Dear Dr. Ellen: My husband and I work together running our own swimming
pool company. It is a very stressful, fast paced business on the east
coast, since there are limited months to use your pool. Anyway, my
husband talks to me in a very disrespectful, rude and degrading tone.
It's not all the time, but, it's a lot of the time and more so with work
related issues.
I used to work with him years ago before our kids and we used to fight
and blow up at each other all the time. He would get me soooo mad that I
just felt like punching him in the face to show him how much he hurts
me. We had kids and also hired someone for the office.
After 2 years, I am back working with him. Since then, I have been put
on medication for some night time anxiety. I seem to handle working with
him 100% better now than I did in years past but, he is still the same.
I try to tell him to just calm down and talk to me about it but, that
never seems to work. Please help me figure a way to get him to respect
me and talk to me like I am a person and more importantly, his wife. -
Beth
Dear Beth: Either you work well with each other or you don't. The
definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and
expecting a different result. You have already experienced the fact that
you do not work well with each other. If you want to keep your marriage,
I suggest that you get a job somewhere else and let him hire someone he
can have control over. After all these years, your husband is the same
man. You couldn't work with him before the children and you can't work
with him years later. Nothing has changed.
If he hires a high school graduate, someone he can train and tell
exactly what to do, you can be there when he comes home and complains
about his work. You too, can discuss the problems you are having with
your employer because it's no longer a personal attack on each other.
The way you are going right now, your marriage is headed for disaster.
In case you are going to use the excuse that you can't afford to hire
someone, my response is, the way things are right now between you two,
you can't afford not to take yourself off the payroll. Divorce is going
to be a lot more expensive and will emotionally devastate your children.
- Dr. Ellen
