pouring on the resentment

I always think I'm going to write here, but then I rarely actually do. Mostly, I don't seem to remember to do so when I have the chance, but sometimes I wonder if writing some of my frustrations down will really help or just add fuel to the fire. I suppose it depends. In this case, the fire is well-stoked, so I figure that writing about it certainly can't hurt.

I feel an almost unmanageable level of resentment toward my husband right now.

He is a wonderful father and I respect him very much. But sometimes he can treats me like C-R-A-P.

Probably the biggest hang-up in our marriage is his coldness. He will completely shut me out, show zero affection, minimal acknowledgement, for days on end for no reason at all. When he IS affectionate, it's often because he wants sex. And if he thinks I don't recognize that, he must think I'm incredibly dense. It's deeply hurtful and makes me feel awful about myself. It's not always this way, of course, but his stone-cold phases happen frequently enough that it feels like a constant battle-- either we're heading into one or coming out of one much of the time.

This bitterness right now is somewhat stemming from a particularly rough weekend. We went away as a family and I thought it would be great. We were joining my parents, without any other family (which is highly unusual for my family, as I come from a large(ish) one... so it's both exciting and sort of daunting to me to have so much attention from my own parents). I was really excited about it and it turned out to be one big stress-fest.

I partly blame my husband for this. Since shortly after we got married (it was not always this way), he has entirely closed himself off from my family. Minus the nieces & nephews, who he treats kindly and affectionately, he acts like time with my family is worse than time getting his teeth drilled. I don't understand it, and it doesn't seem to have any specific cause. No falling out, no past conflicts of substance. He never passes up an opportunity to point out the faults of my siblings, or their spouses, or my parents. Sure, they are far from perfect. AND SO ARE WE. I want to yell it at him, but I know he wouldn't hear it.

Sometimes it's like he has the emotional intelligence of a friggin FOURTEEN YEAR OLD.

I naively thought that this weekend might be a good chance for my husband and my parents to warm up to each other a little. But my husband acted stone cold to them ALL WEEKEND. It's bizarre and even embarrassing. I don't ever want to apologize for my husband, since I feel like this would be a betrayal of him, so instead I find myself working extra hard to make up for his uncaring and bitter behavior.

I think some of this rubs off on my three-year-old, who acted like a tyrant all weekend. He threw constant fits, was negative about EVERYTHING, refused to have fun no matter what. He's imitating his father, that's what I kept thinking.

My husband is an extremely loyal man. I trust him and I love him and am fully committed to him. I've tried without any effect to talk with him about this issue. In recent years, I've stopped bringing it up and tried to accept that this is simply WHO he is, and perhaps it just comes with the loyalty, or something like that. He sees my family as a threat for our affection & time & energy, and it's hard for him to cope with that.

But this weekend, it dawned on me that his behavior toward my family is the OPPOSITE of loyalty. He knows that my family is important to me, despite all their faults and complexities. Yet he continues to drive a wedge between them and me, between them and our family. It's hurtful, that's what it is.

We're expecting another baby soon, and I really want to give the baby my mother's name as her middle name. My husband is loathe to do this, even though I don't think he feels very strongly about a middle name in general. And now his hesitation to not use her name, with no reason other than he's decided to dislike my family, is making me irrationally angry.

I often just hope he eventually grows out of it.