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Old 03-15-2011, 11:03 PM
  # 5 (permalink)  
FindingPeace1
Member
 
Join Date: Oct 2009
Location: rural west
Posts: 1,375
Welcome!

I feel you! My AH is a good man. He's generally kind. He is wonderfully supportive and caring and gentle and thoughtful. He is generous. He is accepting.

My main problem was he was drinking a lot. In secret. And denying it.

I blew it off for a long time. It was a small part of our relationship. It didn't come up that often. When I brought it up, he denied it or blew up or shut down, but I didn't bring it up that often, so I could deal with occasional b.s.

He tends toward depression, but that's not his fault! Right? I mean, I was depressed at 17 and it's not like I chose it! I couldn't snap out of it!

He hid some stuff - porn, debt/shopping, but I only caught him rarely, so it was not that big of a deal...

We went along like that for 10 years.

Then, I got pregnant.

The old accepter WENT AWAY and out came MAMA BEAR.
Would I allow him to b.s. our child? To hide stuff or lie or abuse himself when parenting? OH, HELL NO!
Everything changed. I realized there was dysfunctional stuff happening.

So, I confronted him, with EVERY intent of working through it with him, but honestly.

Everything went to hell in a handbasket. He was defensive and sullen and shut down and sarcastic and fatalistic and hopeless and cranky and snotty.
For a year.

I kept plugging away with my message that I needed communication and recovery steps.

Nope.

I finally said, "I quit".

As I move forward with divorce, he is playing the depressed, powerless, victim. Weak. Sad, beat up. I "ruined his life" and "stole his dreams" and "destroyed his future". He has "offered me everything, but I obviously "have a grand plan to divorce" and "nothing is good enough".

Don't get me wrong. It eats at me. The powerless victim works well. But right now, I am seeing NO CHANGE and a bunch of bluster.

It may be powerless victim quacking and not all the other abuse junk that lots of folks on the board are talking about, but it is just another flavor of alcoholic quacking.

And if he was hiding and lying and not communicating, no matter how great he was, he had some jacked up sheet that I have every right to say, "no thanks" to and that I deserve more.

Hope that helps.
peace
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