Posted by Dinah on February 28, 2002, at 10:24:00
I would have titled this "Angry husbands" but since my husband knows my posting name I thought that might be unwise.
I began to wonder last night if I am expecting too much of my husband - if a good number of husbands are like him and I just have idealized notions. So I was hoping that in this large number of people with spouses, I could come to realize that his behavior is perfectly normal.
He's a good man. He has never physically abused my son, me, or even my dogs. He's brilliant, witty, responsible, and honorable. My son loves him immensely. I wouldn't do without him for the world and divorce isn't even an option. But I have a problem with his anger. He won't consider therapy because he doesn't think he has a problem.
Some examples:
Son has feet with shoes on sofa. Instead of reminding "son, shoes" he'll jump up and stalk over, grabbing feet off sofa. Or if son has dirty hands and is reaching for something, instead of telling him to go wash hands he'll scream "Stop that" very suddenly. I suppose I should add that son already has problems with anxiety. I call it discipline by startling.
He'll do the same sort of thing with me, going from calm to furious to calm again with amazing speed. And he has an enormous ability to radiate anger. I almost think it's a power thing with him more than anger - a way to control us. Most of the time it just makes me want to hurt myself, but sometimes I explode, screaming very rude things at him or hitting the wall or something. Since the only thing I hate worse than the anger of others is my own, that usually brings on an attack of migraine or irritable bowel syndrome that lays me up for a while.
The dogs are all terrified of him. The best way to herd my dogs is to have him merely stand in the room where we want them to leave. They quickly rush out. He doesn't hurt them, but he'll storm at them with arms raised as if he's going to hit them.
Then there are the miscellaneous acts of road rage, all well within the law and within the bounds of safe driving, but extremely disturbing to the unfortunate passenger in his car.
Of course this doesn't happen all the time, maybe an average of once a day, more some days and not at all on others. Perhaps I should document it so that I have a better idea of how often it happens.
When I talk to him about these things his response is to tell me that he is sorry I am so miserable. If that doesn't stop me, he'll go into loud mea culpas, saying what a terrible husband and father and man he is, almost forcing me into reassuring him.
Again, my only question is whether these are normal spouse behaviours and if I need to just adjust my expectations to a more reasonable level. I am really just looking for detached rational feedback, since I don't wish to be more emotional over the subject than I already am.
poster:Dinah
thread:19013
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20020223/msgs/19013.html