Hi Brooke,
Sometimes I want to ask you questions after working through everything on my own as much as possible. This time, I’m coming to you completely raw.
I’m getting married in Sept. Truth be told, we are already married on paper for logistical and health insurance reasons, but the real wedding is Sept. I fell in love with this man last year, because he is kind and supportive, stable and consistent. It was like he was put here to love me and for the first time in my life, I was able to accept that love. Before him, I had been with good men, but often got co-dependent and really hung up on what they were feeling, and then getting all tied up in knots trying to manage their happiness. With my fiancee, I was always able to trust that he can take care of himself. Because he is very introverted, he often comes across as reserved and even grumpy a lot, but most of the time I knew that had nothing to do with our relationship and it was just his affect.
Over the last few weeks, as I’ve successfully quit buffering with food, I’m finding myself returning to those old patterns. I see all the ways that he is NOT showing me the love like he used to. I feel a distance and a tension. I get tearful with him when he becomes argumentative over stupid things (he has always been argumentative over stupid things, this is not new! Though I’m convinced that it’s become more frequent). I even found myself asking him to be kinder to me again — a major SCS no no!! He says he has no idea what I’m talking about and everything is fine, but at the same time, I can see him making an effort to tone down the argumentative comments when he notices he does it. I can’t bring myself to believe that I’m about to marry the wrong man. This is the first time I’m even putting that sentence out there. I guess I should do a model, hm? Here’s a try:

C: He said “no, it doesn’t seem weird” when I commented that something seemed weird (I’ll spare you the context).
T: He just shut me down. How the f*** does he expect me to respond to that?
F: angry, resentful, shocked
A: say, “Ok, it’s not weird” and get quiet. I don’t know how to respond.
R: End of communication between us. Distance.

I could use some feedback on this whole thing. I don’t want to enter a marriage where I’m doing thought work on every interaction I have with my husband.

Thanks!
Sonja