Couples Must Operate as a Team

Reader’s Question

I hope you can give me some insight into what I need to do. My girlfriend and I have been together for 3 years. I am 41 and she is 35. To give you some background on me, in our first year, I took my ex-girlfriend and our daughter with me to work but didn’t tell her. We got into a big fight and we split up for a few days, then reconciled, and I moved back in under the condition that it does not happen again and it has not. The second mistake I made was about a year and a half ago. We had gotten into another big fight and split again for a second time for a little bit longer this time. I had been talking to my ex-wife and thought we could get back together and make it work. It wound up being that I was missing my girlfriend to the point of not sleeping or eating. I phoned her and told her that we had to talk. She said okay and when we met for coffee, we talked and smoothed things over, sort of paving the way to getting back together. We agreed to try it one more time.

I made the mistake of not telling my ex-wife what our intention was and I got to my ex-wife’s house where I was staying to find my girlfriend and her sitting on the couch talking. They asked why and I explained it in detail to the best of my ability in front of both of them to both of them. This created some friction between my girlfriend and me and she said I could take a walk. I left the house and drove around for about 2 hours. I phoned her and told her we really needed to talk and she said she would meet me. When we met for coffee we talked and got back on track and got back together under a few conditions that I agreed to. They were:

1. Brutal truth, no lies for any reason at any time.
2. No secrets because that is a form of lie.
3. Get my divorce from my ex-wife. And
4. Treat her with more respect.

I have gotten my divorce on the way, have been brutally honest, have opened my life to her by not keeping secrets of any kind, and I feel I have treated her with more respect than I have ever treated her with. Things were better than they ever were until my two oldest children moved in with us.

That was when it felt like things started going south so to speak. She used to be able to talk about all our issues in the beginning but lately has been saying she doesn’t have time for this s—t and storms off. That is the way I used to be in the beginning. In the last year the physical contact has gone down to about once or twice a month (cuddling, holding hands, sex, etc.). Then about a month ago we stopped talking about anything at all. Now about 2 weeks ago she got ahold of her ex-husband on the computer and it has gotten worse so far as I felt. The other night when we were lying in bed, I asked her if we could talk, that something was bothering me. She said ohh what is it now. I asked her why we don’t talk anymore. She said that we are together, that we don’t have to talk all the time. I left it at that and proceeded to let her know that I was feeling threatened by her and her ex-husband talking all the time on the computer.

That is when she got mad and started throwing the two things I did wrong in my face and then saying if anybody has a reason not to trust anybody it was her because she had not given me any reason for me not to trust her. I did push the issue and asked her if I had any reason to be concerned about her and her ex-husband. She did not answer that question and just pushed the fight even farther. That’s when I went into the living room and left her a note saying that I knew that she was angry and that she had every right to be. Also in the note I explained to her that I had been trying to get her to talk to me for the last six months. She wrote me a note saying that she doesn’t have the patience or the stomach for this and was putting the wedding on hold till she is well enough to talk to me about this as she has been feeling ill and vomiting for the last 3 or 4 days. She also said in the note that she found me self absorbed and inconsiderate and she was tired of it. This hurt me in a way that I had never been hurt before and almost immediately I started to feel extremely guilty.

I talked with my ex-girlfriend on line to ask her if she thought the same. She said she felt the same about me being self absorbed but not inconsiderate. So today I went for a drive by myself and started thinking on how to change this personality flaw that has obviously been damaging my past relationships even though I didn’t ever realize that I was doing this. I proceeded to phone her and told her that all she had to do was listen. I apologized to her about the way I had been acting and that I didn’t know how to fix this but if I could I will. I also told her that if I couldn’t fix this, I would learn to deal with it and move on. So now for the last few days I have been walking around feeling guilty and believing that this is all my fault. The one thing I forgot to mention about the note I left her is, I told her that if she wanted me to go then tell me to do so and if she wanted me to stay then tell me — either way let me know so I wasn’t wondering what was going to happen to us. All she said in her note was if you want to, go, and if you want to stay, then stay. Am I wrong in this? Should I be feeling that it is all my fault? Your help would be greatly appreciated and thank you so very much in advance.

Our Consulting Clinical Psychologist’s Reply

It sounds like you are both making a lot of mistakes and not communicating — and the relationship is suffering for this reason. A major rule of all relationships must be: You Must Operate As A Team! Some folks bring baggage to a relationship — and some bring the entire airport! As a team, a couple must develop a team-decision strategy about all ex-sweethearts, potential in-laws, friends good and bad, money, housing, etc. Couples must develop the “position” on multiple issues — what is your position on contact with ex-sweethearts? Are we going to maintain contact with them…and through what media? Are you going to allow Revenge in the relationship — you emailing your ex so she is allowed to email her ex? Any large and successful corporation has a policy for everything — and couples can do the same thing. Some couple policies anticipate problems such as we agree to

1. Not spend over $100 without notifying the other to reduce impluse buying.
2. If contacted by an ex, discuss the way to respond with your partner.
3. In any social setting, one person can say the magic words “I’m not getting any younger” or whatever as a code that they need to leave…NOW.
4. Don’t invite anyone over unless it’s discussed with all parties involved.

From your description, you and your girlfriend are standing on the edge of goodbye. The wedding is on hold because the old relationship (way of relating to each other, behavior, hurts, etc.) didn’t work. Recognize that from this point on, you will need to form a new relationship and see if that’s worth a marriage. You and your girlfriend have the option of customizing your new relationship if she provides an opportunity. I’d recommend couples counseling to work out the details.

A lot of relationships start out like this, but fix themselves by remembering that it’s the two of you against the world — not against each other. The Internet also has a variety of hints and recommendations on improving marital communication that would be helpful. Forget pride and continue your offer to work on the relationship. Offer to put the relationship on probation for 4 to 6 months, and if it’s not running right by the end of that time, depart friends.