We’ve been together 18 years and I would say that the underlying strength of our relationship is that we have always been friends above all else. I would agree that friendship is important in a marriage, and have never been bothered myself about romantic ideals. This is why it really worried me when he said he loved me but didn’t like me, I felt like I’d lost his friendship. He has apologised now btw, but I do wonder if this is how he really feels about me/or was it the drink talking.

My therapist advised me to separate his behaviour from mine, that I’m not responsible for how he reacts to my depression/anxiety and that he is responsible for his own behaviour (including drinking). I think he wants to support me but for some reason he can’t seem to work out how, I actually think he’s angry with himself over that as much as with me. He is very contrite at the moment.

Hopefully as my therapy progresses my confidence/self-esteem will increase and the communication between us will improve. I’ll post back in a few months to let you know.

You need to find ways to start rebuilding the friendship between you and your husband. If your only interactions are stressed banter, of course there’s going to be conflict all the time.

It sounds like he’s been holding onto his resentment and it overflowed.

I’m in the middle of writing an article on this very subject. I believe that it’s of far greater importance to a marriage to build and maintain friendship with your spouse than it is to try to hold onto love only. Popular culture says that love can overcome anything. However, you’re certainly seeing that this isn’t always the case.

Start treating him as you would a dear friend, and I bet he’ll start doing the same. THAT’s the key to moving past where you are.

Let us know how things work out for you!

-M

Sometimes it’s hard for me to see through the words that someone leaves to get in idea of what’s going on in their marriage. From what you’ve said, it looks like you’ve had issues for a long time, and they’ve gotten worse since you lost your job.

You didn’t say much about the dynamics in your marriage, but I also get the feeling that you have self-esteem issues and that he can be somewhat controlling. Am I close?

Regardless of the specifics, you should work on you. If you were in your husband’s shoes, shat parts of you would you like to see changed? You can only change yourself. He’ll either have to follow suit or get left behind.

Dr. Baucom gives quite a bit of specific advice on things to try in his book – . I really recommend it for those who are looking for advice on what steps to take to rebuild love in their marriage.

This Saturday night he came home after a few drinks and let rip at me. He says I’m up my own arse, selfish, just like my mother (who has had depression for years, something he knows I fear for myself), and although he still loves me he doesn’t like me, he also said the nice things he had said to me were just lies to make me feel better. He was very aggressive walking at me until I was up against the wall telling me to hit him, but I didn’t want to I’m not angry just really sad and scared. I don’t really feel anger, I’m a very passive person and that seems to annoy him. I seem to annoy him by everything I say and do.

I spent the next day in bed ashaking tearful wreck, the progress I was making with the depression has just melted away – my self-esteem feels at its lowest ebb, like someone kicked my legs from under me. He has been quiet as a mouse since this but hasn’t apologised. I don’t feel I can or indeed should talk to him in case I annoy him further, I don’t trust him any more.

We have a teenager and he is my reason for trying to go on, I want to keep our family together but I’m very unsure as to what I should do.

You didn’t say how long you’ve been together, but physical abuse only gets worse if it’s not addressed.

Obviously time has passed, so neither of you are in the heat of the moment. You should establish some very clear boundaries.

The boundaries script goes like this:

“When you ___________, it makes me feel _____________. If it happens again, {consequence}.”

Detail exactly what he did. Tell him how it made you feel. Explain specifically what will happen if the action occurs again.

For you, it might be something like this:

“When you grab me like you did last Saturday, it makes me feel scared and unloved. If it happens again, I’ll be forced to leave for a few hours to defuse the situation.”

If things get worse, the consequences will have to become more severe.

You deserve to be loved, not hurt and scared.

Violence isn’t part of a “normal” marriage, and is outside the scope of this article.

You don’t have to answer, but this is the question that I think is most appropriate to your situation: How much of this personality did you see before you got married?

We tend to think that we can change someone. I know I’ve been there. I call it the broken bird syndrome. We see a broken bird and want to nurse it back to full health.

The problem is that often the “issues” that they have during courtship only intensify after marriage.

Your husband really should do some individual counselling. There’s nothing healthy about your marriage nor his behavior as you’ve described it.