It's interesting to see the dominant/passive roles in play. Each relationship has them. I think it boils down to how much drama, fighting, assertiveness, or whatever one is willing to put up with. I don't like drama. I don't like the emotional play of arguments. Therefore, I find myself avoiding the whole thing. I find myself giving in to end the fight. Doesn't matter, if I am wrong. I just want it to be over. After almost 15 years of marriage, suddenly becoming assertive might have unintended consequences. While I am not afraid of those consequences per se, I do want to try to maintain some status quo until the kids leave home.
An example of this came about last night. We had just bought "Rock Band" for PS2. By the way, it is truly a fun game. Anyway, it needs at least 3 USB connections, but PS2 only has 2. Real smart, huh? I grab my USB hub from my laptop and plug in the connections. Son #1 (14 years old) did most of the connecting and setting up. He had some help from Daughter (11 years old) and Son#2 (9 years old). All 5 of us played it that night. Last night, Sybil had 3 girls spend the night with Daughter. They wanted to play the game. Sybil called be because she didn't know how to get it up and running. She figured it out, and they played. I am leaving work and picking up pizza for the sleepover. As I am coming home, Sybil calls me quite irate. It seems these rambunctious girls somehow yanked on the chords and destroyed the hub. Now, the funny things is this: it was my fault. I'm the one that plugged in the hub the night before. It doesn't matter that I wasn't even home when it got destroyed. It doesn't matter that Sybil thought the arrangement of the chords might be a problem and something should be done about it. It only matters because I was the one handling the hub. So I came home to Sybil yelling at me. I could have had a knock-down-drag-out-fight with Sybil about whose fault it is, but I caved. Why? I did not want a huge conflagration during the sleep over. The end result was I went out to Staples and bought another hub. Just now I think I understand why Sybil was so angry: she wanted to play the game and couldn't. After installing a new hub, she could not stop playing.
This is the typical scenario in my house. Sybil concentrates on finding fault, instead of chalking it up to stuff happens and fixing it. Something happened; someone's head must roll. Since I do tend to avoid the icky emotional stuff, I struggle to confront issues. Sybil has no qualms about this, so she tends to win.
More coming...
The demand of the loveless and the self-imprisoned that they should be allowed to blackmail the universe: that till they consent to be happy (on their own terms) no one else shall taste joy: that theirs should be the final power; that Hell should be able to veto Heaven. The Great Divorce. C.S. Lewis
7 comments:
It's a matter of weighing which is more stressful, as I progress in years, I also try to avoid confrontations...just don't want to waste my energy over silly things...and doing that, sometimes makes me end up beating myself up!
When it comes to not confronting and controlling emotions, you are clearly a stronger man that I.
I could describe my reaction to that situation, but I'll just leave it at saying I would have responded far differently.
I hate to quote Dr. Phil... but he's absolutely right when he says we teach people how to treat us. She's just doing what you "allow", and treating you how you have "shown" her you will tolerate being treated.
What Tajalude said. For example (in much simpler circumstances), my husband always takes his shoes and socks off next to the chair in the tv room. My daughter (19) would, every morning, pick up his socks and put them in the dirty clothes. One day she said, "I am so sick of picking up his socks." So I told her, "Quit doing it." She argued that there would be a pile of socks there and I told her to just wait and see. Turns out he started picking up his socks.
The main thing is your recognize that you need to change your responses. Being assertive may or may not have bad consequences. The real decision is: do you want things to stay the same as they are or do you want to take control of your life?
I third what Taja said. If you keep letting her walk all over you, it's going to get harder and harder to ever get her to stop.
I tend also to just give in to end the fight, but I think I would have fought it on the USB hub thing. I would have pointed out that it most certainly wasn't my fault in any way, shape, or form and that Sybil could bite my ass. I will find ways to justify my husband blaming me for all sorts of things, but even I couldn't justify that one. She was irritated, so you get beat up. Nuh uh. That's not right.
Would it do any good to calmly bring it up now, pointing out that it was in no way your fault and clearly she was taking out her frustration on you? Would she see and understand what she did wrong and apologize?
Hugs, A. You didn't deserve that at all.
Honestly,I echo what Taja has said. Some strong and dominant personalities like your wife just can't help themselves. If there is a submissive person around, they bully them. If you act like a doormat around them, they will just stomp all over you.
I just wonder what you fear will happen if you assert yourself more. Since she seems able to yell at you for hours anyway, it's hard to see how much worse it would be if you were actually putting up a fight, and at least you would feel better about yourself.
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