My husband and I are at impasse (relationship-wise)

In My Humble Opinion
61

I didn’t see this post when I posted my last - I don’t think what you’ve said here is accurate. My OP was probably my most biased post (posted when I was still pretty mad and before I had received all this excellent feedback), and even in that one I was honestly asking for ideas about how to resolve this ongoing issue of ours. If I were guilty of what you are charging me with, I would have laid down an ultimatum years ago - quit coaching, or this marriage is over. I haven’t done that, and I have no intention of doing that. I want us both to come out of this struggle happy, and our marriage stronger than before.

I think you might be projecting a little.

62

I’m sorry, featherlou, I know this must be painful. I first read your OP and wanted to be flip–“That girl needs a Sancho!”. Then I remembered.
My husband was an uber-gamer, I knew that when we got married BUT…as time went on I realized that I didn’t get married to spend most nights ignored while he sat for hours a night in front of his computer, playing WoW with his friends or with strangers or whoever. Yes, I could get online, too. We could be a gamer couple!
I love him, but I can’t sit in front of the computer for 8 hours. I gave him lots of hints, some direct requests and a few screaming tearful hissy fits. I hate your gaming.
He said it was what he always has done.
I said he had me now, he wasn’t some dateless geek. And he is the envy of his geek friends, a nice wife with a good job who loves him and a lovely home.
Why cause her loneliness and misery?
Because he wants to.
Wait.

He had to pause then.
Yes, I wanted him to change. I change all the time, every time I learn something new and so does he. Being married changes both of us. There is no 50/50, sometimes it’s 90/10 one day and 60/40 the next. If I were meeting my own needs all by myself, amusing my self and comforting myself, why did I marry the big nerdy boy?

I need him. Here. Home. Present. Aware of me. I’m interesting. I’m worth spending time with. Lots of time. How many women will willingly watch JunkYard Wars and MythBusters and MST3K and laugh hysterically?
It’s not wrong to want your husband. He’s luckier than he knows.

63

Incidently, as a female poster who has encouraged featherlou to change/find other activities rather than expect that her husband will change, I do want to point out one thing.

One of my rules for relationship advice is that you give advice that primarily affects the person doing the asking for advice.

Imagine a post by BaseBallCoach saying “I’ve been coaching for almost 20 years, and my wife of half a dozen years complains that she doesn’t want to be a Baseball Widow anymore, what do I do?”

I might give him advice similar to my first post in this thread–find out what her real needs are, see if they can be fixed without him. I would also point out that the amount of time he’s spending coaching baseball makes it kind of hard on their marriage–on any relationship. I would encourage him to find someplace on the spectrum between “Calls himself a coach but is never there” and “appears to love coaching baseball more than life itself”–or maybe give up coaching the team for some activity which takes less of his time but still meets his needs. And I might very well suggest that he see if he can’t figure out a way to get the needs that coaching meets met in a way that would help pay the bills.

Or maybe I wouldn’t give him any advice at all–the great thing about being a message board advice giver is that one can pick and choose whom to advise.Certainly I would NOT tell him to tell her that she had no right to complain because this is the way he was when they met.

Maybe I’m weird, but I hope this gives you a little more insight into why I’ve provided the advice I have given.

64

And I’ll ditto every portion of Eureka’s last post, including the being a chick part.

Askance, you’re WAY projecting your own situation here, to the detriment of your credibility, IMHO.

Excalibre, I don’t think anyone is saying “you must change or you must suck it up.” I know I, for one, was suggesting ways of changing OR counseling (and with counseling comes an inherent notion of change on both sides), OR leaving the relationship - and each piece of advice given for a different possible situation which **featherlou **had not, at that point, clarified. As **Eureka **said, the husband isn’t the one here asking for advice. If he was, I’d be advising him on possible ways to change his behavior. But yeah, I do believe we can’t make anyone else change. We can request it, and we can leave if it doesn’t happen, but we can’t make it. (Think back to our last “how do I get my boyfriend to quit smoking” thread. Same deal here.) We can control two things in life: our actions, and our proximity to others’ actions. That’s it.

Do I think she could ask him to change? Sure. I think if she wants to go that route, she should be very specific in her request. Not, “I want you to stop coaching so much”, but “I need you here four nights a week after work until bedtime.” The first, if I heard it, would leave me hearing “I want you to stop coaching.” Period, full stop. I wouldn’t even *hear *“so much.” I suspect that might be what’s happening. I also think, once he’s presented with a clear and calm request, he has every right to accept, decline, or make a counter-offer.

From what **featherlou **said in the first half of the thread, I was under the impression that a request had been made, processed and denied. She hasn’t told us if a counter-offer has been made, or what it might be. That’s why I was focusing on her actions - if he’s unwilling to change his, then hers are all that’s left. Stamping her feet and whining “but you SHOULD be here more, that’s what husbands are SUPPOSED to do”, while it may be true, is also not likely to be productive.

65

Wow. As painful as it is, this is a great thread. Here are my two cents:

I don’t think that anyone can quantify or stipulate how much time is “OK” or “enough” for spouses to spend together–it varies with each and every marriage. If he is gone 6 nocs out of 7, and featherlou was happy with it–there would be no thread. It’s MOSTLY not the amount of time spent, IMO.(although I’ll jump in here and say I think Coach’s time commitment is excessive).

To me, what I am reading here is all about emotional presence and commitment. This has not been said directly, so I am speculating, but it seems to me that fl perhaps does not feel recognized by her spouse. She has mentioned the “taken for granted” bit–and I think that is true. IMO, the date nocs might just be a start for them to share a deeper bond. I think there may be a disconnect going on here–he is busy and so involved and so selfish in getting what he wants (NOT what he needs, there is a difference)–and where does that leave her? And why is she the glue and he not? Would he support her if she suddenly discovered a talent for writing and became a celebrity? Or discovered that she has a knack for helping autistic kids and now spends time away most nocs? Somehow, I doubt it.

I don’t doubt for a minute that she takes care of him and looks after him–as do most women in most marriages. And she deserves some looking after herself. I don’t use that phrase, for my own life, I refer to it as “I’ve fed everyone(husband, kids, family, pts at work), who feeds me?”

To be told–YOU look after YOU or you feed yourself is dismissive and cold. Those who are “fed” or looked after flourish and thrive–why is the giver not given to? I am only tangentially talking about clean socks and toilets here.

Maybe she needs to have him home when she gets home-a few nocs a week. To walk into a welcoming house with someone greeting her with a smile–that feeds the soul(as she well knows, since she is doing so for him). Maybe she needs someone to kvetch about her friends with or help solve the dilemma of her one cousin’s moron of a spouse–I have no idea. Maybe she needs some positive feedback on her knitting or her rebuilt engine. Or maybe she needs to FEEL the security of him being there with her–just being.

None of knows–what we do know is that these are needs common to everyone and expected in a partner. I can attest to the fact that when one spouse is consumed with X, and makes no attempt to compromise etc, that no increase in intimacy is going to happen, period. She is being forced to compete with baseball. This is unjust and unfair and rather childish of him. He is NOT her partner right now–he is taking more than he is giving. Disparities do happen, but this is chronic.

and I have to say, I just wonder if this were a man posting about his wife’s charity commitments, just how many posters would be saying, essentially, “suck it up-you knew about this when you married her.” Not many, is my guess. Not trying to be a jerk, but I wonder if the roles were reversed, just what would be said.

66

I heartily second the idea of counseling. There is something about hearing advice from an ‘outside expert’ that can make it sink in a bit more. I know you said money was tight, but there are subsidized community agencies and most counsellors have sliding scales and even a session or two might prove very worthwhile in getting both of you to seeing the issues clearly, regardless of how you go them.

BTW, if you and hubby agree to go, I’d make it a point to go to a male cousellor. That way, if he does suggest to your husband that he ought to cut back on the coaching, your husband won’t be able to dismiss it as based on built-in gender biases against him.

Good luck!

(Must say, my own hubby should be grateful for this thread: suddenly his own addiction to watching football games on tv doesn’t seem nearly as aggravating to me. At least he’s home and I can talk to him during commercials.)

67

Is a sabbatical an option? (I’m trying to throw out another option, even if it’s not the ideal option.) I don’t know about the timing of the baseball season, but I would suggest that he consider a season off for whatever season it is that he’s not already committed to, with the understanding that he will return to coaching the next season if that is what he wants to do. That might give him a “safety net” so it feels like it’s not a lifetime ban. Who knows, maybe he’ll opt not to go back once he experiences the year off.

Speaking as a person in a couple in which both people have a lot of activities, I’m trying to imagine what it would take to make me feel comfortable giving up one of mine. If the issue was time spent together, one thing would be finding a brand-new activity that we could do together – like, this is the year that we’re going to completely redesign our garden. Or, another might be to get an activity that also meets his needs for serving in the community – this is the year we’re both going to volunteer on a Habitat for Humanity project in our area. To be very honest, if he’s a person who likes to be busy, if his idea of “relaxing” means doing another activity that is enjoyable and not related to his job, “sitting around watching TV together” is not going to be a very good trade for baseball, and it’s probably not fair to expect him to change his likes and dislikes. featherlou hasn’t gone into detail in this thread about what she envisions a season without baseball to be like, and I don’t know if she has talked about this with her husband, but one thing that would help me (if I was her spouse) would be to understand more about what would fill the void.

68

I’d like to say that I don’t think featherlou is being unreasonable in any way.

If her feelings are important to her husband, surely he can find a way to spend less time away from her.

For example, he could coach a team in a different league (that one must be fairly competitive to require a 6-day / week commitment), or “co-coach” and go to only half of the practices and games.

There are ways to fulfill his needs and featherlou’s, if he wants to.

Has this become a power struggle? Does he feel like he would be “losing” or “giving in” if he changes his commitment to baseball?

I just don’t believe a commitment to one’s hobby should be greater than a commitment to one’s spouse.

69

delphica, the sabbatical idea might be a really good one. I know Jim has issues with the league and has for years - taking a year off might give both of us a chance to come at this with a fresh perspective. Talking about what a year without baseball would be like is also an excellent idea

Stainz, I think this has moved into power-struggle territory, and that’s why it keeps on being a hot-button issue with us. I keep thinking of Dr. Phil saying, “Do you want to be right, or do you want to be happy?”

WhyNot, that’s a good idea, being more specific about what I want. I think I’ve pretty much been saying, “You spend too much time on baseball.” when what I meant was, “When you go to baseball six nights in a row, I feel neglected and lonely. Would it be possible for you to take a night off from baseball after three nights when they’ve got you scheduled for six nights straight?”

In all fairness, I should also mention that Jim and I are having two different perceptions of how much time he spends at baseball. He says it’s 3 or 4 nights a week, but only during the active playing time (May to July), not during the drafting/practice time (Feb. to May). I suspect, as usual in couple issues, the truth is probably somewhere between my perception and his. I start to get wound up when it’s Thursday and I haven’t seen him awake since Monday, and his schedule says he’s busy for five of the next six days. I don’t notice as much when his schedule is lighter, as it often is.

70

Well, I’m a single gal. Notoriously know as being “high maintenance” among friends and loved ones.

However, in relationships this sort of issue doesn’t seem to come up for me. I have a minimum amount of attention that I require from my mate that I make clear at the outset. If a person is unwilling or unable to devote that much time to our relationship, then there’s no point in our having one, because I’ll be miserable and that’s bad for everyone.

So, I suppose you need to decide what your minimum is to be happy, and make it very plain. Unless you can devote X number of nights to me a week (1, 2, 7) then I’m going to be unhappy.

I guess it comes down to how much of your happiness are you willing to sacrifice for his? Obviously these things have to be flexible and there will be times when one of you is busier, but for me, there’s no way, whatsoever that I could tolerate that much time without my spouse around. It would break my heart and I would feel unloved and unwanted.

Obviously, YMMV.

71

I think he’s projecting his own superiority complex onto the other coaches if his main reason for not wanting to scale back is because he’s worried that the other coaches will look down on him.

Look, his choice is either an unhappy wife, or fellow coaches not deeming him somehow “worthy”? A retarded monkey could make this choice correctly 10 times out of 10. Who the fuck cares what the other coaches think? He’s not being paid for his time there; they should be on their knees out of gratitude.

He needs to fully embrace that he is not a fulltime uber-coach. Any smack talk coming his way disparaging his level of commitment to the team should, in his brain, get filtered out by the satisfaction he gets from his level of commitment to his wife.

Workaholics are to be pitied, not admired. Moreso hobby-aholics. His worldview is off-kilter. Does he really think the other coaches will respect him more if he spends so much time coaching that he ends up getting a divorce?

The other coaches’ reaction would probably be “WTF, dumbass, you’re fired; go get her back!”

However, if the time disagreement (he says it’s less, you say it’s more) turns out to be that the actual commitment required of him is less than he’s spending, he needs to bail on all the extraneous activities. No group meals down at the local watering hole, for example.

72

This is, word for word, what my husband said when I told him about this thread and the husband’s concern re the other coaches.

73

That and the fact that a person can often become addicted to putting time into any given effort, often beyond any hope of marginal return, and not realize just how preposterous the effort has become. Sometimes you have to step back from something to realize that, you know, you really don’t have to spend THAT much time on it.

At SIX DAYS a frickin’ week, you should either be paid or cut back. I only work at my real job five days a week. Even four days a week is a bit much; I mean, don’t these kids have homework and stuff?

74

If I was in debt, doing volunteerwork would probably feel like a great emotional escape for me. Spending time on volunteerwork is a kind of luxury that says: “Money is not yet so tight yet that I have to flip burgers at McDonalds as a second job”.

Also, volunteerwork puts me in a position of power and strenght: I have something to offer. I work. Yet, in volunteerwork I don’t have to be so good as I would if it was a professional job; they have to be glad with what I give them. So, volunteering empowers those who are insecure of their job-skills.

That may be why volunteering in itself, (apart from what the volunteer actually does, in this case baseball-coaching) might hold a strong attraction for some people.

75

In my opinion, there is still not enough information here to fully understand the complexity of this issue. Mainly, and I believe some of these questions were asked on the first page: What is the biggest difference, for you, between Apr/May and July/Aug (the hardest part for you) and the other months?

  • Are the non-baseball months exactly what you want, all the time? In other words, the other months = no complaints?
  • Is it mainly a matter of being bored/lonely during the baseball months?
  • Or is it a lack of physical love that is the driving cause of the frustration?
  • Is there any jealousy in that he loves something so much, other than you?

I think the degree of responsibility he has in his coaching is needs to be known. I’m not sure if he’s coaching a specific team year after year, or he’s more or less just working with indiviudals to improve their game?

If it really wouldn’t matter to the team/players/league/etc whether he was coaching or not, I think something needs to be done, as I agree he’s probably not being fair to the relationship (especially if this was discussed beforehand and he’s currently aware of your discontent). If there is a certain degree of responsibility involved with the coaching, however (I know you said it was volunteering, but to me, especially in a structured environment, someone as dedicated as it sounds like he is could end up being depended on) than my reaction might be a little different. You said you’re not interested in baseball and I’d bet you and your husband’s opinion on this might differ. . . ?

Just some initial thoughts/questions…

76

Just thought I’d toss in my perspective (in case maybe what you are really wanting is to hear from someone else who would HATE this situation).

Lots of people have chimed in that you can find a way to put up with this, whether by finding your own hobbies, suddenly taking an interest in baseball, etc.

But I think for me it would amount to the fact that he simply is not giving you what you need from a partner. Not that someone else couldn’t keep going in this situation, but you need more. And, frankly, the only way to get that is for him to cut back his committment.

This would be a (very sad) dealbreaker for me in even the best of relationships. Some of us (who have plenty of hobbies, friends and interests of our own) really want and expect that a life-partner will spend significant amounts of time with us.

Wish I had good advice…good luck!!

[total aside: Actually, coming from the poly perspective, i would probably sit the person down and say ‘This really looks more like a secondary relationship to me than a primary. Is that ok with us?’

77

Have you tried keeping track of exactly how much time he is devoting to baseball? Use a calendar and note down what time he leaves and what time he gets home each night. Do this for two weeks (or a month) and then have a sit-down discussion with him where you can show him exactly how much time he is spending away from you. When you are doing something you really enjoy, time seems to fly by. He may not honestly realize just how much he is gone.

78

Every once in a while there’s a thread that makes the whole SDMB experience totally worthwhile. Thanks to everyone contributing to this one.

While I appreciate the practical advice posts that offer ideas for having him spend less time coaching or having featherlou find other hobbies of her own, I think the posts that zero in on her essential dilemma of not getting what she needs from someone she loves are the most salient. They certainly resonate for me in my relationship with my (wonderfully) hyper-acheiving girlfriend. She’s a doc, and as much as I understand and admire what she does, I need more attention and affection than she’s able to provide.

We’re both 50, and I’m not particularly hopeful that her habits will change any more than my needs. I know I have a horrible choice to make. It’s making me very sad. And I am very sad for featherlou.

79

When I read this comment, my first thought was that it was Mr. Featherlou himself who spent his time with the other coaches making disparaging remarks about “part-timers” and their having to stay home with the wife because they’re “whipped.” It’s his own attitude that he’s projecting onto his colleagues.

80

I think SnakesCatLady has a really good suggestion there; keeping accurate track of his hours would probably give both of you some perspective (since you say you may be exaggerating his hours unintentionally). After a few weeks, you can sit down with him and discuss your specific needs and discontents and throw around a few of these ideas–taking a year off, cutting down the hours, and so on.

I’m another one who would hate to be in this situation. I have plenty of interests and stuff, but I married my husband because I like him best. I wish you the best in working this out and finding ways to get you cared for as well as him–it can and does happen, but it does often take several years to work out. (As an older lady once said of marriage, “The first ten years are the hardest!”)