Pondering Minstrel

Friday, January 28, 2005

MARRIAGE

Communication, committment, love and trust. These are a few of the foundations of a good marriage, but what if one of those elements is crumbling? Is any one of them less important than another?

The past few years, communication has been an issue. We've been together for 10 years, and I'm beginning to wonder if he's had enough. Sure, the other elements are still in tact, so at this point in time, we'd never get divorced, but we don't talk. Not really. I don't feel like I can talk to him, and he doesn't feel like he can talk to me. He's told me so.

He did and said some things to me today that really hurt me. I tried to talk to him about it, and he wouldn't let me complete a sentence before he started defending himself and told me that I had hurt him, and then he walked away. I can't tell you how much that hurt. That hurt more than the original offense. I can understand that it's difficult to hear that your spouse is having difficulty with you, but walking away doesn't really solve anything either.

He went into the other room to learn a game that the kids want to play with him. It's a video game that takes him out of his comfort zone, so I tried to be supportive. After he was done, I attempted to talk to him about what was bothering me. I started off by apologizing for having hurt him. I told him that it was unintentional. He accepted the apology, but as soon as I started talking about what was troubling me, he complained/scolded me about bringing it up again.

Why was I bringing it up again? We were laughing and having a good time, and now I'm talking about this again.

"It's over and done with for me. It's in the past. I don't even remember what it was about. Do you?"

I just looked at him dumbfounded. I couldn't believe this was the reaction I was getting, and I was unable to answer.

"I don't need to talk about it anymore," is what he told me.

It may have been a whole 30 minutes in the past, but we hadn't talked about it. He clearly didn't want to talk about it ever, so I dropped it. I know when I'm not wanted. How I act on that knowledge is a different story, but I decided to respect his desires and kept quiet.

I guess what bothers me most about this is that he didn't care to hear how I felt. He may have instinctively known what I was feeling, but he just didn't want to hear it from me. I want to give him the benefit of the doubt. Maybe he was just tired, or it was too soon to talk about it again. Maybe he's still too hurt to talk about it. I don't know.

I didn't want to go to bed feeling upset, so I thought I'd try to at least talk to him about how he brushed me off and made me feel incosequential. When I held his hand and looked at him, I could tell he wouldn't want to hear it. He didn't look mad or annoyed, but I could tell that if I started to talk about it, he would get upset and we'd end up in a fight. Which brings us to why I'm writing at 3:39AM PST.

I've been trying to sleep, but I can't stop thinking. I also can't get rid of the feeling that he doesn't care to know me anymore, and believe me, I've tried to rationalize it because I know he loves me, which is why I can't understand it, but it still doesn't make me feel any better. Should love be all that's necessary? Should we push everything else aside if we know that we love eachother?

And I can't stop wondering... isn't this how marriages of 20 years, etc. end up in divorce? Little things chip away at it for years and years until there's nothing left worth saving. It doesn't seem like a huge event, like an affair, really leads to divorce as much as the ever-ambiguous, "we just grew apart". Don't people, statistically the husbands, usually say they never saw it coming?

I know he doesn't talk to me as much as he used to, and with incidents like I just described becoming more frequent, I talk to him less and less as well. Hell, one of the reasons I started blogging is because I didn't feel like I could talk to him, or more like I felt like I was talking but nobody was listening. At least with blogging, I don't care if anybody is listening. If you care, it really sucks, and it makes you feel lonely. I'd much rather feel lonely because I'm actually alone than feel lonely in a marriage. You're not supposed to be lonely when you're married. You're supposed to have someone that you can talk to about anything and everything. How much do you suck if you can't even get someone that loves you to listen to what you have to say?

I really can't imagine being in love with anyone else, but will we be able to continue to live with eachother as time goes on?


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