I swear I don't even know the man, anymore

There were several things that attracted me to my husband (SWI) in the early days of our relationship:

1. While sensitive and somewhat shy, he also had an underlying strength that prevented him from being taken advantage of by others.

2. He seemed to be able to get the necessary things done in his life without being anal about them.

3. He had a great sense of humor and the kind of laugh that as soon as you heard it, you were laughing, too.

4. He had compassion for others in lesser circumstances than his own, and even if he didn't help in any concrete ways (for example, with donations, money contributions, etc) he at least still had the compassion.

5. While he had high expectations for our children, he also understood that they were young and would make mistakes while trying to learn.

6. He was careful to separate his job-related stress from his homelife.

7. He always took an interest in my work, activities with friends, etc.

8. Intimacy was something we both looked forward to and always had in common.

9. His political interests, while always different from mine, at least allowed for some agreement/consensus.


Sadly, none of those things appear to be true any longer.

While he might still be sensitive, I cannot consider him 'shy' but 'unsocial.' What came across as shyness is now clearly a predominant tendency to unsociability. My SWI would much rather spend his time alone than with anyone else, or in a group. And while he still avoids being taken advantage of, there is no openness there...it's like he's always on guard. And while he might be vulnerable in some respects, he never allows that to show, not even to those closest to him. My SWI trusts NO ONE, not his parents, not his sibling, not his co-workers or friends, not even me. And it shows. Always wary and tense, he gives the distinct impression that the next person he encounters will do him harm unless he is on guard against them.

My SWI has no regular chores that he does around the house, anymore, except yard maintenance. (In the summer, it was mowing the lawn...now that winter is here, eventually, his only responsibility will be to use the tractor for heavy snow removal.) The majority of his days are spent lying on the sofa, watching endless empty hours of TV while I'm busy doing everything else. He gets no physical exercise at all. He asked for The Clapper for xmas so that while he's lying on the sofa, he doesn't have to get up to turn the lamp off on the table beside him. To me, if you're willing to pay good money to be THAT lazy, you've just created a whole new definition of lazy! It's not difficult to see why I'm having trouble summoning the appropriate amount of respect that a wife should have for her husband, especially in this instance. Asking him to do simple things, like letting the dog out, or going down to the basement to get a loaf of bread out of the freezer prompt huge, impatient sighs, and protestations of 'can't YOU do it?!'

All too often, my SWI's sense of humor now involves humor at the expense of someone else. I can't say that that is a continual problem, because it only happens occasionally, but there are definitely times where he carries the humor too far and starts hurting peoples' feelings, when he was always careful to avoid that in the past. Maybe that's part of the reason why his laughter no longer inspires us to laugh with him...

My SWI no longer appears to possess even the smallest shred of compassion, anymore. Occasionally, he would give some change to the homeless man that hangs out by the post office. He doesn't, anymore, which is okay, except now he's convinced that the man isn't really homeless, he's just a con looking to make easy money from people with 'bleeding hearts.' He has developed an outright disdain for people who show kindness to others in dire circumstances, insisting that the homeless, the destitute, and the unemployed are solely responsible for their awful situations. It's hard for me to believe, but this is the same man who led a Cub Scout troop for three years. This is the same man who saw a small child on the side of a busy highway and risked his own life to stop his car and help the lost/runaway child get back to his parents. In the compassion aspect, I would say this is a 180 degree turnaround.

He has very little patience with our children (who are now legal adults) anymore, regardless of the fact that my stepson hasn't lived with us in over 3 years. My SWI is unable to tolerate my son lying on 'HIS' sofa (even when he's not at home to lie on it, himself) and cannot seem to tolerate even the slightest amount of holdover-teenage-self-centeredness, or even the vaguest hint of an exasperated tone in his voice, for example. Every time my husband claims that my son has committed some sort of infraction, the first thing he says is that 'he can always find somewhere else to live.' Maybe it's a guy thing that I just don't understand, but I don't want my son to feel like his home isn't really his home, kwim? The kid just graduated from high school in June. He is in college, he's holding a job, (which is more than I can say for my stepson) so I wish my SWI would cut him a little slack.

He still tries to keep his job stress separate from his family/personal life, but it seems to be tougher for him, now. A lot of this might be directly related to his Depression (which he claims to not have, anymore) but if it's not Depression, then he's turned into the equivalent of an 80-yr old man who rarely leaves the house (and sofa!) except to go to work. If he's sent me an email or called me at work to b*tch about his day at work before he's even left work for the day, I take that as a warning to avoid him once he arrives home, and I'll warn my son to avoid him as well. However, sometimes that's not good enough, and we get the spillover, anyway.

To say that my son and I often walk on eggshells is an understatement. Being unable to tolerate loud noises or distractions of any type, no matter how inocuous or well-intentioned has been my SWI's modus operandi for the better part of the last 5 years now. Although his right to make loud noises that annoy others on purpose (like stomping through the house and slamming doors, for example) is protected. Which brings me to the detested double standard. The unspoken 'rules' that he expects us, the other household members, to abide by have never been followed by he, himself. He has always demanded special exceptions though no one else is granted that leeway.

He no longer seems to have any interest in what I do, either at work, or in my personal life with friends. If I attempt to share those things with him in conversation, he makes it clear he is not interested by dropping eye contact after the first minute or two, preferring to return to his beloved TV or magazine article, instead. I've learned to not bother trying to talk about my life with him, anymore. Why waste my breath?

Our sex life had always been at least good, if not very good, until we had been married over a year, and then it started going downhill. There were several years there when his Depression was bad that the frequency dropped to once every 2 to 3 months. (That was extremely tough for me...my ideal frequency is every other DAY.) Despite at least two focused attempts to discuss this sole specific issue with him, he still refuses to make romance/intimacy a priority. For him, foreplay doesn't begin until we take our clothes off and get into bed together. There is no passion, there is no ardor. There is no pursuit, there are only rare occasions when he approaches me with hugs, squeezes, etc, and if it wasn't for my being the initiator 95% of the time, I swear we'd rarely have sex at all. I am a very tactile person and he is aware of this. He knows how important regular touching is to me. Foreplay begins in the mind, and it begins long before we ever reach the bedroom. My SWI seems to have forgotten that and nothing I have been able to say or do has made any improvement. It has now gotten to the point where I mostly just prefer not to have sex with him at all, since I know it will just be another 10-minute passionless mechanical session.

In the span of our eight years together, my SWI's political views have gone from moderate Republican to now extreme right-wing Libertarianism/Republican (except for the heavy religious aspect.) He believes that certain conspiracy theories are fact, and he very much resents that his tax dollars go toward helping those in society who are less fortunate (here's another place where the 'no compassion' issue comes into play.) The icing on the cake came when he told me to 'keep my calendar open' for April 2010, when he's planning for us to attend the next 'teabagger' march on Washington DC.

WTF???!?

I couldn't keep the look of shock from my face. ' Does the man not know me?' I wondered. I knew his beliefs had grown even more right-leaning over the years, but I had no idea that he is now starting to identify with these extreme right-wing nutjobs who no semi-intelligent person takes seriously! I replied that he should plan to go alone or with someone else, as I would never willingly choose to participate in something like that.

And now we're getting ready to take a weeklong trip together. *sigh*

I wish that I could count on a week's vacation producing tangible benefits for my marriage, but I guess I'm just not that hopeful.