Major life Check in
In between arguments, my husband is a wonderful provider and a great father although I believe both of my children would describe him as slightly overbearing has a kind of big ego…but really amazing in so many areas, seriously, this is generally a good man.
The following post is describing a particularly terrible evening and taking out of context is completely unacceptable but I just really feel I need some support either way and feedback
2026 today I told husband I wanted a separation
He does not take any criticism well, and had lied to me about some little things in the beginning of our marriage. He gets very defensive and angry that “he doesn’t deserve how hard I am on him” when i have a complaint because “he works so hard” I asked him to be respectful of my need for space that we would figure out a plan, but I didn’t have all the answers tonight .
He then mentioned needing to quit his job and that I should go find an apartment to live in. He also of course said that he loved me very much and had no interest in separating and wanted to keep our family together. I told him I did not have all the answers at the moment. We are financially stable and could certainly come up with a reasonable plan, but that wasn’t my first concern, maybe it should be .
THE EVENT that brought this on
We were having a normal conversation, lovely actually…and I starting doing dishes as he left the kitchen and went up the steps to the bedroom.
Everything seemed fine. The thing that triggered him was me mentioning as I turned to do the dishes I “wished people would clean the sink bottom after making a meal” I was not very upset actually just kind of talking out loud and he got extremely agitated. I was listening to a podcast and had my earphone in, but I could see that he was at the step landing yelling down at me so I took out my AirPods and I was like hey don’t worry about it. I got it. It’s not a big deal, I specifically said I was not actually very irritated about it just talking out loud and I was like you go up and take a shower or whatever. I’m very happy to do the dishes. I could see he was extremely upset so I was trying to deflect or get him to move beyond the comment. but he proceeded to walk down the steps and continue yelling at me about how he didn’t deserve this treatment and honestly, I was so shocked by his reaction. I don’t even recall his exact words, but I repeatedly asked him to back off asked him if he was OK and said don’t worry about it. I’ve got the dishes lets not make this a big deal. He then sat down, but I could see he was still very upset. Then as I was doing dishes, he got up and he came into the kitchen where I was doing the dishes and held up a knife at about head level, one and a half feet from my head and was shifting the knife in the light back-and-forth for an unnecessary amount of time then holding the knife at that level, (he later says he washed the knife as well as a plate and a fork-I literally have no memory of anything but the knife)decided to walk behind me with the knife and then placed it in the drawer. He then walked to the couch and sat down again. during this event I was frozen. I felt extremely uncomfortable and my body was I think kind of stuck in this weird “is he really holding a knife near me” state of mind. After a couple minutes when he was sitting on the couch, I said “husband that whole deal with you holding a knife so close to me in when your clearly in a terrible mood and where you’re not in your right state of mind was a dick move and made me feel extremely uncomfortable.” I said it firmly and I was upset and let him know it.
When husband heard this, he immediately said in a very angry voice that he was completely offended by me, and for the next couple hours we argued about my offensive comment that i made about him making me uncomfortable holding a knife near me during an argument he claimed he just walked over to help me with the dishes.
The next day he came home from work and I was like “hey I’m still upset about that incident” we need to talk about this and he again accused me of offending him and told me that how dare I say something like that to him how could I think he would ever hurt me. and I said I’m not saying you were going to hurt me. I’m just saying that it’s extremely uncomfortable, considering that we were having a tense moment that came out of nowhere which, by the way he started and was unreasonable and that I just felt really uncomfortable. some of this argument (the next day when he was asking me to keep explaining my offensive reaction to the knife) was in front of my 17-year-old daughter, and I certainly wasn’t going to ever condone a man who was almost twice your size during a time where he was agitated standing near you with a knife whether he claimed to be helping you or not.
After all this, I realize the most upsetting thing is the fact that he didn’t just apologize right away from making me uncomfortable and accept immediately at his response to me mentioning something about a dirty sink was over the top. I gave him so many chances to backtrack and make the right choice and say something kind to me, but he got home from work and was ready to fight with me all over again about my offensive attitude at this point after so many arguments with him causing me to doubt myself I’m putting this out there to give me strength. Give me some hope that me blowing up the life of my children, and that the life I planned for can no longer be I’m not a horrible person.
I’ve been to Therapy and maybe she has no idea based on me being upset in the description, but she told me my husband’s behavior is very narcissistic. To be fair to him he has apologized multiple times for the way he behaved and that he could see how it must’ve made me feel, but he stopped short of saying he could have ever even subconsciously tried to intimidate me or make me uncomfortable by washing that knife the way he did next to me. Maybe I should just believe him. Maybe I should just truly and truly believe him.
The most pain at this point for me is he apologized after I said I thought we needed to seperate.
Is the side of the story plausible can I trust him? Can we work together so that in the future if his behavior is called out for whatever reason that he won’t just become defensive and blame shift? Was I offensive? Is this something I really need to look deep inside me and think how could I have ever insinuated that he would hurt me? Should I be over it by now? It’s been two weeks and I’m still crying and upset.