New Every Day,

Thank you for sharing. Your issues while having some similarities are a bit different than mine. I do appreciate that you 'dumped' on me as it gives me a better perspective of your relationship dynamic with your exH - I am here to figure out what makes relationships 'work' - that is part of the process. I 'get' the shoes in the car, I also had old towels, an extensive first aid kit, snacks, and some other clutter too when I was being 'Mr. Mom' to my children, my wife doesn't mind the additional things (other than the trash it generates), as the snack part is her enjoyment too when on longish trips and if they were going to play in the local river, and an extra set of clothes too.

I equate drinking as having the potential for substance abuse. Moderation is okay, like one or two drinks with a meal; however, if it is more than that, there is potential for a bad outcome. On rare occasions my wife binges alcohol (when she is really upset), but not often, I can count the number of times on one hand in the past two decades. I can see if the AOs were linked to his drinking where this would be a very difficult situation for you.

I too am guilty of overeating myself, my wife also has emotional eating. While I would like to be in better shape, as would my wife. The need for physical attractiveness is not really a high level need for me, nor for her from what I can observe. It is 10th place out of 10 Dr. Harley lists for me, as I have 'no room to talk' and I accept her appearance no matter what it might be.

I know how you feel when you feel 'controlled and resentful' as I feel that too, the word 'contempt' comes to mind for me. I wasn't kidding with regards to those 30 hours in a day, my wife's expectation back then was for me to do an impossible 30 hours worth of work every day, and when these weren't met, ENs were withheld by her. I later came to learn that 'unrealistic expectations' is a form of emotional abuse / control issues. I have throttled that back on my efforts; however, I don't mind doing up to 30 hours of domestic support in a week (I'm retired) in addition to meeting other emotional needs, even though doing as little as 10 hours as you suggest would be a fantasy for me as things do need to get done around the home [laundry, dishes, cleaning, yardwork, repairs and maintenance].

There is some good news is that I can finally see the results that my wife is working hard on severely reducing her 'expectations' for the past two weeks with her own individual therapist and her stated expectations have dramatically shifted for me - for right now it seems 'too good to be true'. I strongly suspect, her and her T are going over my journal entries that I e-mailed to her T where I documented 75-1/4 hours of DS in a given week with up to 16 hours per day - when I did the 16 hour days she seemed somewhat satisfied; however, the ones where I did less than 11 (per day) she wasn't. This has changed, I can tell she is still very irritated by my throttling back in this area, I can tell she it biting her tongue very hard on this, but it needs to change as I have directly said it generates 3 of the 4 horsemen of Gottman - our couple's T uses Gottman, but is open to Dr. Harley's methods - I use whatever works, and I think Dr. Harley's methods have the best chance of success based on my research for my wife's personality type. I am thankful this is happening; however, I am not sure if this is sustainable for her.

Less than a year ago, my stating that I was going to be throttling back my hours in order to do some 'me time' or 'self-care', was the apparent cause of her most recent suicide attempt this past May when I first understood that I was in a predominately emotionally abusive relationship. So, I am proceeding down this new path with the utmost of caution.



I can see your husband's perspective, even if it would seem on the surface to be superficial. Personally, I am within 10 pounds (3%) where I married her almost two decades ago. Whereas my wife is a bit more than that. Her physical appearance is the least of my complaints, in fact, I think it affects her more than it does me - so it is a non-issue for me.

With regards to keeping a house, it is next to impossible to keep it at museum quality levels of neatness (that is my wife's expectation of me, to be like her mother), especially with children in the mix; however, to me some clutter is okay with me. I have built many storage areas, my wife occupies those with 90% of her stuff [which she calls half it 'family property' like holiday decorations, her cooking toys, etc], so my stuff, and the kids stuff do not have home on the shelving systems I built, so I am accused of not being as neat as I should be. If I look at her parents and her brother, my level of mess is fractional to her brother and her father (both are hoarders), but her mother (my MIL) keeps her area of the house neater than most museums with nothing out of place - more of the all or nothing type thinking. My level of clutter is comparable to my wife's yet, I am held to her mother's standards. My daughter has compensated by becoming a minimalist (getting rid of everything except the absolute minimum amount of clothing and things that she absolutely needs) to meet my wife's expectation of my MIL's standard, which is another emotionally unhealthy issue altogether.

I too am glad my wife is *finally* working on our marriage at the 'same time' - together - it feels like the first time ever even though we have seen at least 7 couple's T's over the years totalling more than 4 years of therapy with the majority happening since 2019. I suggested doing Dr. Harley's program two months ago in 'couple's therapy', and it was outright rejected by her. I am currently 'cautiously optimistic' about this. While I will voice my request that she initiate some ENs, I won't dwell on it, or 'coaxing' as you put it. We have come a long way to almost get to the starting line of Dr. Harley's program, I still don't have a full 'buy in' from her. We have one more video to watch "Program 5 - The Plan (Part 2 of 2)" before I broach that topic.

The only video other video that my wife has not watched, that might be triggering for her is the "Infidelity: What every couple should know" based on what she has done with casual acquaintances who are the parents of my children's friends and a life coach who befriended me in a online group therapy type setting. This one I will pre-watch before watching it with her. What is your opinion on this video if you have seen it? Should I encourage her to watch this video or not prior to actually starting Dr. Harley's program in earnest?

Once again, thank you for your time on this matter.

Take care.

Have you heard back from Dr. Harley? Are you going to resend the email?

Brain Hurts,

Yes, I did follow up with an additional e-mail, and included the 'office' address.

Within a few hours of the 2nd e-mail, I got a personal response from Dr. Bill Harley. He apologized indicating that he had not seen my first e-mail.

He offered up for me to do the following questionnaires with my wife that is available on the website:

• The Emotional Needs Questionnaire, the
• Love Busters Questionnaire, and the
• Marital Problem Analysis

Which he indicated that once this is completed that it should help guide me to a resolution in my marital issues.

Additionally he said the following books will guide me as well:

• His Needs, Her Needs,
• Love Busters, and
• Five Steps to Romantic Love

=====

This is where I am in the process, my wife and I need to finish the introductory video series at https://www.marriagebuilders.com/videos.htm, we still need to view "Program 5 - The Plan (Part 2 of 2)". I will purchase the Five Steps to Romantic Love (workbook version from Amazon since the marriage builders bookstore doesn't have this version). What version do you recommend?

I will then download and print the three questionnaires from above and do them with my wife. Once this is completed, I will contact Dr. Harley again with a list of questions that I will generate based on both my answers and my wife's answers.

Do you have any other suggestions and/or comments?

Sailor

Sailor thanks for the link, I’ve been here since 2005 and never saw those videos before. I’ll listen today while I work from home. It sounds like you have a great plan there, as well as getting the workbook. To get on the path of making the most love bank deposits.

I was sorry to read about your daughter not being able to keep things in her room, I hope this changes soon as you makes changes in your home.

The videos are a simplified version of the books going over the basic concepts and applying them. My wife says a lot of the stuff resonates with her - I am interpreting this as a 'good thing'.

Regarding my daughter's minimalist tendencies... or 'not being able to keep things in her room' - that is a 'catch-22' type scenario for her. She has AN - and likes to be 'in control'. She controlled her weight in a very bad way - she is now in full remission on this, and has discovered her 'sweet tooth' but still eats healthily. She controls her grades and is an 'over achiever' on the opposite end of the spectrum and by societal standards she is a tremendous success - but at an emotional cost. Both my wife and I have encouraged her to keep her things, especially with sentimental value, and that is an issue. The catch-22, my wife wants to have a spotlessly clean house without clutter, only my daughter can meet my wife's impossibly perfect demands (my wife can't even meet her own demands, even though my wife was doing that when we first met 22 years ago) and the only way to do that is to minimize the amount of 'stuff' one owns. My daughter consciously made the choice to be minimalist citing her primary reason was to leave when she is finished with HS and could take all of her stuff with her. So, I am quietly monitoring the situation, and only taking action(s) when warranted - for the most part I am encouraging my daughter with her methods of minimizing her exposure to toxic behaviors from me and my wife.

My daughter wants to leave the house as soon as she is able to at 18 yo (upon completion of HS degree + simultaneous two year college degree), I am encouraging this independent behavior (a 'love buster') against my wife's wishes, as it will remove my daughter from the 'toxic' home environment. My daughter initially indicated her intent was to go 'no contact'; however, my goal is to modify her desire, by my actions, in managing the situation to at least 'limited contact' if not something closer when she actually leaves.

This month, she has had two major milestones towards normalization - she has been invited as a HS prom date, and she has felt comfortable enough to invite her friends over to our house for the first time since she was 4 yo. - this happened today (she is on spring break). I am very happy over these developments as the behavioral boundaries are indeed working and things are becoming more 'normal'.

I will update once again, after we have finished our questionnaires, or other significant developments.

I am really happy to hear your daughter is comfortable having friends over again. Great opportunity for FC time as well and sounds like it makes a deposit for you too.

I hope you’re having better luck getting to the radio program, that was a great help too in motivation and encouragement. Looking forward to hearing your updates!

Update:

I too am very happy for my D. My D's recovery is part of the multi-pronged approach with regards to rebuilding emotionally healthy behaviors within my family's dynamic.

My wife has been stressed out this week with a tremendous amount of anxiety. So, when my wife is 'being this way' with her anxiety issues, progress has temporarily halted, we still have one more video to watch together.

Side note: my wife has been [mis?]* diagnosed with anxiety issues, and is medicated for it along with depression.

Due to my wife's current anxiety levels, I am no longer painted white, but painted black. I will raise the issue in our next couple's session this upcoming Tuesday in addition to what my wife brings to the T's attention.

Upon the suggestion of our couple's therapist, my wife has made two major movements in addressing her volunteer workaholism (just one of multiple significant sources of her anxiety) in the past few days due to what our couple's therapist had recommended after I made an observation as to the cause of my wife's anxiousness, and was exceptionally impulsive in nature (she tendered a notice of resignation within hours, in person, of the session from being our church's treasurer after being in that position for better part of a decade). While I personally approve of the changes; however, I don't approve of the impulsivity of it, as I fear the radical change at the same time as my wife may blame me for removing something she is passionate about from her life due to her current mental state, as I was the one who correlated the link of her current, in the moment stress levels to her volunteer work, and the couple's therapists asked my wife several questions prior to making this recommendation in addition to bringing this up with her individual therapist [she did not do this prior to her impulsive decisions].

It sucks having to be walking on eggshells hand-grenades / land mines all of the time (one wrong move and the situation explodes), but that is where my marriage is at.

Regarding 'Marriage Builders' program... As soon as my wife and I watch the next video, I will tactfully ask my wife if she wants to commit to Dr. Harley's process [I need her 'buy in' or 'permission' to do this with her together] I will then reveal to my wife I have been in contact with Dr. Harley via e-mail, and ask her to fill out the questionnaires Dr. Harley requested, and get those submitted to him for feedback with a recommendation on how to proceed. My forms have already been filled out; however, like an ocean-going convoy, we can only travel as fast as the least fast partner, and she doesn't seem too interested in being held accountable for her part of the marriage dynamic.

I would like more positive movement in reconnecting with my wife; however, I do not want to be coercive in nature as there is a fine line of making a reasonable request to being perceived as emotionally abusive with being coercive as it requires change of both partners and in my opinion also requires the consent of both partners, myself included.

I wish I had something better to update you with; however, that is where it stands at the moment.


*According to book "Stop Walking on Eggshells" [mandated reading for new therapists in my state of residence], 3rd Edition, indicates a misdiagnosis of anxiety and depression is the most common misdiagnosis for BPD

Minor update:

As of Monday, my wife and I have finished watching the video series (except the infidelity one at the top of the page), and my wife gave a 'green light' for filling out the questionnaires on Monday. I e-mailed them to my wife and she has printed them out and also shared the blank forms with our couple's therapist yesterday -- who is Gottman trained and describes her method as "Emotionally Focused Therapy" (EFT) and is interested in "Marriage Builders" even though it is more of a "Logic" focused system in my opinion. My wife has her individual therapy later on today -- hopefully that goes well too.

I feel that we finally made our way over to the 'starting line' of our adventure with Marriage Builders (it took just over a month to get this far) and my wife indicated she hopes to have these forms ready by next week.

I just hope and pray my forms do not overwhelm her as they cover all of the things that I mentioned in this thread and then some that we haven't even talked about* - I have already verbally indicated that the AOs (all the different forms of AOs including suicide attempts, divorce/separation threats, false accusations, yellings, etc.) will be listed along with acknowledgments of recent improvements with setbacks.

* My approach for the past year is to tackle one major issue at a time so it isn't overwhelming with her. However, as she is already familiar with most of the topics I listed, I am hoping and praying that it doesn't shut her down emotionally. I have enough material to create at least 24 page single spaced type written pages as described both in the video series than the Marriage Busters book; however, I don't want to do more of a 'blame fest' that I have already done, I am only going to focus on Level 6 issues which are predominantly on the issue of unacceptable levels of 'abuse' and by addressing those major issue; hopefully, the minor issues will also be resolved similar to the 24-page lady after two groups of 3 issues were addressed for her.

The topics that we haven't talked about are minor issues on "Independent Behavior" that I fully support if done in moderation as long as her 'me' time doesn't come at the expense of 'we' time.

Pray for our success if you are a believer, and wish us luck if you aren't for the recovery of our marriage and connected relationships.

Any recommendations and/or suggestions on approaching this would be greatly appreciated considering the level of issues within my marriage? I am predominately interested in avoiding abusive behaviors while simultaneously, constructively and amicably dealing with conflict with enthusiastic agreements? Suggestions? Thoughts?

MAJOR UPDATE - help/suggestions requested

This week, I feel that we finally crossed the 'starting line' on the "Marriage Builder's" program. My wife finished reading the HNHN and LB books last week. My wife finished filling out the forms from nearly a month ago on Monday evening (2-1/2 days ago). Also, on Monday, my wife also apologized for the first time ever on emotional wounds that she has caused in the marriage and towards our children with her AO's - a quantum leap level milestone for becoming 'self-aware'. My wife verbally acknowledged that 'we' need to work on every area, all of the emotional needs and all of the love busters -- and she is willing to address these issues on Tuesday, and she repeated both yesterday on Wednesday - she never before has repeated an apology and taken ownership of an issue in this manner - this is a major breakthrough for my wife in self-awareness.

Yesterday evening we started to share what we had filled out in our respective forms, her perception is in close alignment with my concerns - I hope it is not mirroring of my previously expressed needs and is genuine - I will assume it is genuine unless there are indications otherwise.

A week ago, we celebrated our 20 year wedding anniversary. I took her on a hot air balloon ride, had a nice brunch together at the venue where we spent our 1st night together as a married couple, and then I took her to some Caverns (unplanned spontaneous added activity). So, literally I took her up into the heavens and then down into hell - got a laugh from the couple's therapist on that one. I did this for her when we first met and on our honeymoon, also did this on our 10 year anniversary, and then again last week for our 20th. This is the kicker, she said she loved it, even though she has said that she is terrified of heights and is afraid of being enclosed in an underground cavern. Her actions and behaviors do not match her verbal statements - it is a bit of a conundrum for me since she has enjoyed it from the beginning of our relationship.

Circling back to the Marriage Builder's program, my wife has expressed an inability to meet the 15-hour per week commitment to each other; however, she has expressed that 10 hours is 'doable'. I'll take it, as it is a huge step from her previous levels of engagement towards our marriage which was more often than significantly less than an hour except for the couple's therapy.

Additionally, as soon as we are done sharing our forms with each other I plan on forwarding them to Dr. Harley for his analysis, I am hoping this will happen in the next week.

As I am no longer 'walking on land-mines/hand-grenades'; however, I am still 'walking on eggshells' and I don't want to upset her, while confronting the issues contained within the forms, I am looking for advise from any of the readers on how to proceed while holding each other accountable for meeting each others respective needs with 'enthusiastic agreement' without triggering her on issues that she has been previously triggered on. I plan on using 'radical honesty'; however, I would like to use it as a tool without having the effect of it being a bludgeoning weapon - for me this is a fine line - so I will be rewriting my concerns in SET (support empathy truth) communication which takes about 5x the space before presenting them to my wife (I will keep the original straight to the point version for contrast comparison of the 'Love Buster's Questionnaire'. I am very much aware, that improvement in every area is needed, so I do not want to overwhelm her, yet be firm in expressing the desire for positive progress in recreating our marriage in a positive and healthy way.

Any tips, suggestions, 'lesson's learned' from your own experiences would be greatly appreciated as I feel due to the nature of my marriage, I wish to nurture it in a healthy way instead of doing too much, too fast, which may drown it and wash any progress away. For the most part, I am letting her take it at her own pace, which is not the pace I would like.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you for listening.

P.S. Our couple's therapist indicated that she had recommended the HNHN to several of her other clients too in the past week. I was pleasantly surprised by this remark.

There’s a lot that can be expressed in different language, and I spent a lot of time on this. Do you have the radio app or listen on the web? It comes naturally to them.
I love it when you… instead of a demand
I’d like to … this week. How do you feel about that? instead of walking on eggshells or independent behavior
For the UA time, what are some things you both enjoy doing? Did you two fill out the RC inventory?

NewEveryDay,

Thank you for responding, it is really appreciated.


Yes, I have the radio app; however, it doesn't work on Android, I have complained, and there has been no resolution. So, I am downloading the mp3's, transferring them to my phone and listening to them that way instead, as this is a round about way, I have not listened to as many as I would have liked.

Yes, I am quite familiar with that style of communication and have been practicing that for over half a year, using 'I' pronouns to make my communication less confrontational (critical), and avoiding "you, but, however, except, etc." even before becoming familiar with the Marriage Builder's program. That is a great start for that style of communication, it is the foundation for SET, BIFF, DEARMAN and other more intricate communication styles which emphasize empathy, compassion, validation, etc, and other even less confrontational methods of communications. Depending on the circumstance will determine which method I use, all of which use the "I" pronouns that Dr. Harley & his wife use, the method in the radio program is the foundation for these other methods of communication. Many of these communication styles are just different variations on what Dr. Harley speaks of. For instance the SET - T stands for truth, Dr. Harley's term for that is "radical honesty" - same concepts with different names.

So, instead of "Could you please do ______ for me?" will be reworded to "I really like it when you did ______ for me, I think it would be really nice if I could experience that again."

The problem is that even when using these communication methods, they still have not been responded to [I am thinking that this is 'falling on deaf ears' - a disrespectful judgement on my part which I only am thinking of, but not expressing to my wife, but I am expressing here as an example as it generates contempt on my part], so there is no 'enthusiastic agreement' there. I'm all for it, just waiting for my wife to implement the 'enthusiastic agreement' portion on this. My codependency is so afraid that she will stop this - walking on eggshells - as she is under-responsive.

Here is an example of SET so you can see the similarity:

Instead saying something like "Stop yelling at me, you are making me upset!" SET would be expressed as "I hear you." [Support / validation] "I know you feel upset with me," [Empathy] "and I feel that way too." [Truth / 'radical honesty']

My wife has made great strides with dealing with her 'anger management' issues using some of these methods. I really don't care what the therapists and other mental health professionals call it, as long as it is effective, and they appear to use very similar methods of communication.



Yes, we did that the day after my last update. We have a dozen activities identified (5/6 scores) - now she needs to find the time to do them with me.


Circling back to my own issue where I stated:


In Dr. Harley's book he stated a minimum of 15 hours for a 'healthy' relationship and recommended a minimum of 25-30 hours [for a relationship that is in trouble, such as mine] and occasionally a kid free vacation of 2-3 weeks in certain instances, and not the maximum of 10 hours my wife stated. Right now she is only making her 'spare time' available, and is still not putting our relationship first by her actions in spite of what she professes otherwise.

Since my last post we have done a single 1.5 hour lunch date, and another hour doing the RC inventory since last couple's therapy (I use this as start/stop time for weekly hour counting), and a half hour reviewing the 'marital problems' analysis and the first topic "need for affection" on the emotional needs questionnaire.

So far we have spent 3 hours UA in three different periods on our relationship together (1.5 hours RC & 1.5 hours of IC), and we have 48 hours left in the weekly interval (Tuesday's therapy session, or 16 hours if we are going Sunday midnight to Sunday midnight) to do another 22-27 hours of work - not going to happen. This is a far cry from the three 4 hour long suggestions in the book for UA.

How do you suggest addressing this issue, as I am frustrated in getting this program moving in a positive direction without being 'demanding' and maintaining the "I" expressive communication styles?