u/dubsawaythrow

I'm a little surprised that I don't see more labware or other equipment for mushroom growing across vendor sites.

For example - the first time I ordered LC, I would've loved the ability to also order a vial holder along with it for when I did the Castellani method on some agar. I've also found myself wanting a pill filler for prepping capsules, something that quickly measures the same amount of agar into petri dishes, etc.

I'm just wondering if I'm the only (weird) one?

This might be more appropriate for a relationships sub, but the religious context matters here and I didn't really want to post this somewhere where that part of it wouldn't be understood.

After several years of couples therapy, multiple therapists, and a lot of attempts to find common ground, I'm seriously considering ending my marriage.

Even our current therapist, who we've been seeing for about a year, has told us pretty directly that we're headed toward divorce.

For context, I'm 40 and my wife is in her late 30s. We're both active, lifelong members of the Church. I served a mission. We were sealed in the temple. We've both held plenty of callings, including several stake callings on my part. We've been married nearly 18 years and have three kids, all in the double-digit ages.

From the outside, we probably look like a pretty typical LDS family.

The truth is, we've never really had a very happy marriage.

I want to be fair to my wife here. She's a good person. She's loving and generous toward a lot of people, and I have a great deal of compassion for her. I also know I'm not innocent in all of this. I've been inconsiderate at times, I've hurt her, and I've made plenty of mistakes of my own.

I'm not trying to convince anyone that she's the bad guy.

I'm trying to explain why, after almost 18 years, I've reached the point where I don't know that this is a healthy marriage for either of us anymore.

Looking back, we got married too quickly. She agrees with that. There were red flags that neither of us really understood at the time, and honestly, neither of us had ourselves figured out yet.

The conflict started almost immediately.

At our wedding reception, just hours after we'd been married, she yelled at me from across the room because I was dancing with another woman during the open dancing. There was nothing inappropriate happening. I didn't even know that was something she would consider disrespectful, especially since she was dancing with another man herself.

That incident isn't important by itself. I mention it because, looking back, it was probably one of the first examples of something that has followed us through our entire marriage: she tends to assume the worst of me.

A little over two years ago, she finally said something that put a lot of this into words.

She told me that she has basically always viewed me as her opposition.

That was painful to hear, but it also explained a lot.

Through therapy, we've uncovered that she struggles pretty severely with anxiety, obsessive tendencies, trust, and some negative feelings toward men in general. I've tried very hard to understand those things and have compassion for them.

But they still have an effect on what it's like to be married to her.

For me, it has meant feeling distrusted, criticized, second-guessed, blamed for things outside my control, and often treated like I'm someone she needs to protect herself from rather than someone who's on her side.

I can handle criticism. That's not really the issue.

It's the constant combativeness that has worn me down.

One of the things that finally helped me understand why this has affected me so much was something I came across recently about "capitalization" in relationships.

The basic idea is that one of the best indicators of relationship quality is how your partner responds when you share good news.

There are four general response types.

Let's say a man comes home to announce that he was promoted to a Senior position at work:

Response Type	Example
Active-Constructive	"That's amazing. You've worked so hard for this. Tell me what happened."
Passive-Constructive	"That's nice. Good job."
Active-Destructive	"Your coworkers are going to resent you. Management probably has an ulterior motive."
Passive-Destructive	"Cool. Did you remember to buy milk?"

When I read about the active-destructive response, it hit me pretty hard.

That has been my marriage.

I've been self-employed for 7 years. I've come home excited because our team landed a significant new client. And her response is, "It won't last."

Another time, I was invited by a globally recognized company to come teach a workshop at their headquarters in a major city. I was over the moon about it and told my wife that she gets to come with me.

Her response was, "You're going to lose money on this."

Neither of those things turned out to be true.

But that's been the pattern for years.

- I share an opportunity, and she points out how it could fail.

- I share an accomplishment, and somehow I leave the conversation feeling smaller than I did before I brought it up.

After enough years of that, I've found myself not wanting to share things with her anymore.

And that is an incredibly lonely way to be married.

When I've tried to explain this to her, the response is often some version of, "You're just looking for reasons to be mad at me."

So then the conversation becomes about whether I'm justified in feeling deflated instead of the thing that deflated me in the first place.

Again, I know I've hurt her too. I'm not pretending otherwise.

But we've been working on this for years. We've been to therapy. We've read things. We've talked about the patterns. We understand each other better than we used to.

What hasn't really happened is meaningful change.

And I think that's where I've reached my limit.

I can understand why she is the way she is. I can have compassion for it. I can forgive her. I can 'own' my part in our problems.

But I don't know that I can keep living in a marriage where I consistently feel like my spouse sees me as an adversary.

At some point I have to ask myself whether I'm willing to live like this for another 20 or 30 years.

And no, I'm not.

I'm not angry when I say that. Mostly I'm just sad.

I don't hate my wife. I don't think she's a terrible person. I don't think I'm some innocent victim who's done everything right.

I just don't think we work very well together, and after nearly 18 years of trying, I'm starting to believe that may not be something we can fix.

So, for those of you who are divorced members of the Church, that's really what I'm asking.

I'm not looking for anyone to tell me whether I should end my marriage. That's my decision.

I'm more interested in hearing what finally made you realize that your marriage wasn't something you could continue.

I'd especially like to hear from men, because I'm curious whether having a spouse who consistently felt more like a critic than a teammate was what played a significant role in your decision.

Women are absolutely welcome to weigh in too.

Again, I am not asking anyone here to make the decision for me.

I am trying to hear from people who have stood at this same crossroads and can tell me what they learned from it.

---

EDIT -

Multiple people have asked if I'm writing this post and my comments with AI, because apparently the way I write screams it. I assure you I'm not, nor have I used AI to process what I'm dealing with. I've not even mentioned this to AI once. I'm a little shocked that I'm being suspected of it.

I SWEAR I'm not using AI. I would almost offer to do a recording of me asking my AI apps if I've ever mentioned this to them so that I can prove it to everyone in this thread... but that seems oxymoronic a little bit.

I think my profession is coming through to you all. Part of what I do in my business is copywriting for other companies. I tend to write in a pretty formal manner - even in casual settings - just out of second-nature.