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JOURNALING

The weekend started out really well. H had read an article in the local paper about the overcrowding at the dog pound and asked if I wanted to go look at puppies Sat. (we have been looking for another dog for a few months) to see if they might have what we were looking for. We went in and I have to admit that I just wanted to cry Soooo many sweet dogs without homes....

We looked at older dogs first then went to look at puppies. H pretty much fell in love with a little pit-bull female but I wasn't completely sold yet I told him we needed to look at the older dogs again before making a firm decision. I drew his attention to a young Golden Ret. mix who I noticed had yet to bark. Needless to say this beautiful "Lady" (her name) now lives with us and HOGS the bed! She has pretty firmly attatched herself to H too which is good considering all of the other animals have their noses so far up my butt that I can't move for tripping over someone

So all is well, H had to work Sat but only went in for @ 20 min. We went out to eat with my parents and had a good time. Took Lady home to meet the menagerie and had no real problems (my Lab-Pit mix wasn't overjoyed at first but she seems to have gotten over it), spent the night cuddled up and chit-chatting...H started to look inot getting chickens??

Sun. rolls around and wouldn't you know it...I woke up with this driving NEED t discuss H's views regarding R. I THOUGHT I was going about things right...didn't start off with "we need to talk", "I have a question", "I think.." or anything like that. I asked H what he thought of the progress of the R, did he think it was still moving forward well or did it seem stuck? I got my head bit off!! H siad that HE thought R was great but obviously I didn't and felt stuck and wasn't happy (???) I asked him HOW did he get that from what I just asked him? I told him that I was confused about our sex-life lately and didn't understand what was going on...H said i haven't been in the mood is all. Now here is PROBABLY where I went partially wrong...I told H that I felt I had a valid concern here because the LAST time this started happening in our sex-life things didn't turn out so well. I didn't want that happening again.

That sent H over the edge...said I had just made sure that there wasn't going to be any sex now. Said, why didn't I ever learn to just shut up. I went on the defensive then
I jumped up and said " WHY do you have to do this? WHY do you make it UNSAFE for me to ask you anything? WHY do you feel the need to punish me for ANY question that I ask regardless of it's content??

That shut him up. For a little bit anyway

A bunch more crap got bandied back and forth...more of the same old really, H asking why i gotta analyse all the time, why can't I just accept what he says as being the truth and quit looking for more or doubting what he is telling me

Then I asked him "why can't you tell me what I do RIGHT? You readily tell me what I do WRONG but the only thing you tell me I do right is cook. I am well aware of what I do wrong...you make that clear but if I knew what I did right then I would be better at doing it." H starts telling me that he DOES tell me what I do right, the finances,taking care of him and the house, he thanks me when I do things etc. I told him that those are things, acts but what do I do right EMOTIONALLY?

H says "ILY, I cannot imagine my life without you in it".

I told him "I NEED to hear that, to be told that by you. That is something that I can't guess at nor will I make assumptions about it."

I guess that got his attention because he hugged me. I dropped the convo then. The rest of the day we didn't talk to each other a whole lot but it was more of an ameniable silence. H actually ended up being productive...built himself a work bench and rearranged the laundry room to accomodate it (cleaning it in the process!) He asked me for help with the work bench and thanked me when we were done. I used reading a book to keep myself occupied so i wouldnt bug him. The night ended well with snuggling and chatting about chickens again

Guess the chickens are going to be a go...he wants to order some in 2 weeks.

Maybe I'm silly or naive but I felt better about NOT letting the argument end with both of us walking away in the middle of it. That is our typical argument behaviour
I don't expect H to remember what I told him during the argument but at least I got it off my chest and I feel better about it I don't know if this is productive or not but I just realized that H and I have probably argued more in the past few months then we did in our entire R prior to this (excluding the "bad" period). I guess that is reaching the goal of allowing confict to enter into our R...something we have both gone to great lengths to avoid in the past.

What did I learn from this:

H says exactly what he means...no more, no less. I have to REMEMBER that his thought process is NOT the same as mine. That one is taking an awfully long time to sink in...someone remind me of this later on when I get squirrely, please?! I have to also trust that if something IS wrong H will let me know, not leave it up to me to guess. H's moods are NOT my fault either, I need to beat this one in hard. More often then not they are actually work related...I need to let H tell me this in his own time rather then trying to push for it.

I need to STOP asking:

What's wrong?
What are you thinking?
Are you mad at me?
Are you in a bad mood?

I'm beginning to think that if my first inclination is to address H with anything that begins with "what" and "are" I need to pull a plug on it. STOP before I ever get started.

I can feel the headache already

Hugz,
Zoo

"If patience is worth anything, it must endure to the end of time. And a living faith will last in the midst of the blackest storm." - Mahatma Gandhi