Couch 171: Scams R Us

((NPC))

When I do a crime, I want you to be my accomplice.

Hugs, Scarlet...That must be so frustrating, all the ER visits with no resolution. And I agree with QM that you don't deserve emotional abuse.

Thanks for sharing, CE. This totally sucks.

H got home last night and we continued our discussion, at least he stopped yelling, but the end result was the same, if I decide to go back to therapy for a couple-3 months whatever I will need to be prepared to also dissolve my marriage.

I am not done with therapy, but I am also not ready to end my marriage.

But saying that I have to ask myself, what kind of a marriage is it, if I have to choose between it and self-fulfillment?!

I am going to see t on Thursday this week and next, will talk about this some and look at my sand tray pictures and make sure she emails them to me, and then that will have to be it for now, until I decide to leave h. Because that's where this is headed. The writing is on the wall.

art—did he give you an ultimatum? What exactly did he say?

I'm sorry Art, that's not fair of your H at all. Also wondering if he officially gave you an ultimatum, or if that's just your reading of it?

everyone seems very needed today.

The world can piss off today.

I'm in a very similar boat, whisper. So many hugs to you.

So again, the doctors found nothing wrong with my H. He's had an ultrasound and a CT scan in basically every place you can. Plus 9x blood work. So I guess the good news is that we're narrowing down the options of what could be wrong: gi track or nerves. But $325 each time he goes...

H did apologize for what he did the other night. Still scares me. I haven't seen his anger in 3 years. I still feel broken. But T has been writing very comforting emails and that's helping a lot.

He said he can't live with my wishy washy (saying I'll quit then going back) (I can't blame him for this I piss myself off) and that I need to choose. He also said after the phone argument. That made me feel even more like crap. At least he stopped talking like that after I told him I did not hang up on him, that I'd thought he hung up on me when the call dropped. Last night after he got home he was grilling me about "why did you start in the first place do you even know?" I said yes and told him. "Why were you going after you fixed that?" I told him. I explained why I'm going back. I told him I'll just go back very briefly to go over the pictures with her and get copies and that's it. 2 sessions tops. I won't work on the other stuff I wanted to. For now we are ok because I agreed to go only twice more.

He also said he's tired of hearing about my worry the last 3 weeks. I said well I haven't had her to talk to, so I've been talking to you which is what you said you wanted. He said well I can't live like that. You need to stop worrying and live your life.

Which is one of my main things in the therapy that he doesn't want ne to go to.

I'm a mess today. Sorry couch.

I don't like your H, sorry Art.

He seems effing threatened by your growth. Also saying he wanted to kill himself after the phone argument, sounds like a suicide threat (emotional manipulation), which I'm super wary of since it's VERY effective.

I was in a friendship where the other party used it to get their way and continually verbally and emotionally abuse me. It doesn't have to be willful malice for someone to act out and subsequently learn things implying "You made me feel like killing myself!" work VERY WELL for controlling others.

Ugh, I'm so sorry, Art. I'd be a mess, too.

First, as QM said, his comment about what he wanted to do after the phone argument is extremely manipulative. (Even if he did legitimately feel that way.) And makes it sound like he needs therapy, too...though I get the sense he's the type who would never go.

The thing he said about not wanting to hear your worries would bother me, too. It makes me think of what my H said a few months ago, where all I talk about is therapy (so not true!) And I was like, "well, you said you wanted me to share more of what was going on in my head, and this is what's going on in my head right now, so..." He's been better about it since then.

Your H clearly doesn't understand anxiety, because, as I'm sure you know, "stop worrying" does NOT work! Along with "there's nothing to be anxious about," etc. I'm sure you wish you didn't worry so much or that you could be more decisive--I know I do (about myself!) anyway--and it's not like you're doing this on purpose to annoy your H. Sorry, I'll stop ranting, I just feel for you.

Any way you can talk to your T before next week? (Or is it this week you see her?)

Ugh. Anyone who uses threats of suicide as manipulation...

I am wondering, though, how he would feel if you saw a different therapist? Is it therapy or this therapist he reacts to? Because I honestly get the sense sometimes that he thinks he and L are rivals.

I’ll also say on that matter that it’s entirely possible you and L have gone as far as you can. Maybe someone else can help better with the worry and anxiety, which seem fairly consistent.

Personally I’d keep the therapist and dump the husband, but you seem attached to him.

Family tried this with me. I responded with "You should do whatever you think is best for you".

They are still toodling around, decade plus later.

Oh Artie I'm so sorry about your H's behavior and attitude. I wish I had something helpful to say other than pick out the things I didn't like in that conversation. It's not easy to just stop worrying!!

It's a shame he can't see how hard you're working in therapy and seems pacified because you've agreed to only two more sessions.

(((((Artie)))))

Would he consider seeing a T?

Do you feel safe? Anger is a normal response but physically acting on it isn't okay. Emotional abuse is still abuse at the end of the day.

(((Artie))) Might be time for some really hard core gloves-off marriage counseling. Like a marriage retreat weekend? Some churches offer them.

Wow, Art--it's like he was just waiting for the opportunity to jump on this.


So your husband throws a toddler tantrum, and it worked. Again. You've decided what it means for the future and made your decision to accommodate him. And again, he gets to not take any responsibility for his life, his emotions, his needs.


Do you not hear his contradictory messages to you: just be happy and make up your mind--but do what I need? And if you don't, I'll make you ultimately responsible by killing myself. "I'll hold my breath until I turn blue." Do you see what childish behavior this is?


I'm sorry, but I don't see any way this repetitious cycle ends until you can declare to him that he's responsible for his life and you will no longer carry his emotional life as your burden. And if it takes forever in therapy to reach that point, so be it. You get to control your life--but that also means you alone have responsibility for your life.


It seems to me that you each spend so much energy shifting your individual responsibility for your individual lives to the other, neither of you are owning your own lives. Which also means neither of you have much to offer the other. And neither of you sound very satisfied with that.

(((Art)))
I am so sorry you are having to go through all of this. It is so difficult dealing with ambivalent emotions.

With this statement, your H is invalidating how you feel.

My H started going to a therapist who really is a good fit for him. It has helped him (and us) tremendously, as he has worked on his controlling behaviors.

Hey, art—just wanted to let you know I’m setting the last test for my summer theories of myth course, and I put a question about Jung in just for you.

ETA: the Couch can be a deeply influential place. I haven’t eaten a Burger King croissan’wich since una said they were the second grossest thing she’d ever had in her mouth.

Art, I went on your profile here because I recalled you having this same issue for awhile now with your H. You actually started a thread last year in August called Marriage or Therapy and discussed how your H wanted to move out because you went back to therapy and were spending all your money on it, etc..etc..etc...(I guess during one of your breaks). Obviously there is so much more that your H has not come to terms with. He’s still stuck in the same spiral and you are growing. It looks like in that thread he hates your therapist.

Do they still make those?! I said that when G.H.W. Bush was still vice! Like THIRTY YEARS AGO! but hey, when your right, your right

I'm afraid to ask.

Also Art, upon skimming your older threads..it looks like you’ve “terminated” with this T a lot since 2012. I didn’t read all the threads but I hope all the times u terminated with this T since then is not because your H has his boxers in a bunch. It would explain at least part of the reason why you keep going back. There are probably other reasons there as well, but you should go as long as you need to go for you.