This reply is on the short list for support and validation. I just wish I could get her to understand it this way.
I've heard couple's counseling suggested a few times, but the last time I was finally able to get her to agree to go she said she felt attacked and ended up storming out without finishing the session, and that was before she underwent all this.
Just the other day I confronted her about being interrupted again before I could finish explaining my idea and that I was hurt because she had promised to work on doing that less. She said she interrupts me because my ideas are stupid, as if that validates her active. I told her that I thought she might've had a different opinion if I'd been able to fully explain my reasons but she cut me off again and insisted she'd firm enough information to judge me as wrong by the first half sentence I uttered. I told her that wasn't even my point: that she'd promised to do that less, and I ended up sleeping on the couch.
I don't know how to get through to her and she refuses to try counseling, asserting that she has no issues to work on.
I appreciate the insight. I really do get this, and I feel sorry that anyone would go through it, not just my partner.
Forgive me for saying so, but what you described sounds a lot like "you reach a point where you just can't fake it any more." Am I supposed to accept that my wife simply can no longer pretend to tolerate me? Have I been "the enemy" all along?
What's the trick to Menopause?
To prevent a recurrence of cancer, my wife's ovaries were removed and it has triggered menopause. We are in our mid 30s. It is a terrible business, with numerous symptoms like pain, discomfort, mood and attitude changes, and the like.
She is seeking treatments by her own idea, but that process has been extremely slow. In the mean time, all affection for me has completely evaporated and been replaced with anger, resentment, distance, and disrespect.
I know that she has no choice in what is happening to her, I know it is not her fault, I know she is barely able to control it, and I don't blame her for any of it. And yet, this new person living with me refuses to interact with me at all unless it's to chastise me for some perceived slight or criticize me for voicing my opinion.
I tried to express that I was feeling undesired and attacked but understood my plight was in no way similar to hers (nor as intense, serious, difficult, or important). I didn't want her to apologize because
Wanted: Pain survivors and those with addiction experience
Greetings to the community. I'm looking for advice on a situation.
Before I met my wife, she was a heroin user. Based on her history and behavior of use, neither of us really categorized her as an "addict," but she was a user. She kicked it right before we met and stayed off it for years, promising it would never again be an issue (which I trusted).
However... She recently relapsed.
Owing to a number of factors, chief among them surviving cancer and (likely, though as yet un-diagnosed) RA, along with a number of other influences like family history and (probably) poor diet and exercise habits, she is in a great deal of chronic pain. We have spent years trying a great deal of medical (professional and otherwise) treatments to no avail. The pain was affecting everything; her mood, her ability to be productive, her ability to concentrate and achieve her goals, everything.
So, without my knowledge and (as was claimed) to her own shame, she started using again. Small but regular q