Negotiating with myself instead of H. Also..self betrayal..negotiating for what I think I *should* want rather than what I *actually* want.
This is so true for me. This is one of the single biggest issues I need to work on. My little “negotiations before the negotiations” I think it is going to be clumsy at first… but I am really trying it. The *should* remark is so on the mark for me. What would a ‘good’ husband do. Say. So on. In trying to be a great guy I am being the worst mate ever.
We were planning a trip this weekend..not one we had been planning for more than a few weeks but we were both looking foreward to it.
A few days before my H comes to me and says he is nervous that we will not have enough money on the trip.
I agree with him..because I really like to have a wide margin..being close the limit is nervous making for me.
It wasn't that we didn't have enough money simply to go..but he was concerned that we wouldn't have enough to DO a lot of things he wanted to do on the trip.
His initial offer on the table as a solution was to delay paying rent.
For me that is not and never would be an acceptable alternative.
However I have accepted similar situations in the past because I was dealing with my giver and not being honest and frankly self betraying.
Resentment ahoy. I hated doing it..and I lost respect for him and for myself and..and..and..the list could go on and on.
What a high price to pay for such a small issue.
Now that I have gained some wisdom in this area..and enforce standards and boundaries I simply said..that is not an option that I am comfortable with and I am not going to agree with it.
We talked about other options..should we camp so as not to have to pay for a room?
Should we bring our own food?
How many activities did we both want to be able to do in order to feel the trip was satisfying?
How much do those cost?
What about gas?
All sorts of questions that we didn't have answers to got asked and figured out and the final conclusion was that we had just not planned adequately to be able to go at this time.
We still wanted to go though.
So we looked ahead on the calendar for dates we thought might be a better option and came up with a financial plan to cover the expense. Made the dates and the figures line up.
No one has to sacrifice..no one has to be resentfull BECAUSE we were honest and even brutal with regard to what we really wanted and expected.
It could have gone badly.
I could have agreed to a plan that I felt guilty and resentfull about...he could have agreed to take a trip that wasn't exciting enough to be worth it to him either of those would have fed bad feelings.
Instead we came up with something that we are both enthused about.
POJA does work..it's hard but it does work..trouble is that people tend to work against themselves when they should be backing themselves and for themselves when doing so is self destructive.
I want to be able to refer to this later. This is a great example. Even contained resolution. Wow… resolution… THAT is something in short supply around here.
Use my talents for me instead of against me.
If you have the education..which you do.
If you have the ability to detach..which you do.
Then you also have the ability to look at yourself and determine whether or not what you are DOING is in agreement with what you KNOW and BELIEVE is going to be fruitfull or hurtfull.
You have the ability to pull the plug on your immediate reactions..you know that..you are no slave to your emotions..when you feel the urge to conflict avoid..name it..when you feel the urge to act with your giver..name it..just bringing those things out into the open takes a good deal of their power and sway from them in my experience.
Talk about hard to do. I have minimal education(fake modesty) and a huge helping of detach ability(not fake modesty)… but I can make this work. Using my talents for me means I need to understand completely how they work with reference to Frozen. I will ponder this.
I have actually said..I feel nervous..I want to tell you what I think you want to hear..but I also know that I will be resentfull if I do/say/agree to this.
That brings my H onto the same page and lets him have that firsthand intimate knowledge that he otherwise wouldn't have because the truth is..I am not going to be running around emoting as a rule. I am not and never have neem saying that you should or could change your basic personality into something else in order to be intimate.
You are still you and always will be..so will Froz..it is not fair to ask her to change herself into someone else either.
The idea is to try and refocus with intent those personal issues that misalign you with each other.
Sounds very open.. I am trying to be that way.
Now..it *is* more of an issue for her because you are on the other side of the line with regard to infidelity.
However..I can also relate to Froz..and say that I *have* betrayed my H by not negotiating fiercely and agreeing to things I was not really on board with without him knowing it..and thus feeding a ton of resentment which on occasion completely alterred my vision with regard to him as a person.
I think that she has done this also [getting married with a heart full of resentment and false expectations comes to mind] and if she is able to swallow that information [jagged though it is] and process it she will have a much clearer understanding of the hows and whys of ANY person making bad choices for bad reasons.
I addressed that briefly in my last post when I was talking about being able to identify with him and his feelings and reactions during the A time.
I can't swallow it in one piece. I can't go from zero to sixty in a nanosecond..but neither could he..neither did he.
When I look at it it sections..bite size pieces..one at a time I really and truly CAN see myself making the wrong choice at every given point and then of course..each decision that you make builds on itself and alters your course..by tiny degrees. If it was all at once every person living would fall on their butt from the direction shift..stagger around disorientedly..and work furiously to right themselves.
Do I think it is necessary? It was for me. If I can't get my mind around it..can't understand it to any degree..then I have no ability to empathize and no ability to RELAX because I feel so vulnerable. Like I've been diagnosed with an incurable fatal disease that will take the rest of my life to kill me..but it has no name and no description and no origen and no symptoms.
I understand the idea of eating the elephant one bite at a time… but she knows a large number of the facts… if not all really, and she is really upset about it. She has led me to believe she could never identify with me because she could never do this. That said… we did have a pretty good discussion tonight and I listened, mirrored, validated and empathized. I have had huge issues with this before, and probably still will, because to validate feelings seems to be like agreeing. I want to get into this more and I bring it up now because of your words on wrapping your head around your information made me think of it.
Throwing the info out at her instead of handing it to her?
Well..are you being honest? Is it really the same info..not exaggerated?
If she's laughing about it..she probably isn't threatened by it over much.
What does she say?
How do YOU feel about it..and why do you think it takes that overreaction in order to get it out on the table?
Are you aware that you are stuffing? Is it related to her approach? Are you being harrassed into exploding with the info?
I throw info not related to the affair. In trying to be real and honest, I overdo it. Like a clumsy toddler, I ram into her with my arms flailing about… and she is not a fan of that. I am just clumsy with trying to be open and vulnerable. She hasn’t laughed in a long time… not about anything we have talked about. Maybe I am forgetting something recent….
Cold logic can be your friend and save your @ss..it's just not good company.
That is like a sig worthy line right there. Very true.
The truth was..I was extremely invested..I was going to take a huge loss if I walked..in all areas of life..so if it could be fixed..I would do well to put my effort there.
Those cold facts held me during my own fog and fantasy period..and only just barely I might add.
Just another example that it isn't inherently a bad thing to be wired this way..it just has weak areas and difficulties like every other trait.
I think it is seen as a bad thing for me to not be emotional. I think she sees me as cold and callous most days. Not just another trait or a different trait… but a flawed one. And the why did I stay argument… well that could go on for days without the slightest budge on either side. We work against each other in so many ways….
I had to chime in to respond to the part about crying for extreme beauty and such.
Ditto.
I am more likely to cry as a result to something that I am NOT invested in personally than something that I am.
Violin and cello music would be an example.
Poetry that speaks to me.
Great epic *stuff*. The budweiser commercial would be an example.
Once a touching moment on the Simpsons..but I was pregnant at the time..so I'm not owning that one.
Thanks for the validation. I suppose I am not odd or crazy. Or maybe we are…
However there have been occasions in which I made a conscious choice to engage when my initial reaction was to withdraw.
The one I remember with most clarity was when I had a ratherlate miscarriage.
It was a jumble of conflict for me..because initially I was not happy about being pregnant.
Extreme fertility is a hallmark of my family just as difficulties with fertility is for others.
I felt trapped..scared..angry..resentfull toward the baby.. you name it..every ugly emotion that a parent would be ashamed to admit.
Then..just when I had accepted it and attached..I miscarried.
I actually got to *see* the dead baby on the ultrasound screen because the tech didn't expect it and didn't turn it away.
I felt numb..of course..at first..how else would I react?
Then standing in the parking lot..feeling the coldness on my face [it was October] and seeing my hair fly around and catch the sun ..I remember standing with my hands on the railing and actually thinking..if I do not experience this..I will regret it the rest of my life..so I made a conscious choice to allow the feelings..all of them..guilt..relief..sorrow..loss..failure too.
I have been at this crossroads before. The fork where on one hand, I feel the feelings and experience the event… or on the other… I compartmentalize and move on. I have so often chosen the latter that I scarcely remember an event that even touched me that had to do with me. I have been adept at ‘protecting’ myself from negative emotion. Again… working on this.
Weirdly enough it never once occurred to me to call my H at work and tell him. I mean it occurred to me..but not as a viable option.
After all..he would be upset..and there was nothing he could do anyway..why not wait until he got home?
Sound familiar?
So I did..and then we were weirdly out of sync..because he was at the starting point and I had been processing all day.
Plus there really was no good way to deliver this particular message so it had an ackward and artificial quality to it.
Sound familiar?
Now I recognize that as being extremely controlling and selfish and just..weird.
The death of his child was not something he needed to know about right away? [we were very close in timeframe to it being a still birth officially..only a few weeks away]
He's not allowed to get upset about it? Even if it is at work?
So..I still didn't handle it right in total..but at least I did actually grieve..despite my family attempting to diminish and make that grief seem silly. They aren't comfortable with emotions either.
Yes.. familiar. Very. It all makes sense and you explain the example very well. Thank you for sharing that story. I am so sorry that it happened.
It was Hs family who embraced and comforted and even encouraged grief as legitamite.
SIL actually cried openly in front of me..almost for me..and I will never forget that. She's an empathizer for sure. What a stark contrast..that is about the time that I began to seriously question the wisdom of my reactions and expectations..it isn't when I made most of the changes..but the seed sprouted..let's put it that way.
Thank you for passing it on. Recently, I have recollected things from my past and processed them a different way. Looked at them another way. Things like that…. It will work better for me if I have a present issue, I am sure…
Well it seems I have given you more than a point or two..if you are not in a text induced coma yet I applaud the effort.
Snore….:)
Let me know what you think.
I am grateful for the examples and the information you are sharing. It is very interesting and enlightening to me. Nice to talk to someone I have something in common with so they can tell me what they did and how.
