I think I've reached the last straw, I even read "Boundaries in Marriage", but I'm still at the end of my rope. My husband and I have had many issues over the past two years but this one cinched it. He told me he was upset because last summer I had applied for a job in Horseshoe Bend and shortly after had gone driving through my old neighborhood looking at trailers. He wanted to know why I hadn’t told him. Well, the main reason I was even considering leaving was because when he hurt my feelings, or insulted me, or any other problem happened and I tried to get him to talk to me, he would put me off. Sometimes it was late at night, ok, I understand that one. But then I tried in the morning, well in advance of time to leave for work so we would have ample time to discuss things, and he would say “It’s Monday and that’s not an appropriate time to talk, wait”, then that afternoon he would say “It’s a week-day, if we talk about it and get all upset, we won’t get any sleep, wait until Friday”, and then on Friday it would be something like he had to go take care of a family member or something and on Sat. there would be the kids around, or another family obligation he would have to take care of, or something terribly important on the TV he was watching at the time. So I finally gave up, figured he didn’t care how our relationship went, or at least how I felt about things, he only cared that he didn’t have to deal with anything but his own issues and satisfaction, and I decided to look and see what was out there as options. I didn’t tell him I was looking because #1-I wasn’t sure I wanted to go; #2 I knew any mention of leaving would cause him to “blow-up” and I wanted to be sure I had a back-up in case it either became unbearable or he kicked us out, I needed a job before I could consider a trailer and I wasn’t sure I would get the one I interviewed for and I needed a trailer or someplace to take my family to if he did make us leave; #3 I know him well enough after 2 years to know he can’t handle any kind of discussion of his shortcomings or mistakes-he won’t acknowledge them and won’t allow anyone to mention them without either bullying them into taking it back or twisting the conversation until he seems right anyway and I knew any such conversation was futile after all the attempts I had made at getting him to talk to me as mentioned above. Now he says I didn’t try very hard at getting him to listen. I reminded him how many times I’d tried and he said “What about the following Monday, and the following Tues. and so on? You should have kept on trying.” For how long? Months, years? I told him I had gotten depressed over it and finally given in to looking for options. He tried to twist it around by saying “Well I’m sorry you suffer from depression.” in a condescending way, like he was trying to make it sound like I had a mental disorder, he was trying to discount the problem and make it all my fault. <p>
The last straw. Sam was upset with Pat because he had overheard a phone conversation she had with a girlfriend in which she called him an unkind word. Then, later, he got onto the kids because they had been making noise in the house at 10:30am and he thought I was sleeping. This made Patti mad and she came into my room and complained. Sam had a fit, said she had no right to do so. Then he started naming off all the things he was mad at her about, then started saying I was a poor mother because I let her go with her girlfriend out driving and shopping (she’s gone about 3 times, usually on Friday). I put a time of 10:30 for her to be home and they have to call-in at 8:30. She has done so each time except the last one where she called at 8:30, then again at 10 to ask if she could go home with her friend and spend the night, she stated they had already got the ok from the friend’s mom for her to stay and I let her. The next day her friend had to go to work and since it was 30 mi. to bring Pat home, she dropped her off at my mother’s (5 mi. from the friend’s house) and I picked her up later that day. He was also mad because the girls had eaten at the local Mexican restaurant and she had been talking to an 18 year old boy and had given him her phone number. When he called and I told her she couldn’t see him, she stopped, however, he called again about 2 weeks later and Sam said she must have been still flirting with him. He was yelling about that also. After he calmed down and left the house, I decided to go and visit my friend Lona and after I was going to drop the kids off at my mom’s so we could work on the problems. He came home as I was getting Lona’s Christmas present ready to go (I may not get to visit her before the holiday as she sometimes goes to Missouri), and he started yelling, accusing Patti of convincing me to take them out of the house and when I told him I was going to visit my friend, he said I was a liar. When I told him I told the kids they had to go to Grandma’s he accused me of being a liar again. I left and dropped James off at my mother’s, but Patti came home after going to Lona’s. On Sunday, I went to my mom’s to pick up James and as soon as I left the house, he called my mother and told her alot of things he’d told me, like that I was an irresponsible mom and all the things we had been doing that he didn’t approve of. In addition, he went through Pat’s room and things and then removed her phone (never bothered to talk to me about what he wanted to do, I feel he should have included me, and he waited until I left and then did this). My mom told me he’d called, but the way she told me, it sounded to me (and she said to her) like he wanted her to tell me what he wanted to say so we could resolve things. But when I got home he started yelling at me and Patti and telling me how he had gotten one step ahead of me and told his story before I could “lie” to my mother, then he yelled at Patti for about 10 min., then at me and I finally told him the things he had done to upset me. This was the last straw, he never should have interfered with my family and tried to drive a wedge between my folks and myself, that’s just not right. Anybody out there have comments/advice? Thanks in advance!!
