Over the Shock and GALing 5

[Thinker]

Being happy in our R is too risky for her as it would open her up to emotional risks and pain. She can't feel happy in our R right now because she does not feel emotionally safe in it.

Explain this some more. What's happy? What risks? What pain? What's emotionally safe?

For that, you have to understand the dynamic we had during much of our M.

I have a number of bad tendencies in an R (all leading back to my own issues, but that is a topic for another conversation). I tend to put my own priorities and my own work first. I tend to believe that I have the correct answer and the correct ideas about how things should be and those that disagree with me are wrong. In my M, those came out as me being absent (at work), dismissive, judgmental and critical. If my W expressed dissatisfaction with something, I took it personally and set out to prove she was wrong, to minimize the complaint, or simply belittle it.

My W is a proud, intelligent, educated and capable woman, but one who avoids conflict and lives for affirmation. I (in honest self assessment) was not treating her as an equal. She took all of this very personally and internalized it. To her, all of this was real, emotional pain.

I didn't see any of this. In my view I was a good provider and a great husband. We had everything we needed, I was faithful, we did fun things together, I helped out more than my father ever did, etc. And besides, she was never really complaining, so...

In recent years, my W put up a wall between us, and built her own life - own friends & confidants, own goals, own sources of happiness. I am on the outside, and in her R with me there is no joy, no laughter, no deep discussions of hopes and dreams, no open discussions of needs. I understand this as her defense mechanism. If she isn't happy when we are together, then she can't get disappointed. If she doesn't talk about her needs and dreams, then I can't minimize and dismiss them.

That wall and that distance is what opened her up to the EA, etc. That wall is still very much there.

For her to open up or to allow herself to be happy, she would have to feel safe - that I am not going to trigger negative emotions in her again.

So, it's important to me to keep working on my own issues. I'm getting better. Big changes in the past few months, but it's always easier to see the issue and the root causes than it is to make real permanent changes. The old me still pops out occasionally in response to my own fear or unhappiness. Work is still ongoing.

In the past months I have been baffled and hurt by the way she responds so negatively to any attempt I make at levity. On one hand she states that there is no fun or laughter in our M. But my jokes get a dismissive frown. Turning on music and trying to dance with her gets an annoyed "Don't!, Stop It!" If I am in a great, fun mood, then she avoids me.

Why is she being such a "wet sponge" - this is not my W's normal personality??

So this knowledge that "positive emotions make you vulnerable" helps me to understand. Until my W trusts that the disrespectfulness, judgmentalness, criticism, cynicism, etc are gone from my side of the R and she feels emotionally safe, she is not going to allow herself to be happy and have fun.

This understanding helps me to be patient and not get too frustrated as my attempts at fun and levity get rebuffed.

It also puts the focus right back where it should be...on me!