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Not sure...divorce or work on it?

1792 Views 6 Replies 3 Participants Last post by  PBear
Dear All,

First, thanks in advance for reading my long post. I do not know where to start and where to end but I am going to give this a try. I will cut to the chase:

About Me and My Wife:
Both internationals in US (on the way to becoming citizens)
Graduate degree holders with good jobs and good financial status
Dated 3 years (first relationship for both)
Married 4 years
No kids
I am 34 and she is 28.

She is beautiful, very responsible, smart, and an awesome cook.

Our Childhood:
I had a difficult childhood (parents not getting along, no financial stability, etc.) But I did OK and am generally a positive person.
My wife is from a financially sound family but her parents also constantly fought. The worst part was she was abused by her brother for years. There was also some molestation involved and nothing was done to prevent it.

Our Social Lives:
She was never a social person to begin with. She has no friends now. No one to pick up the phone and talk to (not even family or other relatives except me). She is not in touch with any friends from her past. She feels she doesn't need any friends.

I am the opposite. I am social person and want to be one. I would really like to do things with her.

Issues:
While we were dating I missed the warning signs. This being my first relationship I made mistakes as well.

1. She hates the country we were come from. She hates everybody from that country (no exceptions). In her dictionary there are not good people from that country. She hates everything...even our language. Not exaggerating. Understandable to a certain extent because of what she went through in her childhood. But the problem is I am from that country, I have friends friends and family in that country. Just to be clear, as backward as that country may be it shaped who I am right now. But I am open-minded, believe in equality (I help out in everything from cooking to cleaning), and try to be roman while in Rome (improving myself and fitting in).

2. Related to the first point. She hates all my friends (even those not from our country). She hates my family/relatives. There were warning signs while we were dating but now it is worse and she is very strong about her opinion. She always finds something wrong in others to cut ties.

3. We have no social life. We have nobody visiting us or we don't visit anybody. I want these in life. Not every weekend but at least once or twice a year. Please enlighten me, is this too much ask?

4. She spends 99% of the time at home (except while shopping)...cleaning, watching tv, or browsing on her ipad. Does not want to do things outside. I try to get her to do something with me but she quits halfway.

5. My parents worked to tough times to provide for me and my brother. They have never outside their state or the neighboring states (and never been on a flight). I would really like to bring them to the US once (for a month or two) and take them around to a couple places. This "has become" a deal-breaker for my wife. She was Ok with it initially.

6. She doesn't even want to even say "hi" my brother or to my parents let alone be in the same room with them.

7. Some of my friends are good people at heart but to her they are not-americanized/westernized-enough and are bad people. She does not want to find anything common in a deeper level. And to clarify none of these friends live where we are. She is even against occasional (once every 1 or 2 years) meetup. I am slowly reducing talking to them...how long can I keep saying "this weekend is not a good time to meet".

8. May be I could have done a better job at communicating but she says I am making her thing that she is a bad person and she says that after marriage I have to let go of things I love to do. I agree on toning things down to be somebody whom I am not is not something I willing to do.

9. She gets uncomfortable around people. She is not herself around them. Sometimes says the wrong thing that makes me twitch (am I a bad person?). This turns people away or makes them uncomfortable. I am not sure what to do about this. Again could have been addressed if we were social enough during dating.

10. "She" decided to quit her job and move to where I was after our marriage. She couldn't find a job for 2 years (visa issues). She indirectly blames our marriage for this and also not being able to make friends. Contrarily I have always encouraged her to go out and do something by herself. I even offered her a 1-year pass to live by herself (which she has never done in her life) and do everything she wanted to do.

11. Now she does not want to have kids because it is too much work and we are already fighting and kids would make it worse. I want kids and I want to bring them up in a social environment. I do not think that is going to happen in this marriage because of her aversion to people. Sometimes I am not sure if her anger is towards people from that country or her inability to fit in a crowd (she sometimes blames her parents and our country for making her that way).

12. Our sex life has gone down the drain (no sex in the last 5 months). I am by no means a selfish person. In fact, I would say I am 99% "giver" and 1% "taker". Now among all the problems she says it is last thing on her mind and that she does not even think sex is very important in a relationship. I disagree.

13. We have been doing counseling for 3 months now. our therapist even subtly pointed out that she may be depressed and was exhibiting "victim mentality". She disagrees and thinks that her way is the right way. I am to blame as well, as I have been a "people pleaser" and enabled her attitude in our marriage. Now I am trying to stand my ground but she thinks that I am fighting and never support her.

15. She is in the process of cutting ties with her parents (who become close friends with my parents after our wedding) because of what did not do to stop her childhood abuse. She says I am not supportive enough and I should do more during these tough times. She may be right and I agree. But here is my challenge: I did not know about her abuse until 1 year back, which is when our marriage started falling apart. In the last year she has made it clear that that she does not want anything to do with the people from that country (my family and friends) and she may not want kids.

She is a pessimist, atheist (hates god and people who believe in god), thinks everybody else is happier, very controlling (her way or no way), is jealous (sometimes even about me), never forgives/forgets, hyper-vigilant, has sleep issues, blames others, not grateful for/about one thing. These have become stronger in the last one year. Based on my research a lot of these can be related to her childhood abuse.

I want to be clear that I am a responsible person and try to do equal amount of work in all household chores (from cooking, cleaning, finances, etc..)...even though sometimes I think she can been obsessive with unrealistic cleanliness standards. Sometimes i think we spend more time cleaning than enjoying things.

I constantly get the feeling that she does not think she has any problem to work on or that she exhibits victim mentality. It has been very tough for me to support. Sometimes I think that I am her husband and I should support her no matter what. But that would mean that I have to give up on a lot of things. She is firm not giving any of my friends/family from our country (but live in US) even a chance. She says that I am selfish to bring up marital issues and not supporting her while she is trying to cut ties with her parents. But she also says she cannot promise that she will be able to make compromises on the things i want in life (kids/friends, etc.). Even if she accepts that there are things that she needs to work on, I fear that (like in the past) she would quit half way saying this is too much work/pressure. She herself accepts (sometimes) that she has intimacy issues but later contradicts herself and refuses to work on it.

If this sounded like a write up on how bad my wife then I am sorry. That was not my intention.

I am torn. I feel like I am throwing this marriage away and I am being selfish. I feel that she needs to grow up emotionally. Again I did not know most of her history until 1 year back. I want to support support her but I do not know if she will do her part and work on improving/changing certain things. I suddenly feel like we have nothing in common to keep us going. I really do want a family. Even if we decide to split up I am not confident (may be due to my lack of dating experience or my insecurity) that being a 34-year old foreigner I would be able to find someone with similar outlook on life to settle down.

I am sure this did not provide the full picture but it is already very long. So if you have questions please let me know. Thanks again for taking the time to read this post.

PS: Sorry about any typos. Long posts are hard.
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Does your therapist know about the abuse/molestation?

C
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Honestly, it seems like your wife is a likely candidate for individual counseling. Whether it's related to her childhood abuse/molestation or what, but she's angry at something from back then, and she's not letting it go. And as others have said... If she's not wanting to work on this with you, at some point you'll have to let her go and worry about your own health.

C
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