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Originally Posted by RDMercer
Poshgirl, I'm sorry for what you're carrying. Truly sorry.
My wife has had a chronic long term (years) illness. I've been the sole income earner for a long time, and take on more than half the parenting and household chores.
She went through surgery last month, and one of our kids, and they are both recuperating. Kid had bern sore for a year with multiple ER trips. I took him to all of them.
Wife's friend lost her husband, so I've helped with that home and yard as well. Elderly family members need support, and they have no one else nearby within 60 minutes, so I've picked up some responsibilities there.
I didn't think I had too much on my plate until I wrote that out just now. That looks like a lot.
My blood family.... One parent had health issues and was an alcoholic. I didn't accept I was GIVEN, a lot of responsibility by the other parent. Despite traumas, losses, whatever, I met my family responsibilities and passed everything in school. I worked the whole time, since middle school.
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Yes, that's a lot. How much time do you spend on your own hobbies, interests, passions, goals?
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I'm good at NOT talking about my emotions.
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To be honest, I think some people should *not* force talking too much about their emotions. Some people are better off processing for themselves. Though, it's true too that everyone (except maybe schizoids) needs to express&share sometimes, even if not often.
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I also have always felt like other people's emotions and needs were more important, and that I had to fight to be heard.
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If you take on responsibilities, duties so easily and you are hell-bent on carrying them out always, then yes, that would be closely related to this issue. It kind of is about "spoiling" others, putting them fully in the focus/spotlight. It's a form of codependency even.
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So for the last month or so here, I've been a d.ck. If my wife says, "I need some support," I'm replying, "Why do you always find fault? Why can't you give me some credit for all I'm doing?"
I don't want to be like that.
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OK, what I don't understand is, what in that sentence sounds/feels like to you like she is fault-finding? "I need some support" simply states the fact of needing some support. It does not state anything about how much support was given or not given previously, hence it cannot be a criticism in the factual sense.
Unless you mean she uses that kind of tone/expression....? But the sentence itself as quoted here does not contain any criticism.
However, I do understand that you want to feel like you are being given credit for what you've already done/are already doing.
And being overloaded by responsibilities, duties, is going to make you grumpy easily, that's normal, yeah. So then it is possible that you could see a critical tone where there is none. I'm not saying there isn't such a critical tone, I haven't seen the way your wife expressed her request for support. I don't even know specifically what kind of support she was asking for.
I'm just giving you this alternative possibility that it wasn't intended to be critical. It could be the wrong possibility though, and maybe it was actually a critical expression.
Also I think the overall context matters a lot when reading her sentence.
So for context: Does your wife often ask for your support? (Beyond the duties you are already performing by default.) Does she often express appreciation for it? Do you ever ask for her support? When you do ask for her support, does she readily give it?