Recently, my husband acknowledged that he’s seen this blog. He says he can read it if he pretends his wife doesn’t write it. He says that he wants to educate himself, that my blog and site “would be very educational” to people who also “think” they have an abuse problem.
He has never addressed a specific post or even acknowledged that he sees any part of himself in my writing at all. Although he finds my blog educational, I can’t help but wonder what is so educational about it, from his point of view.
I mean, if he pretends that I’m not the author, then why read it? If he doesn’t want to gain a heads up on what I’m thinking, then why read it?
His Wife Would Not Think Like I Do
That’s when it hit me. His Wife could not be the woman who writes this blog. His Wife would NEVER publicize our relationship online. His Wife has zero complaints about him because His Wife loves acting as his servant, not his equal.1 His Wife is very different from me.
His Wife remains silent except to call him in for lunch, dinner conversation, and maybe some light concern over finances or the children. His Wife enjoys sex whenever he is in the mood and ignores her sex drive when he isn’t. His wife “lets him be himself” by realizing that his temper, ideas about what a wife IS, and the fact that he works his ass off for his family is ENOUGH. His wife doesn’t ask him to call when he was going to be late, or admonish him for driving drunk. His wife loves him for “who he is” and appreciates that he loves her in his own way.
And His Wife would not, could not, feel or think the way the author of this blog feels and thinks.
He refuses to believe that His Wife is me.
I’ve Begged for Him to Know Me, But He Wants His Wife
You know, I’ve never ever ever hidden or locked up my journals at my home. I told him once that he could read my journal if he wanted to. In fact, I was DYING for him to invade my privacy. Dying for him to WANT to know what I thought about him, our marriage, our children. Or even what I thought about when I wasn’t filling the role of “wife” or “mother.”
He never read them. He didn’t want to know.
I doubt he reads this blog either. Why would he?
1. “His Wife” is who he thinks I should be, not who I actually am. Patricia Evans wrote about the concept of the dream woman in her book The Verbally Abusive Relationship: How to recognize it and how to respond.