Susannah's Going to Stop Trying to Control Things .....Tomorrow

Hi S&L
Thanks for the explanation/apology. It means a lot. I admit I was confused and hurt when I read your reply, and a little bit ambushed. I had been drawn in to providing personal information only to have “AHA! That explains everything!” and suddenly we’re talking about something completely different. But that was only an initial response and calmed right down. It was replaced by frustration, since I felt I had no good way to respond. Your analysis didn’t feel “true” to me, but what to do about that?

1) I could ignore, but that didn’t seem respectful. It would also feel like tacit agreement with your assessment.

2)I could rebut. I could go point by point and present evidence and studies, as well as personal experiences, that are in themselves, perfectly adequate explanations for my anger and that do not rely solely on any predisposition/pathology/intellectual weakness/cognitive distortion that I may have. But these protestations would serve only to reinforce your accusations, “Well, well, well – I seem to have touched a nerve with Susannah.” So that was a non-starter. I began to feel trapped. Delete the whole god-damned journal! As a person who already feels “invisible”, the last thing I need is to be made to feel that phenomena that I (and others) have observed all my life also do not exist! But this journal is a valuable historical document for me. So, no. I couldn’t delete it in what would have amounted to a fit of pique.

3) Well, then what? What about @Trynagetbetter response? He seemed to have my back on this one and I felt not just grateful for his backup, but that I needed it. Why? Because I respect him tremendously, his observations matched my own, he was empathetic, he’s someone who has written fearlessly and honestly about gender and race in his own journal (and mine), and (if I’m honest) because he’s a man, so extra credibility points for my position. (Ick! on that last part, but I won’t deny it. It was a thought that I had.) So all those reasons explain why I appreciated his response. But not why I needed it. The real question was: The quality of his contribution notwithstanding, why was MY say-so about this not adequate? Why do I need to bolster my own experiences and observations with those of other, more credible (read, male) witnesses, as if mine don’t matter? TBD – still thinking….

4)Finally, I could go away and consider your words and see if there was truth to them. And that’s what I ultimately decided to do. Whenever I find myself having a strong reaction to a criticism (usually when it is from someone I like and/or respect), I pay attention to that and try to do some introspection. Sometimes I see some or a lot of truth in the criticism. Other times I exonerate myself, but believe me when I say that is not the goal going in.

Funny, though – because this all loops back around to @Max Fisher 's original quote and the (as yet by me) unanswered question – why do I care if someone is/might be wrong about me? It’s tricky, because I do actually care about my reputation. It was very important when I had my business and it is now important because I need to be able to function effectively in my town government and volunteer organizations, etc. But this seems like a different thing. Not reputation – but more like a basic disconnect about me, as a person. Not so much about wanting to be accepted and validated, but more about wanting to be understood? Why? Because relationships are formed (for me) at least in part, by some sort of mutual “recognition” born of discovery and understanding. It’s a tough concept to articulate, but like porn, (haha), I know it when I see it. So in our specific case S&L, (I assume all other potentially interested readers have stepped away to retch by now) I think it is about wanting very much to maintain a connection I felt I had made with you and a sense of alarm that that connection was in danger. Alarm, not that you “got me” too much, but that you didn’t “get me” at all.

Shorter version: Thanks, S&L! We’re good.

Ps. I KNOW that @Max Fisher is a grown man, but my oldest daughter is closing in on 30, so sorry - 33 seems like a kid to me. Add to that his sense of humor and the “young man” profile photo he was using that day and it’s all I could do to not tousle his hair and give him a quarter for an ice cream cone. No offense was intended at all, Max.

 

Yes. When I think of how much I would have changed, did change, am STILL moderating about myself and my behavior in order to best support him, all while receiving almost no reciprocation from him, I get a little sick. Right now, I'm deep in the process of trying to figure out why I did it.

I think @RUNDMC may be on to something here (at least in my case). So, not only "an idiot", but also perhaps someone who is prone to project their traits onto others - someone who can't conceive of that level of callousness because they aren't capable of it themselves.

 

Also, I'm so sorry you find yourself back here.

 

Thanks for your reply. I don't recall ever having seen this "biggest motivator" mentioned on these forums before. As always, I can count on you to be both honest in your self-assessment and humane and loving in your intentions toward your wife. And thanks for acknowledging that sexual attraction in aging partners is even a possibility. I can't remember who it was, but a 40- something on these forums once, while commenting about sexual attractiveness, said something like, "and in 20 years, it won't even matter." Umm. Really? Sexual desire and desirability automatically end at age 60 or at any other arbitrary age?

Yes - thank you! Again, with the humane-ness!

No doubt - but worth the effort, if for no other reason than to not give them (whoever "them" is) the satisfaction.

Interesting. The perceived "missing out" may be part of it for my husband, but he has admitted more than once that he believes the most important factor is power. He has said that he targets young girls because of their powerlessness and claims never to have developed an attraction for any woman in a position of authority over him.

I think Amy Schumer said it very well here:
https://whohaha.com/inside-amy-schumer-last-fckable-day/

 

I love this place....

 

Oh no! I didn't take it that way at all! And you are not alone. I think it's safe to say that we have all felt foolish from time to time. I am currently spending a lot of time trying to figure out why I tolerated things for so long. Sometimes I feel really blind, stupid, and weak - but most of the time I realize I am just kind-hearted, forgiving, and tend to think the best about people. It makes me vulnerable to the kind of hurt I've been through, but I still don't think I'd give up those qualities to avoid vulnerability to pain. I hereby extend a formal invitation to you to drop by here on any bad night you want!

 

I know my comment will be totally out of your context here, but the "see people as human again" struck a chord with me. One of the best outcomes for me of reading PA's journals has been the role it (and all of you) have played in my being able to begin to see my husband as "human again". There are so many of you that I really like and admire. I have come to think of you as friends - wonderful, funny, human, multi-faceted men, who happen to be suffering from an addiction. I admit, my husband has engaged in behavior that sometimes seems monstrous to me, but he is a human being, as worthy as any of us.

I REALLY hope you feel free to keep doing this. Your comments here and in your journal have been some of the most valuable and pertinent to my situation that I've seen here.

I've often thought about the hell all the folks here have been through together and how interesting it would be to have a big get-together sometime (I know this is a fantasy) just to see what everybody looks like, what their voices sound like, how they laugh - big hugs all around.

 

Definitely not ignoring you, my friend. Busy week for me so far and staying back at the house with my husband over the entire upcoming holiday weekend (!) Ruminating on your question.

 

I haven’t posted for a while, as I have been busy with family. Daughter “J” came for a long-overdue visit. We hadn’t seen her in almost a year. She’s 22 and they change pretty quickly at that age, so it’s almost like getting to know her all over again. She, my husband, and I took a short road trip to visit yet more family and generally had a good time. But as is almost always the case now, the enjoyable parts of the trip were overlaid with the addiction and all the emotions that come with it for me. It is very difficult to watch my husband struggle with everyday activities while I work on my own addiction-caused problems. I am doing better, but still struggle with scanning, obsessive awareness of “targets”, and anxiety, even when I am not with my husband. When we ARE together, it can become exhausting. One thing in particular weighed very heavily on me this time. There were several times during the trip when I would look at “J” and husband together and think that if he were not her father, he would definitely be ogling this 22 year old girl. I’ve had this thought on many past occasions, but this time it seemed very real and present to me somehow. A couple of times, I wondered if he actually felt sexual attraction for her. After all, an addict’s thoughts can be so off-kilter and inappropriate– why would it be surprising at all if he objectified and sexualized his own daughter? The addiction allows for so much that is terrible, why not incest? I felt a bit nauseated a couple of times.

After we delivered “J” to the airport on Friday for her trip home, I took husband to the house and stayed for dinner. We were just finishing up when daughter “R” called. “R” and I are very close and she calls a lot to chat or to ask advice. She just finished grad school in the spring and began her first “real” job since June. She’s an engineer in a field where women are very under-represented – only about 10% - so she’s the only woman on her entire floor. She has been complaining to me about a guy in her office messaging her excessively over the company message system. His messages are personal – not work-related. I have been dismayed to hear that she feels uncomfortable about telling him to stop - not wanting to “hurt his feelings” or “make him mad”. I have tried to tell her how to handle the situation until I am blue in the face and she has still been unable to get the courage to do it. So the situation has dragged on for weeks. So when she called, it was to say that she had been simply ignoring his 10-12 messages per day, hoping he would get the picture and stop. He had not, so she wanted to ask my husband what was up with that. From a male perspective, why didn’t this guy get the picture? So as my husband began to explain to her that young men are often completely clueless and incapable of hearing what they don’t want to hear, she interrupted him and said, “Oh no, he’s not a young man. He’s one of the senior engineers. He’s in his 50s, with a wife and kids.” I fucking lost it. My heart started pounding, I felt hot all over, and I became so angry that I couldn’t speak for a moment. What the ever-loving fuck?!? My daughter goes through hell in college and grad school as the only girl in her class most of the time, getting picked last for teams, projects, etc; is the object of near constant harassment by fellow students and not only finishes her degrees, but excels. Now she’s a bona fide engineer, working at a company she really loves, just trying to do a good job. But she has to spend her time and energy dealing with some asshole more than twice her age, pressing his power advantage, messaging her a dozen times a day. Obviously, no one wants this to happen to her daughter, but given how many times my husband has been that asshole, the irony of the situation was too much and, as I said, I lost it. So I just looked at him and said, “Go ahead. Tell her how to handle this asshole. How can she make him stop? She couldn’t find someone more qualified to give her advice.” So he began giving her suggestions. I could tell it was going to be crap, so I left the room. Right now, the only advice I have for her is to march in there Monday morning and kick this guy in the balls. So I’ll call her about it in a couple of day after I calm down a bit. I’m so fucking tired.

 

We are still recovering from all the recent "kid time". It has brought up a lot of feelings in my husband and as a result, he has had a pretty rough week. It seems he is finally beginning to fully understand the impact his addiction had on his parenting. I try to have patience and just listen, but it is very difficult. Maybe because I'm not an addict I'm not able to comprehend how a man could hide in his office for 2-3 hours four nights a week, telling his family he is "working late", all the while downloading pile after pile of porn, and truly believe that this mindset and his absence had no impact on his children. But that has been his position until very recently. To his credit, he has not been resisting the feelings of shame as he would have in the past. He says he now feels it is entirely appropriate for him to feel shame and he is determined to work through it. The only time he slides into despair is when he gets to the "making amends" part and realizes that once kids are grown, the damage is done. It's rough to watch.