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Old Mar 14, 2015, 05:38 PM
CarefulHands CarefulHands is offline
Junior Member
 
Member Since: Dec 2014
Location: U.S.
Posts: 10
Thanks everyone for your replies and advice.

Rose, I think I may have over-condensed my post; I could easily write way too much so I was trying not to go overboard. I also wanted to avoid being unfair to him since there are two sides to every coin. But here is my perspective. I know it's long, but it's still "the short version," haha.

During counseling, I realized that throughout the relationship I've often felt emotionally unsupported when I needed to lean on my husband. Instead of empathizing, he would minimize my experiences, invalidate my feelings, criticize how I was coping, and shame me for trying to get my emotional needs met, frequently saying that he "wished I was a stronger person.” ("Be a stronger person" = "stop having so many feelings, or have the decency to stop bothering me with them.") In addition to acting superior, he could also simply act too self-absorbed to be bothered. I can give examples if it helps but for the sake of brevity, that's the gist of it.

He did a little individual therapy around the same time as our marriage counseling, (as did I,) and I think that both types of therapy helped him become more aware of when he was being insensitive, which he has been working on. He used to say things that were hurtful and refer to it as "honesty." When I told him I was hurt, he would say he refused to lie to spare my feelings, and accuse me of being too sensitive. After his time in therapy, he says fewer insensitive things and will usually apologize if he says something hurtful, instead of blaming me for being hurt.

Our T focused a lot on helping him get in touch with his own emotions, which he was extremely cut off from. He used to tell me regularly that he never feels anger since he is a logical person and knows that there's "no point" in getting angry. Of course he did get angry, because he's human, he just didn't acknowledge it and it would seep out in hurtful, passive aggressive behavior. Because he was so cut off from his own feelings, especially the "bad" ones, (fear, sadness, anger, etc.) he could also be very judgmental of me when I expressed a range of emotions.

He has made some progress in that area, too. He is still limited in expressing his own feelings, which is hard since I connect most naturally through hearing from another person about who they really are and how they feel, and sharing who I am and how I feel. To me, knowing who you really are and sharing that with another person are key to intimacy. When I want to talk to him about my feelings, sometimes I feel like he is "there" with me more than others. At other times, I feel like he is trying to say the right things, and can't always go there emotionally with me, but I appreciate the effort. But there are also times when I feel totally tuned out, and like he can't be bothered. This is really hurtful and it reopens old wounds.

I still have trust issues from times when I felt alone during moments of intense pain when he was not really “there.” I still have trouble feeling free to open up to him and not fearing judgement or stonewalling. The step we were about to move into in counseling was all about addressing wounds from the past, forgiveness, etc. I think working through the past was what I needed right then, but outside of counseling I don't feel free to try to have a dialogue about it.

tl;dr: I think couples counseling could help me to forgive and learn to trust him again. I also think it could help my husband get more in touch with his emotions and his sense of empathy, which may help him to be a more genuine, caring and trustworthy partner.
__________________
All the blood and all the sweat
That we invested to be loved
Follows us into our end,
Where we begin to understand

That we are made of love,
And all the beauty stemming from it.
We are made of love,
And every fracture caused by the lack of it.

-Sleeping At Last