Is it ONLY sons???

[Pooh]

Sunny, I swear you and I are very much alike.  My first marriage is very, very similar to yours in many ways.  I will tell you two things I learned, AFTER the divorce.

1.    I had never let go of all the hurtful things he did.  I thought I had, but yet, I realized I never got past them.

2.    I spend 21 years waiting for him to "get it".  I kept trying and trying.  He never did.

So, the downfall of my marriage was both of us.  Even though I was doing all kinds of things for him and kept trying, truly by not letting go of the past, I wasn't.  And because he never "got it", he had no desire to mature and grow in the relationship.  It was both of us.

[miss_priss]

Sunny1 - I understand, and I sympathize with you.  I can relate to that same anger and frustration, the feeling betrayed and trampled on.  The hardest part is when others (and your DH) tell you "oh, you're just reading her wrong, that's not her, she would never do that!"  Its like you just want to smack those people on the forehead, and say "how can you NOT see what she's doing?!?!?!"  It makes you doubt your own intuition, your own feelings, and makes you question your own sanity, when in fact, you're not the problem at all.  MILs like ours would treat anyone that way, for the simple fact that we are a threat to their control and manipulation over their sons.  It's a sad thing. 

It used to anger me a lot when people showed sympathy towards her.  At one time, I could semi-confide in my SIL.  After one of MILs screaming tantrum shenanigans at our home, of course MIL told SIL what monsters we were, and that we kicked her out for no reason, and she "just couldn't figure out what she did wrong."  When I told SIL why we had asked her to leave (she called DH a "spoiled bastard," and told him to go <BLEEP> himself, and to go to hell and take me with him...SIL had the audacity to say "well, she only acts that way because she loves him so much, and you are interfering in the close relationship they used to have."  REALLY???  Confirmed:  It's not just MIL.  It's SIL too.  They're nuts.  That's not how you show "love."

DH's like ours are programmed to respond in a certain way to mommy.  We have to remember that their very survival depended on it when they were children, and those survival mechanisms are so ingrained that well into their adulthood they still lack the ability to form healthy boundaries.  Of course that will cause resentment!  We fell in love with men who basically already had wives, and before we realized what trouble we were in for, it was too late, we already loved them. 

Couples counseling is the best place to start working through that anger and resentment.  I promise, there is hope, and the relationship can be repaired.  It takes a lot of work, but you can get there!  Believe in eachother, and hold eachother up. 

[cdb]

I just realized that I am also a Daughter-in-Law. Wow, it is good I don't have any current issues with that one  cdb

[luise.volta]

cdb - Whew!