I thought I could help my husband be someone better than he was. I thought that was being supportive. And I thought he would appreciate that. He may have even asked me to help him do that. Now I think he hates me for trying to do that. I would hate it if someone put their focus on me, to better me. The fact is....he gets to be who he is and who he wants to be. I get to be who I am and who I want to be. I have stopped trying to help him be different. It might mean we have nothing left....but I must stop focusing on him and get on with a life that I can be proud of myself. I wanted to be a WE but I am really only an I. I wanted to be a team but I must stop trying so hard to make my partner be the team partner I thought I needed him to be. It means I have to shift my focus and put my attention on other things other than him. It means I must make a painful hole where the relationship was (in my own fantasy and goals) in order to let in room for real opportunities where I can fill my heart and soul with love and joy rather than disappointment and resentment.
I have been one to look to others for validation and direction in many areas of my life. I am taking baby steps to trust my own value and strength. I am me.... Now that I am grown up, I am not just a husband's wife, a parent's daughter, a child's mother, a sister's sister. God will not condemn me to hell for having a will and mind of my own, being what I was created to be. It is my destiny and life challenge to live using all my abilities, passion, feelings and power - free of anyone else's preferences for me. I don't have to play the perfect model of what I think (guessing their thoughts) others would like me to be. Now I get to know and feel who I want to be outside of the chains I put on my own self.
I strive, no I permit my self, to live and put my attention more in the present moment (where life happens) and less in the past and future - permitting myself to stop my bad habit of focusing on regrets and fears and creating more moments of bliss and gratitude. That is probably what lured me to my husband in the early days...he permitted me to step out of my goal-orientated, careful world and made moments for me to laugh and enjoy a light-hearted silliness - somehow I wrongly interpreted his permission as love.
Now I get to learn how to quench my own desire for joy and love in more beneficial, adult ways, not expecting others to do the job for me. I don't need someone else's permission to be happy and light. I don't need someone to "set the scene" for me to take time to enjoy life. I can set up my own enjoyable environments and permit myself to take a break from the heavy load of responsibilities I have created for myself. I can make it a good habit to take responsibility for my well-being upon my own self.
Maybe giving permission to laugh and enjoy is a form of love.
Maslov's heirarchy of needs
Submitted by jennalemon on
After reading my own entry, I felt something was missing in content. Here is what is missing: Before I can permit myself to laugh and enjoy and (by Maslov's hierarchy study of human needs) have love and self actualization, I must first have more basic needs satisfied. Those basic needs are: Physiological (breathing, food, water, sex, sleep, THEN Safety (security of body, employment, resources, moralitiy, family, health and property) ,T HEN Belongingness/Love (friendship, family, sexual intimacy), THEN Esteem (Self-esteem, confidence, achievement, respect of others, respect by others). AFTER those needs are met, THEN Self-actualization (morality, creativity, spontaneity, problem solving, acceptance) can be possible.
So many of my basic needs are not met any more. I had been spending my time meeting other's in my family's needs (like many of us women were taught to do) that I was not aware of how I was letting my self down by not taking care of myself.
Until a person feels some amount of security in the more basic needs, they cannot move up the needs ladder toward enjoyment and laughter. I know I am capable of love and joy because I had those things when I was part of my original family with my parents.
This "needs" chart seems to not be present in my husband. The planning and executive function of knowing what will be needed (and plan for it) seems is missing. He seems to only want inconsequential things NOW and to be in constant motion with activity so he does not have to THINK or PLAN or be accountable, filling his thoughts with the lowest of his own singular physical needs. Security is lopsided (from me) in his brain.
The applicablity of Maslow
Submitted by PoisonIvy on
The applicablity of Maslow occurred to me a while ago, too. This morning, the thought popped into my head that my husband doesn't want to feel or deal. He avoids feeling sad and anxious and angry and by doing so, he avoids having to deal with the issues that led to those feelings. Of course, what has happened is that he has externalized much of the feeling and dealing onto me. I don't mind these things generally except that I do mind when I'm doing them for two. You know the term "eating for two" when a woman is pregnant? I think we non-ADHD spouses often are living for two.
Thinking alike
Submitted by jennalemon on
We should all take a cruise together.
Good idea
Submitted by I'm So Exhausted on
jennalemon,
Too bad I get sea-sick and I am terrified of deep water!! LOL :)
I can concur
Submitted by I'm So Exhausted on
jennalemon,
I enjoyed these two posts. I can understand your feelings.
For myself, I get into a panic mode when I look back - at my marriage. It is so very hard for me - in the past few months - because I feel like crumpling up in a ball, hiding in the corner of the closet in shame, and bemoan that I made so many huge mistakes and wonder what the same hill I have done.
I thought I was doing it correctly. I thought I was being a good wife. I thought I was following Biblical truths. I have the wisdom that I am not in control of anyone but me. I have myself, and I love the nurturing soul I am. How can I possibly get to 29 years of marriage and realize I screwed up major big time? And when I thought all I had to do was change what I was doing - I would be left alone in my efforts.
Menopause - Midlife - Empty Nest - and the reality that I now have a jumbled up mess.
No I am not depressed. No I am not sitting on a pity-pot. No I am not feeling sorry for myself. I do not want others to see this inner turmoil. How can I get back that lovin' feeling?
I know that romance novels/movies are just as bad at giving women false images of men, as Playboy is at giving men false images of women. I don't expect that. I just dislike the comparison I get. I love my uniqueness. I do not want to hear how 'any other man would have left by now.'. (Because we have no intimacy in our marriage.) Seriously? I don't want to hear that 'compared to all the other men in the world' I have it great. I don't want listen to him tell me that he is at the ends of his ropes 'trying so hard.' I have done so many different counseling types over the past years. But when it comes to measurable ways of improvement, he does not follow them. The list from the ADHD specialist was not looked at. The homework from the marriage seminars was not even attempted. He takes pills. He takes vitamins. He takes supplements. He just want to BE. No questioning his choices or actions or decisions. No compromise. No compromise. No compromise. No room for me.
Maybe in real reality, I do not want to try to figure out how to be married to him.I don't THINK there is anything left. However, I do not KNOW that there is nothing left.
While no one but me is at home, I look around and feel comfortable in my house. Enjoyingat my things, and the tidy-ness, and the sunshine, and the birds singing, and the fun TV show on in the background. No, I really do not want to have to go out and get a job to support myself.
I just have to say, deep inside, it is all just too much.
Feels like un-love
Submitted by jennalemon on
That says it, Exhausted, "No compromise. No compromise. No compromise. No room for me."
The opposite of love is not hate. The opposite of love is not caring.
Peace, Joy, Love ?
Submitted by c ur self on
I was stuck on the merry-go-round of life...until I started to understand where the good life actually comes from. To many times I based it on my efforts, my creativity and just when it looked like my moment in the sun had come...I found it to be lacking and briefly gone...I was carried up and down by the circumstances I encountered thinking they would produce the good life I so desperately desired.
Three noble truths:
The good life only occurs in, by, and through the Grace of God.
The good life occurs only in, by, and through relationships with others.
The good life only occurs in, by, and through the innocence of mind.
Three ignoble Illusions:
The illusion that man can make life happen by his control.
The illusion that man can make life happen by forcing his relationship.
The illusion that man can make life happen by the power of the imaginations of his mind.
Old post I needed to hear - c your self
Submitted by jennalemone on
I just read this again and it gave me some peace. When I get myself into a space of surrender and faith, I feel calmer and can accept what Life has given to and is giving to me. I can look at my life from a third party view and stop judging everything. I can be OK in the world and just observe and feel it rather than to try to control it. I can stop blaming myself for not being able to control everything. I can stop feeling responsible for things I am not responsible for.
Thank you...I needed it too...
Submitted by c ur self on
It reminds me to patiently wait and to cast my cares on the one who cares for me....Jen I pray the person of peace will overwhelm you today with his spirit:)
C