My husband (42m) and I (35f) have been married for 13 years. We have a great relationship and are happy overall, but we’ve gotten into fights a couple of times lately over communication.
2 weeks ago he was upset for 3-4 days. He has been having a hard time at work so I assumed he was stressed about that, even though I tend to get anxious that it’s something I’ve done. Another couple of days goes by and he shares that he had actually been upset at me, but then he realized that he misunderstood what he was upset about so it was fine. I told him that it wasn’t and that he should have talked to me when he was first upset so that the whole thing could have been avoided. He says that he did try to bring it up but that I shut the conversation down (I do not remember this.).
I will admit that I tend to be a perfectionist and I have an anxiety disorder. When I am in the wrong I get very emotional and cry easily. It often leads to my husband comforting me after we get in a fight.
On to the now. Last night when husband got home from work we were talking and he says “I have to talk to you about something.” I guess I must have looked panicked because before I could respond he says “This is why we can’t communicate. Everything is fine, but you’re already freaking out.” I apologized and said I didn’t mean to have that response, but that I wanted to talk. He said he didn’t want to talk anymore and that I should forget about it.
He ended up leaving the house to “think”. When he came back he would talk to me, but not about what he originally wanted to talk about. This morning he is being cordial, but distant, as he gets ready for work. I asked him how he slept and got some short answers back, but he doesn’t seem interested in engaging so I went to my home office to start work early. I don’t know how to move forward here. Obviously we are having some problems with communication and both of us think it is the others fault. I don’t know if I should ignore this entirely or give him his space now and bring it up again later.
4 comments
You need to take responsibility for your responses. Having a partner fall apart at the idea of bad news is extraordinarily stressful. He probably withholds a lot from you for fear you will not be able to handle it. This added stress is causing him to retreat internally as he feels he has to deal with all of these stresses alone.
I know you don’t intend to behave this way, because I used to be the same way. I have extreme, PTSD and anxiety, and it caused a lot of problems between me and my husband for similar reasons. Through therapy and CBT, I had to learn how to do better. Once I did, my husband was also able to make changes. But it started with me.
This is not a blame issue, it is a relationship where two people feed off each other‘s activity and responses. It sounds like your husband is trying to be loving and supportive by handling the stress on his own without sharing it with you. This is not doing you any favors.
You need the practice and experience of hearing difficult things and going through the hard emotions. It is only through practice and through stabilizing procedures, such as adding physical touch or adding helpful phrases to help regulate yourself. This is a process of self growth for you.
Through this process, your husband will feel more supported, and will begin to open up more. You will begin to get stronger emotionally and you will be able to increase your bandwidth for stress, and may find yourself being supportive to him more and more often.
This does not happen overnight, but it sounds like you 2 love each other very much, and can understand that underlying feelings can creep up and disrupt our loving patterns. This is all that has happened to you, and you can both “unlearn” them together. 🙏❤️
Definitely respect someone’s need for space. However, respectfully tell him when he’s approachable that you are not liking the games he plays. He is not you and you are not him, he needs to pick his battles, I mean what was the big deal about your reaction? “I have to talk to you about something” would be unnerving to practically every woman. Perhaps he would have preferred you roll your eyes? He’s not afraid of his reactions and you should not be either. It’s okay to be annoyed but to punish you for whatever is bothering him is manipulative.
Marriage counseling. A couple of sessions can help you interrupt the bad patterns you are falling into and develop better communication tools.
This was definitely me original thought. How can I possibly control my reaction to that when it was for a split second? I do love that you said not to be afraid of my reactions. I’ve been so scared of how my reactions are perceived by others (not just SO) for so long and I think I need to break that cycle.