Moved Back from Overseas to Figure This Out...

[S4tk]

Today is Friday. It was a mixed week, but I will say mostly good. I am sitting here journaling while D5 is watching morning cartoon shows.

W and I ended up going last night for drinks. Since I didn't immediately journal it until this morning, things aren't 100% linear.

She got orange juice and we joked about that. She loved coffee and the occasional alcoholic beverage before BD, but since then she feels they induce bad anxiety in her. She doesn't touch either right now.

I asked about Thanksgiving. She said she had nowhere else to go, besides my parents' place (big gathering there annually). She asked me if she was still invited. I said of course, but I just wanted to ask because she had decided a month ago not to come to a family wedding on my side and I wanted to ask rather than assume.

She joked that she could just stay upstairs in the bedroom where people pile their coats, and I could just bring her a turkey leg. We had a good laugh about this.

We talked about little things for a bit. She shared some more about her meeting with our HR people (we work for a religious organization and they are trying to figure out what the heck to do with us in the midst of this marital crisis).

She had gone out yesterday afternoon to get some work done, and she mentioned how it's hard for her to work while at Starbucks. I said, "too distracting?" She didn't really respond. Lately she has displayed a kind of agoraphobia or something.

I let her know my IC therapist is interested in meeting her once, to help me improve myself. She asked me how IC is going and I started sharing about some stuff from counseling about my T wanting me to be friends with negative emotions like sadness, confusion and fear, instead of just ignoring them. We laughed and talked some about that.

At some point, she began to share about feeling betrayed by some people and their "fear" driving the discussion. She even mentioned the "script" some people seem to be working from (she is taking about some of her Christian friends who are strongly talking to her about not throwing away the M), which I thought was interesting since the DB forum talks so much about the script that MLCers play through.

That is ironic because I fell into the same trap of "scripting" later in the evening (will explain shortly). I listened as she talked about these feelings. I tried to ask open questions and maintain eye contact.

She then asked me if I felt I had ever gone through a crisis of faith. I mentioned a time in college when I prayed and fasted a lot because I was confused about many things in life, and then the time after I dealt with cancer when I stopped reading the bible for a few years. I asked her if she was feeling a crisis of faith.

She started talking about it and shared some. She talked about peoples' interpretations, and how we cannot know if anyone is right. I asked her how we know who is right, or the truth. She said she didn't know. We talked for a while about this, and I validated the journey she is on.

She then began talking about the control found in organized religion. The subject began to hit very close to home at this point (we have spent the last 13 years as mission workers and "part" of organized religion) , and I slipped up. I affirmed that organized religion contains elements of control (her point) but I still let my fear/control drive the conversation at one time. I made the especially stupid mistake of saying that every institution/philosophy does this, and said some things about Jung and Rogers, knowing that this is the IC she has chosen right now. Stupid of me. More of the same.

She then shut down and the conversation turned south. I apologized and we moved on, but she said that I am still not understanding her, and I'm doing some of the same things in our conversations.

I responded by saying that in our M before I began to look inward, I had been blind to how I do this, but that now at least I see when my fear causes me to respond in certain ways - and that I quickly apologize instead of denying it or leading us into a fight and making her feel crazy. This is a major 180 for me, and I think she saw this.

I felt discouraged that the last 25% of our convo went south after I did so well the first 75%. Later that night after she went to her room, I texted and said, "I guess I get a 1 out of 10 for being a listening friend tonight. I am working to do better." Surprisingly, she came out of her room, downstairs, smiled, and raised up her hand and said 5 out of 10.

Today I am bummed because I feel like the talk with one step forward, one step back in my own growth. But I resolve to learn from it.

Positives:
1) As soon as the conversation shut down last night because of my comparison of organized religion with Jung and Rogers, I realized that my comments came from a place of fear and control within. Rather than reject my wrongdoing, I accepted it and apologized with open eyes.

2) I was able to listen to some really difficult and fearful things about her crisis of faith without reacting, and with validating her in some ways. I saw growth here in me.

3) She rated me more highly than I rated myself and this was affirming.p

Negatives:
1) I am still doing more of the same by wanting to control her under the guise of intellectual discussion.

2) I am trying to rush process I cannot rush.

I've smacked myself around a bit today, but I imagine some more is coming in the form of labug and AS.

/ducking for cover/