How to rebalance, imbalanced effort in a heterosexual relationship?
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A friend approached me confidently about realtionship advice and its a tough thing to address. What better place than to ask Lemmy given the broad scope of culture and more genuine reactions here. We figure what can it hurt.
A couple in my friend group have been together for 3 or 4 years who really seem to love each other looking in from the outside, are having some tension.
The lady doesn't input the same effort for planning life events, making any sort of weekend plans or after work activities. It's always the guy picking all the slack up and managing problems. Budgeting and making sure everything is in order. He cooks, does the cleaning, and generally does the relationship thinking as a whole. That is not to say there isn't some input from his partner, it seems she's very indecisive from how he describes when making plans or any sort of choices like where to eat or what to do during a problem of any magnitude, almost stress outburst behaviour from her. Defensive type lashing out against him.
He wants to know some advices on how to rebalance the effort scale and to generally improve the dynamic as she seems to be shutting him out according to him. It's always been imbalanced in effort since the beginning he said but they are good together. They want to make it work but the stress and tension is building to unhealthy levels from what I understand as in he's ready to break up. They don't fight really but there's some definite underlying issues, when he tries to talk about it or anything emotional derived she says things like she doesn't know, doesn't know how to explain the way she feels at all and says her mind is sort of blank and that is how he describes most of their deep talks. He described to me that their communication as he's a very involved communicator and she can go off and be unresponsive or completely not answer questions he asks like they don't exist.
There's tension between them she's snappy more often than not and deals with severe depression/anxiety. Hates her job. Is always in a negative mindset. While he is usually more upbeat and postive not bubbly but hopeful.
I've seen him have hard days and be tense and snarky as well who hasnt had a rough day? To me it just isnt like her where she always generally has smart comments towards anything. She's not what I would say is an uptight removed but almost anything can ruin her mood.
I'm likely missing some points here it's not my relationship nor am I good at these things but I'm trying so be easy on me here. The only thing I can tell is they genuinely seem to love each other. Sex life is imbalanced he has a high drive and her very low as in can go months then sometimes 1 to 4 times a month. They did get hormone testing but everything appears normal. Worth noting he said she sleeps excessively like after work all through the night most days. They no longer talk as much or text during the day. Where that used to be more common. He did mention she has a male coworker she works with daily that they are fairly close he is unsure of in-fidelity but they meet for work at his apartment every morning apparently it's easier since they share a work vehicle. I was told that he wanted to quit in a rush a few months ago and they had an argument because he was about to leave and she irrationally seemed to want to quit with him. At the very least their very emotionally tied. It may be nothing he said.
She told him she doesn't feel any different in the relationship for the way she views them when asked.
But just doesn't show attention anymore when he gets upset her response will be Boohoo or similar.
Personally I believe she's burned out and has anxiety on top of horrible depression but I have no real clue how to address that for them. It's such a personal topic.
Lemmy give them some of your best advices they used to be so full of life and laughter. Thank you all! If I missed anything or any specific questions just ask. We both are excited to see what comes of this.
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System shared this topic
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A friend approached me confidently about realtionship advice and its a tough thing to address. What better place than to ask Lemmy given the broad scope of culture and more genuine reactions here. We figure what can it hurt.
A couple in my friend group have been together for 3 or 4 years who really seem to love each other looking in from the outside, are having some tension.
The lady doesn't input the same effort for planning life events, making any sort of weekend plans or after work activities. It's always the guy picking all the slack up and managing problems. Budgeting and making sure everything is in order. He cooks, does the cleaning, and generally does the relationship thinking as a whole. That is not to say there isn't some input from his partner, it seems she's very indecisive from how he describes when making plans or any sort of choices like where to eat or what to do during a problem of any magnitude, almost stress outburst behaviour from her. Defensive type lashing out against him.
He wants to know some advices on how to rebalance the effort scale and to generally improve the dynamic as she seems to be shutting him out according to him. It's always been imbalanced in effort since the beginning he said but they are good together. They want to make it work but the stress and tension is building to unhealthy levels from what I understand as in he's ready to break up. They don't fight really but there's some definite underlying issues, when he tries to talk about it or anything emotional derived she says things like she doesn't know, doesn't know how to explain the way she feels at all and says her mind is sort of blank and that is how he describes most of their deep talks. He described to me that their communication as he's a very involved communicator and she can go off and be unresponsive or completely not answer questions he asks like they don't exist.
There's tension between them she's snappy more often than not and deals with severe depression/anxiety. Hates her job. Is always in a negative mindset. While he is usually more upbeat and postive not bubbly but hopeful.
I've seen him have hard days and be tense and snarky as well who hasnt had a rough day? To me it just isnt like her where she always generally has smart comments towards anything. She's not what I would say is an uptight removed but almost anything can ruin her mood.
I'm likely missing some points here it's not my relationship nor am I good at these things but I'm trying so be easy on me here. The only thing I can tell is they genuinely seem to love each other. Sex life is imbalanced he has a high drive and her very low as in can go months then sometimes 1 to 4 times a month. They did get hormone testing but everything appears normal. Worth noting he said she sleeps excessively like after work all through the night most days. They no longer talk as much or text during the day. Where that used to be more common. He did mention she has a male coworker she works with daily that they are fairly close he is unsure of in-fidelity but they meet for work at his apartment every morning apparently it's easier since they share a work vehicle. I was told that he wanted to quit in a rush a few months ago and they had an argument because he was about to leave and she irrationally seemed to want to quit with him. At the very least their very emotionally tied. It may be nothing he said.
She told him she doesn't feel any different in the relationship for the way she views them when asked.
But just doesn't show attention anymore when he gets upset her response will be Boohoo or similar.
Personally I believe she's burned out and has anxiety on top of horrible depression but I have no real clue how to address that for them. It's such a personal topic.
Lemmy give them some of your best advices they used to be so full of life and laughter. Thank you all! If I missed anything or any specific questions just ask. We both are excited to see what comes of this.
Step 1: get both parties to agree there's an imbalance.
If you ctame get to this point, no other advice matters
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A friend approached me confidently about realtionship advice and its a tough thing to address. What better place than to ask Lemmy given the broad scope of culture and more genuine reactions here. We figure what can it hurt.
A couple in my friend group have been together for 3 or 4 years who really seem to love each other looking in from the outside, are having some tension.
The lady doesn't input the same effort for planning life events, making any sort of weekend plans or after work activities. It's always the guy picking all the slack up and managing problems. Budgeting and making sure everything is in order. He cooks, does the cleaning, and generally does the relationship thinking as a whole. That is not to say there isn't some input from his partner, it seems she's very indecisive from how he describes when making plans or any sort of choices like where to eat or what to do during a problem of any magnitude, almost stress outburst behaviour from her. Defensive type lashing out against him.
He wants to know some advices on how to rebalance the effort scale and to generally improve the dynamic as she seems to be shutting him out according to him. It's always been imbalanced in effort since the beginning he said but they are good together. They want to make it work but the stress and tension is building to unhealthy levels from what I understand as in he's ready to break up. They don't fight really but there's some definite underlying issues, when he tries to talk about it or anything emotional derived she says things like she doesn't know, doesn't know how to explain the way she feels at all and says her mind is sort of blank and that is how he describes most of their deep talks. He described to me that their communication as he's a very involved communicator and she can go off and be unresponsive or completely not answer questions he asks like they don't exist.
There's tension between them she's snappy more often than not and deals with severe depression/anxiety. Hates her job. Is always in a negative mindset. While he is usually more upbeat and postive not bubbly but hopeful.
I've seen him have hard days and be tense and snarky as well who hasnt had a rough day? To me it just isnt like her where she always generally has smart comments towards anything. She's not what I would say is an uptight removed but almost anything can ruin her mood.
I'm likely missing some points here it's not my relationship nor am I good at these things but I'm trying so be easy on me here. The only thing I can tell is they genuinely seem to love each other. Sex life is imbalanced he has a high drive and her very low as in can go months then sometimes 1 to 4 times a month. They did get hormone testing but everything appears normal. Worth noting he said she sleeps excessively like after work all through the night most days. They no longer talk as much or text during the day. Where that used to be more common. He did mention she has a male coworker she works with daily that they are fairly close he is unsure of in-fidelity but they meet for work at his apartment every morning apparently it's easier since they share a work vehicle. I was told that he wanted to quit in a rush a few months ago and they had an argument because he was about to leave and she irrationally seemed to want to quit with him. At the very least their very emotionally tied. It may be nothing he said.
She told him she doesn't feel any different in the relationship for the way she views them when asked.
But just doesn't show attention anymore when he gets upset her response will be Boohoo or similar.
Personally I believe she's burned out and has anxiety on top of horrible depression but I have no real clue how to address that for them. It's such a personal topic.
Lemmy give them some of your best advices they used to be so full of life and laughter. Thank you all! If I missed anything or any specific questions just ask. We both are excited to see what comes of this.
Your friend is in a relationship while your friends SO is not.
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Step 1: get both parties to agree there's an imbalance.
If you ctame get to this point, no other advice matters
She agrees it's wildly imbalanced and wants to change but he said she tries hard for a day or two then drops the ball and returns to old ways.
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Your friend is in a relationship while your friends SO is not.
I know and it's so disheartening that is why I don't know what to tell him other than it's heart breaking ending love but I kind of think it might be the best bet. They currently haven't spoke today since an argument last night. She wanted to use him to complete an a long errand and he refused until they have a couple day to relax and reset. She got mad and he thought it best to go silent until she figures out her end. It almost seems like she will apologize but it's manipulative because she will go back to the same pattern he said.
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A friend approached me confidently about realtionship advice and its a tough thing to address. What better place than to ask Lemmy given the broad scope of culture and more genuine reactions here. We figure what can it hurt.
A couple in my friend group have been together for 3 or 4 years who really seem to love each other looking in from the outside, are having some tension.
The lady doesn't input the same effort for planning life events, making any sort of weekend plans or after work activities. It's always the guy picking all the slack up and managing problems. Budgeting and making sure everything is in order. He cooks, does the cleaning, and generally does the relationship thinking as a whole. That is not to say there isn't some input from his partner, it seems she's very indecisive from how he describes when making plans or any sort of choices like where to eat or what to do during a problem of any magnitude, almost stress outburst behaviour from her. Defensive type lashing out against him.
He wants to know some advices on how to rebalance the effort scale and to generally improve the dynamic as she seems to be shutting him out according to him. It's always been imbalanced in effort since the beginning he said but they are good together. They want to make it work but the stress and tension is building to unhealthy levels from what I understand as in he's ready to break up. They don't fight really but there's some definite underlying issues, when he tries to talk about it or anything emotional derived she says things like she doesn't know, doesn't know how to explain the way she feels at all and says her mind is sort of blank and that is how he describes most of their deep talks. He described to me that their communication as he's a very involved communicator and she can go off and be unresponsive or completely not answer questions he asks like they don't exist.
There's tension between them she's snappy more often than not and deals with severe depression/anxiety. Hates her job. Is always in a negative mindset. While he is usually more upbeat and postive not bubbly but hopeful.
I've seen him have hard days and be tense and snarky as well who hasnt had a rough day? To me it just isnt like her where she always generally has smart comments towards anything. She's not what I would say is an uptight removed but almost anything can ruin her mood.
I'm likely missing some points here it's not my relationship nor am I good at these things but I'm trying so be easy on me here. The only thing I can tell is they genuinely seem to love each other. Sex life is imbalanced he has a high drive and her very low as in can go months then sometimes 1 to 4 times a month. They did get hormone testing but everything appears normal. Worth noting he said she sleeps excessively like after work all through the night most days. They no longer talk as much or text during the day. Where that used to be more common. He did mention she has a male coworker she works with daily that they are fairly close he is unsure of in-fidelity but they meet for work at his apartment every morning apparently it's easier since they share a work vehicle. I was told that he wanted to quit in a rush a few months ago and they had an argument because he was about to leave and she irrationally seemed to want to quit with him. At the very least their very emotionally tied. It may be nothing he said.
She told him she doesn't feel any different in the relationship for the way she views them when asked.
But just doesn't show attention anymore when he gets upset her response will be Boohoo or similar.
Personally I believe she's burned out and has anxiety on top of horrible depression but I have no real clue how to address that for them. It's such a personal topic.
Lemmy give them some of your best advices they used to be so full of life and laughter. Thank you all! If I missed anything or any specific questions just ask. We both are excited to see what comes of this.
Your friend should move on with his life, rather than committing to unending misery.
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She agrees it's wildly imbalanced and wants to change but he said she tries hard for a day or two then drops the ball and returns to old ways.
Cool. Now it's just getting her to come up with different options that are based on her unique characteristics. Not everyone is made for planning. Not everyone is made for coordination. Not everyone is made for todo lists. She needs to bring her wholeself - he needs to contribute his special powers to supporting her developing her special powers and vice versa.
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A friend approached me confidently about realtionship advice and its a tough thing to address. What better place than to ask Lemmy given the broad scope of culture and more genuine reactions here. We figure what can it hurt.
A couple in my friend group have been together for 3 or 4 years who really seem to love each other looking in from the outside, are having some tension.
The lady doesn't input the same effort for planning life events, making any sort of weekend plans or after work activities. It's always the guy picking all the slack up and managing problems. Budgeting and making sure everything is in order. He cooks, does the cleaning, and generally does the relationship thinking as a whole. That is not to say there isn't some input from his partner, it seems she's very indecisive from how he describes when making plans or any sort of choices like where to eat or what to do during a problem of any magnitude, almost stress outburst behaviour from her. Defensive type lashing out against him.
He wants to know some advices on how to rebalance the effort scale and to generally improve the dynamic as she seems to be shutting him out according to him. It's always been imbalanced in effort since the beginning he said but they are good together. They want to make it work but the stress and tension is building to unhealthy levels from what I understand as in he's ready to break up. They don't fight really but there's some definite underlying issues, when he tries to talk about it or anything emotional derived she says things like she doesn't know, doesn't know how to explain the way she feels at all and says her mind is sort of blank and that is how he describes most of their deep talks. He described to me that their communication as he's a very involved communicator and she can go off and be unresponsive or completely not answer questions he asks like they don't exist.
There's tension between them she's snappy more often than not and deals with severe depression/anxiety. Hates her job. Is always in a negative mindset. While he is usually more upbeat and postive not bubbly but hopeful.
I've seen him have hard days and be tense and snarky as well who hasnt had a rough day? To me it just isnt like her where she always generally has smart comments towards anything. She's not what I would say is an uptight removed but almost anything can ruin her mood.
I'm likely missing some points here it's not my relationship nor am I good at these things but I'm trying so be easy on me here. The only thing I can tell is they genuinely seem to love each other. Sex life is imbalanced he has a high drive and her very low as in can go months then sometimes 1 to 4 times a month. They did get hormone testing but everything appears normal. Worth noting he said she sleeps excessively like after work all through the night most days. They no longer talk as much or text during the day. Where that used to be more common. He did mention she has a male coworker she works with daily that they are fairly close he is unsure of in-fidelity but they meet for work at his apartment every morning apparently it's easier since they share a work vehicle. I was told that he wanted to quit in a rush a few months ago and they had an argument because he was about to leave and she irrationally seemed to want to quit with him. At the very least their very emotionally tied. It may be nothing he said.
She told him she doesn't feel any different in the relationship for the way she views them when asked.
But just doesn't show attention anymore when he gets upset her response will be Boohoo or similar.
Personally I believe she's burned out and has anxiety on top of horrible depression but I have no real clue how to address that for them. It's such a personal topic.
Lemmy give them some of your best advices they used to be so full of life and laughter. Thank you all! If I missed anything or any specific questions just ask. We both are excited to see what comes of this.
There is 2 ways really: your friend needs to leave, or he needs to be fine with the imbalance, winding down as much as is necessary.
She's not going to change unless things stop working for her. It's a simple reality of the human mind. That doesn't mean it's guaranteed she will change, she might not.
The real threat of him leaving will cause huge issues within her. She will either change to keep him, or fall into more misery. Both are very possible.
Him stopping to care, and (likely) toning down his involvement is the harder option for him. With toning down I mean, maybe just cook for himself, maybe just clean whatever is absolutely important to him and his own dirt, masturbate more, do less "relationship thinking". Do everything necessary down to a level that he is actually comfortable with. You can actually be completely fine in an uneven relationship, it's mostly a mindset thing. Of course being with someone else might be better, which is leaving again. I'm poly, so I've got that covered anyway, they seem monogamous, so no other people to fill the gaps without leaving, in my relationships everyone does just as much as they want and gets everything else they need from other people, which works perfectly.
But yeah, him toning down his involvement will also result in missing comfort for her (like leaving), which will either cause her to change to more even involvement, or feel even more bad and lead to the first possibility.Your friend can't control what his wife does. He can only control what he does and get comfortable with how his wife is. In my opinion, this whole situation from what you said is pretty much his fault, and not hers, as you've said this inequality has been like this from the beginning. He knew what he was getting into, she doesn't seem to have misled him or changed majorly. He should've either never entered/deepened this relationship or have been truly fine with the inequality, if he was, there would be no problems now.
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Step 1: get both parties to agree there's an imbalance.
If you ctame get to this point, no other advice matters
lol, both parties agreeing does mostly nothing. It's a nice step, and maybe even necessary for them to stay together, but with "no other advice matters", you vastly overstate how important this realization is. You can easily agree on this and everything not working out anyway.
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A friend approached me confidently about realtionship advice and its a tough thing to address. What better place than to ask Lemmy given the broad scope of culture and more genuine reactions here. We figure what can it hurt.
A couple in my friend group have been together for 3 or 4 years who really seem to love each other looking in from the outside, are having some tension.
The lady doesn't input the same effort for planning life events, making any sort of weekend plans or after work activities. It's always the guy picking all the slack up and managing problems. Budgeting and making sure everything is in order. He cooks, does the cleaning, and generally does the relationship thinking as a whole. That is not to say there isn't some input from his partner, it seems she's very indecisive from how he describes when making plans or any sort of choices like where to eat or what to do during a problem of any magnitude, almost stress outburst behaviour from her. Defensive type lashing out against him.
He wants to know some advices on how to rebalance the effort scale and to generally improve the dynamic as she seems to be shutting him out according to him. It's always been imbalanced in effort since the beginning he said but they are good together. They want to make it work but the stress and tension is building to unhealthy levels from what I understand as in he's ready to break up. They don't fight really but there's some definite underlying issues, when he tries to talk about it or anything emotional derived she says things like she doesn't know, doesn't know how to explain the way she feels at all and says her mind is sort of blank and that is how he describes most of their deep talks. He described to me that their communication as he's a very involved communicator and she can go off and be unresponsive or completely not answer questions he asks like they don't exist.
There's tension between them she's snappy more often than not and deals with severe depression/anxiety. Hates her job. Is always in a negative mindset. While he is usually more upbeat and postive not bubbly but hopeful.
I've seen him have hard days and be tense and snarky as well who hasnt had a rough day? To me it just isnt like her where she always generally has smart comments towards anything. She's not what I would say is an uptight removed but almost anything can ruin her mood.
I'm likely missing some points here it's not my relationship nor am I good at these things but I'm trying so be easy on me here. The only thing I can tell is they genuinely seem to love each other. Sex life is imbalanced he has a high drive and her very low as in can go months then sometimes 1 to 4 times a month. They did get hormone testing but everything appears normal. Worth noting he said she sleeps excessively like after work all through the night most days. They no longer talk as much or text during the day. Where that used to be more common. He did mention she has a male coworker she works with daily that they are fairly close he is unsure of in-fidelity but they meet for work at his apartment every morning apparently it's easier since they share a work vehicle. I was told that he wanted to quit in a rush a few months ago and they had an argument because he was about to leave and she irrationally seemed to want to quit with him. At the very least their very emotionally tied. It may be nothing he said.
She told him she doesn't feel any different in the relationship for the way she views them when asked.
But just doesn't show attention anymore when he gets upset her response will be Boohoo or similar.
Personally I believe she's burned out and has anxiety on top of horrible depression but I have no real clue how to address that for them. It's such a personal topic.
Lemmy give them some of your best advices they used to be so full of life and laughter. Thank you all! If I missed anything or any specific questions just ask. We both are excited to see what comes of this.
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lol, both parties agreeing does mostly nothing. It's a nice step, and maybe even necessary for them to stay together, but with "no other advice matters", you vastly overstate how important this realization is. You can easily agree on this and everything not working out anyway.
You misunderstood the words. You can agree on this and fail to resolve. But you can not disagree on this and resolve. And that was the point
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There is 2 ways really: your friend needs to leave, or he needs to be fine with the imbalance, winding down as much as is necessary.
She's not going to change unless things stop working for her. It's a simple reality of the human mind. That doesn't mean it's guaranteed she will change, she might not.
The real threat of him leaving will cause huge issues within her. She will either change to keep him, or fall into more misery. Both are very possible.
Him stopping to care, and (likely) toning down his involvement is the harder option for him. With toning down I mean, maybe just cook for himself, maybe just clean whatever is absolutely important to him and his own dirt, masturbate more, do less "relationship thinking". Do everything necessary down to a level that he is actually comfortable with. You can actually be completely fine in an uneven relationship, it's mostly a mindset thing. Of course being with someone else might be better, which is leaving again. I'm poly, so I've got that covered anyway, they seem monogamous, so no other people to fill the gaps without leaving, in my relationships everyone does just as much as they want and gets everything else they need from other people, which works perfectly.
But yeah, him toning down his involvement will also result in missing comfort for her (like leaving), which will either cause her to change to more even involvement, or feel even more bad and lead to the first possibility.Your friend can't control what his wife does. He can only control what he does and get comfortable with how his wife is. In my opinion, this whole situation from what you said is pretty much his fault, and not hers, as you've said this inequality has been like this from the beginning. He knew what he was getting into, she doesn't seem to have misled him or changed majorly. He should've either never entered/deepened this relationship or have been truly fine with the inequality, if he was, there would be no problems now.
He just responded that he is trying to pull back a little and see how she responds they haven't talked since yesterday even though she sent him a message today about an errand she wanted him to do. He wants to fall back but is so emotionally attached that it's hard not to go back and just keep eating the problem until burn out again. U guess torn you could say. Love is a wild emotion is all I have to say.
Do you think he should go totally dark on contact until she comes around to wanting to talk or how should he approach? To me it seems like he's a bit overly hopeful or sees the good in people too much. Which is why I struggled to offer help and advice.
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You misunderstood the words. You can agree on this and fail to resolve. But you can not disagree on this and resolve. And that was the point
I'm pretty sure I didn't misunderstand the words. You literally said "no other advice matters". I.e. this is the only thing that's important. That's quite clearly false, you just admitted it yourself.
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lol, both parties agreeing does mostly nothing. It's a nice step, and maybe even necessary for them to stay together, but with "no other advice matters", you vastly overstate how important this realization is. You can easily agree on this and everything not working out anyway.
This seems like it's mapping. They both agree there's this issue of equality in the relationship but perhaps they just aren't a true fit like they thought. Maybe all good things come to an end. I didn't want to jump to saying this because I don't want to be that guy.
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He just responded that he is trying to pull back a little and see how she responds they haven't talked since yesterday even though she sent him a message today about an errand she wanted him to do. He wants to fall back but is so emotionally attached that it's hard not to go back and just keep eating the problem until burn out again. U guess torn you could say. Love is a wild emotion is all I have to say.
Do you think he should go totally dark on contact until she comes around to wanting to talk or how should he approach? To me it seems like he's a bit overly hopeful or sees the good in people too much. Which is why I struggled to offer help and advice.
If it was my friend, I would ask him what he would do if he was absolutely sure that his wife will never change. And then tell him that this is what he should do, because 1. in my opinion it is toxic to be in a relationship and expect the other person to change and 2. her not changing is the most likely outcome, people do change, but they always resist it very much, and often that resistance is too great.
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Sounds like her depression/anxiety is the root of problem. Has she talked to a doctor, other than getting hormones checked? Was she always like this, or has something changed lately?
Its always been sort of like this even as a teen but after college friends kind of parted ways and everyone's lives took off that it's really only them her hobbies got left behind and all the work realization of a lifetime of 40 hour week dynamic just crashed her further.
He thinks it's depression/anxiety a lot too and she took therapy that she said helped to vent and just talk outside of them but she's almost just shutdown sort of. To me it's like she's maxed out internally and auto pilot is running on fumes. So she sleeps excessive after work and that's about it.
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This seems like it's mapping. They both agree there's this issue of equality in the relationship but perhaps they just aren't a true fit like they thought. Maybe all good things come to an end. I didn't want to jump to saying this because I don't want to be that guy.
Just because this is not literally the most important thing, doesn't mean the relationship is necessarily doomed.
But one thing I believe very strongly is that a relationship only works when both people are fine with leaving each other under certain circumstances. If leaving is such a big hurdle that you accept lots of misery instead of it, something is fucked. That's why I hate marriage and the whole "until death do us part" thinking. If you can't leave someone, you're basically saying "I'm fine with you doing the most horrible things to me". Leaving should always theoretically be on the table. People treat leaving or the end of a relationship as this super horrible thing, but in actuality everyone knows that sometimes it's absolutely the right course of action.
To me, it doesn't seem like their relationship necessarily needs to come to an end. From what you have said of course. With more details, this might change. But I can still see lots of paths that could lead to them staying together.
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If it was my friend, I would ask him what he would do if he was absolutely sure that his wife will never change. And then tell him that this is what he should do, because 1. in my opinion it is toxic to be in a relationship and expect the other person to change and 2. her not changing is the most likely outcome, people do change, but they always resist it very much, and often that resistance is too great.
His response was if he could be poly with her he thinks it would work out where his sex drive being high and hers really low that he could get his needs filled and she's very quiet and shy that he needs more social interaction the scale could balance out and they can still have love and enjoy one another when they both want to on each their own time. They are monogamous. She would definitely have an issue with that.
As far as the toxic aspect he said he does think it's sort of toxic to want her to change but he feels her being so severely dreoessed and anxious it's for the better. Not to turn her into someone else but to re-ignite her life and enjoyment again. He wants to be less harsh about it on a day to day basis but told me she won't do anything if he doesn't stay on about it until it's done.
To me that seems uhh understanding and also messed up like she needs to learn adulting for herself. I hadn't previously had that info that he was sort of always pushing her daily. He had just told me he could ask a a question or a few and she wouldn't even respond as if she thought about it but from his view it didn't exist. Kind of wild to think about from my view.Personally I don't think she will change. He wants to fall back cease contact as much a possible for a week or a month and just give her space to see what comes of it all.
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His response was if he could be poly with her he thinks it would work out where his sex drive being high and hers really low that he could get his needs filled and she's very quiet and shy that he needs more social interaction the scale could balance out and they can still have love and enjoy one another when they both want to on each their own time. They are monogamous. She would definitely have an issue with that.
As far as the toxic aspect he said he does think it's sort of toxic to want her to change but he feels her being so severely dreoessed and anxious it's for the better. Not to turn her into someone else but to re-ignite her life and enjoyment again. He wants to be less harsh about it on a day to day basis but told me she won't do anything if he doesn't stay on about it until it's done.
To me that seems uhh understanding and also messed up like she needs to learn adulting for herself. I hadn't previously had that info that he was sort of always pushing her daily. He had just told me he could ask a a question or a few and she wouldn't even respond as if she thought about it but from his view it didn't exist. Kind of wild to think about from my view.Personally I don't think she will change. He wants to fall back cease contact as much a possible for a week or a month and just give her space to see what comes of it all.
he was sort of always pushing her daily.
This is exactly what it sounded like. Glad you've got this information, now I've got more things to say.
What he's doing comes from a perfectly nice and helpful place. He actually sees her behavior hurt herself and wants to help her hurt less.
But you should never "help" someone in this way. It's the worst thing he can possibly do, it actually only makes things worse.
The only way you can help people is by being there for them and assisting them on their own path. In other words, the only way you can be a positive force is by letting them do whatever the fuck they want, and helping them with that. If "whatever the fuck they want" does not include "getting out of the depression" and "getting rid of anxiety", then there's literally nothing you can do. If you try to get them to do actions that you think might be good for them, even if they actually were good for them if they wanted to do them, if they don't want to do them by themselves all you're doing is just making them feel worse for "being wrong".
It might even be the case that she wants to get out of depression or get rid of her anxiety, but she's taking the wrong actions for it. And he may be trying to get her to do "better actions", that actually accomplish what was set out to do. Even that doesn't work. She has to get to the "better actions" herself. You can maybe ask questions, or point out that the "current action" doesn't seem to be working, but the idea to change her actions has to come from herself.
That is the only way people change. People change by their own will, or they don't. As another person, you can basically just be with them and watch. Anything much more and you're starting to fuck things up more instead of help.
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he was sort of always pushing her daily.
This is exactly what it sounded like. Glad you've got this information, now I've got more things to say.
What he's doing comes from a perfectly nice and helpful place. He actually sees her behavior hurt herself and wants to help her hurt less.
But you should never "help" someone in this way. It's the worst thing he can possibly do, it actually only makes things worse.
The only way you can help people is by being there for them and assisting them on their own path. In other words, the only way you can be a positive force is by letting them do whatever the fuck they want, and helping them with that. If "whatever the fuck they want" does not include "getting out of the depression" and "getting rid of anxiety", then there's literally nothing you can do. If you try to get them to do actions that you think might be good for them, even if they actually were good for them if they wanted to do them, if they don't want to do them by themselves all you're doing is just making them feel worse for "being wrong".
It might even be the case that she wants to get out of depression or get rid of her anxiety, but she's taking the wrong actions for it. And he may be trying to get her to do "better actions", that actually accomplish what was set out to do. Even that doesn't work. She has to get to the "better actions" herself. You can maybe ask questions, or point out that the "current action" doesn't seem to be working, but the idea to change her actions has to come from herself.
That is the only way people change. People change by their own will, or they don't. As another person, you can basically just be with them and watch. Anything much more and you're starting to fuck things up more instead of help.
So they haven't talked since yesterday basically she messaged him today but it was about an errand and be didn't respond.
He thinks it's best to fall silent and wait it out maybe for a week or a month I guess time is arbitrary. Basically until she comes back to him with something of substance and is at a place where they can talk it out. I'm sure they could talk it out if he initiated but it wouldn't be as fruitful and allow her time to think on the situation as a whole. Do you think the silent approach is good or? If he tries to initiate a deep conversation she sort of rejects it like ughh sigh type vibe.
