Counselling has caused more trouble

[neednewbag]

Dh and i are going to counselling together.In the last session when we discusssed the fact that he hardly ever suggests we go out. I've been unhappy with this for year and have mentioned it on and off but he always says he'll try...but it never changes. In the session, the counsellor asked him to commit to suggesting one thing for us to do each month. When we came out, i felt really upset that he's basically ignored how i've felt for years. I told him afterwards, if it had been the other way rounds i'd have been really apolgetic about it, but he wouldn't apologise, he just said the counselling is about what happens from now. Later i was still upset and he aksed me what was the matter. I told him and he got really angry and said there was no point in going if i was going to use it "to twist " everything and as an excuse to have a go at him. I was already feeling dreadful as my mums ill and i'd been up with ds the previous night. I asked him to stop being horrible as i already felt bad and didn't want to feel any worse, He just shouted "why should I"and carried on being horrible. In the end i asked him to go to the spare rooma and we spent the night apart. This morning, he said the reason he got so angry was that the sessions made him feel vulnerable. He didn't say that yesterday tho, when i asked he felt afterwards. If feels like he's just thought up an excuse to justify losing his temper. A couple of hours ago, we were talking about it again, and he carried on trying to justify his behaviour and upset me even more - to the extent that i was walking round town crying down the phone. he then told me, he had a sore throat and was tired, and i sarcastically said "poor you" ( i really couldn't have given him any sympathy after how spiteful he's been) and he shouted "fuck you " down the phone. I called back and he said i deserved it for being so nasty. I just feel like we should split up now as the counselling was supposed to help, not make things even worse. What does anyone else think?

[camillathechicken]

counselling is not a magic wand.... it gives you the tools to examine yourselves and change behaviour. it doesn;t make all the nastiness go away

sounds like when he said he was feeling vulnerable, that was your cue to listen to him, after he had a chance to reflect on things... this is all new to him too.

the sarcasm and the swearing is not going to move you forward

you cna either use the sessions to dig deeper and find out about yourselves, whihc might make it worse before it gets better, or give up on it and go your seperate ways

[OhComeLetUsADiorHim]

NNB - my h always used to save all his vitriol for after the session and let me have it all in the ear on the way back to the car. It is not nice, and yours sounds similar to mine. However, perhaps you could agree that after each session you won't talk about it all as counselling does raise some painful things for both partners.

It was normal for you to feel upset and normal for him to react to that angrily (well, normal for a man!)

I do think you need to give the sessions a bit longer.

[neednewbag]

Thanks - I don't want to give up yet. Maybe the best thing is not to discuss the sessions at all - just to try to do what we agree. can i ask if counselling helped you and your h?

[OhComeLetUsADiorHim]

Well, the first counsellor gave us up as she didn't feel experienced enough to deal with our problems! The second one really annoyed h and he refused to go unless we swapped (he gave me the creeps too). So, we are back on the list and waiting for the other counsellor to be free at the specific time we need! (Not difficult customers at all ).

In thoery, and having done counselling on my own, I know it can be a very painful experience but it will eventually be rewarding. The first few weeks especially bring up a lot of hurt. It is easy to then throw that at each other afterwards. Mine did, every week. I used to dread leaving the session.

We reached a crisis point a month ago and I told him I had seen a solicitor and was applying for a divorce. We talked for 4 hours and managed to salvage the wreckage. It has been hard but we are both trying. I am looking forward to going back to the Relate sessions though.

[neednewbag]

i wonder if it's best to agree not to discuss the sessions afterwards? Just to agree to do the things we need to do but not actully say how the session made us feel and go over it all - what does anyone else think?

[neednewbag]

anyone there?

[camillathechicken]

i think not talking about it is going to perpetuate problems you are already having, what you need to do is learn how to communicate effectively, how to listen and hear each other and have dialogue.

[neednewbag]

What i mean by not talking about it is that we don't go over who's such such and such wrong. Instead, we try to do whatever we've agreed to do - eg me accepting apologies more and him making more sugestions about htings we do

[camillathechicken]

that sounds reasonable. no point nitpicking and point scoring after

[neednewbag]

he's just come home now and is playing with ds. I don't know what to do now..........

[NotquiteChristmasyet]

Agree with Camilla, but I do think it could be a good idea to draw up some groundrules - you could agree to have some time to think about what has been said rather than talk about things on the way home from the session, when feelings are raw.

As Camilla says, think too about how to talk together. As I understand your OP, your dh accepted the idea that he would take the initiative to take you out more often, but instead of welcoming that, you wanted an apology for the fact that he hasn't done so in the past. I can see why you feel that, but these are two separate issues: a) is he going to apologise and b) is he going to take you out more now?

By wanting the first one to be solved, you threw the second one back in his face. Perhaps if you had left it a day or two after the session before talking then you wouldn't have done that?

Expect things to be raised in these sessions which hurt - it shows that you are touching on important issues. But consider that you don't have to get angry to discuss them.

Counselling does often make things worse before they get better - like taking the scab off a wound. But if you look after yourselves - and each other - you can minimise the hurt and build on what you cover in the sessions to grow together.

Best of luck

[neednewbag]

thanks for your comments. He's just putting ds to bed now - i scared of what will happen later...i don't know what to do/say

[camillathechicken]

why not tell him this? you are scared, you are unsure, you want to work things out, but don;t want to upset him or have a row....

[neednewbag]

We've has a talk and i suggested that we don't discuss the session at all on the same day but we just let eachother know ,BRIEFLY (we said max 10 minutes) how we felt it went the following day. How does that sound?

[neednewbag]

anyone there?

[1sue1]

Sounds good, thing is its easy to say when calm, that next time you're angry you'll 'do this' or 'do that'...yet when it happens, all that goes out the window.
So in theory not talking about it after will work, but when he's wound up after, or you are, will it be that easy to stay quiet till the next day?

[NotquiteChristmasyet]

Sorry. Went away to write Christmas cards.

That sounds like a really good step. You need to be gentle on yourselves, if you can. You've started a huge step going to counselling and it may well be hard going. It may well be that you find you want to spend more than 10 minutes talking, but that you start to get upset/angry, so by setting yourself that limit, you can stop, give yourself a break and come back to it again the next day.

You can also practice listening to each other. No matter how frustrated you feel, or how little understanding you feel you are getting from each other. Try to listen to him during that 10 minutes, and see if you can echo back what he has said - "So you are saying that you feel X and Y and that you want to try Z" - without commenting on whether his feelings are fair or unreasonable or whatever. If you can listen and echo back how he is feeling then he too might learn to do the same for you. It would be a major next step, and a good building block for future talking.

Best of luck

[neednewbag]

thanks, notquitechristmasyet. I'm still feeling terrible today, but maybe a little more hopeful

[LadyMuck]

I suppose that I am a little surprised that your counsellor appears to be trying to help solve "issues" rather than helping you both with "processes". Counselling should be about giving you a toolkit to enable you both to resolve the issues that will continue to come through life. So usually counselling would look at communication skills, ways of resolving conflict, forgiveness, expressing intimacy, building a shared vision for your future. In looking at these issues you would both have to face a number of the factors that have made you who you are today - eg parental marriages generally form the key default as we enter relationships. Admittedly individual issues can be raised to be used as almost worked examples for conflict resolution etc.

Counselling can be painful because it causes you to look at and reconsider issues which impact our identity. For example a man can truly love his mother, but then "discover" that in fact she was over-controlling of his father, and that pattern is leading to problems in his own relationship - this will usually stir up all sorts of painful emotions. But from reading your OP, that isn't what is happening here (yet at any rate) - it seems more that you are having difficulty with communication.

Where 2 people are committed to working on their marriage then good counselling can be a life-saver. There are 2 books that I would recommend to read alongside the counselling, bother by Relate, Stop Arguing, Start Talking and Staying Together.

[neednewbag]

we have discused issues from the past in earlier counselling sessions and now we are looking at ways of improving things

[jetson]

Probably best not to discuss the seeions immediately afterwards as you'll both be feeling raw. And, as he is a bloke, I can quite believe that counselling would make him feel vulnerable. Blokes hate admitting they're wrong (sort of true generalisation) so you have to tread carefully if he's slowly admitting it and changing his ways (like agreeing to take you out). He'll be feeling all twitchy as it'll be like admitting that he has been crap in the past. My DH hates apologising and used to always explode with anger if I asked him to; I never understood why as I am always happy to say sorry and I couldn't figure out why he wouldn't say the one thing that would make me feel better. He did explain that he felt apologising meant admitting he had been a shit and he couldn't bear that. Bring up the issue of apologising in your next session and the counsellor will probably explain to him in a way that you never could (i.e. clearly and without loads of emotion and blame, sorry I don't mean that as an insult but as it's you who needs an apology it's definately better if he hears it from someone else). She could explain that it's not about admitting you were a shit; it's about making your wife feel better. Slwoly slowly catchy Monkey-if he's agreeing to changes and f he's turning up to therapy then feel optomistic and don't push it. if she's a good counsellor she'll get him to see how he should be treating you. Try not to get into heated discussions at home. Jot it down and bring it up in sessions! It'll be in a much calmer environment with a mediator so it then won't turn into a row.