This is from Tim who posted a comment on The Hallmarks of a Mid-Life Crisis article.
His comments are in bold–mine are starred, and stay in regular font.
Dearest HB,
Thank you so much for your reply. Let me first apologize for my spelling and puncuation, very hard to see with tears in your eyes, secondly if I need to post questions/comments on another part of the site just let me know. I’m sorry if I’m about to get long winded as I really don’t know of anyone else who has gone through this nightmare that i can talk to.
**You’re fine, Tim. People begin talking me on one part of the site, and when it looks like things are going to get long-winded on my own part, I end up giving them a Q&A page of their own. The questions posted, and the answers given are usually helpful to other people down the road–of course I will put a link leading from where you began talking to me to where we’ll end up. The conversation will continue in the comment block under the Q&A I put you on.
Don’t be surprised if other people also post comments, questions, etc. I usually don’t worry about that, and if I need to go into greater depth, then I will copy it, answer it on a separate page, then link back to where the comment came from. 🙂
I suppose the reason I was somewhat aware of what my wife was dealing with is because when she told me she had been “miserable for 21 years” (I know that is not the truth) I googled that statement. Midlife crisis $ perimenopause/menopause were the two most common responses that seem to “fit” what she and I were experiencing. I was wondering could the two be linked or related? along with “I don’t know whats wrong with me”, “I don’t know who I am anymore” ,”I have to find myself” I also was told “I’m 41 and my life is half over and i’ve done nothing for myself and now it’s all about me” and “I’m tired of being a wife, mother and daughter”.
**She speaks of being miserable for 21 years to help feed her justification for what she is doing against herself, her marriage, her family, and her husband. All these things she’s saying are part of her ongoing emotional crisis, complicated by an identity crisis that kicked into high gear when she faced something she couldn’t handle. It’s usually a major event that begins the mid-life transition, that quickly transforms into a serious emotional crisis. Although menopause (women) and andropause (men) can be contributors, the fact is this crisis is based on past emotional issues contained within the person going through, and coming out of it (or not, as the case may be), is up to the person going through it, and no one else.
Her speaking of not knowing what’s wrong with her, is evident of her confusion, because you do see moments of clarity from time to time in her–these times are interspersed with getting mad over what seems to be the smallest things, and the anger often burns very hot, while what flows out of their mouth is confused rubbish, that doesn’t make sense to you, plus profanity, amongst other things–signs of a rebellious child, who is severely testing the limits of behavior, and often, propriety as you’ll be caught off guard at times.
If she’s nice, that immediately becomes suspect. Mid-life spouses are notorious for being nice because they want something, and once they get it, you’ll start being treated like dirt again. Just saying, because if it’s not happened yet, it most likely will, because they seem to have a copy of the same Mid-life crisis playbook that tells them what to say, do, etc..and it’s eerie to hear them speak just like each other, saying the same things, acting in similar rebellious ways.
She’s the only one who can figure out who she is-and her lost identity must be eventually found within herself. You can’t find it for her, nor can you do this for her, you can only give her the space and time she needs to find it for herself, Tim.
Left-behind spouses generally have a really hard time when they first discover their spouse has gone into emotional crisis, because at first they take it personally-making this all about them, when it really isn’t about them-it’s about the mid-life spouse. Most people are notorious fixers, and if something’s wrong, people do seek to “fix” it, when this crisis cannot be “fixed” by anyone outside of the situation–again, only by the person that is directly going through it. She must go through it, and figure out for herself what she wants.
As a spouse in search of help for the love of my life, I recommended she go to the doctor to get her hormones checked (wrong thing to do)and was told that she didn’t have a problem that I was her problem. At that point I was convinced she is bi-polar or her hormones have made her someone I didn’t know anymore. (I do not know this person anymore and it’s beyond heart breaking.)She used to be so full of life and naturally beautiful, now she looks hollow, lost too much weight, seems to hate life and dyed her beautiful brown hair to a black and almost platinum. If you did not know her, you would not know it was the same person from a Christmas picture in Dec. until now. Again heartbreaking.
**You were only trying to help, and she took as you trying to “fix” “control” and “manipulate” her. Because she is currently unable to face herself, she is projecting herself upon you- as she has told you she didn’t have a problem, and said that you were her problem.
I know this hurts, but it’s not true, and as long as you realize that it doesn’t matter what she says you will always know the truth of the matter, it will help you continue to cope with this situation.
Her attitude seems to have gone the complete opposite of what you once knew, hasn’t it, Tim? That’s part of this, too…and you really can’t do anything except allow her the space and time she needs to figure herself out, while you get more understanding that will lead you into a time of learning that the road she has put you upon, has made this journey about you, just as her crisis is all about her.
Right now, you’re in shock, upset, and understandably devastated by everything that’s going on. However, the more quickly you can pull yourself together, and learn to detach from her behaviors, the more able you will become to cope with what she’s doing.
However, for right now, BREATHE, and know that things are going to be all right, letting yourself grieve this loss of connection. This is a relational kind of death that you’ve experienced within the area of your marriage. When she emotionally bombed you, she set the marriage aside in her mind, and she put the marriage asunder, sent it to its death. I wouldn’t be surprised if she told you at one point she wasn’t married to you anymore. Mid-life spouses think to live the single life, and in order to justify this, they do set the marriage aside, if only in their minds during this time.
However to reinforce something–this is NOT about you-this is all about her. When people mistreat anyone in any way, it’s all about them, and has nothing to do with the person being mistreated. There is always a hurting person behind every bad behavior. It’s not an excuse, but that’s the way it is. It’s hard, sometimes, to look past their awful antics, and see those issues that drive a given bad behavior, but it’s a necessary aspect so you can learn to detach from these actions, and learn to go forward for yourself.
There’s not one thing you can do to help her, except to give her space, and time to deal with herself. Bear in mind that not everything requires an answer from you. You don’t have to defend yourself to her, when she speaks things you know aren’t true, or “rewrites” marital history in an effort to try and blame you for what is truly her problem, her crisis. So, don’t buy into her attempt to shift blame onto you, for what is really on and about her, and not about you.
You didn’t break her, so you can’t even hope to fix her-she has to learn to fix herself on her own timetable. Use this time you’ve been given wisely and well to learn about yourself, while she’s learning about herself.
Since this has happened I immerse myself in books and the web (so thankful I found your site) about MLC, perimenopause, marriage, divorce and most importantly Gods’s Word and how He can and does redeem and restore marriages.
**God is still in the business of marital restoration, Tim–however, even He will tell you this is a time of growth for not just your wife, but for you, too. God often seems to lead us down a crooked path, but if we went straight for the goal, we would not learn a thing out of this experience.
I can attest to the fact that I not only survived throughout his crisis, but I also thrived, as God never forgot me during that time. He blessed me beyond measure, even as He walked me through some of the hardest emotional paths I ever walked in my life.
Once I got a good basic understanding of what was happening down, then He began trying to turn me in such a way that my focus came off my spouse in crisis, and turned it all upon myself.
This wasn’t easy, because I’m thinking, “Why do I have to change, when it’s not me that’s having this problem?” What I didn’t understand then, was that I had no control over my spouse at all, while I had full control of myself–and that was the beginning of a journey that I have long since finished, but am still growing forward within various aspects.
The mid-life crisis is a true wake-up call and a trigger into a time of self-growth that will be beneficial to both people because both people will learn the emotional lessons we are all called upon to learn, but at different times.
I can save you some research by letting you know there is NO medical cure for the crisis, no “magic pill” that will make it end any faster, no “short-cuts” that will lead to the end any faster–there is only time, faith, love and hope that we learn to place in the Lord during this time.
One of the lessons we’ll learn is to develop a solid personal relationship with Him, as we’ll either connect for the first time, or we’ll strengthen an existing connection, and learn more about the various aspects of God during this process of taking our own personal journey.
There are going to be times when things are going to seem to be going so slowly, and that would be because your mid-life spouse isn’t going to be moving that fast. Facing, resolving and healing various issues doesn’t complete overnight–this will take a long time-for some people it takes years, depending upon the severity of their emotional issues.
However, God knows what He’s doing–and if you continue following after Him, He will guide you forward in ways you never thought possible. Intuition, often called your gut feeling, or instinct plays an important part, too, if you take the time to develop that gift. God uses it to help us–and I always tell people that He’s always there, only a prayer away, and He knows what’s best, so it’s important you learn to listen to that still, small voice that doesn’t shout.
He will also teach you many things about your wife you never knew before, too.
Although the crisis isn’t about your marriage, and isn’t even based on your marriage, it’s attacking your marriage, as Satan seeks to tear down everything during this time.
As these winds of change continue to “howl” around you, seek solace and safety within the arms of God, who will take good care of you.
Just a note for fellow left behind spouses who are new to the devastation, like me, and doing your own research, a lot of MLC blogs and chat rooms will say that MLC is a cop-out, that it is just an excuse for spouses to leave and/or have affairs. I’ve been in street level law enforcement for 24 years and have come to know the true nature of people, I know my wife better than I know anyone, MLC is real and not a “cop-out” by any means and I feel sorry for those on both ends. To those who have the spouse that go through the midlife transition as just a small blip in the road, You need to fall on your face right now and Thank God our Creator.
**Truer words were never spoken, Tim. You’re the first one I’ve seen that has spoken so openly on the subject of MLC being dissed by chat rooms, and certain other blogs. I mean, you’ve got counselors who don’t believe in this process, because whatever school of thought they were in, didn’t prepare them for people who would come to them showing these kinds of signs.
It’s an humbling experience, because I will be the first to say I have no formal education beyond being a high school graduate. I’m also a blue collar worker who drove an eighteen wheeler for 10 years. However, God has a tendency to call people who aren’t qualified (like me, LOL), and qualify us to do work we don’t have the formal education to do, but through Him, we become empowered, and enabled to do it, because we serve a Master Teacher who knows all things. 🙂
I have been truly amazed in times past to find that the counselors who are trying to learn about this will often reference the six stages of a mid-life crisis article I wrote back in 2002 to help with their learning.
There have been people that have come to me asking questions to take back to their counselors, and even counselors who have come to talk to me directly, for this same purpose of learning.
Sometimes I’ve had left-behind spouses who will write me and say their mid-life spouses have sent them the link to that six-stage article and ask them where they think are in the process—which in turn, they’ll end up asking me about it.
So, I’ve seen people from both sides of the spectrum come to read, although I hear more from the left-behind spouses than the mid-life spouses, but that’s OK, it all serves a purpose, the exposing of the truth behind this time of life, and educating people from various walks of life.
Couple this with all of the misinformation that floats around the Internet on any given day, and you can imagine that it’s an ongoing fight to get people to understand this time of life is NOT a cop-out, nor is it an excuse for bad behavior–it’s actually an emotional developmental growth process, just like puberty was, and change, growth and becoming what God means for a person to become in Him, are a major part of this process.
We must all grow up, sometime, and that process begins at a “right” time, although left-behind spouses might think to consider it a “wrong” time–however, God’s Time is never the same as ours.
People really do want to be careful whom they choose to associate themselves with during their spouse’s crisis. I don’t list any chat rooms, message boards, or other blogs here, because quite frankly, I don’t endorse any of them–the emotional atmospheres in a lot of the chat rooms, and message boards are emotionally poisonous, as the “group think” on most of them seek to draw in way too much negativity, and a place that should be supportive, quickly becomes a place of spouse bashing, speaking of dating while married ( I do NOT advocate these things), and Satan jumps right on the bandwagon as a major influence, making bad situations much worse than they really should be, because a lot of people’s attitudes become resentful, angry, then bitter, and this only serves to drive people who really need help to go somewhere else.
I don’t blame them at all–I know if I had encountered some of these wrong types of attitudes years ago, when it was me, I wouldn’t have stayed online the first time I was teaching from a platform of a message board that wasn’t even mine in the beginning–however, God had later plans for me, that foundation was laid in place during that first round, and I’m now carrying out this secondary part of this plan by writing on this blog.
I’ve been back out in the public eye for nearly a year, and have faith He will continue sending me people who have need of all He brings through me for the benefit of others.
At any rate, I digress here.
HB, you said, above all there is hope long as I love her. I took our vows before God and meant every word, and true love NEVER dies, so I will always have hope.
To quote Humphrey Bogart, “I was born when she kissed me. I died when she left me. I lived a few weeks while she loved me!”
**You’re definitely going to be tested and tried hard during this time, because things always have a tendency to get worse long before they become better. When you think things can’t get any worse–look out, because that’s what will happen.
However, ask questions–questions are good, and the only question that’s dumb was the one that wasn’t asked in the first place.
Understand this isn’t a short time-it may take years before it’s all said and done, but as I said, God doesn’t forget the faithful left-behind spouse–He’s right there in the trenches with you, and knows what you need, when you need it.
I hope this helps.
((hugs))