Letters to the Editor
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Yeah
I think Cary said it best you definitely need to see someone objective and sort this out or else it will get worse and you'll end up just leaving.
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Why do you want to analyze his behavior?
I'll analyze it for you: his behavior sucks. He is a bad husband. He does things that would be unacceptable in a vague acquaintance, let alone the person to whom you swore vows.
And you'd quit your job if he got hired there? What's that saying about you? Again, I'll answer: It's saying that your only response when he does something detestable is to run away. Run away in a figurative sense, of course; it's obvious you haven't built up the courage to leave the relationship. And this is to say nothing of the fact that you feel you would HAVE to quit if your husband got hired at your job. If that's how much you can't stand being around your husband, well, to most people the rest of the sentence would be obvious.
So, like I started out saying, you don't need other people to analyze his behavior. You need for him to STOP FUCKING DOING IT. Please tell him that.
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Good thing...
...you published her letter and not his, which I hear was much better written.
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the root?
Maybe its the church that's the problem. A lot of wackos frequent them. Did you meet him there?
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NPD? Maybe, but . . . (part 1)
I notice there is no psychologist or psychiatrist in this thread offering a diagnosis. To do so would be unethical, wouldn't it?
This is not to say that the people saying NPD are wrong. They may be quite correct. The problem is that there are other personality disorders in which people manifest some of these behaviors. Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD), Histrionic Personality Disorder (HPD), Antisocial Personality Disorder (APD). These things are tricky.
However, what I think is useful for you LW is to read all these letters and understand the common (almost consensus) wisdom of what people are saying. Psychological diagnosis and reading and researching about these things can provide useful information, but, in the end he has whatever he has -- and you can bet that he sure has something wrong with him.
It might help to understand personality disorders in general. As someone who has worked some with the mentally ill, I have often heard psychologist and counselers say things like this: "Well, he has Bipolar Disorder, but thank goodness I haven't yet pinpointed any personality disorders." Please note the use of the plural. People can have more than one personality disorder and a diagnosis with a so-called serious mental illness like Schizophrenia, Bipolar Disorder, Schizo-Affective Disorder, Major (clinical) depression. This is called co-morbidity. Guess which problem the mental health care professionals don't want to deal with? You got it. They don't like having to deal with people with personality disorders because they are so difficult to treat. All the games in the world will come into play.
That should tell you that you cannot really help him, that you cannot be his therapist, that you can only learn coping stategies. Is that how you want to spend your life?
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Marriages with similarities to yours (part 2):
I have known four circumstances:
Marriage A:
This was a couple who were married at the respective ages of 15 and 16. She got deliberately pregnant so that they could legally marry and she could get away from home. I don't know all the details, but she grew up in a home with three disabled siblings who required lots of care. Lucky her! She got to be the normal one, which meant she was overburdened with the care of her siblings. Ironically, she married a very dependent fellow. He could not stand for her to be away from him and wanted to go everywhere she went. Still more ironically, her mother and disabled siblings kept moving wherever she moved to be near her. And of course they all -- every single one of them -- required her to sacrifice her time and her interests to their care. Her husband had his problems but the real drama queen was her brother who had out lived his life expectancy and absolutely tyrannized over everyone. Although confined to a wheel chair, he demanded all to do his bidding. They did.
My amateur take: Her husband hand a Dependant Personality Disorder, her brother had NPD, and the whole family was enmeshed due to circumstances and tragedy. In other words, they couldn't get away from each other.
What's your excuse?
Marriage B:
A woman who had previously left an abusive and battering relationship, married a guy who just loved her to pieces. She fell into his affectionate arms only to find that he behaved very much like your husband. He stole her friends, he demanded to go everywhere she went, and he is vain and manipulative. On the other hand, when she was ill, he was really there for her -- making sure she didn't have to many visitors, fussing with her doctors, and demanding she limit all her activities until she was completely healed. She would surely like to go more places by herself, but they have only one car and his needs take priority. They couldn't possibly afford another car because he has spent through all savings and has now overextended all financial aspects of their life. He is being chased by creditors and he will not stop spending. She naively assumed that his wild spending was not affecting her credit. She was wrong. She stays with him because she is approaching 70 and hasn't much work history.
I suspect there is something wrong with both of them, but sometimes when people make bad decisions they have to learn to live with them.
However, what is your excuse?
Whatever you decide to do, you had better thoroughly check your credit and his credit and your bank accounts. Do not let him handle the money.
Marriage C:
Everything she did he had to do better. Everything she wanted or cared about, he didn't give a damn about. He maneuvered their lives together in such a way that they were both working at the same job but he was the only one getting a paycheck. He was financially dishonest. He stole money from his employer. He was intellectually dishonest. He stole her opinions and passed them off as his own and then complained to her if they weren't well-received. He was emotionally dishonest. He sometimes pretended to feelings and emotions that it eventually became clear that he really didn't have. Ultimately he committed a pretty unspeakable crime and when she tried to leave him, he decided that feeding their child pesticides in small doses might keep things under his control. She left him covertly with no money and no work experience she could put on a resume. She didn't get much financially, but she figured getting herself and her child out alive was a priority.
His diagnosis: NPD and APD.
That last one should scare you. The people who are saying don't have children with your spouse couldn't be more correct.
Marriage D:
My parents. It is hard to get diagnosis on dead people but I am pretty sure my father had both narcissitic and histrionic elements to his personality. He was a hypochondriac who was always dying. Naturally dying people should be the center of attention. He demanded it. Often, at the dinner table in the evening he would place his hand to his heart and declare that he would not make it, by morning he would be dead. He was vain, charming, and a workaholic. Impressing other people was mandatory. His flashes of completely irrational anger were reserved for his family. My mother has Borderline Personality Disorder from what shrinks have told me. She also liked to be the center of attention, but she was no match for Dad, since she wasn't always dying. Instead, she was always manipulating. Her children were her main targets. Triangulation was her speciality. Housecleaning was her favorite form of torture. We had the cleanest house on the block. When my parents were home together fighting and manipulating and competing, it was as if all the air was sucked out of the room. All four of us were physically and psychologically abused by both of my parents. None of us grew up normal.
I am not sure what normal is. I have lived long enough and known enough types of people to know that "normal" is the rarity and that probably most of us at the mercy of a psychologist and a DSM could be diagnosed with something. LW, changes are there is something wrong with you. But do not go to counseling with your husband. He will manipulate your counselor unless she/he is cleverer than most of them. Your husband will soon turn it around so that everything is your fault.
Please understand. No matter how messed up you may be. He is worse. Getting better -- if he ever improves at all -- will take willing commitment on his part and years of therapy.
How much time do you have?