Shattered Delusions

She hasn't filed for divorce – yet. I'm fairly certain she hasn't committed paternity fraud (or if she has, my brother or father knocked her up.) She hasn't had me arrested. I would never attack her, but plenty of men have been arrested without even pushing their wife in self defense.

But she's done enough of the textbook behavior that MGTOW, MRAs, Marriage Strikers, and Leykis 101 all warn about that I guess I can be categorized as a "beaten dog."

Whenever I get some time alone, I love it. I've always enjoyed my alone time, but now I appreciate it more than ever. I set my alarm and get up earlier than I "need" to, despite not getting enough sleep, because it is the way I get time to myself. I'd rather be tired and have had time to myself than tired and not have had time to myself.

The other day, it was two weeks since I'd had any sexual contact with my wife, and that session, a week after the previous session, had been stopped short by my wife. Now, during my wayward youth, when I was in long-term relationships with girlfriends, if we would have ever gone a single week without sex (after we’d become sexually active), I know any of those girlfriends would have freaked out and demanded to know why I was holding out on them. It never happened. Because I wanted sex and so did they. So… did… they. They wanted sex… with me.

Anyway, this other day was the day my wife will usually condescend to let me make love to her. Ah, but many hours before that would typically happen, she told me she was on the rag. Now, she was also not taking one of her meds, which she claims she does to help her enjoy sex more, but not taking the meds also makes her more bitchy. When menstruation and a lack of medication combine, my wife can literally go crazy or she will get vicious and say the kinds of things to me that marriage therapists say will kill a marriage. She reacts disproportionately to things I do in a negative way. (And I'm constantly reminded in my own thoughts that I made it clear before we even had our first date that I didn't want someone who needed – or thought she needed - ongoing medical treatment. This warning, I no longer have much doubt, prompted her to hide the truth from me.)

I was home, getting things ready for an event for the kids that my wife had put together. At least she set it up so it wouldn't be in our home, which she allows to become a junkyard until she schedules a time I will be home to help her clean up. I really wouldn't mind that our home is a disaster – if she was holding up her end of the marital bargain in most other areas. My wife had set up this event and it was becoming clear, as she was on her way home to pick me and supplies up, that we were going to be late to our own get-together. I was irritated, but I caught myself, shrugged my shoulders, and decided it either wasn't a big deal or wasn’t on me. I would not express my displeasure to my wife, I resolved.

Unfortunately, I reacted badly when, in the rush, some of the supplies got knocked over and spilled. I lost my temper for a split second. My wife then lost her temper at me for losing my temper.

The get-together went well enough.

Back at home, one of the kids was being disobedient and delaying things when it was time for him to go to sleep, so I needed to react. I deliberately did not yell, but instead took something away from him. His response? He starts hollering and makes himself vomit. No finger needed, just pure psychological will. This is becoming a habit on his part. I told him making himself throw up was a stupid way to go through life. My wife, in her altered state, equated this with me calling my son stupid to his face.

Now, I can't get into a long discussion with her about the psychosomatic crap my kids are pulling, because it will unavoidably lead to my wife hearing "YOU are faking YOUR physical problems" and that's a huge trigger for her.

She demanded to know the name of my therapist and when my next session will be, which will be in a couple weeks. She then said she wants to go with me, and she said she wants to move out and take the kids until then, when she would go to the session with me. She NEVER says stuff like this without the combination of menstruation and medication issues.

So… as if you couldn't tell, she successfully avoided sex again.

The next day, she was making a list of things to pack for her and the kids to move out for a couple of weeks. Now, really, from a purely selfish standpoint I would be THRILLED to have the place to myself. Less of a mess..., fewer chores... being able to do what I want, when I want, how I want... getting more sleep... no nagging... being able to masturbate without having to work it around when she'll be around, etc.

But… I felt morally obligated to do what I could to keep the kids under the same roof as both of their parents. So I offered her a deal about how I would behave over the next week, and if she still wanted to move out, fine. I really do think that with me concentrating on it and with a time goal in mind, I will be able to behave more to her liking.

She took the deal. Then she proceeded to try to irritate me. Clever, right? She wants me to lose my temper so she can justify, in her mind, leaving with the kids. She took up the issue, again of trying to get me medicated. This is a woman who is down on the rest of her family for their drinking and illegal and now-medically-permitted drug use, but she's on a bunch of medications and she wants to drug me, too. Probably to kill my libido so I'll be like her.

She kept hounding me about the medication, saying it helped her. What I wanted to scream at her is that if I'd known she was on these medications and would always be on these medications I wouldn’t have moved forward with the relationship. But that wouldn't result in anything positive, so I acknowledged it is a good thing if they have kept her alive, but I don't need them. She kept saying she wanted my cooperation to make the situation better.

She wouldn't shut up.

Finally, I told her that am stressed out and feeling ignored, disrespected, neglected, and many other things. I don't need to be drugged because I perceive reality. I need to modify my behavior. (I didn't add that I need to stop being angry that I was so massively duped.)

She kept hounding me about getting drugged.

I flat-out refused. I told her I am going to therapy per her request and that was enough demands.

Then she denied making a demand and said she was trying to have a discussion.

Eventually she went on with a real doozy of saying she wished she had gotten to know the real [grumpy] me before she married me.

Boy, did I want to run with that one. Yeah, I wish I'd known a lot of things before we married, too, like how her statement that it was "OK" that I wasn't a virgin was lie, about how many limitations she has and how many she places on herself, her mental health history, about how all of her medications, about how she really felt about me and about sex… I could go on but this entry is going to be long enough as it is.

Instead, I explained she knew the real me, it is just that I have been slow to adjust to certain things over the last couple of years and I am working on speeding up that adjustment. She took that as meaning I was saying getting married and having kids made me miserable, but I repeatedly indicated the last "couple" years. I've been a husband and father for a lot longer than just the last couple of years.

So, she kept prodding and asking what the problem was, and I kept trying to put it to rest by confirming what she has repeatedly said – that she's happy with everything except my temper. So, I'm working on my temper.

She kept persisting, so like an idiot I asked her to be an actress instead of looking for ways to turn down the role. "I know you don't want the part, but pretending can be good enough." Her response, perhaps unwittingly, confirmed I was correct that she doesn't want me or want sex.

She kept the conversation going, kept prodding, so I told her it wasn't about frequency so much as her attitude. I want her to enjoy this aspect of life and I don't want to feel like I am adding a burden or chore onto her shoulders. I noted that she looks for ways to avoid it, and that I'm not as dull as she might think. I am very sensitive about this and I am sorry for having imposed on her.

Her reaction to this?

She gave me a bunch of hoops to jump through. Yes, she even tried the "If you do more housework, you'll get more sex" lie. Nothing I do is going to change the fact that she, perhaps because of medication that she's always going to take so it might as well be just the way she is, doesn't want sex and doesn't much enjoy it. I could take over every single chore and errand and be the most romantic and gorgeous guy, and it won't matter. (Oh, and the things she said and didn't say also confirmed to me that she's not attracted to me.) So she gives me a list of chores, including putting away the dishes. I used to be prompt about that. She washed them, I put them away. But then she literally let the dirty dishes sit in the sink for several weeks, perhaps months. (She ended up throwing some of them away.) Sometimes in the past, I have taken the initiative to clean the dishes just to give her a break, but I hadn't this time. So, she finally gets around to taking care of them, and apparently gets bent out of shape that I let them sit where they dried for a few days., after it took her all that time to get around to washing them in the first place. She took one of the bedroom activities off the menu while she was at it. And she told me that she didn't want every lovemaking session to have to "last an hour". Yes, you read that right - the wife telling the husband she wants less foreplay (and yes, most of the foreplay is me trying to please her). I told her it wouldn't last so long if it was more frequent. So, included in all of this, including the list of additional things I was supposed to do, she says I need to… wait for it… get more sleep! I can only conclude that means she wants me to have less time to myself or doing the things I want to do, since she just piled on more responsibilities. (And, as a reminder, she's a SAHM, perhaps all too literally. But she hasn't worked a job, other than homemaker or mother, since we started trying to have kids. So it isn't like I'm expecting her to handle most of the domestic chores and work a job on top of that.)

Yes, I learned my lesson. I'll just shut up in the future, or come up with some nonsense. I didn't make a single demand on her, just lamented that she doesn't enjoy sex, but I knew better than to even do that, and should have bit my tongue.

She says she wants me to be happy, but she really doesn't – not if she has to lift a finger. She wants me to appear to be happy, probably for the sake of her ego. And yes, I know Dennis Prager says happiness is a moral obligation. Dennis Prager has also been divorced what, twice? I'm not getting divorced. Not as long as I have minor children or unless she files.

She wanted a wallet, a sperm donor, chauffeur, bodyguard, ear, and errand boy and she got what she wanted.

I will give her credit for not cutting her hair and getting fat, and as far as I know, she hasn't killed any of my kids. And she hasn't filed for divorce. Yet.

Where does this all leave us? Let's review.

I want passion, I wanted to be wanted, desired. I want a partner in the wonderful gift of lovemaking that God has provided. But that's too bad for me, because I'm not going to get that.

I rarely get to spend time with friends. Most of my friends I never get to see anymore.

I don't get to see my family much (my wife does).

I have little time for my hobbies, and if she has her way, I'll have less.

I have limitations on seeking to better my career, and my wife, from time to time, will demand I neglect work to give her an easier day.

My wife has insulted me, called me names, and repeatedly harped on things I did before I ever met her that she previously accepted as part of my past.

She may condescend to have sex more frequently, she claims, if I jump through hoops (funny, never had to do that with women in my wayward youth… they actually wanted to have sex.)

She has insisted I get therapy, and now says it isn't working well enough and she wants to come into my therapy sessions.

She wants me drugged.

She frequently criticizes me and demands I change.

She has explicitly and implicitly communicated to me that she's not attracted to me and doesn't like sex (but she did use sexuality as a loss leader until she had what she wanted).

She's not holding up her end of the marital agreement, has conducted (admittedly) bait and switch, and engaged in social fraud and misrepresentation.

She has set things up so I do not get enough sleep.

My dreams have been killed.

Despite her admitting that her desires and major decisions have led to serious mistakes that have significantly impacted our life in an negative way, she takes any questioning or cautioning about her plans as an attack or at least raining on her parade.

She threatens to leave and take the kids with her.



Of course, I haven't been perfect: I've yelled at our disobedient children.

Hmmm… Sure looks like I have been a big sucker, doesn’t it? Is this a textbook case of why men are on a marriage strike?

Oh, and amazingly the menstruation was all over less than 36 hours after it started.

[UPDATE December 2019: It's painful for me to read this entry, especially given that she now does almost NONE of the chores or errands, and we have even less sex than we did back then! And this is despite her changing her meds to supposedly bring some libido back.]