Alright Men, I Need Advice About Marriage

[lizzy-bet]

Quick Background: My husband and I have been married for 6 1/2 years, we were both active duty Marines when we met and jumped into our marriage after 7 months of dating, and knowing each other for 1 1/2 years total. We come from very different backgrounds and have very different communication styles. My husband is very intelligent and quite the book worm; he was salutatorian in high school and now in his last year of college maintains a 4.0 GPA. I got out of the Marines after 4 years, and he was forced out after 10 because of a couple knee injuries, and benign testicular tumors that were causing torsion (flipping of the testicle) that required surgery, and staples in the abdomen, and there were a whole mess of painful complications, etc.

We have endured quite a bit during our marriage: He was having an emotional affair with an ex-fiance the first 2 years of our marriage. This caused a lot of drama, and when I put my foot down she began attacking me and the whole situation escalated into something straight out of a soap opera. He had surgery in early 2009 and I waited on him hand and foot since he couldn't pee or poop, or even roll over without assistance. Then, I got into a great college and moved to go to school and we lived separately for 2 years while I was attending classes. This was not planned, but he had issues with getting out of the Marines after his surgery. The whole thing was a HUGE fiasco, lots of lawyers and tests and waiting. He was fighting to stay in against my wishes (and the doctors wishes) but finally was forced to retire in 2011.

Now in 2012 he is still trying to figure out his place in the civilian world. He has some chronic pain and limitations, and seems to be suffering from depression. He goes to school online and lives in his room 24/7, he has TERRIBLE allergies where we live and has gone to the hospital a couple times for it and nothing has helped. We have just been chugging along; I am very outgoing and do almost everything by myself since he doesn't want to. I feel like we have been complacent and that I've settled big time to have this type of lifestyle. I'm done with school now and have been searching for a new job. I have submitted lots of applications and nothing has come up that pays enough to support both of us, and no matter how I try to talk to him about it he just seems very disengaged with helping me choose the best future for us. A childhood friend of mine owns a recording studio and wants us to become half partner, and I'm getting the paperwork and seeing if it's even worth the effort. Basically, my husband (who is studying music production) would engineer and produce in the studio along with my friend, and I would do the management/accounting/booking and marketing.

Now I know this isn't right, but I snoop on my husband's facebook and email conversations. I do it once or twice a year - that's how I caught the emotional affair, and I use it as a way to keep tabs on what he's doing when he's locked in his room 24/7. I've noticed he's been sending songs he produced to friends, including projects I did in school that were produced by my instructors and telling his friends he produced it. He is also telling friends that he's entering into a partnership with this guy for the studio, and going down to work out the paperwork (I'm working out the paperwork, not him) and that he's going to San Diego next weekend to talk to an entertainment lawyer! Which is not even remotely true. He has been talking to a girl we served with who is apparently one of his best and closest friends (I never knew this) and telling her I love you after conversations and follows his nickname for her with "my love." They are friends, and don't speak very often so I don't really care about that part. What bothers me is that he is telling her she's one of his best friends and he has never mentioned that to me.

In fact, I learned lots about him from his conversations with other people that I never even knew. His 30th birthday is next weekend and I want to throw him a surprise bday party with his very best friends from the Marines. I asked him on the sly what he wanted to eat for his bday dinner, and he said "I don't like birthdays, I've told you this, I don't care." I told him I want to make him dinner, and listed off a couple dishes and he said as long as I clean up I can make whatever I want. In one of his conversations with a friend he said that his favorite holidays are Thanksgiving and his birthday!

I could keep going with the many discrepancies and falsehoods he's told me or told these other people he talks to on the internet. I don't know what is causing the lying, or what is going on with him at all. On the sexual side of things, I have caught him looking at and paying for porn sites on multiple occasions. This PISSES ME OFF because I told him I LIKE porn and want to watch it with him, and he has always denied liking or watching porn and then does it behind my back. I know depression can mess with people, but I really feel that everything I'm trying to do for him as his wife is pointless and nothing is going to help.

Any ideas or insights on this behavior?

[Boisdevie]

Ideas? Have a big grown up conversation with him and tell him in what ways your relationship isn't working for you. Ask him to do the same. Then see if you still have a future together.

[lizzy-bet]

I have had this conversation with him plenty of times, and he does not engage. He says he is sorry, and then changes for about a week and then goes back to being his normal self.

[Boisdevie]

I have had this conversation with him plenty of times, and he does not engage. He says he is sorry, and then changes for about a week and then goes back to being his normal self.

Well you either accept this and stop complaining. Or give him one last chance to change (unlikely to happen) or you're out of the relationship. He needs to know that you're serious but probably thinks he can do what he's done before, and what you've been prepared to accept in the past.

[lizzy-bet]

I don't see how this can be so cut and dry, I am trying to give him the benefit of the doubt - he is in constant low-grade pain, and seems to be depressed. The economy is total shit, it's going take at least a few more months for us to be able to move. I'm not asking him to change any one specific thing, he just isn't happy and it's taking its toll on both of us. The Veterans Administration is very slow to provide counseling and he still has pins in his knees that were supposed to be taken out 2 or 3 years ago and even after pestering for appointments, nothing has changed.

My real question is addressing the lying, and the reasons behind it. Does he just not think his own life is adequate? I am also puzzled about the types of lies, I don't want to call him out on this stuff since I'm snooping. I feel like he is a totally different person with everyone else than he is with me, at least on the internet. Should I press further into my investigation and see what I turn up? Are these red flags for something else? He's lying to his own family members and making himself out to be more accomplished than he really is.

[Boisdevie]

I don't want to call him out on this stuff since I'm snooping.

So how exactly do you plan to tackle him then? He's been lying to you so confront him with it. You deal with this situation now or you waste more of your life and deal with it later but deal with it you must.

[lizzy-bet]

I don't know, it doesn't appear that he is lying to me, but he is definitely lying to his friends and family. All the things about us possibly purchasing the studio are "I'm doing this, and this, and this" and the songs he's sending to people claiming to have produced are not all his, and I don't know why he's doing that. I really don't get the porn thing or the birthday thing if you scroll up and read those. The lies just make no sense, they are all small and usually don't involve me directly but it's hurtful to see that he's so different with everyone else. We've talked a lot about the family members and friends he's talking to, and when he recalls conversations he's had or is having with them they are not at all the way they actually are in reality.

[lizzy-bet]

Well he is lying to me, but not about anything huge, just small and kind of strange things to be lying about.