CaptainCarrot
New member
First, a bit of background.
In the three years my wife and I dated prior to getting engaged, we experienced major toxicity from both our families.
Hers shared prescription drugs, and the addictions which came with them.
Mine tried to force their religion on people, then bathed in an ocean of hypocrisy.
We looked to our relationship as a way of escape, and looked forward to marriage so that we could be our own, separate unit.
Which was great for years.
We had a shared social circle, shared hobbies and many deep interests, and generally operated in an Us Against the World mentality, especially for the year we moved away from everyone we knew.
By most measurements of relationship strength, we were solid bedrock.
Part of her efforts in broaching the subject of opening up, a little over two years ago, involved pointing that out, in the midst of reassurance that WE weren't going anywhere.
Which was fine, until she actually developed a deeper attachment.
And suddenly I realized I'd been operating on a very long list of false assumptions.
Among them, that WE would be permanent, and any new relationships would be inherently temporary.
So here we are, going on nine years of marriage, and her secondary relationship going on nine months, and I apparently can't handle it.
To be clear: I understand that I do not have a right to her attention, to her time, or to her body.
I understand that in the front of my brain.
However, the back of my brain (where my identity lives) is getting ripped to shreds in uncertainty and insecurity.
I have spent more than a decade building an identity which starts with "her boyfriend/husband," yet now it all feels fragile because I clearly wasn't enough.
Which leads into all kinds of deep dark emotional pits, and toxic questions.
"What am I doing wrong?"
"What did I do when we were dating that I'm not doing now so that she isn't attracted to me anymore?"
"What is he doing that I'm not doing that leads her to want to spend time with him?"
"Why am I not enough?"
It doesn't help that my own attempts at secondary relationships have just disproven another of my prior assumptions:
That "my needs" is some kind of communal bank account which all my relationships deposit into, and that as long as someone's making deposits, everything's fine.
When in reality, at least in my experience, each relationship is its own entity that has to be independently supportive of all of my needs.
NRE, while fun at the time, has left me feeling vacant when thinking about my marriage, and her experiencing it with her boyfriend just fires up all of the above toxic questions.
My whole identity as a married man centers around the idea that there are only ever two kinds of people:
1) Us (my wife and me)
2) Everyone Else (...yeah)
Group #2 comes and goes throughout our life, but WE remain.
...and that mindset is now apparently pushing my wife away.
So, with all that various and sundry brain-vomit in mind, my question for the forum:
How do I get past that mindset?
In the three years my wife and I dated prior to getting engaged, we experienced major toxicity from both our families.
Hers shared prescription drugs, and the addictions which came with them.
Mine tried to force their religion on people, then bathed in an ocean of hypocrisy.
We looked to our relationship as a way of escape, and looked forward to marriage so that we could be our own, separate unit.
Which was great for years.
We had a shared social circle, shared hobbies and many deep interests, and generally operated in an Us Against the World mentality, especially for the year we moved away from everyone we knew.
By most measurements of relationship strength, we were solid bedrock.
Part of her efforts in broaching the subject of opening up, a little over two years ago, involved pointing that out, in the midst of reassurance that WE weren't going anywhere.
Which was fine, until she actually developed a deeper attachment.
And suddenly I realized I'd been operating on a very long list of false assumptions.
Among them, that WE would be permanent, and any new relationships would be inherently temporary.
So here we are, going on nine years of marriage, and her secondary relationship going on nine months, and I apparently can't handle it.
To be clear: I understand that I do not have a right to her attention, to her time, or to her body.
I understand that in the front of my brain.
However, the back of my brain (where my identity lives) is getting ripped to shreds in uncertainty and insecurity.
I have spent more than a decade building an identity which starts with "her boyfriend/husband," yet now it all feels fragile because I clearly wasn't enough.
Which leads into all kinds of deep dark emotional pits, and toxic questions.
"What am I doing wrong?"
"What did I do when we were dating that I'm not doing now so that she isn't attracted to me anymore?"
"What is he doing that I'm not doing that leads her to want to spend time with him?"
"Why am I not enough?"
It doesn't help that my own attempts at secondary relationships have just disproven another of my prior assumptions:
That "my needs" is some kind of communal bank account which all my relationships deposit into, and that as long as someone's making deposits, everything's fine.
When in reality, at least in my experience, each relationship is its own entity that has to be independently supportive of all of my needs.
NRE, while fun at the time, has left me feeling vacant when thinking about my marriage, and her experiencing it with her boyfriend just fires up all of the above toxic questions.
My whole identity as a married man centers around the idea that there are only ever two kinds of people:
1) Us (my wife and me)
2) Everyone Else (...yeah)
Group #2 comes and goes throughout our life, but WE remain.
...and that mindset is now apparently pushing my wife away.
So, with all that various and sundry brain-vomit in mind, my question for the forum:
How do I get past that mindset?