Letting go, finally

[JGuy]

This morning in the car, my W was very talkative. Small talk, gossip about other friends, etc. I felt irritated by the fact that she wants to interact as though everything is fine when the way that I feel inside is everything but fine. I didn't express my irritation but instead tried my best to just sit with it and try to own my feelings. After giving her awhile to get out everything she wanted to chat about, I asked her how it was going after the MC session yesterday, how she was doing with regard to her decision to go NC with the OM. She said that she was just thinking about it, talking to friends, etc. She said that her contact with the OM has been fairly minimal anyways. She downplayed it as though it wasn't a big deal or a commitment to be taken all that seriously. She reiterated that she wants the focus of her decision to go NC to be more about her own need for integrity than about my need to know that she is committed to the M. Of course, this comes across to me as though she is rejecting the validity of how I'm feeling and what I might need to feel safe and able to trust. Despite feeling angry about this, I let the conversation go and didn't apply any additional pressure beyond the curiosity that I expressed. I decided to just reflect on this more and see what I could learn from these observations.

After dropping her off, I thought about it more. I tried to validate myself, calm myself down, and be objective. I could clearly sense her reactivity around feeling controlled. I could see the absurdity of the misunderstanding - I'm not trying to control her, I'm just trying to communicate legitimate needs. I am oversensitive to anything that suggests my needs aren't valid, and she is oversensitive to anything that suggests that her freedom to say no isn't valid. When her issue is triggered, I appear to her like a controlling tyrant who is out to get her, which causes her to become over-protective of her freedom and independence. In this state, she can't see that I'm really just hurting and that I have legitimate needs that aren't being met, which I'm trying to communicate. The more that she is triggered in this way, the more it invalidates my experience of myself, which is that I'm a vulnerable person who just wants to be understood. This triggers my issue of feeling abandoned, which causes feelings of frustration for not being understood. In trying to communicate this frustration, I come across as controlling. Voila, the negative feedback loop is complete!

Understanding this is one thing, but seeing how I can change my actions to produce a better result is another matter. I can self-validate that my needs are legitimate, but if I try to communicate those needs to her, then it seems to guarantee that they won't be met. This puts me in a bind where no matter what I do, my needs won't be met. If I say what I need then I'll be perceived as controlling which will push her away. If I say nothing then she'll never know what I need.

For a long time, I have felt that the answer must have something to do with HOW I am communicating my needs. I have tried every way I can think of, but nothing has seemed to work. I have even tried not communicating my needs at all, effectively invalidating myself while minimizing my needs, trying to settle for less. This is what I did throughout our entire M because it was the only way that I could stay in the M. The problem is that this just leads to me feeling unhappy and unfulfilled in the R. This causes resentfulness, so I know that unless we work through this, it will never feel settled. I keep coming back to the thought that there must be something I'm missing. Perhaps I just need to validate her and be very, very patient as she works through her issue? I am trying to visualize what it would be like to walk a fine line where I can accept my need for connection while also accepting her need for freedom. Only when she gives out of her own freedom will she be able to meet my R needs without feeling controlled. How to expect nothing at all but without invalidating myself?