Physical & Emotional Abuse Support Group

Abuse is a general term for the treatment of someone that causes some kind of harm (to the abused person, to the abusers themselves, or to someone else) that is unlawful or wrongful. No one deserves abuse, period. Abuse can be emotional, physical, or sexual.

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Happiness

wiggywango
wiggywango
This is something I think about a lot...probably too much. My H used to tell me whenever I tried to talk to him about the way I was feeling about the relationship that he felt I was holding him responsible for my happiness. He said on more than one occasion that he didn't want to be responsible for another person's happiness. I used to tell him that's not what I was doing and after thinking about it a lot, it was my feeling that what I was doing was not holding him responsible for my happiness as a person, but holding him partially responsible for my happiness in the relationship. Does this make sense to anyone? Is there a difference? Maybe I was placing too much responsibility on him and couldn't quite see it? I'd appreciate thoughts from anyone who might understand/can relate to what I'm talking about. Thanks.
gem111
gem111
Hi wiggy,
This is different than you, but.......
It took me 20 years to figure out I could NOT make my husband happy. The harder I tried, the harder he tried NOT to be happy. I finally quit worrying about whether he was happy or not and concentrated on me.

Whenever you give someone else the power to even help make you happy, I feel that is giving your power away. You can only control yourself. My husband thrived on stress and negativity and that's what he wanted surrounding him. If he wasn't happy, there is no way he wanted anyone else happy.
I got so I only relied on myself for my happiness and totally ignored his moods. I could do that with him as he was abusive at times, but not like I have read about up here.

I wish you the best!!!
(((((((((((((((((HUGS)))))))))))))
Baxjanson
Baxjanson
What I hear there is not so much you saying that you expect him to make you happy, but recognizing that the relationship (which you value and want to keep) is making you unhappy. So in order to be happy, you must (and are willing to) try and change the relationship to be one which will make you happy. Sounds like the most effective way to make that happen would be to be in a relationship with someone who didn't set out to make you miserable. I like it!
wiggywango
wiggywango
Thanks Gem and Bax. It's so funny to read your different takes on what I said because that's exactly what I struggle with. I was unhappy because I felt invisible, ignored, unimportant, taken for granted. Everything with him was always me, I, mine, never us, we, ours. It didn't feel like a true partnership. Never mind the circular conversations, his defensiveness, blame shifting, name calling and other hurtful statements. He would say it got to this point because he was tired of me being "miserable" all the time. That I was making him "crazy" and he didn't know who he was anymore. I think it's because he didn't understand what I meant when I tried to tell him all these things...he couldn't see the problem so I must be being dramatic and demanding and creating all these "feelings" out of nothing i.e. I shouldn't be feeling "that way". I'm shaking my head as I'm typing this because I can't believe I feel the need to ask this question...should I not have been feeling that way? Was I "creating" feelings out of situations that really shouldn't have been that big a deal? Should I just have focused on creating my own happiness independent of anything he did or said or how I perceived he treated me? But then how can you call that a true partnership? Can it be? If I'm confusing anyone here sorry....I'm confusing myself at this point. It's just something I struggle with all the time...wondering if I just expected too much.
deleted_user
deleted_user
The thing is you cannot have a true partnership with an abuser no matter how much you try. And no, you are not expecting too much to expect your partner to treat you with respect and compassion and that means no blaming or name calling!