Re:Heavily Conflicted Mesflicted: [quote author=teacherwriterguy link=board=1;threadid=11585;start=0#msg94128 date=1116243331">
Think of it this way - you are considering your 'market value' and when it will be higher or lower; this is not a thought that's conducive to keeping you married. It's a train of thought that eventually leads to separating because you're already envisioning how you might do better or worse or really just how you might be apart from your wife.
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You are soo right, but that's the thought I've been having, but only recently, and only because of the thought of being childless. I know thoughts like this happened when flirtation happens with someone else, but that's not the care here.
Re:Heavily Conflicted Mesflicted: Thanks Amy
And everything you say makes sense, and it the kind of feedback I was hoping for. Thanks to everyone who posted on this thread.
We are in the process of looking into adoption as a team. I still feel uneasy about it, and my wife knows it because I told her. We've talked about it, but I feel I'd truly hurt her if I told her all my thoughts. She knows my thoughts on some of my fears, but not all. When we communicate, and I believe we do it fairly well, we get closer, but then, after sometime, opening up to her seems to backlash, she'd get moody and mockingly repeat back an insecurity, or a deep thought, which I didn't care unless it was in front of her family (which she did a lot). I never truly understood why, until I started studying psychology. It gave me a deeper understanding of where she came from, and I had to look at her family, who I already had heavy conflict with for no apparent reason. Her family is large and primarily female. They have a great relationship with each other, but the males of the family don't fair very well. And the ones that do well, are highly respected for example, are your typical alpha male, one of which is a good friend of mine. He is much older than me, but he gave me some advice when I was in conflict with the women of the family, and it was not to back down. I told him, if I see reason in their arguments, I would listen. I naturally have a very strong personality, one they thought I didn't have, I guess because of my age. And some of their reasoning made sense, but occasionally, and this was years ago, certain members of her family initiated unwarranted personal attacks to degrees I never experienced before. Things were bad at the beginning of our marriage, especially after some of these attacks. I don’t think I was unfair with any of them. I always conducted myself with reason and approached things as logically as possible, and they seemed to bounce on me more and more when I conducted myself this way, my wife included (probably the root cause because she had bad communication problems with me, but not her family and I discovered this from her own mother), and I understand now it was because they took it as a sign of weakness, I let my guard down.
Re:Heavily Conflicted Mesflicted: For example, a turning point in our marriage, was when her family asked for help from us (it had to do with money), but “expected” us to deliver this help in the fashion they wanted at all costs. I was actually very, very happy I could help, really happy, but there was one standard stipulation I had to make sure was setup. Once the family heard of my of stipulation, through my wife, they were enraged, at least some of them were. I was at fault too for being head strong, but I had my principals. Basically, how I saw it, they wanted my unwarranted help and no questions asked, and that’s exactly how it came across. It was either their way or no way. They staged a planned intervention, and they exploded on me, some with personal attacks. I in turn exploded back badly, and held my ground, which I think set them back. There was no reason to their logic and to this day, I still see no reason to their logic at that time. I didn’t cave in on that day, but as gesture of good will, which was my intent all along, and to save my marriage, I did it their way, and they in turn attempted to fill my stipulation, but only after. Ultimately, over the years, they are good people, I know this, but from my experience, I have to be smart about it. I know they highly respond to strong personalities, and eat the weak. And this personality trait is subconscious. Unfortunately, because of all this conflict that happened, along with other problems in my own life, I’ve become something very different than what I was. I too now follow the “eat of be eaten rule” which I don’t like. I have virtually lost my patience for anything that doesn’t make logical sense, which is bad and I’m personally trying to work on it. I have become very aggressive on all aspects of my life, and the “funny” thing, is my wife respects me more and our marriage for several years now has been fairly good, we have been really close, again we have our differences, but all marriages do. Just ultimately, I’m losing the essence of who I truly was. It’s like Anakin Skywalker being seduced my the Sith. All good intentions, but very angry. Throw in the midst our current situation, you can almost call me Darth Mesflicted.
Heavily Conflicted Mesflicted: Hi everyone, this my first time on this forum. I going to speak freely about something that's been really bugging me. I had privously written this as a note to myself to help clarify my thoughts. I decided to post it here.
I'm not a cheater, but thoughts and temptations I have had...more recently. Why? my marriage has been a work in progress. Both highly religious, but we have differences, some big and some small. Sex has also been a work in progress. It's not fantastic, OK is a better word, but I really have no point of reference since I got married young. I don't think she puts much effort into it, though she thinks she does. Plus she doesn't take care of herself, appearance and health, at least she didn't, which leads me to the whys. She had a medical problem, one which I asked her for a long time to take care of. It was making me curious what was happening. She said she was fine, family genes, but genetically I hadn't noticed it before or heard of it. Turned out, it was bad, real bad, but only after we had a heated argument about it did she check herself out. She could have died but luckily didn't. In aftermath, we found out that she can't have kids. OK, its not the end of the world, but it really bugs me. I have a lot of anger. You see, I'm an only child, the last of my clan. Again, I've never cheated on her, and my will is pretty strong, thanks to my up-bringing, I guess. But thoughts of not having children, is really affecting me, which I never thought it ever would. The thought I can just find someone else that can have children is in the back of my mind and I feel like shit for thinking it, plus the whole "thing" just pisses me off. Hell, I'm a guy close to 30 years, hot blooded European man, with, what I'd say, a good market value. Genetically, I believe I have a lot to offer to my offspring. I believe I'd be a great dad. I don't know! I am willing to live the rest of life with no children married to my wife, and if I've given you the impression she's a horrible person, she'd not (we just have our differences), and possibly die alone (if she dies first), which also bugs me. We've talked about adopting, and the thought of "helping" a child appeals to me, but the child will still not be my flesh and blood. My lineage will die with me, not because of something that's beyond my control, but by choice.
Re:Heavily Conflicted Mesflicted: Also, lately, I've noticed my wife glancing at other men. It's not to say I hadn't noticed before, but now I "feel" it's different, and it's upsetting me. I know, I'd like to believe, it's just my insecurities playing on me, but I was never one to have these insecurities. I believe myself to be highly logical and have a scientific mentality, and I understand all the basic instincts involved in animal (including human) relationships, which leads to this fear I've been having because of her "glancing". She is a very maternal person, who has now been faced with the prospect of not having children. Her problem, which I'd like to keep secret, has removed the ability of having children, otherwise she is physically fine. Based on her and her family's personality traits, which can be summed up with "we are better and always right, and if not, we'll beat you somehow" (kind of a heavy conclusion, but they have their saving graces), and my knowledge of human and animal relationships, she will continue to conduct her life as usual; trying to get pregnant by me (and so will I), though it's physically impossible according to our doctors. She will eventually start to believe, or want to believe, that the reason she can' t have children is me. Please understand, I don't conclude things lightly, a lot of thought is put into this. Back to the basis of cheating and validate my conclusion, her family (large) has a cheating streak in their gene pool, and they know it, but "unjustifiable" denial to the point of ridiculousness is one of their traits, and apparently, one of my wife's also. Though I believe she has never cheated on me, she defends and denies certain family members who have. She will deny anything, small and big, if she desires, usually in defense of her families apparent flaws. Another example, one of her cousins is gay (he brought his boy friend to my wedding, plus he has a flaming personality), but she denies it at all costs, even though she knows I have gay friends. It's been almost a decade, and she still denies it, when other family member are not so keen on denying it anymore. Now, my family is definitely not perfect, and far from it. My family has a cheating streak also in our gene pool and I know it and don't care if anyone knows it; I use it as a learning experience, though none of it could truly prepare me for this scenario in my life. Back to my fear. So based on this (what I know), she will eventually blame me, subconsciously. She will not verbally blame me, because the physical proof will not support that thinking, and she is not one that likes to hear she is wrong (I don't believe anyone likes it, but she is very aggressive about it). This initial denial, will lead to large amounts of justifying thoughts to her, including the one I fear which I've seen used in my culture before and by people I personally know. That is using religion and superstition to justify her blaming me for her problem, which isn't the medical problem she had, but that she can't have children. She has never truly saw the illness she had as a the problem, it was the ability not to have children that only concerned her, where I was worried about her dying. But all this thinking will eventually strengthen her natural basic instinct to find a mate that will get her pregnant, though it can't physically happen. I'm concluding this with non certainty, but I have already experienced signs to believe my conclusion is possible.
