My husband and I got married young and for the most part that’s worked great. We love each other so much, we are great partners and have built a great live, we have fun together, all of the good things.
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But we did also get married when we were so young that we have grown and changed over time, which has mostly been positive. But over the past few years there’s a new piece of his personality that isn’t objectively wrong or bad but IS bothering the shit out of me specifically, which is that he’s become super focused on fate and the idea that everything happens for a reason. It did start slowly, so I’m not worried about like, a health emergency or whatever, but it started cute–we found our cat as a stray and he said this cat was meant to be our cat, for example.
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Over time it’s gotten worse, he now makes comments about this about almost anything. If we go to an event and not many other people are there, it’s meant to be that we are there because we saved this event; if he meets a new person it’s somehow meant to be that he met this person at this moment in time instead of another moment.
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There have also been a few times where I’ve found it borderline offensive, which is also pretty new. So he will also say that bad things happen for a reason and are teaching us things and will have some good outcome, but he will say that to our friend who has MS, an uncurable and degenerative disease that will kill her one day. It wasn’t about her MS specifically but it feels like an obvious reason to not say something like this. Or he was out of work for a while recently and will say that he really needed that time and all of his work opportunities really fell in a way that worked for him and allowed him to do these other things in his life–this one is selfish, because I was the one who made that possible, and “thanks to my amazing wife who kept us financially afloat during that time” does not make it to the this was meant to be narrative.
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While this is annoying, it is mostly harmless and absolutely not coming close to outweighing the good parts of our relationship. I am also holding out hope that this is a temporary obsession and he’ll chill out around it. So I’m really looking for advice on how to deal with it when your partner is annoying but not wrong, and maybe how to take the edge off of the most annoying parts of this?
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tl;dr: my husband who I otherwise love very much has gotten obsessed with fate, I find this deeply annoying, how do I deal with it?
12 comments
I’d be direct. And nip it in the bud.
This kind of thinking it can be fun and comforting. It also can be lazy oversimplifying and offensive. Talk to him about both parts. The parts you could respect and admire, and the other side of the coin that is annoying and unkind.
We all engage in this sometimes, even the most rational of us. You can probably appreciate him looking for silver linings, or reflecting on the positive aspects or lessons in a thing that isn’t positive on the face. These are totally healthy ways to think.
But I’d point out to him the times and ways in which this is not healthy or respectful. It wasn’t kind to reflect on someone else’s genetic illness like that. Or, the example I often to use is that there is nothing in “fate” that means thousands of children in Guatemala are starving to death this year. They didn’t manifest it. They, or their parents, didn’t fail to put food on their vision board. That’s not why it’s happening to them. They did nothing to cause it. No one is leaning from it. It’s just bad.
Our fate, is largely random. Our spheres of control exist, but they are narrow. Imagining we (or others) have control when we don’t leads to discrimination and shame. (Poor people are poor cause fate, or moral weakness, and the not greed of others or the failure of communities).
Violence, poverty, accidents and illness are sometimes just fundamentally bad things. Random bad things. Sometimes bad things just happen and there is nothing to learn and no reason. At that time, you can choose to be kind, or you can choose to be unkind. You want him to choose to be kind, and you are worried about how his framing some of his thoughts about fate, because they won’t move him towards kindness.
The goal should be to be kind to others, and respectful of them. Not to try to explain away events in ways that make you feel at peace and applies order and meaning where there isn’t any.
I mean, I’d assume you’d mention this in this context, but is he religious? Or consuming any type of wellness related content that might be influencing him with that mindset?
And have you…asked him why he does this? Not about things like the cat. But calmly, after the fact, about situations like the one with your friend or where you feel like it invalidated your work. Nowhere do you mention what you say to him when he does any of this.
A lot of people turn to religion when they feel purposeless or lost in life, because religion gives them a sense of structure and direction. I wonder if something similar is happening with your husband? Like, life is chaotic and messy, or there’s something that’s made him feel a loss of control, and it comforts him to think that there is an “order” to things.
I think it might be good to open a conversation with him about where his interest in fate came from. Maybe if you can see where he is coming from, you can understand it a little better emotionally. That might help your frustration.
This is obviously not a diagnosis, just a suspicion: could it be early schizophrenia (or some other mental issue)? AFAIK seeing signs or fate in things can be a symptom
Take him to get a brain MRI.
He seems to be skirting ever closer to the whole religious zealotry edge. “Fate” or “Karma” or “God’s Will” or whatever you choose to call it, are great scapegoats for the ills of the world and are often used as an excuse for not trying to make things better.
“They live in poverty because they were a terrible person in a past life. This life they need to learn to be better and this is Karma’s way of punishing/teaching them. It would be wrong for us to try to help because it would hinder their lesson.”
“They live in poverty because they don’t bend to God’s Will. God only prospers those who live according to His Gospel. It would be wrong to help them in any way other than to preach His Gospel so they can see what their Sin is doing to them.”
I know these are extreme examples, but the whole “everything happens for a reason” mindset is a truly simplistic way of shrugging your shoulders and ignoring bad things while simultaneously thanking a nonexistent “power” for whatever good you see. (An example is thanking “Fate” instead of you for keeping the family afloat during his time of unemployment.) And it’s an incredibly slippery slope once you get on it.
I hope he wakes up soon.
Him suddenly deciding everything is “fate” sounds like he doesn’t want to take responsibility for his actions. He can do whatever he wants and justify it later as “fate”. Soon enough it’ll be he’s “destined” to play video games at home all day because the “prophecy” says *you’re* supposed to work your ass off and pay all the bills.
Sounds like standard midlife crisis stuff. Get him to sort his shit out with a therapist.
Life as we know it has dramatically changed since February of 2020. I don’t know anyone, myself included, who hasn’t been affected.
Job losses, loss of friends or family. Just trying to keep my family alive and supplied got a lot harder! Let’s be honest, for most us before that time we pretty much felt we had our life under control. If he would be open to it, I think he needs some assistance at getting at what is underlying this behavior. Maybe you could go together.
Hit him in the head and tell him it was fate.
It’s a coping skill he uses to deal with and make sense if the harsh realities of life. It’s the only way he has found how to deal with things and feel more spiritually connected, even when bad things happen.
I think you are right to be annoyed because this is, in fact, problematic behavior. It sounds like a version of toxic positivity, and thats not great.
This is common in mainstream Christian circles, with very similar language that can be similarly offensive. Like when someone dies tragically but people insist it was their time to go/they’re in a better place/it is God’s plan, etc- that’s not what all grieving family members want to hear, it’s not emotionally appropriate, and it’s dysfunctional.
As you’ve seen from personal experience, toxic positivity can be really invalidating. It minimizes other people’s feelings and experiences, and it is often used as a way to deflect from negative feelings, or from accepting that sometimes shitty chaotic harm just happens in the world.
It may be worth learning more about toxic positivity and talking to him about why it is not helpful. It may be a coping mechanism for him, but its really not a good one.
I think you can handle this 3 ways (in my opinion)
1) do nothing, as you said it’s annoying but harmless
2) when he says something next time, especially if its negative and spoken to another person. Privately pull him aside and say you understand this is his way of thinking but it’s in poor taste to make these comments, they are hurtful and offensive to your friends
3) just spit it out, tell him exactly how you feel. Explain you know this is how he feels but he doesn’t need to push it down your throat all the time