Over the years my husband showed a behavior that baffled me. He would often wait to tell me things until we were surrounded by our friends.
One night while out with a group he announced he was going TDY. Another that he was being assigned a new job. These were things I felt he should share with me first since I was the person closest to him. To share them with others at that same time as me reduced me to the status of a friend.
Naturally he didn't see it my way. He didn't seem sly about it, he simply said he didn't understand what my problem was. The things he announced were things he had forgotten about until that moment. He didn't think they were that important. It wasn't a big deal.
I questioned myself. Was I being controlling? Was this nothing but a control issue? Was it really that big of a deal? So he dropped a few nuggets that I felt he should have shared with me first. I convinced myself that the more I tried to rein him in, the more I tried to demand compliance, the more I tried to make him do what I wanted, the more he would rebel. He needed some freedom, after all, he was independent and headstrong. He needed some privacy, after all even I needed privacy. It must be me.
