BEL MOONEY: Why is my husband so unkind, selfish and horrible?

Dear Bel

I have been married for 31 years. I had been previously married with a son of three when I met my present husband.

He was great with my son until he got to around ten, when we had our own daughter. Then he began to change. Two years later, we had a very bad car accident. I stopped driving and became depressed. I felt like a prisoner. I wanted to move as my life was so limiting, but he didn’t want to as we’d just finished building our dream house.

I went on insisting we had to move or I’d go to live with my parents. My son was 13 when we had the accident and would often go back to our old area to see his dad and his friends. My husband and son began to clash as my son grew up. At last we moved back to our old area. Things were OK for a while, but then it started again.

These days my husband is jealous of most of my relationships. My son lives an hour away and occasionally comes to stay in our annexe with his family. But my husband always gives me a tough time and is really horrible to my son. When my son told us he and his partner were having another baby, my husband got angry with me for ‘not giving him a second child’. He describes my son and his family as ‘trash’.

My husband has had arthritis in both hips for more than ten years, so I have to put on his socks and pants, cut his toenails, etc. He’s always had his tea on the table, clothes in the wardrobe and a clean house. When his father died, I helped him through depression. But when both my parents died, I had no support.

I’m now helping my sister, who has bad eyesight, and her partner, who has terminal cancer. I see them twice a week. One day last week, I cried and told my husband we should stop being horrible to each other and move forward.

All he said was, get a proper job, stop coddling your son, stop worrying about others and concentrate on me. We’ve hardly spoken since Christmas. We sleep and watch TV in separate rooms. I still love him, but I know he doesn’t love me because you wouldn’t treat someone you love this way, would you?

BECKY

No, I don’t think you would. Your marriage sounds very unhappy and I’m sure it would be a waste of time to suggest couple counselling (because he simply wouldn’t agree).

So in truth, this presents a very sticky problem for me. Or rather, for you.

You say you love him, but this is one of those cases where a little voice in my head is wondering what it is exactly that you are loving. The man you fell for? Or the one who calls your son ‘trash’?

Even your longer letter jumped quickly from the time your son was a teenager to now, so I can’t help but wonder what went on in the time between, to bring your husband to this selfish, bitter present?

Was he the reason your first marriage ended? Did you feel increasingly guilty as his relationship with your son deteriorated? Were you too timid to intervene? What role does your daughter play in the family these days, and can you talk to her?

So many questions. I’m also wondering whether you have indulged your husband in his egotistical imperiousness over the years.

In your longer letter, you actually mention ‘my duties as a wife’ — which made me wince, I’m afraid.

Yes, a loving partner will take care of somebody who needs ministrations, but you make yourself sound like a robot wife from another time.

And when you say that you suspect your husband would like to stop your son’s visits, I worry that his possessiveness could tip over into coercive control. I do think it could help you to talk to a professional to try to work out your true feelings.

If you visit relate.org.uk, you will discover various ways that you can access counselling on your own. I hope it might give you the strength to talk to him and ask outright if he would like to end your marriage.

Surely it is obvious that you can’t go on with this unhappy existence? What’s ‘love’ got to do with it if it condemns you to a life of lonely distress?

Should I cut my idle son out of my will? 

Dear Bel,

I badly need your help to make one of the biggest decisions of my life.

A widower in my mid-70s, I’ve worked very hard and have a home, some money and investments to leave to my two children and two grandchildren. But I do not know how to distribute it correctly.

My daughter is a single mum of two and works two jobs. My son (in his early 50s) stays at home all day, playing on his computer while his partner works six days a week to keep them afloat. I can’t discuss this with him because he becomes angry, claims illness, but is always reluctant to seek medical help.

I want to give my daughter and grandsons equal shares, but cannot decide if I should include my son. Do I split everything between the four, or leave my son out completely, or give him less than the others?

What would you do?

ADRIAN

We’re of an age; you remind me it’s time to revisit the will.

It’s a gloomy business at the best of times, yet must be done. But first I offer you some of my own mother’s practical wisdom.

A prudent saver, some years ago she decided it would be sensible to give cash gifts to her nearest and dearest for this and that. So when we moved here 11 years ago, she (or rather she and Dad) helped with the cost of the new kitchen, and both my children have benefited from her generosity when needed.

So why wait until you are dead to help your daughter? Why keep money in the bank?

I do realise you must provide for your own future; nevertheless I suggest you look to the present.

I’d set up a standing order to help your daughter’s household and (hopefully) release her from one of her jobs. Your son need never know; it’s none of his business.

When it comes to the will, I still think you should divide your inheritance equally between four to avoid family conflict. That’s something none of us wish to bequeath.

Your son has no dependents, but even if you think him undeserving, money might help him with future health problems.

The other three-quarters for your daughter and her children seems fair. But do give the help she needs now.

I can’t abide my ‘helpful’ visitor

Dear Bel

I am going through chemotherapy for the third time and mostly feel awful and just want to rest on my own.

My husband has a friend who helps him with a hobby, so he often turns up and stays for at least four hours. I don’t mind this, but his wife (whom I find hard going at the best of times) comes as well to ‘keep me company’.

I am getting myself in a state about this. Our daughter, who we don’t see much as she lives three hours away, has started visiting for several days.

I love this, but I don’t want the woman here when she is with us. It sounds selfish, but my time is short and these visits are getting me down. I can’t cope with her chatter and trying to be pleasant. How do I ask her not to come without upsetting her?

MARY

How dreadfully hard for you to be enduring your treatment yet again; I know how grim it can be and send sympathy.

It’s marvellous that you can see a lot more of your daughter now — her support and loving presence are vital for your wellbeing.

But at this stage in your life (and you are painfully aware how precious each hour is) nothing should be allowed to cause irritation or stress.

You and your family need to be firm with outsiders — even if it runs the risk of hurting feelings.

You say your husband’s friend ‘turns up’ and stays for hours. I suggest it’s time to control this. All visits to your home should be organised around your wishes. What if you were feeling really ill and needed your husband, and then the chum rocked up?

Suggest that your husband fix a time when his friends can visit, using your illness as a firm reason. This will also enable you to reject the wife’s visits more easily.

I’m sure they mean well, but imposing ‘company’ on a sick woman is not kindness.

You need rest and quality time alone and with your daughter. I wish you courage and strength. 

And finally… If grief has broken you, stay strong

Have you noticed how people personalise issues — viewing things through the prism of ‘my’ experience, even if the facts don’t fit?

I love it when readers tell me how something in one of my replies has chimed with their own experience, helping them, too. On the other hand, they can get the wrong end of the stick.

On June 12, I featured ‘Carla’, who had decided she didn’t like her mother at all. My advice was measured, suggesting that she could at once find her mother annoying and put up with her. But EJ protests: ‘I take great issue with your statement “at 26, you should be more detached from mum”. Please do not generalise how “attached” one should be, or not be. I find this deeply offensive.’

EJ then launches into a long wail of intense grief for her own late mother. It begins: ‘How can you know what the relationship is and what mother and daughter have been through?

‘Having lost my beloved mother two years ago at the age of 50, I wish with all my heart I’d never left her side from the moment I was born.’

Her words are very touching and I feel great sympathy for her loss.

But when she says, ‘I know not everyone is lucky enough to have that relationship with their mother, but I did . . . and it’s wrong to judge and say that we should not be attached’, I have to reply.

I was writing to a particular reader about her own issue, not generalising about all daughter relationships! In Carla’s case, stepping back would simply mean not letting her difficult mum get under her skin so much. That’s all.

EJ’s story is entirely different, her pain is overwhelming: ‘I am totally adrift and desolate now without her.’

I beg her (and anyone else broken by grief) to look at the services offered by the excellent charity Cruse (cruse.org.uk) because (and I will generalise) those who were beloved in life would want us to be able to go on after their death.