Okay, then your husband needs to help you. He needs to take you by the hand, and say, “Honey, I need to vent about something.” That will allow you time to prepare yourself and avoid the automated rice-making response.
Solid advice, but right now, I just have to wait for a couple of days for him to calm down. It’ll be unbearable in this household for a while.
I’m thinking about going back to work. I just know it’ll look weird if I show up after calling in sick and saying I wouldn’t be in at all today.
WTF?
Why should she give him “stock non-committal answers” she got from a message board?
This has come up in a few other threads, but there seem to be a lot of Straight Dopers who have minimal communication skills, would rather develop some intricate lie rather than tell someone a painful truth, and, in general, have the social skills of cottage cheese.
Communicating with people isn’t hard, folks. Listen, respond, listen again, respond again. Back and forth it goes. Easy.
My intuitions are similar to these.
Are the complaints from the husband generally about work, or is that just the case in the one instance described in the OP? If it’s generally about work, then there’s a fairly clear reason why the OP would tend to sort of shut down. There’s something serious at stake in this for her. Problems at work can lead to disastrous consequences. In the face of such worries, one can be so (completely understandably and justifiedly) worried for oneself and one’s home situation that it can be difficult to find the reserves to extend sympathy to others, even to one’s spouse. So I hypothesize Fear of Loss of Security as a diagnosis of the OP’s problem.
There may also be a Fear of Loss of Emotional Control, as hinted at in posts above both from the OP and others.
I’m really sticking my neck out with what I’m about to say. And I don’t really have enough information to be able to say what I’m about to say, so take it with that grain of salt. But it strikes me that he has no right to demand this particular kind of emotional support from you, and you have no obligation to give it. It’s not like just because you’re married you have to do every imaginable kind of emotional service for each other. Knowing each other, and loving each other, as much as you do, you ought to each have a fairly good idea what the other can provide for you and what the other can’t, and this shouldn’t be a source of any kind of resentment or bad feeling. If he told you that you’d better be able to run a four minute mile or else your marriage is in trouble, that would be completely unfair. Some people can run a four minute mile, you can’t, and he should know and accept that about you. Even if it really were important for his well being that someone run that mile, he has no right to expect you to be the one to do it. Similarly, at least right now, you can’t actively sympathize with him about the kind of thing he’s going through. That’s just a fact, and it may be a permanent fact, a fact about your emotional make-up. If that’s the case, then it’s not right for him to require you to change that “or else the marriage is in trouble.” If he really needs someone to fill that role, it’s going to have to be someone else–he’s got friends other than you I assume–and that has nothing to do with the health of your marriage.
-FrL-
Oh yes. I think that I have uttered that very same phrase a few times in response to my husbands more day-to-day kvetching. “Well, you can’t do anything about it*, why be upset?” is also a favorite of mine.
*People driving like idiots, being idiots, the weather, etc.
If it were that easy, I bet the marriage counseling business would be cut in half.
Well, when my husband gets upset like this and needs me to be there for him, it is usually about work. I’d say 9 out of 10 times.
And as to friends, we really didn’t have that many and the number diminished further after Katrina, when people moved out of town or even the state. It also seems that whatever friends we have, tend to socialize less now. No one seems to want to leave their house, including my husband. I am the only person he ever confides in and trusts implicitly, and the same goes for myself in regard to him.
Well, there’s confiding in and trusting implicitly, and there’s venting about problems.
I know if I came home and started discussing all of my work problems with my wife, she’d be as sympathetic as possible but would not really appreciate me burdening her with it. She has problems of her own, quite frankly, and it’s not fair for me to add more. Instead, I vent to colleagues. (And this even leads, sometimes, to the actual solution of problems, something my wife is in no position to provide.) I can’t say I wouldn’t love it if she knew all about this stuff and could just give me a big ol’ hug about it all whenever I asked. But it would be completely wrong for me to even begin to ask that of her, much less demand it “or else the marriage is in trouble.”
I do trust in her implicitly, and I confide to her all kinds of things. But that doesn’ t mean I have the right to tell her about absolutely everything. Furthermore, there’s a difference between confiding and burdening with information. My right to confide is not equivalent to a responsibility for her to accept and deal emotionally with anything I might care to tell her at any time.
But as I said above, I’m speaking with far from complete information here.
-FrL-
1st part: I think we’re getting somewhere here. That really describes what I’m going though. I’m so used to being in total control of everything I do, and have been so successful at it so when I get confronted with this emotional need that I have no way of analyzing, I try to shut it out.
2nd part: I don’t agree with you. Marriage is about sharing and being able to depend on one another. For my husband to need a shoulder to lean on is NOT an unfair request. He has always been there for me even when I didn’t know I needed him to be.
Good analysis, Frylock. At least it sounds a lot like my situation.
I know I always feel anxious that the never-ending work griping is a lead-up to “I’m going to quit”; do you think it’s applicable to your situation as well?
Stop!
Stop!
Stop it!
There is nothing wrong with you. And don’t you dare apologize to him.
And you sure as hell don’t need an emotional blackmail artist to “help you”. The bully got yelled at and you get to pay the price. Forget that.
I’m a little disappointed that so many people are willing to back this guy up by telling NoLaFin she has a problem.
He got rude about his needs not being met, threatened her with the end of their marriage, yelled at her about not going to work, and she figures it’ll be a few more days of this crap. This woman just got beat up and some of you want her to learn to take it better. She’s not a trained monkey on call to meet his whims. Shutting him out is an appropriate response, a healthier response would be to beat his ass with a frying pan. Or a Wok 
As far as counseling, people like this are masters of controlling a therapeutic situation and pushing the blame to some one else. And the therapists go right along with this path of least resistance. Usually because they ain’t too healthy themselves.
Make it clear to your husband that you will be as supportive as you’re able and that’s it. If it’s not enough he can find some one else to beat into submission.
And if you need an older brother because yours are too far away, PM me.
Woah, Mongo Ponton, that’s quite a harsh interpretation you’re putting on it.
If that is indeed the case, then yes, he needs to grow up and take care of his own problems. But that is not at all how I’m reading it. I think we need a bit more detail on what the situation is.
The way I’m reading it (and I could be way off here as well) is that he’s coming home and saying “Hi honey, I’m home. Wow, traffic sucked tonight. There was this huge pileup on I93.” And she’s just leaving the room and doesn’t want to hear any of it.
If that’s the situation, then it would be a deal breaker for me as well. If I can’t express my simplest thoughts of how my day was without getting shut out, then I’d seriously reconsider if it’s worth my being in the relationship. To me, that’s NOT a relationship.
Woah, Mongo! seconded here.
And yeah, it’s more like tdn describes is, but with more serious complaints re: work. In the back of my mind I always fear that he will quit his job. He has quit a couple of jobs since we’ve been together, with valid reasons: badly managed, chaotic workplace and just work running out (this was a construction gig).
tdn
I did literally leave the room last night. Went to hide in the kitchen, just to emerge to inquire about what he wanted for dinner.
[quote]
Have you told him you’re aware of what you’re doing and that you want to fix it?]
What you want to do is to retrain your instinct into a response that is constructive.
The problem that you are running into is that the only way to retrain your instinct is to practice, and the absolute worst time to practice is when he is needing you to be the supportive one. So you need a plan and you need to practice, thus you will need his help. This is part of what a therapist would do for you - show you how to deal with your emotional response and then have you practice in a safe environment. The therapist would probably also help you understand why you have this response, but if you aren’t willing to go for counseling, you can still practice.
Here’s a plan I suggest:
Have a discussion with your husband about your reaction and that you want to practice changing your reaction in this situation. You will want to role play by having him act like he is just coming home from having a bad day and telling you about it; and you reacting to it.
There are several ways you can play this - you might try your normal reaction first. This will give your husband a chance to be see how you are reacting when he isn’t so internally focused, and for you two to discuss where this reaction is coming from.
But also try this by pretending to be someone else; for instance, how would your favorite actress act? Favorite cartoon character? Action star?
Another thing you might try is role reversal. He pretends to be you and you pretend to be him, then you come in acting like you perceive him to act.
DING DING DING
I am not a therapist lover. I think they are overused. However, they can be extremely useful in some stuations and the OP sounds like one of them.
I agree with elbows. People outwardly express their feelings in many different ways and at many levels. I am just like the OP in my marriage, my wife frequently perceives me as emotionally distant, and lacking feeling and empathy. I don’t think the posters telling her (the OP) to get to therapy, or calling her emotional repressed, are necessarily correct.
In reality, I feel the same pains and anguishes she (my wife) does, but I don’t project them outwardly–e.g. if I’m angry, slamming a door or yelling at the dog does nothing to make me feel better, it is just a theatrical action in my view.
My wife, on the other hand, feels that she hasn’t adequately “felt” an emotion unless she has let it go its full external foot-stomping, shouting, door-slamming, course. It’s what she needs, and I’m fine with that, but I have trouble faking the silly dramatics just to prove I have empathy.
We are getting better. I let her rage and stomp and understand that she needs her space to do so, and she is getting better and learning to see that my words are how I express my emotions and I really do feel emotions that don’t need to be punctuated with a door-slam.
I’ve also learned to “act up” with dramatics a bit for her sake, even though in my mind it is like following a script:
Step 1: Perceive wife doesn’t believe me
Step 2: Look for convenient non-breakable surface. Slam hand and add curse word.
Step 3: If wife accepts, end. Else, goto Step 1.
Ok…so I guess her husband and her are not meant to be together. He is a bad/weak/selfish person for wanting this from his wife.
Is that what you’re saying?
Because his warning is probably real. This could very well be a deal breaker for him. I know it would be for me. If I couldn’t get help from/rely on my wife during down times…then why be married to her? It’s not being rude…it’s his way of saying that he is seriously thinking that this marriage isn’t working out for him. Just thinking about it and he wouldn’t be saying it. You only say something like that when you are SERIOUSLY thinking about it.
A person can take alot if they believe they have the love and support of their spouse. If you don’t feel you have it, things can cave very quickly.
I guess I am a bully.
Just to note, Mongo is voicing suspicions similar to those I voiced above. As everyone knows, it is a logically valid principle that if two people have the same suspicion, neither of them is crazy. So now I know I’m not crazy. 
(I’m not so sure about what he says about therapists, though.)
-FrL-
It might be too much to ask, but if you can’t see the behavior when you start to exhibit it, perhaps enlist your husband’s assistance? Ask if he will tell you what he needs when he needs it. Over time, if it’s what he needs, you will become more aware of his distress and what you can do to help him, and won’t have the immediate desire to flee.
I have problems with physical affections, never really learning the social cues needed to know when to be physically affectionate with my partner. He has learned to say things like “I need a hug now” when I’m standing there stymied for what to do. I’m (slowly) learning to offer a hug to him when I detect certain kinds of distress.
Dunno, it’s just what came to mind as I read the thread.