Not sure if my marriage will last or if we ever should have gotten married to begin with
IIf you want to read a novel/loosely structured venting, you've come to the right place.
I've been married for 7 years and we've had more ups and downs than I think is reasonable for a healthy relationship. Even before we got married we had a lot of back and forth with things being rocky and then good. There were times in college I'd be at my friend's house at least once a week because something turned explosive, he verbally abused me and stormed out and I didn't know what to do. My friends probably did and still do think I'm dumb for being in this relationship. He had a rough childhood, has PTSD, bipolar 2 and maybe other undiagnosed things. I had a better childhood than most, ADHD, PMDD, among other things that dont always mesh well with his mental health struggles. The reason I stayed initially was i worked in mental health, he was undiagnosed and I KNEW there was more going on. I knew he wasn't a bad person, he just needed help. Once he got that help, I could breathe and it would all get better, right? Eh, kinda but not really.
With him getting on meds and going to individual counseling our fights got less explosive - usually they blew up because he went from 0-60 in the blink of an eye and I am a people pleaser who is uncomfortable with conflict and wants to fix everything now and struggled to give him any space to cool off. There was less verbal abuse, but still things werent great until we finally went to couples counseling after wr got married, he refused premarital counseling (that should have been a hard stop for me right there).
Marital counseling helped a lot the first time. For a while we were pretty good, I felt like maybe I could finally feel like this relationship isn't so much work all the time. Truly I do love the man, he is my best friend and we get along very well, until we dont, and I dont know when that turning point is because he can be very unpredictable and is generally more sensitive than the average person. His family will tell you the same thing and he has always been sensitive.
He's been off his bipolar meds for a while because he didnt like the side effects and thought he could manage just with therapy. I supported him trying, but he never did the therapy part. Its been at least 6 months now. I dont think he sees how much his mental health effects things.
I know I'm not perfect either. I can be defensive, very "one track minded" and only focus on the issue at hand that triggered the argument, basically the symptom of the problem, and not the problem of itself. I get caught up in that, but so does he. PMDD ansd ADHD add to my struggle. I like to be right, so does he, that doesnt mesh well.
It just feels like cycle after cycle of arguments, never fixing anything. My apologies are never good enough, he assumes my intentions are bad and I hurt him on purpose, (As if I married him just to bully him for the rest of hus life??!), I never take enough accountability to satisfy bim. Sometimes he takes accountability and other times he tries to convince me I have no reason to be upset. He will yell at me and call me names, justify it in the moment, calm down later and apologize acknowledging that wasnt okay, only to justify it later with, "It wasnt okay but anyone else would have reacted the same way in that situation."
I KNOW he is capable of being a good partner. I know it takes two people to form a healthy relationship. I'm probably downplaying all of my shortcomings. I'm just hurting a lot right now. Currently he has barely said a word to me since Monday night when I told him I was upset about a couple of things he said. He tried to justify them with no apology and I just gave up on the conversation. There was no fight, it just ended with an "Ok" from me. I dont know why I'm being stonewalled.
I would love to work it out. Despite all this I just typed out, when there isnt dumb crap happening we're great together. We make each other laugh constantly, we spend a lot of time together, share hobbies, we're comfortable being ourselves, I dont like the thought of not having him anymore but I also fantasize about being single. I feel like my husband is two different people mashed into one. My best friend who I love and some senseless jerk who pops up out of nowhere.
I know I myself will be okay without him, I'm not codependent, in fact I'm the breadwinner and manage too much. Nothing is balanced. I do 3/4 of the chores and all of the household management and make like 5x more money and pay most the bills. The money doesnt matter, but the rest sucks. I dont feel like I have a partner either. Ive communicated that but nothing has changed. I even put everything in my head that I manage behind the scenes on a whiteboard so he can pick things to do too, which he agreed to, and he hasnt done a thing. Its been there for at least 2 months.
If youv'e gotten this far, thanks for reading my rant. ♥️
@WhatDidIDoNow
Well that was interesting..
You just told us what it's like to live with a person who's bipolar..
Your frustration and feelings are valid, it will always be challenging to live with a mentally ill person and I applaud your efforts..
I hope everything works out you seem lovely, but your definitely working too hard too keep everything together so I empathize with you totally..🌲
Thank you! He randomly decided everything was fine last night. I asked what was up the last 2 days, apparently he is afraid to interact with me because I have said a lot of rude things lately? So stonewalling me was the answer. This was after I told him my feelings were hurt over:
Him being passive aggressive about me not cooking because I was going to my sisters birthday dinner and I offered to bring him back leftovers. He was closing at work and didnt want leftovers, always refuses to make himself anything so he "has" to buy himself food.
He chose to be offended over something that has nothing to do with him when I was venting about my *** manager.
I am the problem in his head. When he's magically over it, I have to be too apparently.
@WhatDidIDoNow
Ill give you a very honest advice, if he's loyal, if he's a good man, and if he's a good person most times (bcs everyone get angry some time) do not leave him, trust me, I know how it is to lose someone u love, be grateful, be happy
He's loyal. Thankfully infidelity has not been an issue, which is not always the case when someone is having a manic bipolar episode. I don't want to leave, but I dont think him simply being loyal is a good enough reason for me not to at the end of the day. I can't tell you how many times I've been asked, "How much longer are you willing to put up with this?" and told i should set a boundary. Its been our entire relationship.
I’m so sorry this is happening, that sounds tiring. I think it’s important to ask yourself if nothing changed, could you fathom continuing it? I feel like with many people like this, we fall in love with the perfect version of them. The idea of the potential of no problems or issues surrounding them. And you know they’re capable of achieving this. I know some people can overcome the problems, but it sounds like this has been something you’ve been dealing with for a long time. It doesn’t sound like nearly enough change has happened. Sometimes people will never reach the potential they could because they just aren’t willing to, and sadly you can’t be the one to help them there if they aren’t focused on that too.
My view probably sounds really silly seeing as I’m a teenager but I really relate to a lot of what you have to say within my own partner and also my divorced parents. I always feel people, myself included, fall in love with a potential. It’s important to remember that what could be isn’t the current reality and sometimes it won’t ever be reality, you know? That’s just my two cents. I hope everything gets better soon. Hugs 🫂
I think those are some very wise words and it doesnt matter that they're coming from a teenager! Thank you. I certainly did fall in love with the potential version of him. That verson makes an appearance sometimes, but I never know how long he will stay. Maybe a couple weeks, a few months, its never been longer than a year before he starts to drift away again.
Watching your parents and their relationship is an excellent way to learn, whether or not their relationship is successful. Mine have a great marriage and were a fantastic example of how to handle conflict in a healthy way, though I know they almost didnt make it about 5 years into their marriage and its taken time and work for them to get to where they are. My husband's parents were the ones that should have gotten divorced and almost did but stayed together for the kids. Now they're too old to bother divorcing and are basically roommates that bicker a lot, take each other to doctors appointments and sleep in separate beds. My parents have a similar foundation to us with my mom coming from a stable home with parents that had a loving relationship and very little in regard to childhood trauma. My dad came from a family of manipulative alcoholics and started drinking himself when he was 12. Luckily he got his *** together and wasn't an alcoholic by the time he met my mom, but retained a lot of the learned manipulative behaviors from his family. My But they've put in the work and made it work, so in theory why can't we? I know they werent always able to handle conflict the way they do now and did throughout my childhood, I should ask them what it was like when it was bad. My dad doesnt have bipolar or anything so I'm guessing not as severe, but was there verbal abuse? Stomping out? Did my mom want to fix things right away and end up escalating the situation because my dad wasn't ready to talk and wanted space?
Anyway, no I can'tfathom continuing the way things are. Its just an endless cycle of one or both of us being miserable and figuring it out for a little while until it slowly goes downhill again and then we circle back. People always have their ups and downs, but I feel like we have more downs than ups. I know he doesnt see it like that because we have talked about that in the past, but I really think that is because he is used to the chaos and tension since he was raised in it and I wasn't.
This sounds so much like my story. Loving your abuser. Because it IS abuse. Read a little about coercive control. It’s a type of domestic abuse. I wish I had seen it before things escalated really bad and blew up. I don’t really know you or your situation fully so I don’t want to tell you to leave him. But it sounds like he might be holding you back in life and you could do better but you’re stuck under coercive control. I only say this because it happened to me and your story sounds similar. I hope that’s helpful in some sort of way, even if you decide to take the issue to counseling instead of parting ways.
He doesn't control me, in fact he has pretty much just been along for the ride the whole time. He blames me for missed opportunities lol but I didn't MAKE him move where we live, decide to quit pursuing jobs in the field where he got his degree, etc. They were either his decisions or ones we made together, or I thought we did and he never shared his true feelings and that's a him problem if he didnt. I wont disagree that he is holding me back in some regards. I have a strong desire to just go do what I want to do when I want to without considering him at all anymore. We got married at 22 and 24, and in hindsight I absolutely see why older generations encourage us to wait a little longer to get married!
@WhatDidIDoNow
Here's some thoughts.
I wanted to be loved unconditionally. To be loved for who I was, irrespective of my faults. My problem was that I didn't love unconditionally. I hurt a good man by wanting him to be better. Because by wanting him to be better, i didn't love him as he was. It's like a constant criticism. Constantly saying "you're not good enough." It destroyed my relationship.
I had to learn that I didn't love myself unconditionally. I didn't love myself just the way I was, constantly criticised myself. Constantly thought "I need to do better". Never believed I was good enough, just the way I was. I had to get therapy for myself and sort that out, before anything else could come right.
For chores I decided to do what mattered to me. To remember that if I lived alone, I would be doing them all. This meant that if my partner didn't do something or complained I wasn't doing something, it didn't matter, because I was doing what was important to me. It also meant I became grateful for the things they did do. I can assure you that this is a much better motivator than complaining.
I learnt a lot about boundaries. The most fundamental being that boundaries are for me. A great person pointed out that if you share a boundary, it stops being a boundary and becomes a complaint. I had to learn to start acting on my own boundaries, and to stop expecting others to act on my boundaries.
Relationships are hard. And the way many of us are taught to do relationships is quite damaging. Both you and your husband are good people who deserve to be loved. I hope you are able to find the way forward to where you are both happy.
I see what you are saying. I am in therapy now actually and have been on and off for our entire relationship. He has gone for a few months at a time a couple of times, but that is all. Not that everyone needs to be in therapy all the time, but the point being I am always looking for ways to better myself. However, I am accepting of myself the way that I am and the therapy is for me and not for him. I love myself, but I also have my own challanges and want to be better equipped to deal with them. I don't feel like he loves me just the way I am and there's always criticism coming from him. I don't feel like I can be myself without somehow accidentally offending him, and I dont have that problem with anyone else. Some of my friends that hang out with the two of us together observe our interactions and can see instances when I think we are just having a conversation, but something I said was triggering to him and he thinks we are arguing or starts getting irritated. One of my friends is anxious around him because she doesn't know what is going to set him off and is worried she will say the wrong thing. I know I'm not perfect and at times we all may accidentally say or do something unintentionally that upsets someone else, but its so easy to do to him and I don't know when it's going to happen. I cant just be me and relax without him getting upset about something. He assumes the worst and that I am doing it on purpose to hurt him (which I know is a symptom of his PTSD from his childhood.) If he stopped seeing me as this offensive person that is oit to get him, then I think a lot of our issues would be much smaller.
In regard to chores, he is a lot messier than I am, so there would be less to do if I lived alone actually. Sometimes I look around our house and think about that. All of the chores matter to me, but I am forced to lower my standards and deal with constant clutter, dirty bathrooms, frequent piles of dishes in the sink, overgrown lawns and overflowing garbage cans because he can't keep up and I dont have time to do literally everything else plus the stuff he doesn't keep up with. I dont have crazy standards, it doesnt need to be spotless, but I don't want it to be gross and messy all the time either.
Can we not love our partners but also want them to be the best versions of themselves? I understand there is a fine line between encouraging that and criticizing them, which is discouraging. I just stop assuming I'm the enemy and I'm out to get him because if that is the case, why is he still here? He told me a month or two ago that I haven't grown at all, which is completely untrue. Since, Ive had an emotional wall up that I can't seem to break down. I just feel like I'm on the defense all the time because I'm always doing something wrong, but he is far from perfect himself. I just want to be accepted and feel like my feelings matter. If my feelings mattered he would hear me when I say something hurt my feelings. He would care and help out more when I say I'm tired of managing everything and its making me miserable. I feel taken advantage of sometimes for all I provide for him. We live in the house that we do, have the cars that we drive, he was able to get the private student loans he needed to finish college, we have nice things, all because of me. I feel like the sugar mama who just gets beat down for not respecting him enough. Its so hard to meet him where he's at anymore when he won't meet me where I'm at and I feel like all I've done is mature throughout this relationship while simultaneously accumulating trauma.