Being browbeat

  I'm getting more and more bothered lately by the browbeating ways of my DH.  Or, am I overly sensitive and just a total wuss and tone of voice doesn't mean anything, as he states?  I don't know.  If the latter, then I just don't know the difference.  We HAVE been married for 27 years, so why is it bothering me more than usual now?  But the litany of injustices I feel continues to grow and I'm getting pretty depressed about it. 

  For instance, my chicken hobby was a LOT more fun before he got interested in it and decided that, as usual, everything should be done HIS way.  Now 3 out of my 4 chicken coops contain his breed of chickens, and he is agitating to get rid of more of MY chickens because, he says, I have too many in the coop (nesting house) that remains. He won't buy any chicken feed, but has decided to keep some roosters wayyyyy past optimum butchering time because he wants to have backups.  He complains bitterly if any of his chickens ever run low on the expensive natural feed I buy, but will only do any feeding himself out of his hand.  There's a lot more, but you get the idea.

  And there is the matter of my high cholesterol.  When I came home from the doctor with a month's supply of samples to take and lower it quickly (The doctor was so concerned when he got my lab results that he called me to come in right away and get the samples), he had a terrible fit that I was going to be adding yet another drug to the ones that control my fibromyalgia and anxiety.  I tried to stand up to him, but in the end, I agreed to wait for a month before taking the drug, and in the meantime, give up ice cream and regular cheeses, animal fats, etc.  He wants me to get another lab test then.  I DREAD telling the doctor I haven't started the meds yet when he was so concerned about me.  But its easier to upset the doctor than it is to stand up to DH.

  Sometimes I cry for no particular reason.

  Sounds like depression, doesn't it?

  I can just see me telling him I'm depressed.  He sometimes tries to pretend that he is understanding about such things, but under any kind of stress it comes out that he thinks depression is the own fault of the depressed person, and anybody with any intelligence at all will just decide not to be depressed and they won't be any more.  Therefore, if I'm depressed I must not be a. intelligent, b.have no will power, c. take your pick of any other character fault you can think of.

  I should be going to knit with my friends this afternoon, but he is so mean and nasty about me going to town EVERY DAY (not true) that I said I'd stay home today.  I do have to work again tomorrow, so I really didin't have a leg to stand on this time.  But this happens nearly every week.  Sometimes I can stand up to him, but mostly I can't.

  There are so many things I'm not supposed to do when he is home, like quilting, laundry, housework, anything on the computer, that I tend to spend marathons in the studio alternately quilting and working on the computer when he is gone.  But it really makes him mad to come home and find me in the studio, and heaven forbid he should try to call me and have me be on the internet.  He won't leave a message and is real mean about it when he comes home.  And I never know WHEN he is going to come home.  His work house vary a lot, and he frequently goes to Pat's afterward anyway, but I am supposed to be sitting quietly in a chair in a clean house with all laundry already done and put away anytime he arrives.  Needless to say, this is my most frequent failure in his eyes.  I don't keep up with housework very well because I head straight for the studio when he leaves and don't come out until a few minutes before I THINK he might come home.  And of course I often guess wrong and then have to sit there seething because I want to go on sewing or else I'm in trouble because he caught me in the studio.

  I guess you should take all of this with a grain of salt.  I can cope with all of it pretty well most of the time; I am just extra depressed about it right now.