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SO I have posted on here a few times about my H's behaviour which makes me so sad / confused / angry/ etc
( the silly buyI'm furious post)
we have been married two years now.
I remember when we met I said to him, wow , whats with the controlling thing?! He replied, well Im not like that, but if no one else takes the lead Im happy to.
well two years later he hasn't slackened off on his grip, in fact its even more suffocating.
Now I love this guy and I should have such a great life but Im churning inside most of the time.
He has to control everything! EVERYTHING. Even this morning as he went off to work he told me to 'go and look after your daughter' as I was seeing him off. Now for one she is 13, second, I don't need to be told by anyone how/when to take care of her! It makes me feel as if he thinks I am incapable.
He does things like this all the time. He takes over. Even when people don't want him to he does. He tried to get my elder daughter (17) to let him go and buy her some new shoes. She doesn't want any! but he insists so much. It causes friction with everyone. He told everyone to eat sweetcorn yesterday before their BBQ dinner.he insisted, he brought it round to each person. But they didn't want to!! it was so awkward.
its in everything. He's the guy who sold my car while I was out. Insists I don't work for anyone but him, and be available for him at all times! He criticises everything I do in a subtle way saying I should have done it this way. he is a 'his way or no way guy'
I don't know what to do with him.
He denys all this of course.
My kids can't stand to be around him as it causes so much unease, they don't like him being 'helpful' and find his insulting comments to me upsetting.
So if I have a chat with him, what do I say?!
Is there any point?
ANyone any experience of men like this.
( he is self-employed swimming teacher, has his own school, ex-policeman, has 3 ex-wives!)
any ideas, or is it a lost cause.
I just wish he would just relax a bit?!
( the silly buyI'm furious post)
we have been married two years now.
I remember when we met I said to him, wow , whats with the controlling thing?! He replied, well Im not like that, but if no one else takes the lead Im happy to.
well two years later he hasn't slackened off on his grip, in fact its even more suffocating.
Now I love this guy and I should have such a great life but Im churning inside most of the time.
He has to control everything! EVERYTHING. Even this morning as he went off to work he told me to 'go and look after your daughter' as I was seeing him off. Now for one she is 13, second, I don't need to be told by anyone how/when to take care of her! It makes me feel as if he thinks I am incapable.
He does things like this all the time. He takes over. Even when people don't want him to he does. He tried to get my elder daughter (17) to let him go and buy her some new shoes. She doesn't want any! but he insists so much. It causes friction with everyone. He told everyone to eat sweetcorn yesterday before their BBQ dinner.he insisted, he brought it round to each person. But they didn't want to!! it was so awkward.
its in everything. He's the guy who sold my car while I was out. Insists I don't work for anyone but him, and be available for him at all times! He criticises everything I do in a subtle way saying I should have done it this way. he is a 'his way or no way guy'
I don't know what to do with him.
He denys all this of course.
My kids can't stand to be around him as it causes so much unease, they don't like him being 'helpful' and find his insulting comments to me upsetting.
So if I have a chat with him, what do I say?!
Is there any point?
ANyone any experience of men like this.
( he is self-employed swimming teacher, has his own school, ex-policeman, has 3 ex-wives!)
any ideas, or is it a lost cause.
I just wish he would just relax a bit?!
You can start by enforcing that he must say " please" when he orders you around. See how it goes. This will be the first difficult task to accomplish.
However... I am not optimistic that someone like that can change.
Like you said - you knew what he is like before you married him.
I mean, at what point is enough, enough?
Your guy is divorced 3 times, hmmm do you think it is due to bring controlling? You need to have a serious sit down and tell him exactly how he makes you feel and that he needs to stop. A teenage girl doesn't want new shoes? Hmmm that or she doesn't want him to buy them because HE will choose them? You have kids and he needs to respect you and them, talking down to you has to stop, it's a bad example for your kids. They won't respect him or you and could end up in bad relationships too.
I don't know how to put it.
I know he has low self-esteem, as do I to put up with this obviously, I know that!
Just wish I could explain to him that he doesn't need to try and prove things all the time.
My teenage daughter not wanting shoes - she didn't want to go through the process with him is what she meant!
I know he is only trying to be kind, but I feel a part of it is that he wants to look like such a great guy
xxx
A buddy of mine is also a hyper control and power freak. It's just his own insecurity. All I can do is limit my time around him, so he doesn't stifle the life out of me. You're married, so you live together, and I realize it's impossible to get away from your H. Sorry. You have my condolences.
I see that you are also in the codependency forum. Do you think the way your husband controls is a codependent pattern? Does he exhibit other patterns?
People can be controlling and overly-"helpful" for many reasons, and some of those reasons are easier to fix than others. Many people feel like this is showing love, when it's not
Good luck in getting to the bottom of it. The story of the butterfly may also give him perspective.
http://www.hawaiiswim.org/business/TheButterfly/TheButterfly.html
hmmm I hadn't thought of that. I try and not spend all my energy on analysing him, thats a sure fire way to drive yourself crackers! and its part of Co-D as you probably know!
As for him being Co-Dhmmmmaybe, I used to work on the Narcisist label but all this energy spent trying to figure out why he does these things is best spent on working on my own issues I am told. So I try.
he makes it so difficult.
He insists he is just being helpful and kind, but most of the time that is inappropriate or unhelpful. He makes out Im the baddie even thinking his actions are not appropriate..
Its tricky trying to discuss it as he considers he is always right. He used to ask my opinion then immediately ignore everything I suggested, which made me feel put down. but he couldn't see it from my point of view.
When I went to see a therapist (without him knowing) I told him about it one day, and he said 'stop going, all you need is me.'
I try not to project, but it sounds to me like he has a lot of fear..
- he might be afraid that if he's not "helping" constantly, that others will figure out he is not necessary and maybe cut him out of their circle.
- he might be afraid that you talking to him about what he's doing wrong in these situations or pointing out that he is not perfect will force him to admit weakness.
- he might be afraid that you talking to someone else about your feelings may a) cause you to feel close to someone else (and therefore less close to him), b) enable you to learn something that is "bad" about him or puts him at a disadvantage relative to you, or a combination of these and other things.
In my opinion, you're probably right that discussing it him is difficult in the best case and useless in the worst... how do you get him to see your point of view and to recognize the issues in his behavior without "controlling" him and/or impairing your ability to work on yourself without taking on his problems? Probably not easily...
I have my own suggestions and ideas of what you might try, but don't want to appear that I understand exactly what you're going through or that I have all the answers... that's exactly the problem you're facing, right?
Feel free to send me a message if you would like to discuss more. If you have the input you need to figure out your course of action, then vaya con dios :) I hope you will post again to share how it goes.
Although he had an 8 year affair while in his last 15 year marriage.
His story is they all stopped 'looking after him' this seems to have coincided with the children coming along. He seems quite angry about this. So he went elsewhere, but kept up the facade with wife 3 of still being a family with holidays etc, but they stopped sharing a bed quite soon.
Im not saying I have the power to change anyone, but I would hope to be able to talk to him about it, or handle it better than I do. I just go against everything he does when he gets bossy to be honest. Maybe it would be more helpful if I told him , its ok, lets all just relax.
He gets bossy when he wants people to accept his 'help', he doesn't see it as not appropriate or over-stepping any boundaries.he sees everyone else as at fault for not accepting his offers of assistance.
tricky!
Is it the emotional abuse or verbal abuse? The isolation or no respect? The fact your kids can't stand him and he treats them like garbage? Been married 4 times, and cheated on 3?
Do you have a silver lining?
At the time I met him, I was pretty low and scared about being on my own into old age - I'm late 40's. I know that sounds lame but I have no pension and rent my home. I was half way through a degree.
I just didn't want to be on my own!
I can see now how weak and silly that was. Im a very capable woman, or I was!
but here I am
x