Thoughts on Relationship?

I’m writing to see if our relationship is doomed or salvageable.

I will try to keep this brief.

My husband and I have been married for four years, and most of it hasn’t been easy. My husband has a rough past and can be an ass hole at times, but he has a good heart. I fell in love with his good heart.

When he is stressed out, he is very impatient and critical of me. He will call me careless or thoughtless and nitpick small things that don’t matter. I don’t mean to piss him off. I mean well. We have gotten into countless fights about this.

I don’t handle him well when he is critical of me, because it’s not only what he says but how he says it. The way he speaks is as if he is pissed the fuck off, and his tone of voice is also patronizing. Additionally, I have my own set of issues. When he acts like that out of the blue, it reminds me of my abusive father, and I feel the need to defend myself and even my childhood self, in a sense.

Several months ago, he was put on anti-anxiety medication, and it helped a lot, but not enough. I believe it helped him to calm down and realize in retrospect how he treated me. He was very remorseful and trying to make things right with me for a solid five months. These months were great, and we had a lot of healing.

However, about one month ago, he told me he remembered some really traumatic things that happened in his past that he had been suppressing his whole life. Evil things that sound never be done to someone.

He never told anyone about these things because he had pushed the memories so far down that he forgot about them. I believe his feelings about these events were expressed in subliminal, subconscious ways, like through his impatience, anger, and criticism towards others.

Anyway, things were great for a while until he remembered those things. He has been trying to deal with it own his own ever since, and just like he got when he was stressed, he has been very impatient, angry, and critical again.

It has now been over a month of this.

I have given it time. As much as I can give. I’ve tried to be patient with him as he heals, but it is taking a toll on me.

I am starting to resent him again for treating me this way. Lately, my patience with him has been slim to none because he knows how it makes me feel when he lashes out like this. But he loves to turn it around on me and call out my issues and ADHD.

He is supposed to go to therapy by himself, but he hasn’t made any moves. He said he wants to go to by himself before we go as a couple.

I brought this up and asked why he hasn’t gone yet, and he got even more defensive. He said he will do it when he is ready. What doesn’t make sense to me is why he has been buying all these things he and I don’t need, but he won’t make his mental health or our relationship a priority.

Tonight, he got mad at me because I had our dog on the leash, and our dog was pulling at the leash to get away to outside and go potty as I was explaining something to my husband. He interrupted me, yelled at me, and scolded me to take the dog outside. This was after I did what he ordered, which was to put the dog on the leash and keep our dog away from him as he was opening a box. It just totally caught me off guard. First of all, I hate taking orders from him like he’s my dad and not an equal partner that he respects. And I hate being talked to in an angry way or like I’m dumb.

Again, I am not perfect. I can be emotional, reactive, and immature. I did start to record him in the middle of him saying mean things to me, and he caught me doing it. Then all hell broke loose, and he demanded to have my phone.

Now he is saying he doesn’t trust me and never will and that he has to think about what he really wants out of life, and that he wants a divorce.

He said that I am fucking dumb and I do dumb things that don’t make sense (true) and that he deserves a better partner, a more intelligent partner.

He said I have issues with my ADHD and that I need therapy myself (true) and that it’s not fair that I keep a record of his wrongs (also true). You see, he lies sometimes, and to show him that he is lying, I will bring things up. Other times, I will bring up certain issues have been going on for a long time that need to be fixed. I also journal to express myself and I write down the good and bad things in my life.

It is true that I haven’t fully forgiven him for the hell he has put me through for the years we have been together. I do also need therapy in that regard if we are going to make this work.

I know no one is perfect. No relationship is perfect, self included. Do you think our relationship is doomed or do you think it can be fixed? Honest thoughts.