tl;dr Wife mocking me while I learn her hobby pushes me further away.

DB for the past 15 years. Couples Therapy the last 3 years helped a lot.... so I thought. It helped us learn how to communicate. Now, we're communicating about our DB. Fuck. I turn 50 this year; my wife is about the same age, but staring at 50 really awakened me.

So since January, I've taken it upon myself to try and get out of the DB....WITH MY WIFE ALONG SIDE.

I've shown greater interest in her hobbies and activities. I've made attempts to plan fun stuff to do when the weekend hits so we spend time together to rebuild those deep connections we once had.

My wife has a long-held, massive interest in a female-dominant game that is of Asian origin and similar to dominos. She and her best friend (who I'm very close with too) wanted to teach me how to play this game. The game always looked intimidating to me, and my wife is super-competitive, so I usually didn't want to participate.

A few months ago, I finally agree to learn and they teach me. And it IS intimidating and the strategy is complex. So I'm learning. Me? I've played for 8 weeks. Them? They've played for 15 years. My reason for playing? TO SPEND TIME WITH MY WIFE AND BOND WITH HER TEACHING ME STRATEGIES. Great activity, right? I'm leaning in to her bid to be together.

Last night, we're playing, and I made a move in the game that was met with laughter and criticism. Not because it was funny but because, as the two of them put it, "too early to make that move and I shouldn't have done that. HAHAHAHAH." I interpreted that as "What an idiot. He has no idea what he's doing." I didn't react but I was hurt. I don't need this shit, especially from my wife. (How about explaining your strategy to me). I kept my head down and played and guess what? I won the hand!

When I used to be competitive, I would have celebrated that win with a massive FUCK YOU to both of them. But last night was different. Instead of the customary, "Nice job", after winning, I got a cold shoulder like I did something wrong.

And immediately after, the flood gates opened....and I was ridiculed for the rest of the evening. "You're not shuffling the tiles correctly. You can't use the restroom during a hand. Don't go upstairs to talk to our 20 year old son in between games. You can't take that tile because you waited too long."

The night ended, I was so turned off by the evening, I told my wife my thoughts and said I'm just going to sleep in the spare bedroom.

I spent about an hour writing my thoughts down and it basically boiled down to this. I don't like when my wife competes with me. I have zero desire to win at all costs for table games. I want it to be a relaxing, social experience, and it's not. I've tried so hard to move myself so I can find common ground with my wife and I get pushed away.

I'm tired, I'm sad and when episodes like this happen, my mind stops saying "keep forging ahead, progress is good" to "what the fuck am I doing? why does she treat me this way? Maybe SHE needs to work a little harder to find common ground with ME."

Anyways, I'm done with this post. No way I would bore you with other instances of similar behavior. I needed vent because like so many other sufferers here, we have no place to turn to.

Thanks for reading.