I Married An Emotionally Abusive Control Maniac
I am a man who married an emotionally abusive control maniac. It was less at the beginning of our relationship, I think. It’s hard to know. I think I loved her and respected her and ignored it then.
My wife will criticize anything anybody does that is different than how she would have done it. I didn’t use to be the type to back down easily when I know I am right. My wife will never ever back down. So we have had many disagreements that never got resolved. Many times we fought over things where both sides were somewhat valid. We are both educated and knowledgeable. But in terms of what is socially appropriate, I acknowledge my deficiency.
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Eventually I saw how this butting heads was only hurting, not helping our relationship. Duh, trying to prove her wrong didn’t make her respect me. I can see the error in that, but am not sure of the correct approach.
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Now I let her go without defending myself. She is getting worse. She tends to be subtle, minor comments, and I wonder why I let it hurt me so. Most times I can kinda let it go, but when she does it in front of the kids, ‘correcting’ me to them, or making under-the-breath disrespectful comments, it really bothers me because the kids tend to lose respect for me. If I confront her, she will argue her position, and work to ‘prove’ that her way is better. Or she will say basically ‘whatever’, I am being too picky. Well, yes, the issue itself is often petty, but her undercutting me is what I am concerned about. However, again, she will never, ever, back down, so nothing changes. Mostly I try to put it out of my mind as soon as possible.
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She got it from her dad, also from her maternal grandmother. Her dad is a perfectionist, and his love and respect is performance based. Her maternal grandmother was (in my wife’s words) “mean, controlling, emotionally abusive, always trying to create problems between other family members.”
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Does a person like this ever recognize what they are like, and change?
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Are there any appropriate ways of dealing with this?
