WAW - Very confused and devestated - pt 4

[confusedinpa]

CIPA,

The other day I read something in another book ("How to improve your marriage without talking about it"). Stosny is a co-author on this one. When I read this, I had to think of you:

Stosny calls this "Emotional Attunement". In other words, women (but men also) can sense how the other persons (usually their S) feels just by their body language and tone of voice. So as long as you try to validate her feelings while you are still angry at or you say "whatever" with a nervous, anxious tone in your voice, she will not buy it.

So when she says you are doing things out of a book, that is what she is talking about. Part of it may be like spellfire pointed out that she sees the books lying around, but even if they did not, she probably would not buy it, because she reads you much better than you think. She would not be able to explain it the same way, but she knows who she sees is not the real you.

Let me ask you another question about MC and IC: how much time do you actually spend talking about you and your feelings (past or present) vs. what your W does, thinks, or might do?

AN

AN,

Again you are so right. I'm noticing a trend here. Everytime someone posts advice/input, I see how right it is. I really need to get in grips with myself to be able to put it into action and make it part of me!

My DB coach actually recommended that book to me as well. I hadn't gotten to it yet since I've just started Love without Hurt and I have 3 more that I hadn't read yet. Perhaps I have to reshuffle the priority on what to read....

What you said about emotional attunement is so what my wife was telling me last year during counseling. Our counselor then, who I didn't think was very effective so we stopped using him, would always ask us how we were doing to start each session. I would always start by saying that I thought everything was fine and I was happy. My wife would always jump all over that and say that I would say that I was happy but I didn't look it. The sessions would then go down hill from there....

I understand what she was saying now. She knew something was wrong but didn't realize I was suffering from a mild depression. Neither did the counselor. Now that I've snapped out of it via her divorce bomb, I'm able to feel all the different emotions - not just the neutral, low level anger I had been struggling with for all the years.

My therapist and I talked about what my wife said about doing things from a book. My therapist picked up how when I answered my therapist how I felt loved prior to the divorce bomb, I used the love tank analogy from the 5 Languages of Love book. I didn't pick up on it, but my therapist told me she saw how my wife was annoyed of how I said it.

I told her how we had talked about that in the car on the way back. I told my wife that I may have used the words from the book but it was the emotions/feelings I have in my heart. My wife pressed me to answer it in my own words. She knows that's hard for me as I'm not a very eloquent/smooth talking guy. I told her I was going to say - she made my heart smile, but had thought no one would understand that. My wife said she did understand. My therapist said she understood as well. Guess there is something to this about how women seem to understand so much better.....

I think I'm going to have to use my own words more and only use the book words if I can't get my message across.

During my individual counseling sessions, we talk about how I'm feeling and how things in the past are shaped the way I feel/react when things happen now. Then we talk about the things that are happening now and how I'm handling/reacting to my feelings. She challenges me when she thinks I'm exhibiting the wrong coping behaviors/responses and offers suggestions on what are more productive coping behaviors/responses. I think she is really helping me.

During our marriage counseling sessions, we had spent the first several sessions talking about our past and what had happened. Our most recent one we started talking about what is happening now and how each of us is feeling/reacting to them. We are also talking about how my wife needs to let go of her anger as well as be more expressive (vs. her "subtle" cues that I can never seem to pick up). She encouraged my wife to be more verbal (not sure if that would fall under the "solutions based" coaching or not).