Quote:
Originally Posted by Giabrina
And I guess in our relationship when I do explain what I am going to do or ask for his advice on something, he dismisses it and tells me not to do it, that it is a waste of money, why talk to a doctor when you can talk to me, etc. So no, he did not know I was making a phone call to get information about intensive outpatient counseling. He would have belittled me with replies like "nothing is going to help you", "how are you going to pay for that when you have no money" "it hasn't helped in the past, why would it help now" etc., etc.
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Your husband is allowed his opinion, especially when you ask for it. It sounds like he is rather ignorant about mental health care.
But asking for someone's advice does not mean you have to take it or find it helpful or correct or anything else; presumably you ask someone's advice because you hope what they have to say will be helpful in your considerations about what you should do. But what you do, who you ask, what information you use to make your decisions, etc. is up to you.
There is no reply necessary to my giving someone else information about myself. "I am going to call a place today and get some information about their intensive outpatient program." That's not a question or request for opinion, it is merely information so the other person is kept in your loop and if the call happens as it did, your husband is not surprised by the policeman's asking him to accompany him to your home to see if you are all right.
If your husband gratuitously offers his own ignorant, negative opinion
you state, "I'm not interested in your ignorant, negative opinion of what I am going to do; I am informing you of my actions so you will not be surprised with any next steps or conversations we may have as a result of them."
However, I understand where such brutal honesty might not help the next steps or conversations
but one could more gently cut in and just keep with the "I" program, "I am informing you of my actions so you will not be surprised. . ."
I highlighted the "he would have" because you are second guessing someone else. Even if he says the same sorts of things 1,000 times, what he says is about him and he gets the opportunity to express himself each time and perhaps change his mind or say something different; we can't know what someone will say in the future or "would-have-said"; they have to make it exist in the present before they can be responded to in the present by what you feel. Communication has to get tangled if one or both people are responding to would-have-said or with default-ignorant-negative comments.
Any chance you can get him to agree to marriage counseling for the two of you? That might lift some of the load from just your shoulders, help him understand you better and get the two of you communicating more directly so you can work together on your and the marriages problems?