Family Forum / Marriage / Marriage / May 2006

Thanks folks.  I have been going through some kind of emotional crisis.
I walked out of a training session because I thought it was childish,
now there was this blowup.  I am an ex-lawyer (no questions please, I
am in Oz and it is all different.)  I have known clients to separate at
65.  I am 63, my wife is 61, and we have been married 35 years this
October.  We are a wonderful team, so long as we don't try to be a
couple as well - that is about how I would sum it up.

A laugh for the girls:  my wife wanted to wash a doona.  Our past
experience has been that they go lumpy.  A tip from the Internet
covered washing blankets as well.  It says "It came as a shock to me to
realise that blankets aren't self cleanoing like sheep....  Dissolve
soapflakes or wool mix in the bathtub.  Add the blankets, jump on them
for about ten minutes.  (This is a useful operation for a couple of
kids, as long as they have clean feet and the dog doesn't join in.)"

Just make sure that the dog's feet are clean as well.

Doug.

Thanks Tai and Jen.  Yes, I am going through a bad patch and it doesn't
seem to go away.  I get SAD (but fortunately the latitude here is only
about 36.75, nothing like Seattle.)  I routinely increase my
anti-depressants during our winter.  I have to see my psychiatrist on
Monday and may ask for a new approach.

We have a basically good marriage.  I am messed up about emotion
generally.  I was "doing fine" as a child until my emotions in general
and my sexuality in particular demanded expression.  I am a mixture of
enjoying marriage while resenting the dependence it brings.  Not that I
want to be the dominant partner.  I am probably having a "middle-age
crisis" at 63, doing everything years late.

My wife does have her "faults", differences from my fantasy ideal, but
I am quite happy with her around.  Remember Ted shopping around for a
dress for his wife?  My wife is the same size.  She isn't exactly a
houri.  But when I am in bed with her, I get turned on all the same.

I thought that it was urf talking about whether to have only one child.
My wife was an only child; so was her cousin.  It wasn't fun for her.
Not having a brother, she wasn't familiar with how boys and men think
until she started dating.  We can't control the sex of our children (I
finished up with 3 girls) but we are both glad that we had more than
one.

I could say that her present attitudes remind me of the spoilt only
child, except that she wasn't spoilt.

When we finished counselling together, I noticed the beginnings of a
tenderness towards her that hadn't been there before.  It was
completely new.  That has got lost in the meantime.  The honeymoon was
good fun; then we were largely very good friends.  We hid from each
other by directing our attentions elsewhere, to the children.  Two
years plus of separation didn't help at all, but as one doctor said, it
came at an age when our marriage could take it.  I am still avoiding
any intimacy.

Tai, no, I don't want  a sex goddess.  I simply want my wife to stop
saying that I have to adapt myself to what she wants and she doesn't
have to make allowances for anybody.  I don't expect her to become one
suddenly;  as I told a counsellor, I merely want her to acknowledge
that our relationship is a sexual one.  Even a beginning of
boyfriend-girlfriend kissing would be something.

Jen, yes, I am tired of being the parent, but I don't want to be the
child either.  I see it as "my problem".  Because I have a diagnosed
emotional illness, my wife could blame me for all our differences.  But
now I am just caught in the feeling of "the last stage of life."  The
answer, as I tell so many others, is to live one day at a time.

Since I started this thread, I have gone through a deep "wipe-out" of
depression of about 3 days' duration, but I haven't bounced back as far
as I usually do.  I could always count on about one 3-day patch a
month.

One psychiatrist was of opinion that he had "caught" me too late; that
I was now too set to expect any improvement.  I proved him wrong.

Thanks again,

Doug L.