Question by Eccentric Dad: Bachelorette minded wife and family minded husband. How do you make this relationship work?
My wife and I grew up in two totally different climates. Her family was an emotionally disconnected family (I wasn’t aware of this until after I married her) who prides themselves on being smart, proper, perfect, single/solo fun, and setting high goals. My family was an educationally disconnected family (She wasn’t aware of this until after our kids were of school age) who prides themselves on being caring, understanding, human, group/team fun, and enjoying the luxuries of modest family life.

The conflict is in this: My wife wears my family name but she has no intentions on associating with me and my family. She sees the entire family as a bunch of immature, illiterate, ignorant, and disorderly children who are “below her”. Whenever my mother reaches out to get to know her, she pushes her back on her side of the boundary line and snobbishly acts like my mother was stupid for trying to get to know the likes of her. She even treats me like this until I “out smart” her or treat her the same way like she is unworthy/undeserving of my attention. It drives her ape sh|t nuts when I deny her the attention/admiration/praise she feels she is worth.

Now I am learning a LOT about opinions and judgments lately through my self discovery/help research I am doing between chores. How we feel about others is a result of our belief system and how the other person fits (or doesn’t fit) in our beliefs. These people may actually have pride in their behavior, but due to our beliefs we are perceiving their behavior as a problem. Example: I see impatience as a huge and unacceptable issue with my wife; but my wife may see her impatience as a necessary part of life as much of life is aggressive and she is only doing what she feels is acceptable behavior. So what I’m getting at is, she probably doesn’t see her grandiose behavior as a problem and if anything she may see our behavior as being petty and since we act like peons, maybe she treats us like it because we won’t act all high and mighty like her (her family is the same way)…

The problem I want resolved is this: I am very family minded. I see THE income as both of ours. I see THE children as both of ours. I see THE chores as both of ours. I see THE tv as all of ours. I see THE animals as both of ours….. You get the point. Every asset, worth, achievement, and material is shared among everyone in the family. My wife sees it differently. HER income is HER money. MY mess is MY mess. MY tv is MY tv. The animals I bought are MINE. The children SHE gave birth to is HERS……. Everything, everyone, and every situation/mistake has an owner and it is only ONE person and not the “team’s” or “family’s”. She is NOT interested in sharing responsibility, sharing love, sharing information, sharing assets, sharing belongings, and sharing blame…. Also, everything is a POSSESSION in her world instead of a person, thing, animal, mistake, etc….

So without suggesting “therapy” or “marriage counseling” or “divorce”, how do I deal with a selfish, self centered, self absorbed, and detached spouse all while trying to teach my children how to have a functional and SHARING family where everyone a family works together (much like a team does)?
Agreed she will not change. But neither will I. I refuse to “mind my own business” and make everyone responsible for ONLY themselves. I am just as responsible for the children as they are for themselves. This may only be my beliefs, but again, I admitted I’m family minded. We work as a team. The rest of the world works as a team too; just not her. If you are saying she will never be a team player, then I’ll accept that and be a team without her.

Best answer:

Answer by hankredwons
you are living in a dream world .in my marrage everthing is mine and everthing is hers the our is when we shear our stuff and life with each other daily .

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