Pauls words were radical to those ears. And at a certain point, all of them feed into one another. So Im just going to say this. And all kinds of other spelling and grammatical errors and typos. Lisa, This and That, Volume 1. Its not like its hiding or anything. Im all for making efforts to improve who we are. The argument of but it becomes a crime when hes told over and over not to do it and he still does sits on rocky ground if the message conveyed over and over to the blind man remains simply Please dont ask me to stare directly at the Sun because it hurts. No matter how many times he hears that message, it cant hold meaning to him until its tied to an experience to which he can relate. LisaGottman, I Love your illustration straight out of the workplace AND your adding the better clarity of the gaslight effect in place of just calling it gas lighting when its unintentional! Whewso exhausting. We talk by phone or video conference. Like: Oh shit. Not cool. 8) Im very impressed with your healing. So youd definitely be able to blend right in! I hope you find it somewhere Lisa, and anyone else interested ), You said With Steve comes the added emotional labour. I said I sleep better at night knowing he did it and owned up to it. So we screen new people carefully. Toss in Ron Burgandys poop eating, and well have a work of art. ..(However, from what I read, yes- getting comfortable with uncomfortable dialogue is really important in relationships of all sorts.) It cant be overstated how NOT deficient in communication skills you are, Lisa. You tell him a million times. Feels great that hes suh a great Jason to not be mean to Donkey because of her obvious insecurities and foibles in this area, hes so nice and understanding! When we have been hurt and failed by our partner we stop seeing our partners as people, as individuals. It was not unconditional in the sense that he could crap all over me for years and my emotions would never feel the pain and destruction he was inflicting. And we cant risk another Steve. Hank is Skylers brother in law (married to Sklyers sister), and is also a DEA agent who has just found out his brother in law is the drug kingpin hes been trying to bring down. The sad part is, I tried REALLY hard to make that last paragraph as obnoxiously wordy as possible, and it didnt read all that differently with my usual crap. It is very clear what you need to do. Its life-changing stuff, sir. Some people have no grit and cant face reality. And let me just say I am far from having figured out all this stuff so this is just my random musings on what I think makes sense. I found that what we are commonly taught the Bible says is not really what the Bible said to the ancient ears they were written to. I could give you a million examples. I just had a conversation recently about this about someone who thinks people with depression just dont work hard enough or can just get better with a happy attitude. We are part of a we, an not just a me. The big breakthroughs that help me see the world more accurately. (And Im sure the practical consequence could be different, maybe Parent could only drive Steve around one Saturday out of three or something like that.). What you are doing in describing your wife in such glowing terms is what some people refer to as putting her on a pedestal and its worth far far more than the lovely, romantic warm-fuzzies that you are giving us women who are following. I would never do that, how could you think that! To avoid having him be mad at YOU, and treating YOU as if YOUre the bad one (basically letting him know you think hes Steve and not Jason), you (or maybe I, the more conflict avoidant one) would say something like ooh, Im sorry Steve, its just that I really got screwed over by a Dick once in that situation, so I just cant sleep at night if Im not present on meetings like that, its just this silly thing, its nothing to do with you, youre great, hehehe! *Donkey then excuses herself to go vomit with self disgust and Steve disgust in the bathroom*. Bill makes me feel unsafe but he is predictable so I know how to take care of myself. But, my first question is what if Steve has ADHD, or something along those lines, and truly is unable to focus enough in order to remember all the things hes supposed to be responsible for? Have you read anything by David Schnarch? (I use shitty husbands for brevitys sake here, and again, we all fail at this stuff! Dont leave your dirty towel on the floor, son. Most of it I can. I guess were now what Hollywood would call Travissy? Thats the real stuff that matters. And I see a giant bottle on the table for me to swallow in the future. I wore my keys around my neck even in the makeshift shower I had built cuz I had to limit my time away from the warehouse and going home only meant Id get caught up there for hours and when that happened I always came back to signs someone had been there or things missing. I know this thread is getting old now, but I just want to underscore everything youre saying here. I had my own deeply held commitment plus that and choosing love was not wrong. LOL. Love this post. And thank you for your humility, self-awareness, and mostly for just trying. But eventually, theres just no doubt. At least I think we are not. I view her has the worlds current thought leader on empathy. If you would be willing to elaborate, what are the ways he feels you are hurting him? If youre talking to coaches and so on, theyre probably already telling you what you need to do. I would never promise my wife that I wouldnt hurt her, because thats not a promise I could keep. He needs space. I honestly really do need to learn better how to handle/deal with/work with peoples difficult aspect, in addition to getting a handle on these aspects of myself of course, until Im naturally a strong loving person. I just know thats not my gift or calling. So if I were dating now, I would be ruthless in culling out any man who does not show a willingness to learn and practice these basic relationship skills. It is that you have to be even more vulnerable and at the same time even more strong so that you CAN face owning your stuff and allowing for the other persons hurts and finding ways to get both peoples needs met so that eventually, as you both get better at it, you find that you have been building a mutually loving and supportive marriage. I think we all have these tendencies in different situations, but the more and more we become Jason (or more of ourselves if you will Linbo), the harder it will be to be Dick or Steve for instance. Again, English as second language over here. Hello Bill, you know this shit sanwich you just gave me? You could suggest that if she insists she wants a divorce. That scene hit home with me, because a similar thing was played out in my own life. It just happens. Tell her you would want to have a fixed weekly talk about your relationship for the rest of your life wher she can tell you what bothers her and youll work on it (even if youve identified some of her pet peeves, acknowledge that youre aware that youre unaware of a lot of shit). Cant I go to India and clean toilets instead of being a Dance Mom. And so it prevents my healing by causing me to doubt myself and the pain I feel. I would like to think the former, but given how close to the situation I am how can I actually say its not part of the latter? When you think back to [insert personal experience] and how that hurt youon the insidedo you understand that I feel similarly right now?, In an effort to try to understand you and not fight about this, I want to try to make your argument for you. I couldnt do it alone. Alot of them offer free or very low cost groups therapies of all kinds. Thats his stuff, or her stuff. Sometimes you write things about how you doubt you can be in a successful relationship partly because if the challenges of ADHD. I like your insight that we can be Jasons or Steves or Bills with different people or roles in our lives. From the Id rather have an asshole than a nice, clueless dude commentary of yesterday to this easy-to-digest real-world-like example illustrating it in action. He has something invested in not realizing hes Steve. To prefer the willfully damaging man flies utterly in the face of my conception of love. Its up to me to decide whether I am enticed by the challenge of aspiring to be that best version of myself, or simply cant be bothered. This question comes in many forms. I know that all the examples I can think of right now sound more like someone without boundaries, and I dont think that is the answer. This is really good stuff. There is a reason we say that Steve is more damaging. Alan would never screw you over (if he unintentionally does he would for sure own it and apologize). Since both my ex-wife and I are socially competent, we didnt have many disagreements in front of others. She is resentful. She hates that I did that. Another one is maternal gatekeeping. My marriage fights mostly consisted of me attempting to invalidate my wifes complaints under the basic premise that I considered thempetty or unworthy. You just nailed the key takeaway from my marriages nadir: my wife not only can leave me, but she is 100% prepared to if I start serving up shit patties on the grill again. And hopefully both partners will have developed the tools and the confidence required for dealing with those issues together, in a positive way. Its clear you put a lot of attention to it. In reality I think its also OK and even good when people put their spouse on a level higher in owing them that love and respect and commitment. And as I said, how someone reacts to that hurt and how it affects their future behaviour is pretty important. Im sad and often cry with others when they talk to me about their pain, I feel their happiness when theyre happy, and Im angry when they tell me something they made them mad. Travis speaks of placing such a man as being higher ranking, which is a totally masculine way of viewing the world. Your article accurately depicted the life cycle of a marriage from beginning to end! She may not respond at all at first because shes in withdrawal. As Ive said, the Steve stuff I embrace 100%. And Im willing to explain and dialogue again to increase understanding even though it feels like an exercise in futility at times. I can imagine that it gets discouraging. It really depends on the emotional intelligence of both parties and the willingness to do whatever it takes to understand one another. A MAJORITY of people married do not have the relationship skills they need to stay married. And what it means is that the pain I caused my wife throughout last year must have cut her much more deeply than I ever realized, even after her threat of divorce, and I need to know that. Insisting that his lack of abusive intention makes it better than if he had intended to abuse her. I Google why is it my fault my husband acts goofy and untrustworthy? Were all nice people who just dont have good relationship skills and that makes us act in ways that feel shitty to the other person. Its the antidote to the worry, negativity, and contempt that can creep in during the hard times in marriage and then fester and grow and destroy your love for her from within you. I think/hope this has good chances of helping a Steve child to learn to behave more like a Jason in this regard, and also to *get that he wasnt behaving like a Jason*, and that his actions/inactions, intentional or not, affects Parent and ultimalty Steve himself (I think that last part is necessary) so he needs to consider things. My go-to defense when my wife was upset with me inour marriage was to sayI didnt do it on purpose (which was true). Athletic. So perhaps you cope by adaptation, while she copes by endurance. I will say thisthe topic has steered itself into the most depressing and deflating area Ive ever come across at MBTTTR. Lisa, theres so much more that youve written that deserves a response, but for the moment, since Im reeling, I can only muster one for this: The shame on you from Travis assumes (based on my unclear comment) that these are assholes in a different sense than I meant it. Theres no blame, just tools. When they have the fight about the dishes, he is willing to work it out with her in some win-win way that is not dismissive. I consider that husband a Jason. its a zero sum game because she knows this would not be joy for me. Perhaps you prefer this safer option, this option that requires more time and investment and creative thinking, but which (according to the intellect) yields the maximum potential for success. Demonstrate they are as ignorant as I believe them to be, or, 2. Heres a goal for our future:) I think there is alot more emotional abuse out there than we realize, because we all do it at times. She is hurt. They do dumb stuff and even though they KNOW there is a good chance of negative consequences, they still do it because they think the bad stuff wont happen to them. Its about relationships skills. I would say its quite arguable. If you dont know, who can you call and ask? So hes like: Ummm. Donkey, Nope, its always an accident or a misunderstanding, because all women are all wonderful all the time so any bad event cant be their fault, ever. Yes, I am profoundly lonely emotionally. I, too, am optimistic but sometimes people only have their own interests in mind. But maybe its worth noting that a lot of guys are claiming to be nice guys and/or claiming to not hurt people intentionally and they arent all the same in what stuff they are doing in thats hurtful or in how serious it is, theyre just all the same in their eerily similar claims telling their wives that its really only about her skewed perceptions and her being wrong and perhaps in having other guys who think theyre great guys viewed from the outside looking in rather than from the inside of a serious relationship. This is a major disconnect between my wife and I, as she generally has no interest in trying things. You can work with what youve got in many cases (not all!) In the middle of a divorce right now.28 years. Quick sequence of events: Early on Im not relating well, she gets lonely and eventually bitter and our marriage is on long slow downhill slide. Even if the opportunity to get back together with your ex comes up, and even if you're tempted to take it, don't. 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