Midlife Crisis: Support for Left Behind Spouses
Archives => Archived Topics => Topic started by: Rebel Yell on March 31, 2011, 04:21:02 PM
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Are there any MLCers that have not been abused in some form or fashion?
hehe I almost typed FARM or fashion.
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If there are, my guess would be the number of MLCers that have not been exposed to childhood trauma (of one form or another) is very very low. Most LBS that I know can pretty easily pinpoint childhood trauma in their MLCer. I have heard a couple of people say that they are not aware of any, but that it's certainly possible.
To quote my ex-wife......she said my childhood was Leave it to Beaver compared to hers. She told me that just out of the blue a few weeks after bomb drop. I don't remember what we were talking about, but it wasn't childhood stuff......at that time, I had very little info about MLC, much less what might have caused it.
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Don't know if this means anything or not but I found out after the passing of MIL (4 years ago) that the younger boys (twins) were always told everything was for their older sibling. They had to work paper routes at a very young age in an up North state where it was lots of snow/cold hard winters. They always had to give their earnings to mom as they were told it was for their older sister.....she was treated very special and now has a lot of issues. She is very narcissistic. My BIL mentioned this story and I had never heard it before. I have wondered if this sparked any underlying issues my exh never dealt with. I don't know if there are more stories as this but I have a feeling there might be. I also read something somewhere about children being raised to not allow them to voice their thoughts or opinions. You know, the old fashion, "children are meant to be seen and not heard". Just wondering.....not sure.
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My H was sexually abused by his biological father.....he sexually abused all the siblings. I feel that KARMA played a hand, as his father died some 22 years ago at the age of 46......of a massive heart attack.
My H turned 45 beginning of Feb......had a super hard day and reflected on the fact that he could be dead soon.....like his dad....as he was approaching the age his dad died....he suddenly left and moved out 2 weeks later......and still can cot give me a specific reason......he says, just want to be alone for awhile and need space, time.
So hear I sit (STAND)!!!!!!!
Only God knows, where this will go!
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My H was not allowed to disagree with his father. None of them disagree with him to this day. IMO this is not normal. What adolescent goes thru the teens without disagreeing with their parents?
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I don't think my H was abused, but his family is very "formal" very traditional. His own dad has always been reserved and actully very selfish. I see a lot of my FIL in my H.
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Oh, also, my ex's father divorced their mom when they were around 16/17 years old. They were the only children left at home. They watched their father physically abuse their mom many times and as they got older they had one incident where they got into a physical altercation with him since he was hurting their mom. He also drank heavily. He died at a very early age (53). My exh has always said the men in his family didn't live long. I also understand ex's father was a very strict man and didn't encourage them. I think he talked "down" on them and expected so much more out of them. He also told them he would not support them to go to college. I suppose something like this could have an affect on someone later on in their life. I didn't have the greatest upbringing but I've dealt with my issues and have let it go.
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My H did not have a good childhood. Father was not physically or emotionally available. Mother was cold and unaffectionate. My H was told he would never amount to anything. H was a loner for most of his childhood and was the object of bullying in junior high school. He is the youngest of 4 and has never seemed to grow up; he is extremely immature. H's brother has never married and has never even had a long term relationship with anyone. (No, he is not gay)
Something happened in their childhood that prohibited both boys from forming loving relationships with others. They seem incapable of giving their heart to anyone and in my husband's case, that includes his own children. It makes sense, though, since he really had no close relationship with either of his parents and now is unable to have one with his own children. Sad.
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I know that Stayed's husband says that his MLC was NOT about any childhood trauma, but about getting old....
My husband has a combination of both... childhood neglect, the TRAUMA of divorced parents, and signs of growing old coupled with the death of siblings, parents and grandparents, not to mention deaths on MY side of the family.
I am personally uncomfortable with growing older.... it causes me to wonder who the hell I am? What have I accomplished? What do I have to show for my life? Am I with the right person? How many bad choices did I make that brought me to this place.... it makes one VERY uncomfortable in one's own skin....
I also come from divorced parents and while our situation was congenial, it was STILL TRAUMATIC!! Only I didn't really know it at the time... Life was good when my parents were married (from a child's point of view)... we had a nice home.... lived in a special community... I had a horse, swimming pool, smart, mid-upperclass friends.... then my parents divorced, probably due to my Dad's MLC given my Mom's description of his behavior, and she followed her dream. I'm very happy for her, as she is an artist, but I can tell you that going from secure feeling suburban "normality" to "anything goes" bohemian, with a big dose of flying by the seat of your pants and government cheese in a tiny 2 bedroom house was traumatic.
I can totally see, from my Mother's point of view, that she owned her own home, was being true to herself and her talent, and proud of herself for "not needing a man". I'm sure she was scared a lot of the time as well... I commend her for doing a good job.... but for a kid, I would have rather stayed in my snug little piece of heaven in suburbia. That is the reality of divorce. Did we have some good times? Heck yeah, we did! But, I longed for what we had before which probably wasn't all that great, by the way, LOL!!
I just think our spouses lack coping skills. Ask yourself if you married a person who looked inside for the answers to deep questions.... did they even HAVE deep questions? Were they easily frustrated.. always blaming "circumstances" or blasting away about how "old people shouldn't have driver's licenses..." without regard to their own grandparents? Were they REACTIONARIES? Mine certainly was.... hope he drops that trait after MLC quite frankly... Was your spouse judgemental? I know mine was ALL of these things, yet, he claimed he "HATED" judgemental people.... he was VERY "unaware". Earlier tonight, he stated "no one loves me." Seriously? You reap what you sow. No one trusts you, so yeah, we might not be so damn excited that you suddenly turned your attention to us this week....
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My H was not abused. In fact, when we were dating I teased him about his "Normal Rockwell Family". Farm folk, all love each other. He was raised going to church, was in 4H, played sports and his parents were there cheering for him at all his games.
I do know his parents can not handle any type of conflict and are the types to talk behinds people's backs but be sweet as pie to their faces. They can be a bit gossipy and judgemental and H did pick up that trait, but he overall had a great, uneventful childhood.
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I think it should perhaps be mentioned that when we use the word abuse, that may be too specific a word to describe the roots of MLC, though abuse would certainly be included. The sentence below is from one of the articles on this website that may offer a broader perspective.
MLC is the result of significant wounding in childhood and at a person’s initiatory experience and thus their return to the wounding is a regression wherein they choose to repeat their earlier mistakes in hopes of correcting them rather than applying their experience to make different choices.
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DGU, as every, has a good, calm take on this.
Just for the record, my H is another for the loving childhood. He wasn't abused or hurt in any way in childhood, he grew up with two parents who loved him and showed it; he said that he always felt loved. There is the conflict avoidant thing, though, and if anything, the one thing that didn't happen in his childhood home was talking thing out. His parents never argued, he remembers one period of silence between them when he was young, so if they did argue they did it very carefully behind closed doors.
But despite great love from his parents the self-esteem must not have developed at some point; I remember him saying to me very soon after we met that he always felt a need to prove himself better than someone else.
Maybe it's because his parents were reticent; they were the worker bees, always helping, but never putting themselves forth for anything. They may have felt that they weren't "good enough", actually. I do remember them sometimes saying "oh, that's not for us"; i.e. that they didn't deserve something. I think for them it was more about being frugal; they had survived the war in extremely difficult circumstances and asked nothing more than to be able to live and raise their children, but that may have translated to H in a different way.
It may have been to do with material success, as they weren't well off, even if they were the same as their circle of friends. Or social class or something. I remember him saying that when he went to university he started associating with a "better class" of person, and it "pulled him up". So somewhere in there I guess he never felt good enough.
So is that the "initiatory experience"? Perhaps.
Someone here at some point said that he may not have been allowed to own his own feelings; that somehow makes sense.
This actually came up in conversation between my H and I a couple of weeks ago; we were touching on another couple going through this (yes....); where the woman threw the man out. He asked about them, I said that basically she was dissatisfied with life and had decided that her H was the cause. He said well, she has lots of psychological issues (which is true).... I said something in response, then said that by all rights it should be me doing this, as I was the one with the difficult childhood, not him.
Goodness -- a long answer to a short question.
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I wonder whether the MLCer knows that they are dealing with something from their childhood or whether they run because they feel life is running out.
Even when they deal with this I'm not sure that they 'know' about any childhood issues, rather they come through having faced their own mortality which includes all the issues i.e low self esteem, lack confidence etc.
There is a lot of research that states that a crisis is due to issues from their past that they have to come to terms with.
I know just before my H left he started to talk more in depth about his childhood and his parents bad marriage. He has actually projected his parents bad marriage onto our relationship even thou we had nothing in common except a marrage certificate. So when my H journey is finished will he be able to verbalise that it was about the way he was parented? Time will tell I suppose.
xx
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JA, it's hard to tell. Issues from his past? His parents had a good marriage, you name it. As far as I can tell it's the "life is running out" thing. He always had a fear of ageing, that was there at 30 (yes, I know, cliche), I guess it never left. He still has a hard time with birthdays, the first thing he says is "another year, can't even say "early 40's now", that kind of thing.
When he was deeper in replay he did say that he had a list of things to do before he turned 80 and it was too late -- this included all sorts of acting out that I won't go into here.
I guess there's nothing for it but to see how it all plays out.
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I think it should perhaps be mentioned that when we use the word abuse, that may be too specific a word to describe the roots of MLC, though abuse would certainly be included. The sentence below is from one of the articles on this website that may offer a broader perspective.
MLC is the result of significant wounding in childhood and at a person’s initiatory experience and thus their return to the wounding is a regression wherein they choose to repeat their earlier mistakes in hopes of correcting them rather than applying their experience to make different choices.
I'm going to give a different perspective, as a researcher in sociological/ educational issues. Yes, many MLCers may have been wounded by disfunctional OR abusive relationships when they were younger, which would affect how they see themselves and relate to others.
As we grow up and develop, we also build resources through our relationships and experiences. These are resources for relationships, coping with difficulties and traumas, dealing with people, communication, understanding, etc. We can build resources during a lifetime, but they are built on existing self concepts and experiences, an expansion of pre-existing patterns.
Wild children, or children who have been extremely abused/ abandoned, may never be able to recover patterns of trust, language, socilialization, if they pass the window of opportunity when they are very young. Howvere, those who have been protected in some way from the abuser, being able to build up positive relationships (for example, with a sibling) when young, are able to recover.
A child who fundamentally has never been loved will have great difficulty in ever developing the capacity to love.
My H was not abused, although his perfectionsim is a reflection of some inner unworthiness. He developed resources very strongly in some areas (academically, in sports, and professionally), and not so well in others (sharing his space, tolerating fallibility in people close to him, and dealing with stress), as a result of his childhood experiences.
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My H and his siblings were afraid of their domineering father when they were growing up. He has mellowed a lot as he has got older but H has never really been able to speak to him.
However, H was married previously aged 18 when his college girlfriend got pregnant. He was a father at 19 and divorced at 24. He has not seen his son since he was 8, he is now 27. His ex wife did everything in her power and successfully prevented him from having any contact with his son. He now lives in New Zealand so his chances of ever seeing him again are very remote.
When H dropped the bomb and said he was leaving, he gave his reason as 'I have never had a youth'. He felt he had missed out on a lot of the normal stuff young men do, because he had responsibilities as a father. This statement was true, but as we all know we can never get those times back. I guess he is just having a hard time accepting that.
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Hmmm,
I have just found this Thread - well my husband lost his Mum at 15 years of age, had to sleep with his dad for the following year so that he didn't blow his brains out (my H's words), his dad remarried within a year to a Czech lady and went on to have 2 further chidlren with her, his Dad is a workaholic who is angry most of the time (kind to me though since BD).
In the 10 months leading to him leaving my husband started to go back to his school time friends and this path lead to his girlfriend from that time (of 6 or so years) - the OW (who is 43, never been married). He smelled different and his skin was waxy and he developed spots - he would sweat profusley.
He also behaved like a 15 year old child in the time leading up to BD and that totally freaked me out BUT HB has since confirmed that this isn't unusual.
Before I found out about MLC I would say that my Husband had gone back to a time when he thought he was happy - it couldn't be after 1992 as that was when we got together and it wasn't before he was 15 as that was when his Mum had died - so his OW sat firmly and squarely in that 9 year window - then I started to read about MLc and it all sort of clicked....
My Husband is now redoing a lot of the things he did then - playing badminton with OW and MY KIDS!!!!! Oh yeah also with his half brother and sister who are now 25 & 23 and who he never showed a minute of energy for in the 18 years we were together...but his family seem to be able to just 'paper over the cracks'....and just accept his version of events - the whole family are disfunctional in my view but that is a whole different story...I just wanted to add my point of view to this Thread.
P
xx