smoking again. There are no guarantees. That doesn't mean you don't try to break bad habits. If he reverts back to bad behavior, Dr Harley would tell you to separate from him.

I have to say that, listening to the program, I was surprised at how dense your husband seemed. He needs to back up his willingness to follow MB with real effort and change, and he is certain to make many more mistakes along the way.

If I were in your situation, I would seriously consider signing up for MB coaching. You are going to need backup and support.

I agree. Signing up gets you access to Dr Harley and a coach for a YEAR. You can even extend that if necessary. You might need some Dr Harley "stick" to make this work!

Let me add that we will be very happy to help reinforce that. I agree with mrEureka's assessment, and I am hopeful that if Remark will stay engaged here that we will be able to help him over time.

In particular, I would strongly encourage you to post your complaints about Remark here. We will try to help him understand your point of view.

If your husband does not adopt and retain the marriage building behaviors recommended here, for life, we would all support you in permanently separating from him.

By the way, you might benefit from reading my wife's thread "what to do with an angry husband." My wife eventually decided from what she read here that she was going to insist that if I had angry outbursts I would not live with her. I spent a few weeks in a Super 8 motel until we came to an agreement about me coming back - and let me tell you that that changed me in a hurry! We would encourage you to hold your husband to a very high standard.

If we can get your husband to faithfully follow this program, your feelings toward him will change. Right now, very understandably, you are extremely skeptical toward him. Rightfully so. As Dr. Harley said, you can't let your guard down and feel close to him, because given his track record at any moment he might suddenly let you have it. It's going to take a brand new track record on his part to change any of that.

Marriage Builders recommends measurable behaviors. By "measurable," I mean that you can look at him and see if he is following the behavior or not.

For example, Marriage Builders recommends that you give your husband a worksheet once a week listing instances when you felt he was disrespectful toward you. If he refuses to accept the worksheet, we would all recommend you separate from him. If he debates you about what is on the worksheet, we would all recommend you separate from him. His only course of action is to accept that information, get help from us or Dr. Harley or someone to understand it if he doesn't understand how he was disrespectful, and create and follow a plan to avoid those disrespectful behaviors in the future.

I heard on the show that you and your husband discussed my comments to him about getting professional help to stop saying "I'm trying." That phrase is disrespectful to you, and he needs to stop saying it. Dr. Harley described the process of habit formation, and your husband needs to get very familiar with it very quick so he can eliminate the habit of saying this phrase. So one thing we can measure is his willingness to let you and us hold him accountable for saying it. Let's lay that particular disrespectful behavior out in the open and hear from you or him each time he says it. Hopefully he will discover he can stop saying it really, really quickly. Then we can start tackling the next disrespectful behavior, and the next, and the next.

Another measurable behavior is the policy of joint agreement. If your husband accepts it when you are not enthusiastic about something he wants to do, then we can see that he is (at the moment) being sincere. But if he tries to debate you or browbeat you into reluctant agreement, you and we can see he is not following the program, and again, we would all support you in separating from him if he is not going to follow these principles.

I don't think someone argues and defends the legitimacy of a bad habit, do they? I'm relating Dr. Harley's sock example, and imagining Joyce telling him that it really bothers her when he leaves his socks on the floor and could he please put them in the hamper. If, in response, Dr. Harley told Joyce that he liked throwing them on the floor, that he should be allowed to relax in his own bedroom, that she was just being a perfectionist and he didn't appreciate her criticizing him, and continued to throw his socks on the floor, would it still be just a bad habit? I can't help but think that it's more.

Dr. Harley said he would "talk about that later." I'm not sure when that is.

What you described is how MOST people behave when they arrive here. For example, I told Dr Harley in 2007 that my husband got whipped up over "micky mouse" things. I meant it with all my heart and soul!! And when he objected to my behavior I accused him of being "controlling!" I wanted Dr Harley to tell him to stop being so petty. So in many ways, your husband is much farther along than me. At least, he will act like he is going to go along.

And yes, most of us defended our right to our bad habits when we arrived. Some of us felt didn't feel they were they bad at all and some [like me] felt quite entitled!! I will post my post to Dr Harley from 2007 when my H and I had a fight over lettuce in the grocery store.

What?? What?? You want me to stop?? You are trying to control me!!!

Girlfriend, your husband is a BOY SCOUT. We have seen 10x worse change their bad habits.

Marcos, my husband already spent a couple months in an unfurnished apartment a few years back, while he was attending one-on-one counseling twice a week. The break from him 24/7 gave me a second wind, plus I was trying to keep things stable for our son, so I agreed to him moving back in. Obviously things didn't change. My only point is I don't think that would have much effect on him again, especially if we did a legal separation first. I think then we'd both just throw in the towel permanently.

I just wanted to clarify one thing from the radio broadcast. My H definitely has a problem with impulse control, and I do not. His initial response of "no" saddens me greatly, because he was diagnosed with a lack of healthy boundaries almost 15 years ago, and it has been brought up and discussed frequently as an ongoing problem. For him to still be denying it after all this time is pretty disheartening for me. The second part of his answer where he "shared" the impulse problem with me just makes me shake my head. I don't have a problem planning my vacation ahead, I have a hard time planning one that includes him, but usually manage to do something just for the sake of our son.

I'm wondering if you can help me get a handle on how this is supposed to work from here. My H has an assignment to give me eye contact whenever I want his attention. That would be great under different circumstances, but at this point, I don't want his attention while he still has all his other "bad habits." It's difficult to value him looking me in the eye while he's flipping me off, for example. Dr. Harley said something like this would take 90 days (or maybe it was 60) to accomplish making it a habit. Does that still hold true if he really doesn't have any opportunity to practice it with me? I'm really not interested in being his test dummy. And do we wait until he has this one down before we go on to the next? At that rate, we'll be well past the 4-year mark before he even touches on the stack of issues.

We see that pretty commonly - when we can talk someone into intentionally changing their habits, the problems can be solved.

I'm a little concerned we did not hear from Remark today.

Thanks for everyone's responses. Mel, I give you and your H kudos for getting through your issues! I could certainly see that spiraling out of control.

I'm still looking for an answer to this post, if anyone has any thoughts.

He will be working on ALL of his love busters at once, not just one at a time.

I know it hasn't even been a week, but I feel like I'm hanging out there rather precariously. I like plans and I seem to be missing it if there is one. You indicated that my H is supposed to be working on ALL of his LB's, but does HE know that? I know he's aware that he's supposed to be making eye contact and sending a daily email to Dr. Harley, but the seven things on his "list" certainly don't encompass everything. And because of the state of our relationship, some of it is difficult to measure. For example, eye contact becomes pretty irrelevant when I purposely don't look at him (too painful dealing with all his other LB's.) And does it matter that he hasn't sent an email to Dr. Harley since Wednesday? I'm sure his excuse is that he was visiting family out of town, but does that violate #3 on this list (stop making excuses)?

After years of dysfunction, I've developed a fair number of coping mechanisms that I'm not prepared to just throw out because now he's doing "the plan," especially since he's claimed that for some time. For example, we don't POJA successfully, so with his family, I just agree with whatever he wants because I know it's pointless to disagree or share a differing opinion, and then I just make the best out of it. So he would probably say the weekend was great because he got what he wanted and I wasn't complaining, but it certainly doesn't reflect POJA. We also had an altercation on the way home in which he almost let my dog get hit by a car, but the brief discussion we had about it looked very much like our typical discussions. I'm not expecting him to change overnight, but should I? How do YOU determine whether he's making progress or doing what he's supposed to?

Here is just my 2 cents....perhaps just concentrate on the things that irritate you the most, and forego the others for the time being. For instance, if he can learn to give you eye contact and really listen during normal conversation, wouldn't that be a big improvement? Trying to make him change so many things at once may be too overwhelming. Try to relax on the other less important irritants. He may get better within a month, but may backslide from time to time. You'll need to see a big effort on his part. It's the only way you'll know if this can work.

It sure does. I'm not seeing any effort on his part, and I would take a look at Dr. Harley's article "when to call it quits."