I had another terrible night - 04/27/01 07:29 PM
Well, I'm sorry to say we had another terrible night last night. At this point, I just feel like curling up and sleeping!<P>After you all wrote such great encouragement and such wise council, I thought I made a really smart move. I printed out the whole post and I went up to my spot on Lookout Mountain to re-read everything and think. I came up with some REALLY good stuff--so much so that I wrote it down because I didn't want to forget it! For example, I should seek out an individual counselor right away. I should take the lead on scheduling and going to marriage counseling, whether he comes along or not. I should keep my focus on the future and keep my eyes on the goal. I should start to LIST the positive stuff the we do right and that he does right, so I can have a more positive attitude. Most important of all, I need to DO what I know I need to do, whether he chooses to do his stuff or not--if I know something is hurting him, I need to stop and change whether he does or not because the standard that I hold myself to is: whether I am the woman and wife I am capable of being. It is NOT being the wife I can be if he is the husband he can be! So anyway, as you can see, it was pure gold stuff, and I was very proud of myself for getting my head on a little straighter and taking a little time for myself!! YAY CJ!! <P>I even thought about what, specifically, are the things that are hurting me right now, so that I could narrow it down and not just say, "I feel hurt" (too vague), but rather say, "When XYZ happens, it hurts me." Okay--I'll tell you there were three things: 1) I lost track of me. It's my job to do what I need to do in order to take care of myself, but I didn't and I felt like I was being lost in the shuffle. To fix this hurt, I must spend time for me, and I will need some of his cooperation. 2) I got overpowered. I was not taking care of the things I need to do for me, and by not doing that I lost some of my strength. Then, he came up with a major decision that I did not know about or agree with, and he just railroaded over the top of me, and I let him because I was weak. To fix this hurt, I need to be included in his decisions and be in agreement with them BEFORE they are made on both of our behalfs. You know POJA. 3) I feel unimportant. After we reconciled, he spent a lot of time with me, talking and acting like he was interested and I was interesting. Now, we wake up at 6am, go to work and work all day, eat dinner together as a family, and then he's back to work again until 10pm! Weekends too! I used to feel second on his list behind work, now I feel like I have fallen off the list! To fix this hurt, I need a commitment of time (you know, 15 hours/week) that HE is committed to, not just me reminding him and him reluctantly going along.<P>Well, all night he acted sort of standoffish. We watched TV and programmed computers all night until the kids went to bed, and we barely spoke at all. After the kids went to bed, I told him that I had a few "revelations" that I'd like to share with him (and I did), and boy! He just tore me to shreds! One by one, he knocked all my golden revelations down, ripped them up, and ended it all by telling me how I was hurting him! Well, I realize that, and I even addressed that by saying that I still need to behave as I know I should, whether he does or not. I feel like SO discouraged and hurt (and tired), I just can't do this!! <P>Man, I thought when we reconciled that I would be getting off the rollercoaster and getting on maybe a merry-go-round or something, but I haven't cried like this in almost a year! What in the heck is happening?<P><BR>CJ<P>------------------<BR>Judge your success by what you had to give up in order to get it.