Yesterday afternoon I said to him brightly, "Hey, I have an idea I want to share with you!", and he answered grimly, "I'm watching Dr. Phil." completely ending the conversation. I said, "Why don't you want to even hear my idea?" and it led to a familiar but confusing back-and-forth where he gets agitated, says he doesn't want me to ask him to talk or hear my ideas or go for a walk or do anything... which is fine per se, but his tone was aggressive and dismissive and when I said "Ok, you don't have to do anything, but why are you talking to me like that?", he says there's nothing wrong with how he talks to me (as he raises his voice). It went back and forth where I tried to explain the part after the Dr. Phil comment that made me feel badly (raising his voice, angry look in his eyes, being dismissive to me and telling me that he "cannot remember" what he said that was hurtful when I just pointed it out to him). Then he says that he is going to get up and walk away and that I'm acting like a victim because it's no big deal to shut me down if he knows where its going to lead. I said, "I didn't say anything! I came in here with love, and you got aggressive!". Then I spent more time saying we need to communicate and learn to resolve problems differently when they are small. And he says he needs to learn to leave the room if I come into it because every conversation leads to me criticizing him and giving him a lesson (i.e. Why are you talking to me like that? Why don't you want to solve problems differently? Why are you shutting me down? Why don't you recognize there is a gray area between talking "all the time" and planning to never talk?). Finally he shout-whispers he's sorry (while he is looking at me with contempt) and gets up and leaves.
I ended up taking a shower and listening to a guided meditation and when I came downstairs I told him I was thinking about what he said, that he didn't want to be corrected. I said there are two reasons I speak up: first to stand up for myself if you are crossing a line, because I don't like being talked to with aggression. Second, because I always take everything you say through a lens of thinking the best, and that you are struggling, and I always assume you don't mean to say things the way you do when it's hurtful words. But you are a grown man and it must be intolerable to have someone "correct your emotions". You say the things you say because you mean them, and you behave the way you do on purpose, and I'm not going to guide how you talk to me. If you want to correct yourself, you will.
He got upset. Says he doesn't always mean what he says. Of course I would take it like that. I was of course planning a whole upset while I was in the shower, and everybody makes mistakes, and this is just so I feel like a victim and he's going to take every word I say and hang onto it unless I apologize. I said yes, if I say something wrong I'll apologize and I'm going to take you at your word unless you say differently. Then he said something else inflammatory and why don't I just shut up and I did. He went outside for a meeting and there was no more talk all night.
I slept on the couch. I can't bear to get in the bed and have him be cold or aggressively push me away.
I don't know how to move forward without communication. What does "Time takes Time" mean? Does it mean living like roommates and not talking, and me continuing to do everything and just waiting for him to recover? It's not just emotions he doesn't want to talk about: he doesn't want to talk about the finances, the kids, things that need to be repaired at home, chores, errands, the past, the present or the future.
Is this normal in recovery? Total distance? I understand maybe he is healing but after 27 years together I don't know how to stop myself from wanting to give a hug, or needing to talk, or wanting a partner. Will this get better?