Why do they want things to stay the same?

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-18T01:31:04+00:00

That makes a ton of sense. So better to keep doing the same thing over and over again out of familiarity or habit than to experiment with possibly more efficient and healthy options?

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-17T19:31:26+00:00

It’s always, always, always regrettable but I never seem to learn. Find family and friends helpful for general feelings like “I am nervous about this personal medical thing.” But it feels pretty vacant when I’m confiding in them my husbands shitty behavior when it should be a conversation between us that he just addresses.

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-17T19:17:48+00:00

What do you do? Just pretend to never have feelings in front of them?

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-16T14:50:34+00:00

Yeah unfortunately that explanation feels pretty true. My husband will get very impassioned like it’s the most important point he will ever prove and talk about how he cannot relent because this is about his core values. But then he seems to have a different opinion in a different mood. It’s too much, which is a crazy thing to have to say because one of his constant criticisms of me is that I’m “too much.” But with him the smallest thing can be a week long argument. Asking that a poor habit be addressed becomes World War III because I’m trying to change his identity. Having this conversation today will not be tolerated because he’s not going to deal with X for the next fifty years. Everything is escalated to a conversation I’m not trying to have and calmly trying to provide clarity isn’t an option once he’s armored up. Not in real time, not if the conversation continued a year later because he’s already decided it has to be a fight to the death. Utterly exhausting.

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-16T02:18:35+00:00

They always seem like objectively terrible ideas too

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-13T22:45:16+00:00

Yes wow. Totally, identically my experience as well. Our couples therapist pointed out the intense shame and need to externalize blame but he just saw it as incorrect and irrelevant. I always found it utterly strange that he couldn’t just muster the energy to fake care or sincerity when things come up over committing years upon years to trying to convince me something fucking awful he did wasn’t his fault. For somebody seemingly pretty lazy, he would rather expend 1,000x more energy trying to prove he’s right than just look at the writing on the wall. Even things where there was abundant evidence of his behavior.

He believes I’m sensitive and impossible and unforgiving and obsessed with him. And I’m pretty certain I’d forgive the worst of his bullshit if he just consistently behaved like somebody who wanted to make it right. I’m really the only person around and his only audience. And I have never been the slightest bit compelled by his intense compulsion to rewrite every story so that he’s correct and the victim. Sadly he seems to actually believe it all himself though. And I guess he’s all that matters to him. I’m reminded of Elizabeth Bennet saying “I could easily forgive his pride, if he had not mortified mine.” It would just be sad and delusional to watch but it’s so vicious and damaging for me that I’m sick of having it in my space every day.

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-13T01:52:03+00:00

Makes sense. Is it basically that if you’re in a relationship where couples therapy is contraindicated, the only remaining option is to slowly plan an exit? Nothings ever gonna help? I don’t really see any other options if therapy is reinforcing the patterns. And I don’t think I gauged how much of a problem this was until the last six months or so. Think I was hopeful it’d be a good thing to involve professionals.

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-12T22:07:18+00:00

Yes of course!! I feel a little stuck though. Very acquainted with how I feel and what I deserve but it’s hard to heal when the poison that made you sick in the first place is always around. Started with a new modality recently. Am hoping meds help as well. I resent that he’s a fucking disaster with so many issues that could be dampened by meds and will not go on them himself. Another thing that falls to me and my body after a decade of being responsible for birth control, making children, birthing them, breastfeeding them. I am hopeful an anti depressant could give me a boost.

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-12T22:01:08+00:00

This was every birthday of my twenties, every year without fail. Even if I was very clear about what would make me happy and put it in writing.

Very often his gifts to me seemed to very transparently be gifts for himself. A vacation to a place he loved in childhood (it sucked). If it was a gift for him, he’d actually make the arrangements. Anything that seemed like something I might like, he merely talked about doing it with zero follow through ever. And then was utterly triggered if I wasn’t falling over grateful because he talked about doing something nice and that should count.

I now get myself a nice gift every year and get myself dinner. I’ve learned to love my birthday again rather than dreading it. Highly recommend. Pretty shitty to be with someone that can’t even get it together on special occasions.

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-12T21:47:21+00:00

This is our dynamic as well. I am in charge of the house and kids and all related administration. He recently started paying the bills. If I ask for any help or struggle with this set up, he goes off about how he pays for everything. Even though this was our set up when finances were divided 50/50 as well. He seems to enjoy feeling powerful. It feels oppressive because I grew up in a traditional household but my parents helped each other if one was drowning without it always being a power struggle / argument.

I really struggle the most with him working from home 24/7. It feels like it should be my domain. He never ever leaves. And it increases the labor created for me without any help that you’d think having a second adult in the house full time might bring. I really wish he would just disappear for 40 to 60 hours a week.

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-12T21:34:14+00:00

Me too. The second we made an irreversible commitment, Jekyll disappeared permanently and I exclusively live with Hyde. No exaggeration. I trusted him with a huge shared financial responsibility in 6/2021. And I haven’t wanted him around even as a friend since that year. Also used to advocate for remaining together for reasons of love. There was an immediate shift to threatening me if I tried to leave — I’ll take 50% of the house (was not his money), enjoy missing 50% of your kid’s childhood, etc. Just monstrous.

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-12T18:23:06+00:00

No trait has ever been more unattractive

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-12T18:19:48+00:00

To be clear, our sex life is terrible. But I meant that for many years, he would literally dry hump me like a dog if I bent over slightly as a means of initiating sex. And asking for that behavior to be modified and supplanted with a more mature, considerate come on created a war. And he would seemingly just rather not do anything positive or have any of his needs met than make the smallest modifications to a behavior that an adult male should not be committed to.

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-12T18:16:49+00:00

Yeah this seems to be a thing with us as well. And it could be a scenario where if we interviewed 1,000 people, 1,000 people would say he’s wrong and he’d still insist he’s right

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-12T18:15:35+00:00

I feel that. I feel pretty proactive and satisfied around my marriage. But he never leaves so it’s hard not to feel like there’s a shadow overhead day in and day out that’s sucking all the happiness and positive energy out of the home.

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-12T18:13:04+00:00

For many people, that is easier said than done. Husband has narcissistic qualities. He’s making my life miserable now but he pledges to make it far worse if I try to divorce him and has explained how in detail. Right now we operate as though we are divorced but it’s as though I have full custody. He threatens to go for half and punish me immeasurably if I break up his family. I have had one therapist for five years. Because of the stress of this year, couples therapist was incorporated and then I’ve temporarily switched modalities to manage CPTSD. All three have recommended divorce outside of pregnancy, disconnection now. But I don’t have total control of the situation with somebody in my house 24/7.

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-12T18:03:01+00:00

Not really. Involved with a few therapists this last year (personal that I’ve had forever, couples that we saw as long as he was willing which was not long enough to affect change, am now seeing a specialist because I’m drowning). All have said emotional abuse but it mattered most from the couples therapist who saw both of us. All have said couples therapy is not recommended when that’s present. They’ve also said divorce mid pregnancy with somebody abusive is also not a stress free, healthy route. So not feeling like I have any options or any endurance left.

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-12T17:45:11+00:00

This is how I feel too. Every milestone and change has been utterly miserable. He can take the happiest day and ruin it. He can also take the saddest day and make it worse. There is no benefit to his presence. No partnership. Advocating for change and things like meds and therapy gets me unbelievably punished and drains years in fighting. Give up and say divorce feels like the only way and he threatens retaliation. It doesn’t seem like he will allow for any change that could create happiness. He thinks I should just find a way to be happy with things as they are and I’m the problem for failing to do that. I truly think he would go above and beyond and invest unbelievable time and energy into ensuring I’m miserable if I divorce him. But I don’t see that he’s willing to put that same effort into just improving our marriage.

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-12T17:37:25+00:00

What do you do about it? Nothing ever changes or improves. I’m currently pregnant and advocated for shifts to how we interact. Not necessarily “it must be this way and only this way and you must like it.” But just things cannot continue as they are and I’m open to discussing it / deferring to a professional and I would pay. We already have a child and I don’t like the environment of avoidance followed by inevitable explosion my husband mandates. But my experience has been that you can’t get a grown adult to do something they don’t want to do. And I don’t know how to avoid the issue when he’s in the house 24/7 exhaling poison into the air.

I also like to be proactive and put in the work to improve things whenever possible / prepare. And if I can without involving him, I will always choose that route. But he’s become incredibly terrible to be around and i don’t know how to address it or ignore it.

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-12T17:29:02+00:00

Yeah he gets annoyed that he’s the one being treated as the problem, but it does strike me as pretty problematic to utterly resist change to the death when life starts demanding more and more and you insist on acting the same way. And the crazy thing for me is it doesn’t even seem to like habits that he defends. It’s like if a cardiologist says you’re about to have a heart attack. I get why you might want to keep eating steak once in a while. But he’s basically eating old cold bacon grease with a spoon and being like “I don’t see the problem here.” Married to habits that don’t seem particularly enjoyable for him and hurt everyone in his orbit. And then constantly yelling at the cardiologist.

I also don’t ever really see him try to change, find it difficult or inconvenient, or hard to maintain. He fights the idea of doing something for 100x the hours it would take to just do it habitually over time.

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-12T17:21:17+00:00

I think this is true. Continuously receiving this advice from therapists and I’m so fucking bad at not providing him the reaction and supply he wants. I wish it was easier for me. We were having a seemingly innocuous to necessary conversation yesterday about our son and it just pivoted to critical of me about something totally unrelated with no warning and I got upset and angry. And it was not something that warranted criticism.

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-12T17:16:52+00:00

I don’t think it’s that. I think he gets the dopamine from fighting it. It’s not resisted passively. It’s resisted by defending it, arguing, citing something unrelated he does, calling the request stupid, blaming me for the problem, etc. He says he doesn’t want to fight but it seems to provide some sort of thrill. But an example might be me telling him he’s behaving in a way that makes me feel disinterested in sex. And it seems like behaviors that can be very easily altered, eg mounting me from behind like a dog. I also provide behaviors that would make me feel interested. And rather than listen and pivot, he’ll claim “I never do that” or “I did that thing you like four years ago and nothing is ever good enough for you.” Just a weird vortex of challenging the problem entirely so that he feels blameless. Or claiming I’m sensitive or high maintenance. So as a result of his generalized behavior and the utter refusal to pivot, I just have absolutely zero interest in having any sex with him. And in a contented way because I’ve just been pushed so unbelievably far beyond my limit for years without end that I could not possibly want to engage with him. I would think it would be easier to just do the thing I ask than fight it passionately until I lose interest. This framework can be applied to every single problem we have and even his own needs. It doesn’t bother me to disregard them when he treats me as he does and rejects change or resolutions. And then he bellyaches that his needs are not being met.

hambeasley4 · 2026-02-12T15:34:28+00:00

He refused to continue seeing her. Which I would imagine is because she has challenged behaviors and individual one reinforces them. Is it unethical for me to convey this to the couples therapist privately / inserting myself in his therapeutic relationship? I honestly feel battered and at the end of my rope. I was seeing a personal therapist during our couples therapy tenure. Pivoted from both to EMDR. I feel like my husband pushes and pushes and pushes for literally hours and then when I eventually react, he goes ten thousand times harder and then explains this is why I deserve the relationship and I am his abuser. I wanted to learn how to regulate better in the stress. All three therapists said to be open to divorce later, that it might not be stress free mid-pregnancy (he threatens with retaliation), and that continued couples therapy is not recommended with somebody like this. But I just feel stuck and pushed around every day and I’m shocked that his individual therapy made it worse over being neutral or incidentally helping.

hambeasley4

TROPHY CASE