DH sulks constantly
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Anonymous
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My husband has a very strong and frequent pattern of sulking and pouting when he’s upset. It has really strained the marriage and I’m at my wits end. This has been going on for years.
If there’s anything that transpires between the two of us that he thinks is unfair or hurts his feelings, he won’t speak to me for three or four days beyond basic kids logistics. Won’t make eye contract, won’t check his text messages or calls, nothing. It’s not at all the case that I’m some kind of jerk to him. When he upsets me, he apologizes and we move on. But it takes days after I apologize for him to rebound. I’m exhausted. This cycle is killing our relationship. We’ve tried therapy before but he insists he’s just an emotional person who’s allowed to feel what he feels. I’m starting to feel like we’d be better off apart. |
Anonymous
| Oh my, I’m sorry. That sounds impossible to sustain. You may be better off; I’m sorry to say. |
Anonymous
| Has he always been like this? |
Anonymous
| This is not worth "fixing" I'm sorry. But as a last resort have you told him this? |
Anonymous
| This is emotional abuse. |
Anonymous
| Do the 180. |
Anonymous
| My husband is the same. It’s made me no longer want to feel close to him, so I keep him at arm’s length emotionally. I apply the parent training we’ve had to the situation and try to ignore it. I don’t ask what’s wrong, I don’t try to bring him back to normal, I just cheerfully continue with my routine. We were taught attending to behaviors reinforces them, so I’m choosing not to attend to those. And I just try not to think about it. It’s not an ideal way to live but I don’t want to get divorced, and we get along fairly well otherwise. |
Anonymous
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OP here. Yes, he’s always been like this even before we married. I was too inexperienced at the time to understand what a red flag it would be for a marriage and raising children.
Like a PP mentioned, it has definitely affected my desire to be close to him. All physical attraction has gone out the window. And then he wonders why I never want to be intimate. I don’t leave because we have a SN child, otherwise I would. I’m trying to find ways to fill my time and find fulfillment through friends and hobbies, but this is tough. |
Anonymous
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Put your story into AI and you get a diagnosis for him.
Nothing normal about this behavior. |
Anonymous
| He's basically giving you the silent treatment. Which is not okay. If you're not going to leave over it, I'd just ignore it, as you would any kind of childish behavior. If you want to lay it out once, the effect this is having on your relationship, fine, but after that stop talking about it, don't try to cajole him out of his sulk, go do your own thing when he's like this. |
Anonymous
| Sounds like a " Kamala man" |
Anonymous
| OP, my wife is the same. Not just to me, but with the kids as well. We've all learnt to walk on eggshells. But similar to your husband, when she says something, we are supposed to accept it and move on. |
Anonymous
OP here. I’m sorry. My husband acts like this in public too, in front of our friends and family. There was one episode I swore to myself I was going to divorce him over, it was so humiliating and isolating. But again, the logistics with our SN child are just too much. I wish life didn’t have to be like this. I’m confused why he does it too. It’s not like he comes from a dysfunctional family either. |
Anonymous
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This is the silent treatment.
He does it because he's a controlling, selfish, and emotionally abusive person and really most importantly does not care about you or your feelings at all. I would check out of this marriage as soon as possible. |
Anonymous
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This will kill any feelings you have toward a person over time. I have a parent who was like this. Your relationship is already doomed and dead it's just a matter of what you're going to do about it.
Sorry OP. You don't deserve to be treated like this. No one does. |