Woman Writes To Ask Amy: Husband’s Incessant Monologue – Reminds Me Of My Ex Fiance
I don’t think getting married is enough. You have to marry the right person, someone who makes you feel valued, someone with whom you’re compatible. The woman’s husband in this letter (which I copied much, much farther below) is not doing any of that for her.
Before I get to her letter, I wanted to talk about the situation with my ex fiance. I am going to spend a good long portion of the intro of this post griping and explaining about my ex, Fred.
I also posted this letter to my blog because this woman’s husband reminds me of my ex fiance.
I wrote about my ex in (Link): this post, about half way down that page, under the “Personal Experiences” subtitle.
My ex, let’s call him “Fred,” never stopped yapping. He was a talker.
During the several years we were an item, Fred never stopped talking.
The very few number of times I tried to talk about myself, my job, or topics I thought both of us would find interesting, or topics I felt passionate about, Fred would get a glassy-eyed stare as though he didn’t care about what I was saying.
He would not say hardly anything in response to anything I said, and he wouldn’t ask me clarifying questions about what I was saying.
Or, if we were chatting over the phone (about one third to 1/2 of our relationship was long distance), he would go deadly quiet.
Deadly quiet as in, Fred was bored listening to me talk about anything. The moment I would go silent again after an incident like that, he would resume talking as though I had never said anything. I endured several YEARS of that behavior, which I found hurtful, strange, and incredibly RUDE.
Fred would not show ordinary behaviors most people show when you are in conversation with them.
He would talk about himself, his family (mother, uncles, brothers, etc), and his job.
But Fred would not even pause to ask me questions about this stuff he was talking about, like, “So, what do you think of my Uncle getting a new job at Acme Inc.? Do you think he should have taken the job at Spacely Sprockets instead?”
Nope. Fred would talk endlessly about whatever he wanted to but then never ask me for my thoughts on whatever he was yakking about. He didn’t ask for my input.
As a result of that (and a few other elements of our relationship), I didn’t feel valued by Fred, my ex. There was no emotional connection because he did not take an interest in me, my career, my hobbies, my opinions, or my life.
I often would sit in the same room with Fred yet feel all ALONE.
I was “emotionally single,” even though I was dating the guy, in a relationship! I might as well have been single. I did not feel as though I was part of a couple.
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