When your husband is having a Midlife Crisis, there is usually a lot of blame flying around. All blame can do is make the situation worse, its not going to improve anything.It may feel natural to blame him or even blame yourself, but if you can take some time and sort through your feelings to separate blame and responsibility, you can move yourself to a much better place. Remember, no matter what he does or says, your responsibility is to take care of yourself.
I want to take some time here to explain the relationship between responsibility and blame, it might be hard to accept when you first hear it, but it is a REALLY important factor in being able to detach and take care of yourself.
Responsibility is a very empowering perspective. It can be very difficult to do at first, it is usually much easier to blame someone else, but making the effort to shift away from blame is some of the greatest work we can do for ourselves.
Because:
Responsibility accepts the faults of the present and looks to build the future.
Taking responsibility for ourselves is denying anyone else the power over our lives.
Taking responsibility puts us back in the drivers eat in our own lives.
Responsibility accepts that we have control over ourselves and says we are prepared to use it.
Blame focuses on the past to explain why the present is miserable and cannot be any other way.
Blaming someone else is giving them all the power over our lives and claiming we have none.
Blame claims that we are victims.
Blame refuses to take control and claims that others control us
The four important areas where blame raises its ugly head and needs to be avoided are:
Don’t blame yourself! Self blame is the most destructive kind – take responsibility for yourself instead.
Don’t believe him when he blames you, – he is in a crisis and he needs to take control of himself, he knows something is wrong but doesn’t know what. He wants to blame something for the way he feels and you, being the closest are the most likely target. DO NOT accept the blame.
Don’t blame him – I know this is hard, but it’s important. He’s doing what he is doing and I’m not saying it is right, but blaming him just keeps you stuck in victim mode with nowhere to go. Accept what you cannot control – him - and take responsibility for what you can control – You!
Be wary if he blames himself. It might feel like a breakthrough if he starts to do this, but remember blame is a negative, what he needs to do is take control of himself and accept responsibility for his own actions and outcomes. When he starts blaming himself, you might feel he is at least looking in the right direction, but it’s still a long way from taking responsibility and engaging in constructive action.
For now, the most important thing for you is to please understand that the sooner you take responsibility for your own well being the sooner you will be able to detach from him and his power over you. You cannot take responsibility for yourself whilst you are focusing on blame - in any of its' forms.
Welcome to Midlife Wife Support
For the Wives of Midlife Crisis Men
You would think that midlife would be a time to sit back and reap the rewards, really wouldn't you?I mean, by the middle of our lives we have a couple of decades of adulthood behind us. We have launched and worked hard at careers, marriages, families all those things we aspired to achieve. Yet for so many of us it is a time to see those things fall apart.
Midlife Transition is a natural passage of adulthood, we all reach a point where we assess and evaluate our progress in life, we take stock, tweak a few things or even overhaul them and set a direction for the next stage of our lives.
The Transition process is as individual as we are, for some it is barely noticeable, an integral part of our daily life, for others it is a time of reflection and introspection. For others though the Transition can hit a brick wall and can turn into a full blown crisis. When this is the case, the sufferer themselves is often completely unaware, it is their partner who suffers.
If you are the partner, the wife who is left wondering what happened to your husband, your marriage and your life, then this blog is for you.
If you are seeing your marriage fall apart as you watch your husband go through a midlife crisis then I hope you will find useful information / thoughts / musings here to help you get through this time.
My whole point in publishing this blog is to help you to see that their crisis is their own issue. No matter how much you want to, you can't fix it for them. No matter how badly you want to help them, you really can't. It is an inner journey that they need to go on and you are not being offered a companion ticket!
You will do best if you can turn your energy and attention toward yourself. You see, you are going through a crisis of your own and although you cannot save your husband or do his inner work for him, you must do your own inner work and save yourself!
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