Glimmer

We had an emergency session with the therapist last night.  My plan was to go in, remain calm and simply say 'okay' to whatever she said.  That didn't go over quite as well as I'd hoped.


I got upset, I raised my voice, I got agitated, but I calmed myself down and I was able to listen as well as share my thoughts and feelings.  R didn't as much, but I wasn't surprised.  What pleased me is that the therapist saw us in action and she corrected a lot of things mid-stream.  Or should I say mid-scream?  BTW, y'all will know something's wrong if I ever 1)stop doing my hair or 2)if I stop cracking jokes.


Anyway, she admonished him pretty strongly that if he was indeed going to stay in this marriage that he had to let some stuff go.  A-MEN!!  I'm still angry so I don't have a lot of sympathy but I can say I recognize that R is coming from waaaaay behind the starting line.  I don't know if y'all remember, but in my family post I talked a little about his family too, and how they pretty much let him figure things out for himself.  While that's all fine and good, there has to be some guidance and just because a kid gets good grades and is polite to the neighbors, it doesn't mean they don't need parenting.  However, R was good.  He was very much the Golden Child - good grades, good at all sports and super easy on the eyes.  I'm actually kind of nervous for our baby because I've heard that two pretty people will make an ugly baby, and for real, R was pretty growing up!  But I digress.


Growing up, things were very often handed to him.  He worked hard but that hard work always paid off and always with great reward.  Seriously, I think the first miscarriage was the first disappointment he'd EVER experienced in his life.  I take that back - he didn't get into his PhD program because of politics and he's still upset about that to this day.  He cut off all contact with the two other candidates and they were his very good friends.  He still carries that around with him, all these years later.


Unfortunately, being smart and good at sports and good-looking didn't leave him very humble.  He'll tell you all day long he's humble, but scratch the surface and there's an arrogant know-it-all just underneath.  And that's a big ol problem when butting heads with a loud-mouthed, fast-talking, stubborn, way-more-articulate, far more emotionally in-tune person like me.


The guy has no coping skills.  None.  He does not know how to deal with disappointment, express emotion other than anger or articulate his feelings.  I'm talking child-level here.  If he didn't get what he wanted from one person, he'd drop it/them emotionlessly and move on to the next person who would give him what he wanted.  That's why he's got such trouble with authority.  He doesn't know how to take orders or criticism.


Emotionally, that meant all unpleasant feelings get stuffed to the bottom, for years and years and the only way it gets dealt with is with periodic explosions.  His parents told me I just need to let him do that because that was his way.  WTF-EVER!  That may work for you because your little Golden Boy does no wrong but in MY world?  The REAL world?  Tantrums don't fly beyond the age of 2.  In MY world we deal with our emotions and then let that shit go.  What is this bottle-it-up nonsense?  That's how people DIE at 40.


But tell that to a 32-year old for whom it has 'worked' thus far.  Well, I can't because I know nothing remember?  But therapist can and did.  I could have kissed her.  She laid it out for him that he needed to do the work on his own, that I could not do it for him and as long as these triggers from his past kept interfering with his present, he was never going to break the cycle.  That's how I ended up in a hotel room after a fight about the dog.  Something I did or said flipped a switch in his brain, he got crazy, I got crazy and I left.  Not acceptable.


I can only hope he heard what she said and will implement her suggestions - only time will tell.  I can clearly understand the challenges he's working with - he's never in his life had to articulate his feelings, not even anger.  He was just indulged - 'Oh that's just R blowing off some steam.  He'll be fine later.'  But it never got talked about, why he needed to blow off steam in the first place and how to keep from getting to the crazy place the next time.  It's hard raising boys - you want them to be strong and tough but you don't want them punching holes in walls because their team lost the game.  Yet you don't want them to take to their beds and cry for days either.  Girls have their own set of difficulties but I get that it's hard for boys.


However, it doesn't mean I will accept his behavior.  When we walked in, I made it clear that I would not rehash the events of the past weekend, that the past is in the past and that we can point fingers at each other for years because God knows we've got the material.  I said we need help figuring out how to move forward.  R consistently wanted to bring up the past as justification for his behavior and kept coming up short when I refused.  We are looking forward now, what are we doing to heal and move forward?  No answer, but not because he's a jerk - he truly doesn't know.


I haven't yet given up but this has been a long week.  I don't know how much patience I have while he learns skills that he should have learned as a teenager, and frankly I'm still very angry.  I'm not raging like I was because I'm starting to have a glimmer of sympathy for just how hard this is for him and I never really hold on to anger for that long.  But it is still there.


Just this morning he told me he was angry at me but couldn't articulate why.  Is it because I didn't give you the response you wanted?  How is that in keeping with your desire for me to remain true to myself?  You said you didn't want me to be a mindless zombie and I was not disrespectful in disagreeing with you.  So can you tell me why you're angry?


Just forget it, he said.


I reminded him that the therapist said no stuffing, that stuffing emotions down leads to explosions.  If you feel something, name it right then, deal with it and let it go.  That's how we're going to move forward.  He couldn't.  *I* could.  He didn't like my response, he wanted me to say something different but couldn't say that because he knew he would be putting words in my mouth, something he said he didn't want to do.  


But he didn't have those words.  He doesn't have the capacity to say I'm angry because I wish you thought the same way I did.  I'm angry because I want you to just go along with what I say but without being a zombie.  Agree with me but not too much.  Keep it lively but don't get too big.


Although it's probably just as well he didn't have the words because those things are a contradiction.  You can't love someone for their passionate take on life and turn around and tell them to tone it down.  You can be attracted to someone because they're carefree and light and happy and yoga-hippie-fied, and then get mad that they don't make six figures.  And I know he doesn't fully grasp that because he truly believes that he can have anything he puts his mind to.


And for that, he gets a glimmer of sympathy.  Just a little one though.  Teeny tiny.