Mr. Marriage Counselor - "Should I Stay or Leave My Marriage?"

  

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Q: I don't know if I should stay or leave my marriage. I have been with my spouse since May 2004. We recently got married November 2009. Feb 2010 I discovered he had been cheating on me since 2005 & tried sleeping with another woman but she would not sleep with him due to it being casual not exclusive.

Ever since I found out about the affair our marriage has been a roller coaster! We have good days, we have a lot of bad days. He expects me to believe it was just one woman when I know that is a lie. I don't understand why he wont come clean about his past he has been caught already why not come clean so we can move on. He has only sought help through websites like this one but he has not made any effort to seek professional counseling for us or just himself.

As with everything else in our relationship he can turn something that is his fault and somehow flips it on me, how it's my fault and everything wrong I'm doing. His complaints with me are that I think I'm perfect, I don't listen to him, I don't validate his feelings, I assume the worst in him. To be honest these are almost my exact complaints about him.

We struggle a lot with the double standard issue. He is also very much controlling when things are not going his way he has to twist the topic in his favor so he has control. He has even started recording our conversations just so he can go back through the recording if he has to prove his point, this is just insane to me. Its insulting.

This is so difficult, I just don't know if I should stick around for this. There is so much more but these are the current issues at hand that we can't get past. Plus that fact that I just don't feel I can get past the cheating all together. I'll never look at him the same.
--Heidi N.

A: A lot of couples I work with in marriage counseling describe their relationship, emotions, and thoughts just like you - like a roller coaster.

Before you decide whether to stay or leave your marriage, spend some time learning to recognize and change how you keep putting yourself on the roller coaster.  Whether you stay or leave, you'll be better off for learning this about yourself.

Here are a couple of things to consider:

• Good insight in recognizing that his complaints about you are almost the same ones you have about him.  This is a common psychological method to avoid issues.
• You're also right in saying that he's controlling.  But you also allow him to control you.  If you learn how not to allow him to control you, you'll change his controlling behavior.
• Why are you only waiting for him to get professional counseling?  Get it yourself.  Marriage counseling doesn't require both spouses to be effective and beneficial.
• You're being controlled by his refusal to get help - stop allowing him to control you this way.  Read these articles about other women in similar situations: My Husband Won't Go To Marriage Counseling and My Husband Has No Interest in Having Sex With Me.
• There are a number of psychological issues going on that you need an expert marriage counselor to help you see and show you have to respond to differently.

--Kurt Smith, Marriage Counselor

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