I have been married for 3.5 years and have been separated for 4 months. During the time of the separation alot has changed with me. When my husband and I first met and married we were both in chuch. After we married, my husband turned his back on the church and left my there. There is a 9 year age difference between my husband and I. My husband is older. I feel like I have been let down so much in the marriage and my husband is not a man of his word. I do not trust anything my husband says at this point. He says one thing but does another. My husband backed out of buying a house 3 weeks before closing. During the course of an argument, my husband told me to get out of his house (I moved in with my husband when we married). During the course of the separation, I purchased a house without my husband. Within the last couple of weeks, my husband told me that he wants to come home. HOWEVER, I think that we should go to counseling but he refuses. He wants to move to my house and see how things go and if we need to go to counseling he says he will go then. My opinion is that I do not want to put a band aid over the hurt and hope for the best. Our marriage can not be reunited without counseling. Are my requirements too harsh?

Hi Armymp - welcome to SYMC.

So tell me a little more. No children? First marriage? What brought about the separation?

Are your requirements too harsh? I dunno. That's really more about how you are coming to what they are and how you are presenting them than it is about the actual requirements themselves.

You always have the right to decide the boundaries of your relationship. Doing so from a place of compassion (not the same as nice, btw) is the determining factor of healthy and positive as opposed to controlling and negative.

Glad to have you

P

Penny

No we do not have any children. May 21 will be our 4th anniversary. This is my second marriage my husband's first. I think the tension has been in our marriage for some time now.

For much of the marriage I carried us. My husband lost his job approximately a year into the marriage and I had to step up which I had no problem doing for a while. However, after my husband lost his job, he went through a period of not knowing what he wanted for himself. He was trying to find himself, so he did not have a job and was not looking for a job.

My desire has always been to buy a house by the age of 30 and I let that be know from the beginning.

My husband recently got hired and is making good money. However he still feels insecure because I make more than he does.

I dont understand because it is not an issue for me. It doesnt matter to me and I never bring it up! He doesnt contribute to the household bills! and he doesnt appreciate what qualities that I bring to the table.

Dont get me wrong I am no angel. I refused to cook or clean because he wasnt doing his job so I didnt feel like I should have to do mine. I know that that was wrong.

But approximately 5 months ago, my husband went to sleep while cooking and the house caught fire. Thank God he wasnt hurt but the kitchen was destroyed and there was smoke damage everywhere.

I told my husband at that time that I did not want to stay in the house while the renovations were underway. I wanted to move anyway because we had outgrown the house and I felt insecure because my name wasnt on the house and he could say get out at any time.

At that time my husband was gung ho about purchasing a new home. About three weeks before closing, we got in a HUGE knock out dang down argument. I wanted to drive his Tahoe and he told me that I could not drive it without him in the truck with me. This infuriated me!! I helped him with his truck note when he didnt have the money to pay for it. He bought this truck against my wishes! He knew that I wanted to buy a house but he bought the truck and said now we can start saving for the house now!!

He was half asleep when I told him that I was taking the truck. He got up out of his sleep and drove me to Wal-Mart!! I let the anger build up because I was too mad to talk about it. But I told him that since the only thing in the house that was in my name was the cable bill, I wasnt paying anything that didnt have my name on it. He in turn told me that he was going to call the realtor and tell her that he didnt want to buy a house with me.

I thought he was bluffing until the realtor called me. The seller threatned to sue us but he was not interested. He said some things during the argument that should not have been said but he told me to get out of his house! and I did!!

My worse fears had come true. Even after things cooled down, I told him that I apologized for the things that I had said and his reply was "me too". He never said I didnt mean it when I said get out or anything.

So I am bitter and resentful. I cant just go back to the way things were. He said that he is resentful because I purchased the house without him and his name is not on the deed.

After all the smoke had cleared, he stated that he never wanted to buy a house at the time in the first place so I feel like he was playing with my feelings because he knows how important to me that home ownership is.

And he said that he just wanted to spend some time with me thats why he didnt want me to drive the truck. which I think is a TOTAL lie!!

My problem is that I have a hard time forgiving and I dont think it will go smoothly if we start back living together like nothing happened.

[edited to add white space]

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Penny_SYMC,

Ok - I'm going to go edit your post -- just to put some white space in - I won't change any of the content. I find that as I get older my weird dyslexia thing or whatever it is is less forgiving.

Back in a bit.

P

Ok! That's better!

So you guys are under 30 or thereabouts? What happened in your first marriage?

How did you meet and how long did you date?

What was it that you loved about your husband? What did he love about you?

All relationships go through difficult times. They're supposed to. It's how we learn to face our fears and to grow and evolve from that experience. The fact that you have disagreements and different goals and priorities is utterly normal. It's what you do with them that decides how much you learn, how much you grow, and how fulfilling your relationship is to either one of you.

There are a couple different aspects of that. The first is the personal work on your own reactivity. Your resentment is about you ... not about what he does or doesn't do but how you internalize and process those things. Anger falls into that statement as well, and fear, and all those things that make us uncomfortable in our own skin. And, of course, the same is true for him. His resentment and anger and fear are about him not about what you do or don't do. Being able to get calm, grounded, rational, and clear is personal work that no one else can do for you (or you for them, for that matter).

The relationship side to that is how you play off of and learn from each other in through these experiences. How do you take your unique personalities, fears, dreams, hopes, triggers and create something that builds a foundation, a family, a shared life? How do you learn about yourself and each other by staying calm and connected even when your partner is not?

The house and the truck and the money are not the issues. They're the smokescreens that trigger the issues. If it wasn't those things it would just be something else. So the questions to ask are: What am I really afraid of here? What are my values? What are my boundaries? How do I value myself in the deepest sense of the word? How do I value my partner? What is the work I need to do to grow more fully into me?

Of course you don't want to go home and just pick up where you left off! That just brings you right back to where you are now. So what is it YOU need to do differently? What personal and relationship skills could you work on? How can you approach your husband differently? What are you going to do about your anger and resentment (hint: they're yours to deal with not his to fix)?

Great opportunities for personal work!

P

The second

Penny,

I havent posted in a while and this will be my last post! This site was recommended to me by my best friend who is also a part of this site. He thought that it would be a place where I could get advice about my separation well it turns out that my marriage is going back in the right direction. I have found that since I have become the object of Wil and T marriage like I and Wil's friendship is the problem quite frankly I do not agree with what others have had to say about opposite sex friendships. My and Wil's friendship did not cause the problems that he and his wife are having. Just because others have had affairs with their platonic friends doesnt mean me and Wil will. It is not fair to predict my future choices off of others past poor judgment. I do not feel comfortable posting on this site so I wont. Thank You for all the help that you have given to me!!