After 27 years together my wife is voicing her feelings about what she considers negativity. I have given up or honestly except my limits after dealing with a severe TBI for thirty years. I feel exausted and I think I do sound whiney as all of my issues have gotten worse and in some regards I have given up. I am recognizing dementia from when I 1st came out of coma, at different times in the day. She is my angel sent from above and I don’t want to fight but I’m still a man and I’m trying to have pride. I had prostate cancer a few years ago which changed our marital lives. For me some days I wonder how much am I supposed to loose and keep my head up. Thanks for letting me vent too anyone out there!
I know in a strong marriage your partner is who you turn to for all things. But maybe it’s time to turn outwards and speak more to a local support group or vent here in this community rather than to your wife.
Maybe attempt to seperate your relationship with your wife from your relationship with TBI? Does that make sense?
Just a thought.
azurelle
Thanks , that does make a lot of sense. Have to try and make it a habit/pattern, but I will try.
Thanks again
John,
Your wife speaking about your negativity could be her inability to be with you emotionally. For me when I get emotionally tormented, depressed and alienated, my wife will shut the door on me. She will become passive and will get through my negative mind by tuning out. It is like she feels fatalistic, nothing can be done to change things, and that in any event, whatever is my problem is not much of a problem. (“Well, it doesn’t really matter anyway.”) This will send me into burning rage, which then feds my sense of powerlessness and hopelessness.
Clearly people with TBI feel depression and this inability to function. We also all know this mind turns us into absolute contempt, seeing only the worst in ourselves. For me, the mistakes I have made, the time I have wasted, and then feeling unworthy to be loved by anyone makes me feel worthlessness as a human being. Then I get caught in the grip of obsessional negative thoughts and the relentless self-reproaches become delusional thinking into which no ray of hope can intrude. Naturally if I keep pushing it, I will feel guilty for existing: I have contributed nothing and people would be better off without me. So a TBI naturally communicates virtually no significance and smashing what little self-esteem remains.
It seems a TBI makes us feel utterly and permanently defective. For some reason a TBI is a chasm of inner darkness and opens up to this back hole draining out whatever life we have. This is intense suffering, as you know John. So it seems we need compassion in our suffering and this conscious acceptance of our suffering. From experience, and I believe you know this too John, when suffering is accepted it compels to choose a meaning for our suffering. Once we choose a meaning for our experiences and our suffering we create ourselves. It seems by this choice we actively use suffering as a positive force in our lives, it seems to give meaning to our life and sustains an inner awareness.
So John you are a person who suffers deeply, even this shocking awareness of suffering. The central problem seems to be maintaining ourselves in our suffering without getting caught in it. It is like looking for these points to give suffering a meaning and a self who suffers and one who can also let go of the suffering. In the moment the negative is let go the deeper self is possessed.
Also a certain meaning I see in you, being offered to us, is this willingness to learn from everything and everyone. This open mind appears to be your ability to observe life. Your openness appears to be this inner ability to want to choose to live a better life. And really John your negativity is just a symbol of maybe faithlessness in yourself, but within you I also feel this inner springs of courage. Your courage is this ability to accept and even accept your suffering. The depth of your courage I feel is not merely incidental to who you are, real and it cannot be lost. What a gift John and may it take you beyond your beliefs, your doubts and your negativity.
I can feel myself drawing on your courage and the qualities of inner strength you offer. I suspect your wife does the same, draws from your tremendous support and it feels like we are held up by your supportive presence. This is your gift and may you offer this to yourself, as we are all a part of it from you.
Syd, thank you, wow I had to get the tissues out for the last part of your response! Lol I can’t get mad at my wife. When I spend time with old freinds they jokingly say they don’t know how my wife deals with repeating statements ect. But you know if there is a God only he knows how much we (tbi) deal with. As I’m sure you know there’s no point in explaining no one can get it even most neurologist. Thanks for helping me feel good about myself today!!!
It’s very important to feel emotions you need to feel, not block them. But don’t turn to feeling the same emotions forever, use them as fuel to try to feed a positive change. It’s very hard to figure out what you need to change to feel better… But it is so worth it when you figure it out and perfected and start to feel better!!!
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Oh and it’s very helpful to get a counselor to just complain to 
that really has helped me, because I had to realize that everyone’s got a limit to how much they can listen to negative subject matter, unfortunately 
I myself have had to steer clear of a few people in my life because they were stressing me out too much … But I’m much better at knowing when I need to just go be by myself instead of complaining to someone and do something to help me ease my stress instead. Like sometimes I eat some comfort food or a healthy salad that makes me feel better, or sometimes I play a nice game on my tablet it makes me feel happy, we’re sometimes I make art I hope this helps!