Hi all,
I am here to ask for advice and support. This is not the first time I am here. I was here back in Nov 2014. my DH (married 25years in Feb) . Have had our ups and downs in our marriage life. it has not always been unahppy but when I think back of the years we could of had a better marriage. But now everything seems like a big sore what is full of puss and keeps erupting its needs to be cleaned out before it can get better. Unfortunatly my DH doesnt want to work on our marriage anymore. Last year we had 5 months of a great time together and since a long time I had fallen in love again with my DH. So I know this program works. We had sessions with Steve and he was just fantastic and able to communicate with my DH. But the only thing we had trouble was the communication the rules for negatiating just didnt get through to him. For every issue we had big or small we couldnt even get past the first one. It was like banging my head against a wall. I would say what I thought or think of something but he just couldnt repeat back what I mean or just didnt want to. I would listen to him ask him is this what you mean. If he would say no he would get unpatient and I would ask can you say it again from a different angle. And then I would get it. But he would never understand me. Or he would and just do his own thing anyway. Steve at the time said to me that he had a lot of personal issues. What is so true. anyway i am not an angel either and have stuffed things up too by being either sarcastic or my annoying behaviour by not saying what is the matter in a nice way but go seighing around. For me it became worse when he said he is not working on the marriage anymore and he still hasnt forgiven me for the debt I caused on the credit card (even though many and many a times I asked for forgiveness and he had forgiven me I said that at the time now are you sure you forgive me for that and he said yes) Anyway the last time when I got to know this program my DH and me had seperated He had left very angry I was told to write him a letter and that before coming back that he needed to work on his anger and get help for his porn addiction. And that I would like him to get counceling from Steve. He said he would talk to him and from there things began to change. But the disagreements we had after the lovely 4 /5 months became worse and he shut down and did not want to do this anymore. He said he had enough. Also have had no touch or sex for 7 months. He also suffers from depression. He has been without work for almost 2 years now. He used to go to church but is not anymore.Onbly cause the pastor preach something wrong. He blames everyone for everything except himself. He is a pridefull man.(I am not complaining about this but to give you a picture of what is the matter with him) I believe he could be suffering from Post traumatic stress. Now all that is ofcourse a problem but we can deal with that with help etc. But because he cant see how he is hurting himself and myself and the children its a vicious circle/. He doesnt communicate. Sit for hours behind the computer watching war movies anything about war documentary etc. It even that worse now that he is watching war movies in Russian. cause he seen all the english ones. And unfortunatly he is back in his porn or maybe he never stopped. So now this is unacceptable to me. I dont like to be abused anymore. At the moment I am house sitting at a friends place and I dont want to go back to him as he is just very unpleasant. Even the kids dont like to be with him anymore. And I get accused of that I keep the kids away from him. Now I need to go back to square one again and write a letter I suppose to let him know I want him to leave or I leave until he gets help. This time tho I need to see fruit etc. But altho I still love him because I know he can be a very nice person. But he is in a very dark place right now. Please could I have some advice to do the right thing.

Desperate Sue

Hi DesperateSue, welcome to Marriage Builders. Dr. Harley would most likely suggest that you separate and stay separated until you see some radical changes for at least a year. He typically suggests writing a letter telling him what you will need for a happy marriage. If nothing happens in 3 weeks, you should separate. Please read this article: When to Call it Quits

Also, did you post here in the past? What was your posting name? Can you break your posts into paragraphs? Your post is very hard to read.

Hi MelodyLane,
My name was suedesperado. I forgot all my passwords and loginns so I changed it all.

Sorry about the long story I wrote. I shall break it up. Its also all over the place. I know. There is so much to share to get a full understanding of the matter.

And I do know I need to seperate from him. But him being so depressed is this going to get worse?

I also know I have not been doing my part of the program last year. It all fell to pieces after he said he is not doing this program anymore. It was like all so artificial. Being with a depressed person who doesnt think he is is like banging your head against a brick wall.

Altho his emotianal needs were for me to be open and honest. I have done that. When we did the quastionarie last year he did not fill in much and it was very hard for me to do his emotional needs.

He also has trouble filling mine. He doesnt even love himself I think how can he love someone else.

should I write a letter to him that he has to move or we move. and how should I write that?

I shall make paragraphs in my first letter also have to say English is not my first language. Sorry if I dont make any sense sometimes.


Hi all,
I am here to ask for advice and support. This is not the first time I am here. I was here back in Nov 2014. my DH (married 25years in Feb) . Have had our ups and downs in our marriage life. it has not always been unahppy but when I think back of the years we could of had a better marriage.

Unfortunatly my DH doesnt want to work on our marriage anymore. Last year we had 5 months of a great time together and since a long time I had fallen in love again with my DH. So I know this program works. We had sessions with Steve and he was just fantastic and able to communicate with my DH.

But the only thing we had trouble was was the communication esspecially the rules for negotiating. It just didnt get through to him. For every issue we have no matter big or small we couldnt even get past the first one. It was like banging my head against a wall. I would say what I thought or think of something but he just couldnt repeat back what I mean or just didnt want to.

I would listen to him ask him is this what you mean. If he would say no he would get unpatient and I would ask can you say it again from a different angle. And then I would get it.

Now if I had something to negotiate it was like he not even listening to me and he would disagree and just does his own way. So it was like he would never understand me. Or he would and just do his own thing anyway.

Steve at the time said to me that he had a lot of personal issues. What is so true.

I alaso wanted to do the accountability program but he did not wanted to spent money on tha. Also a note that someone paid for our counseling sessions. I always felt he was not even grateful for that.

anyway i am not an angel either and have stuffed things up too by being either sarcastic or my annoying behaviour by not saying what is the matter in a nice way but go seighing around. For me it became worse when he said he is not working on the marriage anymore.

When we started the course and started to talk about things I found out that he had an unforgiviness towards me about the credit card I once used and put a debt on for N$5000. I never really knew how deep that hurt was. Altho (it doesnt matter now anymorebut) at the time he bought a tv, dvd, bd and a sky prescription. (we had no tv for over 15 years because I dont like tv for the reason he always sits behind and watching all sort of stuff and when the kids were young it was not such a good idea) and he bought it all without telling me it suddenly was there. So I was very mad and i bought all these things on the credit card (family games, good family tv series dvd's family holidays etc).

Anyway when we got talking about this subject and I found out about the unforgiveness I asked him for forgiveness and he said he has forgiven me and I asked this are you really really sure. And he said yes. But I had to find a job and pay for it all back. (in the meantime he had a redundancy money from work, tax returns and he never paid one cent to help get this right.

When we had a disagreement he got angry with me again somewhere in September/October and he brought the credit card up again and he said he still hasnt forgiven me for the debt I caused on the credit card (even though many and many a times I asked for forgiveness and he had forgiven me I said that at the time now are you sure you forgive me for that and he said yes)

So one day I was praying and asked God for a job. A few hours later this lady comes in and asked if I wanted a job. Well I was so excited. I am now almost paid of the credit card but he still brings up the credit card.

So to come back to the beginning of it all. In 2014 when I got to know this program my DH and me had seperated He had left very angry I was told to write him a letter and that before coming back that he needed to work on his anger and get help for his porn addiction. And that I would like him to get counceling from Steve. He said he would talk to him and from there things began to change.

But as I said the disagreements we had after the lovely 4 /5 months became worse and he shut down again and did not want to do this anymore. He said he had enough. Also he has not touched me or have sex for 7 months. He also suffers from depression. He has been without work for almost 2 years now.

He used to go to church but is not anymore. Only because the pastor preach something wrong. He blames everyone for everything except himself. He is a pridefull man.(I am not complaining about this but to give you a picture of what is the matter with him) I believe he could be suffering from Post traumatic stress. Now all that is ofcourse a problem but we can deal with that with help etc. But because he cant see how he is hurting himself and myself and the children its a vicious circle/. He doesnt communicate. Sit for hours behind the computer watching war movies anything about war documentary etc.

It even that worse now that he is watching war movies in Russian. cause he seen all the english ones. And unfortunatly he is back in his porn or maybe he never stopped. So now this is unacceptable to me. I dont like to be abused anymore. At the moment I am house sitting at a friends place and I dont want to go back to him as he is just very unpleasant.

Even the kids dont like to be with him anymore. And I get accused of that I keep the kids away from him. Now I need to go back to square one again and write a letter I suppose to let him know I want him to leave or I leave until he gets help. This time tho I need to see fruit etc.

And ofcourse I still love him because I know he can be a very nice person.But I am not in love with him. He is in a very dark place right now. Please could I have some advice to do the right thing.

Or Should I stay and keep doing the program full-on giving him all his emotional needs. I know he is hurting but so are we.

Desperate Sue

I found your thread from November 2014 and it looks like we gave the same advice back then: http://forum.marriagebuilders.com/u...suedesperado&Search=true#Post2828540

Yes Melodylane, that is right. We can work on this marriage and even if he agrees again to do all the counceling and whatsoever. I personally believe nothing is going to change until he seeks help for his depression first. Everyone agrees he needs profesional help but he is the only one who either doesnt want to see or cant see it. I am worried that if I leave that it will bring him over the etch and is going to do silly things. But I also know I have to think of me and the children.
Thanks Melodylane for showing me the old tread.
Desperate Sue.

Have you written Dr. Harley before?

No I have not written to Dr Harley before. But we had phone sessions with Steve Harley. We had about 7 or 8 sessions. The last one he didnt want to anymore as we had a conflict and had enough of this programm. As I said he needs to sort out his personal issues. And no one can make him to that. He has to be willing to do that.
All the books probably tell me to leave him. :-(

Sue Desperado

Separating might be the very thing that motivates him to get help for his depression, though. If he is depressed and refusing help then you should make that a condition in your letter. He hasn't been otherwise motivated from what you say.