I feel like hope is really important. I’m feeling hopeful. My cat isn’t dead like I feared she was because she is elderly. I feel like things are getting better with my husband too. I’ve even felt happy.

To be without hope is a very hard thing. Strange as it sounds, hope is what has kept me going throughout difficult times in my life. Hope that things change.

My husband thought he saw our missing cat. I hope that this is a good sign and she will come back home soon.

I’m glad that things are going better with my husband. Instead of expressing my insecurities I told him I missed him and asked to chat for a bit. We talked and cuddled.

It really helped because I was in my head before and by not expressing my fears and instead expressing my needs it allowed us to have some positive communication. It made me feel a lot better and put my fears at ease without having to talk about them or ask for reassurance.

I had a nice day today.

Hi Anita

That is great news that you had a good nights sleep.

I’m not good at singing either, I’m actually pretty bad at it but I have always enjoyed singing, so I do it anyway. I think that anyone who loves to sing should sing. 😊

That is fine. I’m quite happy for you to do what you are comfortable with.

Love and best wishes! ❤️🙏

Hi Anita

You mentioned that you think about bad things happening with other people and then visualise things working out for them when you are having difficulty sleeping. The first part sounds quite stressful and the visualising things working out sounds relaxing. Do you tend to wake up feeling stressed when you have difficulty sleeping or is that something that happens when you can’t get back to sleep when you try?

I haven’t heard Sade’s music but I will listen to the song tomorrow morning. I think the lyrics sound really nice. It is apt! 😊

You are right, he could not silence the narrative but he did help me to understand for the first time that it wasn’t true.

It is true that I can overreact sometimes and so can he. I have been trying my hardest not to overreact because there is no room for two people to overreact in the relationship. It would just be over. I tend to go quiet to calm down to make sure I don’t add to the situation.

It is hard for me to talk about these things and think about them sometimes. It makes me feel self-punishing. It isn’t your fault that it is hard for me though.

Thank you for a helpful strategy for handling these situations. Thank you for sharing your thoughts with kindness and compassion. I really appreciate it! Thank you for wishing my friend well too! He has improved a little but isn’t out of the woods yet. ❤️

My husband and I only argued once this week and it was a minor argument. Things are improving.

I feel bad after counselling. I just feel really anxious. My husband is trying to make things better. But I don’t trust it yet. It has only been a week. Consistency is important to me.

I’m also afraid that I’m not good enough. When things were okay between us I had fears that he would one day find me too much and regret being with me. It feels like that fear has come to pass. No longer a silly fear, no longer not true and just an old story. It feels like reality.

Love and best wishes, always! ❤️🙏

Sleep well Anita! ❤️🙏

Hi Anita

I’m very aware of the past being present with the difficulties with my husband. I’ve been having flashbacks to when I was a child because of the arguments.

I think that the change in my husband did happen during the pregnancy. But it was not just the stress. He struggled with the idea of being a father for a while. He worried that he would be like his father. He opened up a lot then and worked on his fears during the pregnancy. He is an excellent father, as I knew he would be. I think that it was a big change for him and he found himself caring for our son more than he could have ever imagined. I think the idea of being a father made him feel vulnerable in a way that he had never felt before.

He has been through a lot in his life, lost a lot of people and his family impressed upon him a lot of unhealthy messages. Everyone will leave him, the people you care about most will betray you. You should leave people before they leave you. These kinds of things.

I think having a son, especially internationally and the idea of things not working out is very scary to him. I had a friend who was in this situation and they sent the child backwards and forwards between countries for half a year at a time.

I think the change in relationship and communication dynamics with a child has been hard for him. Taking breaks during disagreements to calm things down was something that he didn’t want but I forced it to happen because of our son. A lot of the changes in communication I have forced to happen for our son. It has taken him a while to get on board with this. I think he feels quite badly about this.

As things got worse, I lost my patience with him and started walking away from him whenever he started acting out.

He has expressed feeling a loss of control in the relationship and feeling like he is being controlled and treat like a child.

I told him that I don’t want to do this, but we have a son and until he is ready to take responsibility for his own behaviour I will do that for him.

I’m going to have to finish writing the rest of my reply to you tomorrow. I’m falling asleep.

Love and best wishes, always! ❤️🙏

Also, I feel like I have been worrying a lot about losing my husband. What will happen if things don’t work out. That has been painful too. I have made some peace with that he is his own person. We just borrow each other. I appreciate everything that he has done for me, but if he doesn’t want to be with me anymore that is his choice and I wish him the best.