{"id":2481,"date":"2015-09-08T17:16:47","date_gmt":"2015-09-08T21:16:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/fxckfeelings.com\/?p=2481"},"modified":"2015-10-27T17:29:18","modified_gmt":"2015-10-27T21:29:18","slug":"fix-or-forget-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fxckfeelings.com\/wp\/2015\/09\/08\/fix-or-forget-it\/","title":{"rendered":"Fix or Forget It?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Deciding whether to continue a marriage and how you feel about your marriage are two very different things; you may feel miserable in a marriage that has the potential to make you happy in the long run, or you may feel ambivalent enough about your union that you tough it out, even though doing so may be the wrong choice looking forward. Making the decision is hard, but if you can be honest about your priorities, you can make the best choice for you, your marriage, and your future.<\/p>\n

-Dr. Lastname<\/p>\n

After too many years of passive aggressiveness by both myself and my wife of several years, we finally admitted that we do not love each other anymore. Despite that, she agreed to give it a go again, though she will not attend counseling where she thinks all her mistakes will be highlighted. She wants to begin “dating” each other again. I’m going along with this but will also be seeing a psychologist to sort out the anger I have for the wasted time. The thing is, even with all of this counseling, I don’t see myself falling back in love with her. I think separating and eventually dissolving the marriage would make me much happier; as a healthy man in my 60s, I feel I have a lot of great years left and want to spend them with someone I can really love. My older kids would probably accept the separation, so\u2026f*ck happiness? Yield to the stupor of reality? My goal is to figure out what the f*ck is going on.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"Fix<\/p>\n

When we have to make important decisions for ourselves that also affect someone we care about, we tend to make the mistake of allowing them an equal or more important voice in our thought process. It’s a little like the old notion of having a devil and an angel on each shoulder, except in this case, you have the other person voicing their needs on one shoulder and you’re sitting cowering down by the elbow, hoping to eventually get a word in edgewise.<\/p>\n

Considering the feelings of someone you’re strongly connected to as if they were your own is a natural habit to get into, but if you want to do the right thing by both of you, it’s a habit that must be broken. It might sound selfish at first, but when you think about it, it’s the smarter approach.<\/p>\n

That’s because, if you over-regard someone else\u2019s feelings when making decisions, you may well make the decision they want and then blame them for it. That\u2019s not fair, of course, because it\u2019s your decision to make. It\u2019s not fair to either one of you in the long run.<\/p>\n

So re-edit your description of your problem; you feel you don\u2019t love your wife and have a negative, angry chemistry that doesn\u2019t change, even when you\u2019re not arguing. Given her age and lack of interest in treatment, you can\u2019t expect her to change. You haven\u2019t presented any reason of your own for staying married to her. Instead, you\u2019ve presented her wishes as if they\u2019re as important as your own, even though they’re completely contradictory.<\/p>\n

Give more thought to your own reasons for staying together. Review your incomes and retirement opportunities, and consider the possible shared pleasures and interests of spending retirement time together. Ask yourself whether you enjoy your time together with your kids. Do your own arithmetic so you don\u2019t demean your own judgment by substituting hers for yours.<\/p>\n

As long as you make your own decision, you won\u2019t be a marriage victim; you\u2019ll either stay because you think you\u2019re better off as partners through the next stage of your lives, or you\u2019ll leave because there are too many advantages to moving on.<\/p>\n

No matter what you decide, it should be your choice based more heavily on your priorities, not shoulder commentary, so it’s a choice you can respect.<\/p>\n

STATEMENT<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel torn by my wife\u2019s desires versus my own, but I can discover my own mind even if I\u2019ve been married forever. I will not disregard my marriage, but I will protect my right to a better life if I determine that this marriage is fundamentally harmful to my well-being.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Deciding whether to continue a marriage and how you feel about your marriage are two very different things; you may feel miserable in a marriage that has the potential to make you happy in the long run, or you may feel ambivalent enough about your union that you tough it out, even though doing so […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[85,67,87,103,89,91,46,25,69],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2481","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-acceptance","category-aging","category-angerhatred","category-divorce","category-ffamily","category-guilt","category-marriage","category-relationships","category-sexuality"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fxckfeelings.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2481","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fxckfeelings.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fxckfeelings.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fxckfeelings.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fxckfeelings.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2481"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/fxckfeelings.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2481\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2486,"href":"https:\/\/fxckfeelings.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2481\/revisions\/2486"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fxckfeelings.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2481"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fxckfeelings.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2481"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fxckfeelings.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2481"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}