Every married couple inevitably has arguments, fights, disagreements, and discord as the relationship develops, but sometimes your wife may become insufferable and keep shifting the blame; even one day you may feel like she keeps blaming you for almost everything; this situation may make you wonder why her behavior is so irrational; and it must be challenging for you to stay with her as you may not be able to figure out what really hurts/annoys her and when she will fly off the handle again; of course, there can be a lot on your wife’s mind that can cause her poor behavior and negative attitudes toward you; here, let’s talk about the possible reasons behind her blame shifting and the proper ways to deal with an unreasonable spouse.
What to do when your wife blames you for almost all the problems:
Fights and arguments are normal and inevitable in any long-term relationship. Understandably, when your wife gets used to blaming you for everything, you easily get frustrated, hurt, angry, and exasperated. Now you wonder why she relentlessly blames you;
Surely, you are supposed to come up with ideas on how to deal with your wife’s constant criticism, but first of all, let’s talk about common reasons why she acts that way:
1 She has narcissistic tendencies:
A woman with strong narcissistic tendencies tends to blame other people for her own bad behavior; for example, if she acts cruelly toward someone, she will say that they are cruel; or if she is lying, she may accuse others of lying; or if she is scamming, she will accuse others of scamming; and so on; a narcissistic person is never willing to take responsibility for their parts in what went wrong, in their mind, the responsibility always rests with someone else.
In addition to ascribing undesirable character traits to someone else, a narcissistic woman is used to attributing other people’s good characteristics to herself; for example, if someone is kind/smart/nice/happy/successful, she will give a negation to the person; instead, she will tell herself that the person is fake and not good; and she will reinforce the mindset with self-suggestions – she will keep telling herself “Only I am authentic/nice/successful…”
2 She is emotionally abusive:
Shifting blame and escaping responsibility can be an emotionally abusive tactic or behavior. An abusive wife may have difficulty bearing responsibility for problems; she goes as far as necessary to shift the blame for her mistakes to her man, even though it may sound somewhat conspirational or unreasonable;
Moreover, an emotionally abusive woman may not accept ownership of her negative emotions; she typically expresses her bad feelings with assertive “YOU” statements, like “You make me so upset/mad.”, and “It is all because of you!”. She may also attribute her blame subtly by starting with first-person language, such as “I would have to … if you didn’t…”
An emotionally abusive woman has a good capacity for self-deception; when it comes to relationship difficulties, she projects the blame onto her partner; for example, she may defend her abusive behavior by giving an assumption, like “I would not nag you so much if only you didn’t piss me off”, and “I would never cheat if I was not upset by what you said!”. In a long-term relationship, an emotionally abusive woman often sets up a dynamic in which her man comes to believe that he is to blame and that he has to work harder to repair the relationship; but because the problem does not lie in the victim, the relationship can not be improved significantly unless she squarely faces the problem rather than skirt around it. The more problems the victim can tolerate, the less willing the abusive woman is to change her abusive behavior. Instead, she may get more aggressive when the victim tries to make things better; why? The compromise gives her a sense that it is not her fault, which confirms her own belief.
Blaming the victim and blame shifting is just a form of making an excuse and switching context; when you are confronting her on something bad she did, or when you attempt to set healthy boundaries, she may switch the entire focus back to you, thereby putting the victim on the defensive.
To discredit a victim, an emotionally abusive woman often focuses on their wrong/bad/extreme behavior; she may even go as far as to say that the victim is the one who actually committed the abuse. This can make the victim lose their mind and can cause them to feel defeated. When the victim is trapped in a particularly weakened state, they are inclined to believe that they have been at fault; more often than not, abusers claim that many authorities ( e.g. church leaders, mental health professionals, the original family members of the victim, and the victim’s good friends) are in agreement with them, which prevents the victim from seeking help and contributes to the effect of isolating the victim; when the victim loses the power and control over the relationship, the abuser wins; in essence, blame-shifting is just an abuser’s customary tactic to pass the buck.
● She has low self-esteem:
Is your wife insecure in the relationship? When she has low self-esteem, admitting to being at fault is too scary for her, and she may just want to protect herself in this way;
In other words, the inability to admit responsibility can be a clear sign of low self-esteem, and this obviously shows up while she is indecisive on issues; in her mind, what she does is just who she is; this means that she manages to diminish herself when she makes a mistake; she makes herself powerless by acting as a victim of circumstance, and she doesn’t realize her mistake; and the more she blames you, the more unwilling she is to admit her mistakes;
Maybe you have heard the similar statements below that she has ever made:
“Due to stupid bus delays, I was often late.”
“I can’t find a good job because of the unfavorable economic conditions.”
“I haven’t got promoted at work because I don’t want to schmooze with my leader!”
Although the reasons in the statements above sound valid, people with good self-esteem are not excessively concerned with the external factors/conditions that may have led to undesirable results; instead, they spend their energy thinking about how to achieve a better outcome, they dare to admit mistakes, but they do not put themselves down due to the mistakes; and they draw experience from them and move on.
Moreover, in married life, a spouse with low self-esteem is inclined to compare with the other one; therefore, your better performance may cause her resentment/jealousy toward you, and the blame is just her way of reacting;
3 She wants you to be overly apologetic:
How do you tell whether a speaker is not confident? Usually, the first word this type of person says is “Sorry”, even if they have not done anything wrong/guilty/faulty. They just apologize for being there because they think someone better qualified should be in their place; do you have a similar experience? Have you become overly apologetic? Therefore, if you catch yourself apologizing for no valid reason in front of your wife, be aware that she may try to bring your self-esteem down.
When feeling lost or out of control, or when noticing the other spouse has done something better and getting jealous, a spouse with low self-esteem may deliberately stir up trouble and bring the other one down to a low level; the low self-esteem drives them to do so to elevate themselves; likewise, when your wife blames you, she may attempt to gain a modicum of control over your bad reactions and emotions;
Remember, it is necessary to apologize for your mistakes or bad actions, but apologizes should be reserved on proper occasions; in other words, you do not have to apologize in other cases;
Anyway, if you notice the warning signs of your low self-esteem, what should you do?
You should be aware that self-esteem is a belief; it takes as much time and effort to build high self-esteem as to lose self-esteem. So when you are experiencing low self-esteem, you should set about changing the belief you have about yourself; remind yourself that no one can take away or give your self-esteem; your wife is also not exceptional; just be yourself instead of the person in others’ eyes. You do not have to be fully accepted by everyone, and just accept yourself;
4 She is insecure:
You may have also heard similar words – ”winners take responsibility, and yet losers blame others;” the same may also apply to your problematic relationship, especially if your relationship encounters the typical situations below;
- She has made some serious mistakes, but she is not willing to admit them;
- You win an argument with her, but eventually, you two still have a disagreement on the responsibility assignment;
- She realizes that her ability to maintain your married life is insufficient; for example, she starts to be insecure about her income or the available amount of money she can bring home, and she may attempt to complain about the financial problems in the marriage and put the blame on you;
From the standpoint of your wife, taking the current responsibility may have made her feel inadequate or insecure; more exactly, some form of her insecurity may lurk under her blame;
How to deal with her blame:
You might look at the issue from a more positive standpoint: when she blames you, at least she identifies the existence of some relationship problems; as we all know, some women just deny existing problems at all in front of their men when their marriages hit rock bottom; denial of relationship problems is a more negative response than blame; and that will be harder to deal with because a woman in denial have to be convinced first that some problems have existed and need to be taken seriously. With a spouse who blames, at least, they have already been aware of the seriousness of the existing problems.
Dealing with your wife’s blame requires a multi-step approach; as we all know, when we do not take the right steps to deal with something, or when we do not deal with something in the right order, the result may backfire.
When you feel like you are blamed for everything, you might follow the principles below to get on with your wife:
1 Don’t directly use emotional pressure to stop your wife from blaming you:
When she is blaming you, in your wife’s mind, blaming is the best way to express her opinion and feelings; so if you force her to stop blaming you, often it will be counter-productive –she may pull further away from you emotionally, or blame you silently or mentally because you cut off her way to deal with the serious relationship issue, and I bet you also don’t want her to stop blaming you because she becomes aggressively depressed and angry;
2 Rebuild respect:
Surely, you can’t succeed in stopping her from blaming you by blaming back or being passive, and that will cause her to disrespect or look down upon you; what you urgently need to do is to rebuild respect with her; remember, if she has already blamed you a lot, your status in her heart has declined significantly; so how can she respect you? You can not ask her to respect you, and you need to earn respect; in addition to being a better version of yourself, you also need to put healthy boundaries around any type of verbal abuse; no doubt, the proper boundaries will do nothing to harm or threaten your wife; more importantly, this will make her blaming self-defeating; and when she realizes that there is no payoff in blaming you, she will naturally stop;
3: Set and balance boundaries with positive communication:
When you two abide by some flawed boundaries, one or both of you may feel tough and unfair; without positive communication, this may create more distance between you two. Therefore, when you are using some unreasonable boundaries to deal with relationship issues, she may emotionally withdraw, and meanwhile, you may also feel disrespected, and vice versa; to prevent such a self-defeating situation, you need to emphasize that you two do not need to be overly loving or submissive when adhering to all the boundaries; remember, being too tough will push each other out further distance;
4: Use her blame as a starting point to enhance communication:
After rebuilding respect, you need to enhance communication; for the purpose of fixing the broken communication with a blaming spouse, the top priority is to get her cooperation; damage can be stopped with the re-establishment of mutual respect, but intimacy requires both parties to work together in daily life. Once mutual respect has been rebuilt, you might use her blaming to launch a productive dialogue – not only addressing current issues but also fostering closeness and connection with her; one coin has its two sides, and an incident of blaming can be utilized as an opportunity for enhancing closeness and cooperation;
An example can make this point clear: recently, your wife always blames you for overspending, but you have all the solid figures and facts to prove her wrong, and you know that even though you argue reasonably and rationally, that will only shut her up until her next complaint; in your mind, she will not stop blaming you; and it has become a game that you has got tired of playing; therefore, instead of attempting to prove her wrong, you might agree with her that the way that you spend money can be discussed;
Here is a dialogue example:
Wife: “Why can’t you control yourself?”
You: ”What do you mean? Speak clearly!”
Wife: “While you get to a store, you instantly start to spend money wastefully as if you are very rich;”
You:” I’m glad you open up to me; if you would like, the way I spend money can be a subject that is worth discussing;”
Wife:” I just want you to know that if you didn’t buy tons of unnecessary things, it would be fine;”
You:” Ok, can you sit down to go ahead with your suggestions that can be helpful with my daily expenses?”
Wife: (Probably She will hesitantly sit down because she doesn’t exactly know what to do or what she expects from you); (Probably, the blame game will soon pause at that point; why? Continued blaming will only get your agreement and validation, the energy sourcing from her anger will be exhausted;)
You: (Make sure to discuss a problem from a problem-solving point of view, and try to come up with ideas and solutions together with her; in this way, both you and she will feel a bit closer; we all have the experience – when we find we can be helpful to someone, we feel better about ourselves; the same to your wife;
In the example above, you neither defend yourself nor agree that your spending is out of control; instead, you utilized her blame as a chance to enhance communication with her; by concentrating on a better outcome of discussion rather than the negative emotions, you were able to help her find a more positive way of dealing with daily issues; if you just defended yourself, fought back or asked her to shut up, you would lose the potential chance of cooperation;
5: See the opportunity behind the problem:
When you have to deal with your wife’s blame, you should not be stuck between two options – whether to end the relationship or go on to put up with the blame; we should not go to extremes in everything; instead, we should work toward fixing the relationship bit by bit; there are a lot of things you can do to rebuild attraction, love, communication, respect, and partnership in your relationship; remember, a coin has two sides; the current relationship problem also shows clearly the aspects where you can improve the relationship; remember, things can turn out to be positive things, you just need to keep a positive attitude and see the positive in a negative situation;
6: Do you dwell on who is wrong or right?
In most cases, who is right or wrong ultimately is not an issue that partners need to figure out; there are too many relationship disputes where each party has justifiable reasons; what you really need to focus on is how to increase the connection and love between you and your wife;
A healthy marriage is never a win/lose; when you strongly believe you are in the right and seek to prove your wife’s behavior and opinion are wrong, you actually attempt to win in the relationship; this will be counter-productive for the relationship; in a game where a player either wins or loses, each party must fight to the finish; in other words, the more you attempt to judge who is right/wrong in a relationship issue, the more she defends herself and even offends you;
7: Understand that sometimes her blame may not be about you:
Generally, we all should have healthy outlets for our negative emotions caused by a variety of uncomfortable social interactions in our daily lives. But if you realize that your wife blames/scolds you endlessly without a reason or rhyme, besides her low self-esteem, it is also possible that she doesn’t find an outlet for her bad emotions originating from unpleasant things in her work or social activities; in such a situation, the blame she directs toward you does not make sense because she is just using you as an outlet; but she may not directly open up to you what upsets her ultimately, especially if your wife is introverted; therefore, once you realize that the causes of her bad emotions come from the outside of your relationship, you do not have to take it seriously; on the other hand, the essence of the partnership lies in reciprocal help and share of sorrow and happiness, so you might try to help her out, and let her know that you are always willing to get through her difficulties, anxiety, and depression …
8: Speak up:
When blamed by partners, a lot of people choose to swallow their anger and hold their tongue; however, speaking up against bad behavior is always a simple but essential skill that you can use to prevent deterioration of the relationship happiness; again, if you feel that your wife blames you for almost everything, that’s negative behavior that you can speak against; let her clearly know that she is playing a wild blame game and that you desire to end it as soon as possible; therefore, you might show your disapproval instantly when she blames you, no need to give her space for allowing the blame game to develop further; let her feel that how badly you don’t want to be blamed frequently; to arouse her empathy with you, you might describe in details the impact of her hurtful words on you; let her realize that you have strongly felt hurt despite your continuous efforts to maintain the harmonious relationship; moreover, let her know that you have tried your best to understand her feelings and opinion from her perspective, and then you might directly tell her to try to put herself in your shoes; in short, to make her take back her hurtful words, you need to use a justify and well-grounded way; and don’t offend in return, you just need to defend yourself, otherwise, things will get more complicated and get out of control; even though she has become quite unreasonable about some relationship issues, you might also focus on emotional communication rather than respond aggressively;
While speaking up, you might try your best to speak clearly and briefly to let her know that her behavior is wrong/hurtful; once she blames you, you are advised to immediately show your disapproval; in this way, you leave less space for allowing the blame game to further develop; surely, to let her clearly see how badly you do not want to engage in her blame game, you need to point out the biggest impact of her words on you, rather than attend to big and small matters all at once; remember, at this point, your wife may also not have much patience to hear a good deal of your moaning; you can also hardly force your wife to see the situation from your perspective unless your words deeply touch her heart;
9: Navigate blame constructively:
If you assume the worst and that she is intentionally doing something harmful and destructive, the relationship will further deteriorate; this is easy to understand because when we think too badly of someone, especially when we believe someone is deliberately hurting us, we only hate them and grow extremely unwilling to maintain the connection with them; they can also sense your negative emotions sooner or later; this will only intensify the conflict; on the contrary, it will be more helpful to assume that she is just doing her best to express her feelings and provide feedback; even though you find her slipping into negative thinking/behavioral patterns, it is better to maintain a positive attitude to confront the situation, rather than let negative emotions get in the way of your behavior;
10: Take your responsibility:
When your wife blames you for everything, she probably resents you because she thinks that you do not take the responsibility that you should have borne; there may be some negative engagements that you have perpetuated in the long-term relationship; therefore, you might ask whether you have ever evaded responsibility for your wrongdoings; in such a situation, once your wife notices that you have learned to embrace your responsibility, she will naturally be pacified and more likely to maintain good mentality; this is always one of the straightforward solutions to relationship conflict;
Surely, I bet you also badly want to communicate with her adequately to end the blame game; in this case, you might try a different way of communication than you used to, such as learning a non-violent/moderate/frank communication; in particular, try to communication with her from an angle of addressing the relationship problems together with her; a shift in perspective can be significantly impactful; understandably, when your emotional wounds are still refreshed, it is not easy to do so, even it can feel defeating and painful; however, it is worthy, as long as the simple shift can transform the meaning and value of the relationship;
11: Cultivate healthy relationship patterns:
When you are seeking to change behaviors around blame, approaching relationship conflict from a place of compassion, care, and curiosity can be a good place to start; holding empathy, compassion, and care for your wife will make more positive outcomes more possible; the compassion and empathy can lead your wife to forgive you for your mistakes and missteps; and it can allow you two to remember that you two are doing your best in general; when she is keeping in mind that you still love her and that you do not hurt her intentionally can help diminish the blame reflex;
After you make positive changes like the above, it may not take effect immediately, but gradually and over time; but as long as you keep doing this way, it is a good beginning of transforming the relationship dynamic into one that is not centered on blame;
No doubt, in any relationship, blaming someone for all the problems only leads to high negative outcomes; anyway, it is necessary to look at what they are:
Consequences of the seemingly endless blame game:
l Emotional distancing:
After being blamed, you must feel that you can not communicate honestly and openly with your wife like before, and you must feel embarrassed to get on with her; likewise, she also has the same feeling; therefore, you two will distance each other emotionally; you will do this unconsciously or consciously; and such a bad situation will be ongoing and last for a period of time; as the blame cycle develops, the harder it will be for you two to feel close to each other;
2 Poor communication:
Understandably, after you feel that you are blamed for some issues that are beyond your control or are none of your business, in the beginning, you may defend yourself instantly, but later, you will be hesitant to come into conflict with her, or you will feel tired of the unnecessary argument; this will lead to a lack of communication over time; when a long-term relationship is healthy, one partner is able to say to the other one when they feel wronged or feel the need to make a change; but after you two step into the blame cycle, you will feel harder and harder to open up to your wife; what is worse, probably you will assume that you will certainly be blamed for any change that you will request; if things go on like this, the relation between you two will only become more and more strained; both of you will manage to escape the suffocating chains of domesticity;
3 Resentment:
It will come as no surprise to a partner who is constantly blamed will feel more and more resentful, especially if the blame pattern has precluded them from communicating with the other one; as resentment and hurt accumulate in a long-term relationship, it will become more and more difficult for a couple to empathize with each other’s experience, and resentment must be an unpleasant feeling; meanwhile, from time to time you may also feel upset about your inability to communicate with your wife;
It is impossible to keep resentment hidden inside all the time; your resentment will manifest as almost anything from poor behavior to passive-aggressive behavior that truly represents how you would like to conduct yourself in front of your wife;
4 Separation or breakup:
If unaddressed or not stopped, the vicious blame cycle may result in the dissolving of the long-term relationship; without forthright and open communication, no long-term relationships can survive ultimately;
Even though communication continues to occur from time to time, one or both of you may come to realize that you have been tired of staying in the relationship that has been destructed by the blame game. Unless powerful measures are taken to overcome the blame cycle, the relationship will only further deteriorate;
What you can do to promote relationship healing:
First of all, it is crucial to recognize that your commitment to your wife does not mean you have to be diminished as a man; many people who seek relationship recovery mistakenly believe that they deserve their injured spouses’ life sentence of being viewed as a second-class citizen; surely, there is probably a critical period in early recovery during which you have to prioritize and triage her wounds; but if you remain in a one-down position, relationship healing can not happen ultimately;
On the contrary, working toward partnership and equality helps heal the wounded relationship; through compassion and lifestyle changes, a lot of injured couples are ultimately committed to a lifetime of accountability. Again, don’t treat yourself as a second-class citizen in front of your injured wife;
And while you are working toward relationship healing, there is no set timeline for the delicate balance of tending to her emotional needs; after all, it is common that an injured spouse has already become anxious and impatient early in the process; there may be some pain that you have caused that she can hardly tolerate; blaming is just one of her way of fighting back; and it is also impossible to exactly measure the depth of the pain and suffering that you cause her; in her mind, she may also set covert contracts that makes the relationship transactional; in other words, if she feels like you do not fully acknowledge and the harm that you have caused to her, she will feel unfair and stay resentful/angry in front of you;
Even if currently you can not find an effective way to move forward, you should try to maintain positive empathy with her; regardless of your current relationship status, it is important not to fall into a victim stance; when your wife blames you for almost everything, don’t think that she owes you something, instead, just accept her and simply think that she is expressing something she wants;
Be careful of the blame that may have appeared to seep through in her language, and make sure not to be subjected to any form of her abusive treatment or language; meanwhile, hold accountability and compassion for how hard it must be for your injured wife; try to do this without becoming passive-aggressive, blaming, or retaliatory;
Understandably, your heart may break for the pain that your wife is experiencing; but anyway, you should try to keep your self-respect intact so that you can function normally in the other roles in your daily life; although there is no script that you can follow to survive the marital crisis, there are some basic principles that can guide your heart and behavior during interaction with your injured wife; for example, it is necessary to change the way that you show up in the deteriorated relationship; in this aspect, long-suffering, gentleness, kindness, meekness, and gentle persuasion are all powerful principles that you should keep in mind all the time; living these principles will help expand your capacity for tolerance and love; when your wife blames you for almost everything, make sure you act as a man without guile; embracing these solid principles is an effective approach for staying out of resentment, blame, and victim thinking;
It must be misery and struggling to live under the barrage of blame; it is hard to imagine related influence on you, but it is healthy to stick to expressing your desire for partnership and unity; instead of violently reacting to the verbal abuse, you might seek to better understand what your wife has gone through recently in her daily life and other relationships; this may help foster intimacy in a way that you do not expect; remember, as long as your wife becomes willing to show her pain and vulnerability, that is the intimacy that should be viewed as a subtle sign that she would like to repair the relationship;
Surely, you can not change your wife as you want, yet you should allow yourself to be changed; specifically, you can try to enlarge your capacity for compassion towards her and other people; when you feel exhausted/stressed/tired, you need to learn to take more care of your emotional, physical, spiritual, and relational needs; even though when your wife blames you for some serious mistakes that you have made, you should remind yourself that you still deserve being taken care by yourself; at this point, she may have already stopped giving comfort to you, but it does not mean that you should be ignored and devalued;
Does your wife also feel depressed when she blames you for everything?
In such a situation, you may wonder whether you should put up with her criticism, or whether you should go away to protect your emotional health; no matter whether her depression is your fault or not, you do not have to put up with her abusive or unpleasant behavior; no matter how much you love her, your emotional and mental health should be your top priority;
As we all know, depression often makes us act in a way that may be entirely out of our character; this also applies to your wife; and it manifests differently at different times; sometimes, your wife may be lethargic, sad, tearful, whereas sometimes your wife may be irritable and angry; in short, your depressed wife may fit between moods; and there is no telling how she will react to your response; so you need to be aware that her sudden mood changes are not permanent; don’t dwell too much on her negative emotions; anyway, blaming you for almost everything that goes wrong is definitely a form of emotional abuse; never accept it;
How to stay with your depressed wife:
When a woman is falling into depression, It is not uncommon for her to look at the outside things from the source of her unhappiness; a depressed woman is generally stuck in thoughts of worthless and a spin-cycle of self-loathing; and such an unhealthy feeling is turned inward; the depressed woman desperately wants to change her state of unhappiness, but she often does not know how to change properly; in this case, she is apt to blame people closed to her to release her bad emotions, especially her partner; as we all know, a lot of love songs have expressed the same meaning – “the one you love is most easily hurt”;
To some extent, depression is a disorder, but this should not be a good reason for your wife to blame you for everything; you should not only learn to protect yourself but also learn to help her deal with her negative/difficult emotions; the following are some tips:
● Remind your wife that she can try to pause her actions while she can not control how her depression makes her feel;
● Ultimately, your wife is the only one who should be responsible for her emotional abuse; understandably sometimes she just can not help feeling depressed, and it is more feasible for you to remind her to warn her of how she treats others around her at that point; on the other hand, remember, as long as you still love and trust her, you should care about her wellbeing and do not hurt her intentionally in return;
● Directly tell her that you feel that she is hurting and that talking to you in any offensive way is unacceptable for you; explicitly state what you can not accept; for example, when your wife feels angry, you might advise her to go into a room and shout and scream into a pillow instead of venting her ill-temper upon you; and explain that if she goes on shouting or using abusive words, you will have to walk away until she has calmed down;
● Meanwhile, let her know that as long as she treats you with respect, you will always be there; it is tempting to tell her that you will always be there no matter what happens; however, when negative patterns are present in your relationship, it is not helpful to make unconditional proclamation of love; in this case, the first thing you need to express is that you desire to get the respect that you deserve;
Final word:
It is indeed challenging to live with a woman who constantly blames you for marital problems and her unhappiness constantly;
Even though sometimes she is justified and you should be truly responsible for the currently less-than-desirable state of your married life, it is tough to endure constant blame; if unchecked, the marriage will only decline and even fall apart ultimately; but as long as you still treasure the relationship, you need to set about changing the relationship dynamic even though you are the one who is willing;
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