A problem in our marriage was that my wife felt I was not very emotionally intelligent, and she didn't feel "felt".

If you have ever committed to marriage counselling, you will probably have heard of Gottman. It became extremely important for me to connect with my wife and for her to feel heard and felt.

I began down that path in 2013 and I almost went crazy from it. By 2019 I was starting to put up boundaries.

What I found was: there was nothing I could say or do that made her feel like I was on her side or that I loved her or supported her. I "felt" her deeply, and it felt like there was no bottom to her emotional state. It felt like she was utterly consumed with pain.

I started putting up boundaries because I was breaking from co-experiencing what she was experiencing.

One of us had to remain more functional.

In 2020, when everything shut down due to Covid, that was when I began to see that she wasn't even able to empathize with what the kids were experiencing. Her pain was the biggest. She couldn't manage her own emotional and mental state let alone be a support.

The times she and I felt the closest were the times that I assumed the most of her pain and immersed myself the most in her depression.

Anytime that she has found fault with me, the way to come out of it with closeness was to hear and validate her emotions.

Putting up boundaries more in the past two years, and big boundaries now, is unfamiliar to me.

I still very much want to "reach" her.

So, this is hard.

Thanks everyone,

RDM