Living with an anti-gun spouse, how do you do it?

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Sounds like the 7 year itch came a little later.

It's just a slump in your marriage or bump in the road. It's purely a personal choice. Be a man and uphold your vows or be a man and let her go. You got no debt save the mortgage. You are still young. You can either start over or make a go of it with your family intact.

Making a go of it means fulfilling her every waking desire. That is just the way that is. Letting her go means simply filing for divorce.

I recommend upholding your vows and a farewell to arms. At least temporarily on the arms. Permanent on the vows and oath bc that is what they are. For life.


Waste not want not. :)
 
Woman tells me to choose between my guns or her I tell her "baby, don't do that to yourself.". Haha. But I'm not married... Lol


Waste not want not. :)
 
America is full of a lot of folks who have loose screws. There is no other way to describe it. There is no other excuse for it. Even if you went to counseling, there are few counselors today who have an open mind about freedom. And freedom is what we are talking about. We will lose it soon, as too many people do not value it.

Four more years ought to about do it.
 
As a vaunted moderator pointed out, the advice from those who are not married
or not fathers is worthless......which is a very judgmental and incorrect statement.

Anyway, from this unmarried man, a wise man once said: "If you compromise for
something, it will compromise you."
 
jad0110,

My heart goes out to you.

As many others have said here, it seems that your issues go much deeper than guns.

This is telling:
jad0110 said:
Note that we did go to counseling for a short while, but she soon stopped going because she decided she needs no help, as “I am the one who is screwed up.” Sigh.
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I have been told that when a whole family relationship is nuts, it is the sane person who goes for counseling. I think that is true.

I paid mountains of money for couples counseling for [thread="504484"]my ex-girlfriend and myself[/thread]. She is an incredible woman and we were both hoping to get married. We had huge issues that went far beyond our differences on guns. In the end, it was these other issues that broke us up, not our differences on guns nor politics. We both worked as hard as we could and bent as far as was humanly possible but it was not enough. I knew our relationship was dead when she refused to continue with counseling or do any more work on the relationship.

It sounds like adult reality has become a bit much for your wife right now. Perhaps you should offer her some space to regain her perspective. She can never go back to childhood innocence, but maybe she needs a short break.

A good relationship is highly valuable.

Try putting the guns aside for a while... have a friend store them.

Decide what is most important to you, and what you are willing to do to accomplish that.

Give it time. The answer will be come very clear with time.

I hope for the best possible outcome for you, your wife, and your children.
 
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I would guess that guns are not the real issue playing out here. I have no idea what the real issue might be because I don't know either of you...but this smacks of some other bigger issue manifesting itself in this gun argument.
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+1 to the above

IMHO, if getting rid of your guns means that your kids have both parents under the same roof then to me that is a no brainer.
 
The advice to continue to live with, and possibly procreate AGAIN, with someone who is philosophically opposite to me is frankly irresponsible. It's a volitile cocktail that is just waiting to blow up in the OP's face.

This isn't a disagreement on which color to paint the bathroom. It's a FUNDAMENTAL disagreement on life outlook. She may-as-well tell him he can't exercise his 1st Amendment Rights along with his 2A... Anyone here that would tolerate that loses my respect. STAND UP for your rights and beliefs. Ending the marriage doesn't mean ending his relationship with his son. He can still spend significant time with son.

He's tried counseling and she isn't interested. They argue. She's mentioned Divorce.

WAKE UP!!! It's over. Sorry to bear the bad news, but the Titanic is going down. You can continue to play with the band and sink with the ship, or get on a life raft.

Work out a fair divorce deal that includes child support. Don't have any more kids with her. Run, don't walk, to the lifeboats.
 
What can I say? She's a woman and she wants to have all the control, and you won't let her. Hence, conflict.
 
Husband (less than 1 year). Not a father. My wife was VERY high-strung and controlling when we were first married. Guns/hunting were brought up occasionally, but only as targets of opportunity. The trend of controlling, demanding, angry, unreasonable behavior finally led to her speaking to a therapist. She's on anti-anxiety medication now and things couldn't be better.
Maybe give the guns to a friend to keep temporarily. When she flips out about something else beyond the point of reason, you'll have an iron-clad argument to get her to counseling ("I got rid of my guns and you STILL behave this way. What is th common denominator?").
 
Mine was Afriad (with good reason where she grew up) and originally used to startle and quiver at every firework or loud bang.

Years later she was willing to sit in the car while I shot...

Shortly after I got her to shoot a .22 rifle, once or twice before she ran for the car and her book.

Soon after that I got her to shoot the Model 10. A dreamy look hit her face and she kept having me reload... and reload.. and reload... before running for the car and her book. She was nearly as good from the outset as I've practiced to be. Bah. OH well a marriage should be of Equals anyhow.

Now she owns her own Sigma 9mm, (picked on her own on grip comfort) and gets me to plan her trips to the range 2 weeks in advance of the trip so we can have babysitters. (if the eldest isn't joining us already)

You have my condolences Neighbor, and I wish you with all sincerity that your Missus finds the same path my once terrified wife did. 17 years together next month for us, it only took a few years after she was willing to hold one, till she was a Shooter herself.
 
Here's the kicker
look at the stories above

and you find one very telling word
WILLING
unless your are both willing to work it out, it ain't gonna
so, put the guns up for a month, and wait, it'll happen and either you confront the problems in your marriage in the light of day, or it just goes in a spiral down
OH
and Leadcounsel hit it on the head
no more kid until your sure it's a life thing and not till next month thing


My advise, write a letter (keep a copy)
tell her how you feel
just that, don't accuse, if you have major but hurt, don't attack her, use the passive, 'when you say XXX you make me feel like this because'

And sometimes, it's like the song says, you gotta know when to hold them and know when to fold them.
 
IMO, counseling for sure. Go to a couple different ones until you find one that seems supportive of you BOTH, and impartial.

Also, does your wife's anxiety cause her to lose sleep? If so, this is definitely part of her problem. My wife couldn't sleep when our son was about two, and I was working nights, and the drug activity was increasing in our apartment complex on the outskirts of Detroit. Three months of sleep deprivation made her so paranoid she was a completely different person. Finally had to enlist the help of her sister (a nurse) to get her treated medically. We moved back to the town where she grew up and although now it's almost twelve years in the past and she's pretty much back to "normal", she's definitely changed. So if your wife is not sleeping, you MUST get her medical/psychiatric help!

BTW, she's not anti-gun, but she has yet to accompany me to the range.
 
As a child can be used to hurt you or exploit you (not just as a major financial factor), even years after a divorce, this should be considered by those who really care for their kids.

I was very lucky compared to some people I know.
If other aspects of a marriage are good, or at least acceptable, for some of us we would quickly choose a good and frequent relationship with a child over a gun, if we had only two stark choices.

Maybe somebody else can locate, and introduce your wife to another lady who was forced to successfully defend herself (maybe a child) with a gun from a low-life, even if it was only pulled out and displayed? Possibly such a women gives seminars or teaches a handgun class in your area?

Staff in local gun stores or police officers might know of somebody like that.

[ mod snip -- the "humorous" suggestion was removed ]
 
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I agree with many others who say it is really not about guns. It is a control thing. Guns are something that takes your focus from her for however little time. It is also a symptom of irrational fear, and potentially other mental issues. There is often no reasoning with people, and if she won't continue professional help with or without you it may not be something you can resolve.

Develop another hobby that takes your focus away from her a little, like fishing, model airplane flying, bird watching, whatever. Watch what happens.

Divorce is painful, especially with children, but living in an unhappy state, will not make things better, and remember it may be doing her and yourself a favor in the long term. People move on, and become happy alone or with someone else.
 
Woman tells me to choose between my guns or her I tell her "baby, don't do that to yourself.". Haha. But I'm not married... Lol
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I am married, and if my wife said, "The guns go, or I go," I would help her pack.
I know I don't have to worry about such though, because my wife knew about my obsession long before we discussed marrige. There were no surprises.

You can do like some people have suggested and get rid of your guns to appease her, but remember this. Once you start cowering down and doing whatever she says, you're never going to be able to stop. She's going to have you by the stones because she knows she can get you to do whatever she wants. Don't get it started. It will snowball.
 
This is a very interesting thread, and I appreciate everyone showing their sensitive sides.

My beautiful wife and I had our "getting to know you" issues for about five years, and then something mysterious happened that helped us become better partners. We found out that a child was not going to be part of the plan, and relieving ourselves of that expectation made room for other more creative exploration into our hobbies.

I had always loved guitars, but adding firearms to the mix was at first weird for her. I was having fun gathering all the acoutrements and cleaning them on the dining room table and finally asked her to go plinking. She has her own LC9, has shot all of my weapons, and is now helping a girlfriend of hers get into it. Our LGS has a ladies night with a female firearm instructor, which will give them the space to make their own decisions without me getting in the way.

After fourteen years of marriage we have learned to let the other be themselves unless and until their behavior starts affecting the marriage directly. She has her sewing machines (4-5 I think) and her art studio, I get to have guitars and guns and tools and shop. Like most successful personal relationships, we meet in the middle, but keep our eyes on the prize.

Today she understands that she may be the one defending us. What a gal.
 
Not to make light of this situation, and not that I'm an expert, but if you look rationally at many marriage issues, you find they could solved by maintaining some things separately.

Many counselors recommend separate bank accounts: his, hers, and the household's. I recommend, if it's financially feasible, separate vehicles. My own marriage would have stood a much better chance if we had maintained separate bathrooms.

The common thread here is for each partner to be able to maintain a life of his/her own and still uphold their partnership. Marriages end because one spouse or the other, or both, clings to a measure of independence that the other cannot tolerate.
 
A glimmer of hope ... a good development

Thank you again for all the replies. While I agree that taking direct advice over the internet is likely not the wisest idea, this has given me the opportunity to at least ask myself questions that I'd never considered previously.

In summary, last night we had a rather nice conversation about our prior "blow up". This came up because yesterday, she encouraged me to go to an auction where guns were being offered up :confused: . So I went, enjoyed getting out on a nice day, decided against bidding. When I got home she asked about my day at the auction. I talked about all the interesting items I saw; some of the great bargains that other folks got and a few instances of "auction fever" that will likely end in "buyers remorse" later :D . I told her I didn't buy anything, that although a 1940 Garand went for way under its value, it was still more than the piddly amount in my current budget. She looked puzzled and said "well, you could have borrowed the money from another budget category to cover it for a short while."

What the :confused: ? Hence how our talk got started later that night. I asked her, why after our big fight a week earlier was she so friendly and open to me going to an auction to buy more guns?

She said simply that she knows that it is my hobby and that it is something that I enjoy and she supports that. This is also when she told me that last week, when we had the blow up, that ... well ... Aunt "Flo" had dropped in for her monthly visit ... if you know what I mean. And Aunt Flo is rather disruptive to her ... as another poster points out:
Pon Farr?
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I did chuckle because that honestly isn't far from the truth.

Back to our conversation. I asserted that I would never, ever try to "force" her or even influence her on guns. I might offer to show her how they function, if she is interested, for the purpose of perhaps removing some of the fear/mystery of them. I also reaffirmed that I would continue to keep the guns and gun related items as out of sight - out of mind for her as much as possible. As I held her, I reiterated that I do love her and our boy and protecting them is very important to me and that the gun is my preferred tool to do so, while her preferred tool is her newly acquired baseball bat :) . She agreed, that that makes sense.

So it is a start. Maybe a small one, but encouraging. I honestly don't intend to try to get her to like guns, or become my shooting buddy. If in 20 years she changes, great. If not, that's fine too. Acceptance is all I want at this point. After all, I do have shooting buddies that I enjoy spending time with (my parents, my sister and her husband, and a couple of good friends).

Sometime I may write up a "contract" or "agreement", as we have done on budget/financial goals. Something that says concretely that I will respect her wishes to be left out of my hobby, and she'll respect my desire to protect her and our son, and own firearms to affect that protect, to enjoy as a hobby, and also (for me) to do my part in exercising my 2nd amendment rights (something she knows I feel strongly about). I have one medium size safe, and I have agreed (just not in writing) to never acquire another safe unless it is a replacement for the one I have and no larger.

So we will see. As others have said, I will confirm that the issues do go beyond just guns. There are control issues, and may always be. That has gotten better overall in the past months (except for the influences of Aunt Flo / the Pon Farr), now that she is off all the meds she was once on. So there is hope on that front as well.

Because it is more about control, I don't believe that getting the guns out of the house will solve anything, it may even make the situation worse, and I do predict resentment on my part if it comes to that. However, I will keep that option open. My parents are very pro gun, and they don't live far from me, so I could always move my safe to their place if it came to that.

I know we aren't out of the woods yet, but this little event has been the most encouraging I've seen in a while.

BTW, for the record, we both more or less brought up the "D" word at the same time. And we both want to avoid it, as I think we both view it as being the "nuclear option".
 
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The guns are most likley just her excuse for her unhappiness. Put all your guns at A friends house. See if her attidud twards you changes. I'll bet she finds another reason to complane. Sorry. Been there.
 
Okay, to go back and answer some questions:


Why did she walk the streets of those cities(especially Oakland) in ignorant bliss, alone after midnight. Was it an occupational thing or did she just party until all hours of the night?
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Her occupation at the time took her all over the country, and she would go out to malls and other places to shop her brains out. :)

How old is your son, and have you gotten him into guns?
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He is 5. I started doing an NRA Eddie Eagle-like program with him when he was about 4. He is a fast learner, he has a good grasp of the 4 rules already, though he won't go out to learn to shoot until he is much older, if I can overcome my wife's objections.

What are her political views, and have they morphed or gotten stronger over the years? Are they the same or different than yours?
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Basically, they are the same, except on guns.

Besides the guns and safety issue/s, what is the biggest conflict the two of you seem to have. Are you at odds with each other over many things, or just a couple?
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Home improvement projects, without a doubt. We do NOT work well together. It's like we speak different languages in this particular area. Interestingly, she and my dad work great together (I do alright with him too, but not like them).

IMO the problem is that your worldview has changed from "sheep" to "sheepdog" while your wife's has not, and she's not comfortable with that change. You're not the same blissninny guy she married. She can't articulate it - heck, she may not even realize it - so she fusses about you having the guns.
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I agree completely. Looking back, I could have done a better job in relation to her when I was changing.

Now that you have a child she may also be waking up more to the dangers of the world, her role as a protector, and she may be feeling a big overwhelmed or scared there.
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I think you are spot on here too. Great insight, thank you.

You didn't say how "in your face" you are regarding the guns. I'll guess that you're not the type who has several full safes (and who really needs another 1-2 to hold the complete collection), a reloading bench w/ progressive press set up in the garage, gun catalogs arriving in the mail on a daily basis, cases of ammo arriving once every week or so, etc.
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No, just one full safe (my gun buying days are essentially done because I have run out of room and I've agreed to not go bigger). I do however have a work bench and a reloading press (Lee Turret) in the garage, though she does not object to that. She does however object to my 30 gal trash bag full of water bottles and other junk to shoot under the bench. So that may be a point to give some ground on. I don't receive any gun catalogs or magazines, and I typically only order ammo in one big bulk shipment once a year.

You can't put the genie back in the bottle on this one. If you two were both single today you probably wouldn't go out on more than 1-2 dates, never mind get married.
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True on the first point, and perhaps true on the 2nd. I still love her, and I of course love our child. Maybe we wouldn't marry if I was the person I am today back then, but then again, I wouldn't change anything.

Patience my friend...this too shall pass.
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Thank you. Patience is important, though I do need to be reminded of that from time to time.
 
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