The only problem my husband and I have is our communication, or lack there of.

It's been a problem for years, but it really hit me last month when we got into a little fight. We have been struggling with infertility for 3 years and I had an early miscarriage 2 years ago. This has been insanely difficult for me. I used to cry all the time, constantly researched what we could do to improve our chances, etc. I was doing it all on my own. He wanted a baby just as much as I did, but he never really seemed to put in the effort (aside from showing up in the bedroom). Even when I had my miscarriage, a year later I told him I was struggling to move on and want to give our baby a name and get a tattoo to help me get some closure. We talked about it a few times and when we were going back and forth about a name, at one point he said "well, this is your thing, so it's up to you". That hurt and the way I took it, it was kind of confirming that he wasn't in this as much as I was. I understand men have a different way of handling things like this and their emotions, but his attitude about all this went way beyond that.

We just never really tall about TTC, we talk about our future and our future kids all the time, names, how we would handle certain situations, etc, but never infertility. I had mentioned a few times over the last year or so that we need to start seeing our Drs, have tests done, and really try to make it happen. He would always kind of brush it off, until this past Christmas, he brought up that after the new year, we should get on that. So finally, a couple months ago, I had an appointment with my Dr and I went ahead and mentioned to her about our struggles to conceive and asked for her guidance on what our next step is. She did labs that day, scheduled a pelvic exam for later that week, and referred me to a fertility specialist. I got home and told my husband all this, called a few days later to scheduled the FS appt., and then about 2 weeks later, a few days before that appt, is when we got into our arguement. He mentioned how I just went into this appointment for my high blood pressure (although he was aware I was going to mention TTC with her) and then left with all these plans and it all seemed so fast because he wasn't a part of it. He wanted me to slow down and do more research on different specialists (even though my Dr was sending us to the best FS within a reasonable distance. That's when I lost it. I told him it has been 3 years! It's about time we get some answers. I told him how I felt so alone in all this and how I was doing everything on my own. How sometimes it felt like he had no interest in having a baby with me and that it doesn't seem to bother him that here we are 3 years later and still no baby. Then he comes back and says that it does hurt him and it kills him knowing how much it is hurting me and how much I am suffering. He said that he does research too. Like when I found out I had PCOS (at the pelvic exam a couple weeks prior) he researched what that meant and how we get pregnant with that. He even started looking into the adoption process and requirements in our state (we have always planned on adopting at some point). He just never communicated any of this with me. I rarely communicate my feelings about this with him as well. For some reason we just never talk about this. He has said in the past that he never brings it up because he does not want to upset me, even though I have told him that we NEED to talk about this, even if I do get upset sometimes.

Our communication problems don't stop there either. So he has a gun that he got through work and did not have to pay for (police officer) and he carries it almost everywhere. Then he talked about wanting another gun at some point. That's all he said about it. Well then one day he tells me he has been keeping a secret from me. He bought the other gun like a week before he told me! He spent like $300-400 on this gun without running it by me (this was like two months ago). In our relationship, we have decided that we will not spend a larger amount of money (like $200+) without discussing it first. So I was mad, but I'm like whatever, it's already done. He took it to the shooting range maybe once or twice, and that's it. Then he tells me a couple days ago, that they are handing out new guns at work, and he is given the chance to buy his current one from the police department. So he sold the one he bought a couple months ago and was about pay for his current one. He ended up selling it for around half of what he paid, and then had to pay $300 to own the one from work. He knew about all this and had it all planned out for like two weeks, but just now told me about it.

These are just a couple examples, the list goes on.

Anyone have tips, advice, exercises we can do to build our communication? With our work schedules right now, we can't make it to counseling and that's not something I want to pay for at this point, since I'm sure this is something we can work on on our own. Due to our lack of communication, when we do discuss the things we never talk about (infertility, for example) it often turns into an argument because there's so much built up thoughts and emotions over the subject.