Sunday, Jan. 13, 2013 10:33 p.m.

you don't want to hear anything you don't want to hear

geez louise, you're acting like a child. Refusing to talk about it does not make it go away. You can't yell at me and call me an idiot because I asked about something that you don't want to think about. It isn't fair to me. I've given you so much space the past several months. I've talked on eggshells around you, knowing how difficult this all is for you and trying to help the best I could by respecting the space you needed. I never asked anything, but waited for you to mention anything to me. Or if I did mention something and it upset you, I always apologized and took the brunt of whatever you wanted to lash out at me with. I knew that you were angry at the situation, and not me, so I didn't take it personally.

But you know what, I'm done with that. I'm done with you acting like a child who runs away from unpleasant things they want to deal with. We HAVE to deal with this. I will do my fair share of dealing with it, as it seems as though I'm the stronger one of us two right now apparently. Mentally stronger obviously, not physically. Yes, you're still the man of the house. I'm not trying to emasculate you.

I do EVERYTHING I can to be the good supportive wife. I WANT to be the good supportive wife. I WANT you to be the man, the head of the household. I don't want to take the role away from you. I'm a bit more traditional that way, I know that while we are mostly an equal partnership, that in those times when only one of us can take the lead, I willingly and gladly defer to you. I love you and I want our family to run smoothly. Though I may not have thought in my younger years that I'd accept this one day - I am ok being taking the more domesticated role of managing the home and children and allowing you to be the breadwinner/head of the household. I know this role specification is not possible right now, and that I must work to financially support us instead of you right now, but I STILL consider you to be the head of the household and I STILL would rather defer to you on any final and important decisions. I STILL want to be in a partnership with you. I STILL want to make it all work, even if we both currently have to sacrifice what we'd really like to be doing and how we'd really like to raise our family.
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Did you know that for the past several months, whenever I'm upset with you, and since we obviously can't talk about anything anymore (because if I accidentally say something that in some way has to do with something that makes you feel bad for what's going on with your career then you clam up and refuse to talk or just say mean things to me assuming that all I ever want to do is make you feel bad) - that you know what I've been doing? Pretending instead that I'm talking to marriage counselor and imagine what I'll tell them one day (assuming that we can one day afford to go to one). I mean, I can't tell you anything anymore; I can't work things out with you because you don't want to talk about anything, or you just accuse me of things - so I imagine in my head that I'm talking to a therapist instead. I tell them the things I can't tell you.

Because you don't want to hear anything that you don't want to hear.

I'm stubbornly stuck on the idea of marriage though. I refuse to ever consider divorce. Which is probably a good thing, because I have to be honest, if I was the type of person to ever consider even considering divorce, I'd be starting to ask myself right now what the point of dealing with all this was. It's not the finances, though you somehow would twist it into thinking that's all I cared about. It's this mental game and how you tear ME apart when your life is out of control so that you can still control something (which I've been letting you do, because I'd rather take the hit if it makes you feel better. Stupid, I know, but you used to recognize your actions and apologize, so it'd be ok in the end. That doesn't happen anymore, so I just take it for nothing and it sucks). It's this impossibility to discuss anything right now. It's how you close up and try to solve problems by ignoring them. It's how I feel stifled by you, it's how I've lost much of myself. It's the little unresolved things that turn into big impossible-to-resolve things. It all feels so convoluted now, and so much to clean up in order to find the core of the issue in order to fix it.

Speaking of, do you know one of the big difference between us, and each way we do things annoy the other? The way we clean.
You think cleaning is just throwing things in the closet or in a box, or someplace where it can't be seen. To you, as long as the surface is clean, you think it is clean, and you're happy.
When I clean, I want things to be organized. I take a lot longer than you to clean. This drives you crazy. You think I'm wasting time, or playing around, when I clean. You hate it and you sometimes get mad at me. You don't care what things look like inside the closet or the cabinet, as long at it's put away so others can't see it. But for me, if I know that things have just been throw aside, or swept under the rug, without any order, it drives me crazy. I feel more unsettled than when things were out all over the place. At least I could see things when they were all over the floor. If I'm going to put things away and hide them, then I'm going to organize them. Everything needs to have its' place. To just hide things in a drawer makes me feel confused, my mind shaken up.
I know that sometimes we don't have time to organize, so I'll let us clean up your way and just hide things, but it always bugs me. To me, it just makes things worse. It makes me feel helpless, like I started down a path of becoming more and more cluttered and I', overwhelmed with the thought of not being able to go back the beginning.

This is a pretty obvious parallel to how we deal with problems in marriage too, you think?

At least I have faith that somehow things will get better one day for us. But if I didn't feel the need to have that faith, I don't know if I would. And I don't know where that would lead us.

Part of me hates saying all this too, because I'm too freaking nice. Did you know that about me? I'm actually really fucking nice. The very last thing I ever want to be is a bitch. I always want to be completely honest and fair in my representation of reality. I know this is a crappy time for you, and for us. I can imagine your feelings and what you're psychologically going through. I over-think everything I say to you beforehand, hoping to choose the best words so that I don't accidentally say something that's going to sound worse than I meant and make you upset. I even know that if you knew that I kind of walk on eggshells around you that you'd get upset at that thinking that I have have to be so delicate around you. I try to give you lots of praise and tell you how much I love you and how great of a dad you are and all types of other things. I try to help you keep your confidence. I love you, I think you're a great person, and I'm here for you.

So would you just let me be here for you? Would you just let me support you instead of tearing me down just because you're feeling bad? Seriously, help me help you! It'll help us all, I promise!

And really, just for a few minutes, will you have a serious conversation with me AND not get mad at me because you don't want to talk about it? We need to figure out plans. I'm not upset at these turn of events, it's just life, but we do need to make decisions. We need to make plans. You always say that you don't want to talk about it right now or that it's not a good time to talk, but is there ever a good time?? I have to attempt to bring it up sometimes because you never will. I try to gauge when I think you're most amenable, but is seems you never are. Stop getting mad at me for trying to bring this up, and plan a time for us to talk about this. As grown ups. As partners.

It can be a cold, perfunctory conversation as though we are merely business partners. After all, we are a sort of business partners - partners in the business of our family management. You wouldn't ignore an issue like this in a professional environment, why are you ignoring it here? I almost wish I were your business partner right now instead, as I'd never let a business partner get away with this - why should a marriage partner get away with it?

I've spent over an hour typing this. Oh one hand, yay, I guess I got some venting out. On the other hand, that's over an hour wasted on nothing but babbling to myself. I have SO much other work to get dome right now and I have so little time it seems to get any work done during the day. I needed this past hour and 15 minutes to work on stuff that I get paid for.

Blah. I'm so tired of wasting all this time on this, when you answering my simple question with a few second answer would've solved the problem a long time ago. It could've been such a simple answer. Why does it always turn into an argument?

I'm gonna go make myself a drink.

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