My Marriage is Falling Apart !

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I am 24 years old Indian lady who has been married for 5 years. Ours is a love cum arranged marriage in a sense tat I had to struggle to convince my parents and relatives to agree to the marriage. Also my husband is 12 years elder to me. We have 2 and a half years old daughter.My problem is our marriage is falling apart.
During courtship, he was a loving and understanding man but now he has become another person altogether.He doesnt like me to go for work, as he is bothered about our daughter. He wants me to stay at home, even got excuses for that by saying" you are not only a mother who stays at home". I spend the whole day at home with our kid,since he leaves at 5:45am and comes back late in the evening/nite. When home he hardly speaks to me and doesnot involve me in any decision-making. He prefers watching T.V after he retunrs home but he do play with our kid before bed. Hardly one or two hrs he is at home before he sleeps. Another thing I noticed is he never appreciates me, instead he point out the mistakes in that.When I aksed him why he does that, he got a clever reply saying that " itz for my own good" . He never ever felt sorry for me, and he agreed that hez an egotist.Now a days I noticed that he loves to go out and spend time with his cousins who are more like his best friends, and they do have their own secrets and fun too. Recently, what bothers me too much is he started going to dancing bars. I am not able to tolerate the thought of him enjoying the dance of those semi nude beautiful girls! When I try to talk to him about our problems, he simply walks away or accuses me of being a whiner and give a big lecture of how stupid wives are in a sense that we are not understanding them also shouts at me for being doubtful. There were so many times he humiliates me in public and even in front of my own people. He acknowledges that our marriage is falling apart but does not want us to work on it; infact even if we had decided on something, he will not follow and will have million excuses too for breaking a promise! Now a days, I started arguing and crying in front of him, but these doesnt made any changes. I feel very alone in my own sufferings. Sometimes I entertain drastic thoughts, now a days it is geting worse! I have friends to talk about but I dont like nyone to label him as a bad guy. I was in madly in love with him, but not anymore....infact i still love him. I am deeply troubled by my inability to reach out to him. The sad thing is I cannot go back home nw since my parents were not happy about our marrige in the first place. I am afraid that they will say, "We told you so..." To make things worse, I am brought up in a very loving enviroment with lots of loving people around me. Now all i want is to convince him that I love him and I need his commitment and support to make our relationship work. What should I do? Sad

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Hi Neeta. Welcome to Able2Know.

I'm sorry to hear that you are so stressed. Are you living in India now?

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Hi squinney...
Hi squinney... thanks for reading my post. We are indians living in United Arab Emirates ( Dubai ). How are you? What is happening on your side?

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I am well, thank you. I was wondering where you live because I thought the customs and acceptable reactions to your husbands behavior might be different. In the US, it would not be socially unacceptable for the wife to stand her ground, not take the verbal abuse and get out of the relationship so that she can foster a more loving life for herself and her children. Such action would actually be encouraged here.

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Neeta--

Very shortly, down the road, you may have to make a choice between your pride and your sanity.

You have a bad marriage. You are unhappy and your husband doesn't seem to care.

Your parents were not happy when you decided to marry this guy.

Your parents were right. (...but you won't want to tell them they were right.)

Rather than admit that your parents were right, you just might tie yourself down to a life of unhappiness.

If your husband doesn't want to change, you can't change him. You can act to end the marriage.

You've gained some wisdom from a bad marriage. What should you do with that wisdom?

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Neeta, I'm a 71 year old man who has lived in the US all my life, except for a one year stint in Morocco where I was stationed with the US Air Force back in the late fifties.

I understand that the differences in cultures has a great deal to do with how marriages work differently. In 1982, my wife and I visited Japan where we saw the women carrying the luggage behind the husband at the train stations, while he carried nothing. However, during the subsequent years, things began to change in Japan for women. They not only waited to get married, but traveled the world where they saw how women were treated with more equality. Today, it's more rare for women in Japan to be subservient to their husbands.

I think it's a matter of women demanding equality. I hope you have success in whatever you decide to do.

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Thanks a Lot for Your Precious replies...
Thank you sooo much for ur precious replies ! Hmmm.. it did really polished my brain :-) But the matter is he really loves me a lot..but doesnt like to show it out! And my problem is i go fustracted coz of the same behaviour! Hez very patient and takes full responsibility of his home expences...and to make matters worse,his work is too hectic! Finding a job like this tough coz they pay well.He doesnt want me to get into any habit such as saying goodnite or kissing before he leaves to work, and the excuse is horrible! he says he doesnt want to see me unhappy if he ever dies :-( so he doenst want me to get into any such habits!!! Is there any trick to break this? How can I make my husband more loving, in a sense that i want him to show it. But he never failed to get me valentine gifts or birthday gifts or anniversary gifts...although during one of the fights he mentioned it that he got me all those gifts because "i am expecting from him" :-( There were times i really wanted to dump him..but at the same time i know i cant live without this guy..i still hope i CAN bring back that old cheerful loving hubby. And somewhere inside me it says, he cant live without me too...once he said he missed me really bad and cried almost 4 -5 days missing me and daughter, probably he must ve left out all alone....but he harldy says such things!!!!

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Neeta - welcome to Able2Know.

Is your family in Dubai, or are they in India? How about your husband's family? Does anyone have status in Dubai, or are you all there because of work? these things would change my initial responses, as the cultures seem to be different between people still tied to India and those living more permanantly, but without status, in Dubai.

I work with a few people of Indian background who moved to Canada after working in Dubai as they wanted to live somewhere their children would have citizenship. There seem to be a lot of unusual stressers due to being in Dubai - as your only attachment to the country is the work.

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Hi ehBeth....
Yes we are put up here for work! I am born and bot up in Abu Dhabi( 3 hrs away from dubai) My parents and brothers still lives there. I do visit them most of the weekends, that a HUGE relief ! Before i used stay with my parents for a week or so, but now a days my hubby showed his dis interest in me staying there, coz he says hez missin us when hez back from work! This is totally upsetin me :-(

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Hi Neeta,

I want to echo what Noddy said. Do talk to the people that love you the most, your parents. Any discomfort will be temporary and benefits long term. I love Virginia Satir who writes about marriages a great deal. This is from the book Peoplemaking (my notes only. I use her texts for trainings), on communication. Some may apply. If you see any of her books, pick it up. And I hate self-help books. She's just something else.

Our common fears in communication are:
1. I could make a mistake.
2. Somebody might dislike it.
3. Somebody will criticize me.
4. I could be imposing myself.
5. He/she will think I'm worthless.
6. People could think I have defects.
7. He/she could leave.

Progress is when you realize that:
1. Whenever I set out to do anything, I will certainly make some mistakes, especially if that's something new.
2. I can be almost certain that there will always be someone who will dislike my actions. People like different things.
3. Yes, somebody will criticize me. I am really not perfect. A bit of criticism won't hurt.
4. Of course. Anytime when I speak in presence of somebody else and interrupt them, I'm imposing.
5. So he/she will think I'm worthless. Will I survive? Sometimes the other just wants to play tricks on me. Can I tell the difference?
6. If I think I must be perfect, I will always find some defects.
7. So he/she will leave. Perhaps he/she should leave. Anyway, world will not end.

Most fears are a storm in a glass of water. They lead us to feelings of isolation, lack of love and self respect, and incompetence.

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Neeta--

You might tell your husband that after he dies, he's not going to be around to see you being unhappy. If he is watching you from heaven, he'll see you tenderly remembering his final goodby kiss and this memory will be soothing your aching heart.

Perhaps your husband is leery of turning love into a series of empty rituals?

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Neeta, You're doing all the right things, so keep your chin up and your dominion.

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just one little thing. are you using your real name on this site? if so, you may consider changing it (by contacting the moderators through "Help" button on the bottom). you never know.

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Re: Thanks a Lot for Your Precious replies...

Neeta Nair wrote:

He doesnt want me to get into any habit such as saying goodnite or kissing before he leaves to work, and the excuse is horrible! he says he doesnt want to see me unhappy if he ever dies :-( so he doenst want me to get into any such habits!!!

You're right, that IS a horrible excuse! Smile

I have actually just had an experience with seeing a wife dealing with her husband's death; maybe this will give you some help in explaining to your husband that not being affectionate won't make you less sad if he passed away. My father-in-law just passed away, and he and his wife were not very affectionate-- no kissing before leaving for work or nice goodnight rituals for them-- but she still feels very, very unhappy. She has actually said that it makes her even more unhappy to think that they didn't show much affection while he was alive. So if anything it has made her feel worse.

I suspect that your husband really does know that this wouldn't actually help you be less sad, so hopefully you can speak to him about that and get through to him. If he then just comes up with another excuse, I would start to consider that he might just not like showing affection very much.

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My Marriage is Falling Apart !

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