Passionate Marriage

[Cathy47]

When someone attempts to be more of a self in a relationship system, the absolutely predictable response from important others is, "You are wrong; change back; if you don't, these are the consequences!" In fact, if such responses do not occur, one's efforts to define more of a self are probably inconsequential (emphasis mine)
- Murray Bowen, as quoted by Schnarch

Tim, this is where the waters get muddy for me. It's that "boundaries" thing and all that. I understand a need to retain a sense of autonomy in any relationship we have and especially in a marriage.

If you have lived a certain way for years and have been less than happy with what that was producing in your life then you are probably going to get a negative reaction from those who are used to certain actions from you. I can understand that because change produces fear, especially if it is someone we love that is changing.

My confusion, or maybe I should say the thing that I think could cause others to be confused is the idea that we should be able to make change with no regard to the other person's feelings. If we are lucky the person attempting to change the dynamics in the relationship is doing it in the hopes that both partners will benefit. Change is being made out of respect for oneself and the other person.

If you have a person who all of a sudden decides they are going to change and to hell with what it does to others....their changes cause drastic, emotionally harmful problems for the other then I believe limits have to be set and consequences naturally occur.

The quote above seem to be rather broad sweeping. Someone like my ex who has decided he is going to be his own man and to hell with the pain it causes his children. When I say pain I don't mean small stuff either, I mean stuff that has caused clinical depression. Someone like him could take that quote above and use it to justify his position and his actions.

My children don't communicate with their father. He has been told by them to either stop dismissing their feelings or stay away. He told them he was not responsible for their feelings.

I understand the concept of taking care of one's own feelings by not allowing yourself to define your feelings based on the actions or reactions of another. There just seems to be a fine line we walk though when engaged in an intimate relationship because, regardless, we do and should feel concern for that person's feelings. I guess what I'm wondering is does the book teach how to obtain that middle ground, does it teach how to get to the place where you can retain your self and at the same time still feel concern for the other person?
Cathy

[Cathy47]

michlynn, If you are living with a passive/aggressive you are going to have to do a lot of reassuring. Their biggest fear is abandonement! My ex was VERY passive/aggressive. My son said something to me recently that covered all the bases. He said his father never learned to "fight fare."

The passive/aggressive does not know how to process the discomfort of others. It becomes all about them and their fear and pain. It sounds selfish but is based in that deep fear of rejection. They work over time at doing the right thing and when someone gets angry they look at it as abuse...it's like they are being told they are not good enough because being loved means being good at all times.

They have this romanticized, rose colored glasses view of life and relationships. It sounds as if your ex learned one of two things....he either withdraws or goes into a rage. Coming from alcoholics that is understandable.

People can learn by example. He doesn't sound like a stupid man and a little patience on your part and the willingness to show him how to "fight fare" can make a huge difference. Passive/aggressives are so easy to love. They can be so endearing but they can turn on you in an instant. It's not easy being in a relationship with someone that is so, so overly sensitive. Definitely no sense of self.
Cathy

[Tim2point0]

I guess what I'm wondering is does the book teach how to obtain that middle ground, does it teach how to get to the place where you can retain your self and at the same time still feel concern for the other person?

Very much so, Cathy. He makes the point repeatedly that in a relationship like marriage, one needs to remember that he is dealing with another human being, another person, and the need to be aware of the effect one's actions are having on those around him. Not only the SO, but also the children. The point is, if the changes being sought are on a point of personal integrity, this will be the natural focus.

Change is being made out of respect for oneself and the other person.

Just so.

The quote above seem to be rather broad sweeping. Someone like my ex who has decided he is going to be his own man and to hell with the pain it causes his children. When I say pain I don't mean small stuff either, I mean stuff that has caused clinical depression. Someone like him could take that quote above and use it to justify his position and his actions.

Exactly, but that would not be an act of differentiation, it would be an act of marital sadism, and therefore an act of fusion. It would also not come from an issue of integrity, but rather of selling out one's integrity. In such a situation, the ideal is that someone (the SO, or a competant therapist) would be able to call the person on their hypocrisy, and point out how they were violating themselves and their relationship. Confronted in this way, if the person were able to honestly confront themselves, they would hopefully realize what they were doing and "rise to the occasion".
Schnarch tells a story about his own marriage to illustrate the point. His wife wanted to start having children, and he was ambivalent on the topic. They had discussed their positions before marriage, and for him, nothing had changed, but she decided she wanted to have a baby. After much self-confrontation, she made the differentiating move of going off birth control. She informed him of this fact, and said she wasn't going to force him to have kids - he was free to use condoms or any other method he thought would be effective - but she was no longer going to participate in that. He had to confront his own feelings on the matter, and ultimately decided he'd rather have a child than use condoms. This is an example of a life-altering decision that was brought about by one spouse making a unilateral differentiating move. He had his choices, and he acted on that...

[eyesopened]

Tim and Dave,

Thank you for answering. I just ordered PM. The concept of soothing is very intriguing along with using sex to improve the entire marriage.

I think my husband deep down would like to be able to just relax sometimes and be taken care of. Instead, he's usually the one at work who works the longest hours, who gets the most projects assigned to him simply because he is so reliable, who doesn't take vacations because his bosses become so dependent on him that they don't want him to be away from work for more than a few days.

At home, he's running around doing yardwork, doing laundry (he made it so that I can't get to the washer and dryer without moving a lot of heavy stuff now--it's a long story), cleaning up after dinner, etc. Whenever I do those things, he criticizes the way I do them or makes it difficult for me to do them (like the laundry), so I found it easier to simply let him do it even though occasionally I have to hear him complain that he has to do everything. I often accused him of being controlling (although I have complete control of the finances, have his support to go to work, stay at home, or go to school, to do as I please and go off to visit my parents and other family members for weeks at a time, etc.), but now I think there's something much deeper and sadder going on.

All your talk about how things change in a marriage if one person changes has proven to be true in our marriage in the last couple of weeks. It also seems to me that once the marriage changes, you can finally see some of the negative patterns.

During one of my husband's and my few relationship talks (via email) recently, I told him that I sometimes felt like somebody who'd been in the desert without water for hours or days. When I finally get to his house, I want and need water. But, instead of giving me water, he prepares preparing a lavish feast, and then doesn't understand why I'm still asking for water and doesn't appreciate the feast that he's spent hours preparing.

But, when I look at this scenario from his perspective (or mine as the giver), where he's the one who's come in from the desert, I see that instead of me offering and giving him water, I'll give him water if he asks for it or tells me that he needs it (ok, if he collapsed from thirst, I would give him water without asking since the need would be so obvious). And, he'll choose to die of thirst before asking or telling me what he needs, and he assumes that I don't truly love him because I don't recognize what he needs and give it to him freely without him asking. This may be the reason why the one and only relationship book I've ever been able to persuade him to read is Willard Harley's His Needs, Her Needs, after which he said very honestly that he felt that he was meeting all my needs (I'd given him a list and asked for his list), but none of his needs were being met (my immediate reaction was to fire back an email showing him how entirely wrong he was, which was unfair and untrue on my part, but somehow his comment finally got through to me later that week, and I finally accepted it as his honest feelings about our marriage).

In our marriage, the initial change came about when I realized that he was probably hurt when I turned him down for ML (usually for mundane reasons such as being sleepy, busy, tired, engrossed in a movie on TV, felt fat, etc.) and I also finally understood the problem I have with intimacy and trust.

What I did was to start initiating ML with him, telling him that I want to ML with him and apologizing several times for my past behavior of carelessly turning him down, convincing him that he didn't have to satisfy me every single time (sometimes I like not to focus on the big O and to just relax and use all my senses) and that I truly do enjoy and want sometimes for him to just lie back and let me seduce and play with him, offering and giving him long (2 hours or more) foot rubs that he seems to enjoy more often than ML right now since he's working very long hours and this is his favorite nonsexual physical affection, and telling him "I love you" first instead of waiting for him to say it first. Also, after reading Michele's article on this site, "He Must be Teething ", I've stopped assuming that when he's upset, it's because of something I did and I'll ask him what's going on as soon as possible rather than let this fester for days while I start feeling more negative toward him with each passing day.

Since making those changes, I've noticed that he's more relaxed, he's happier, we spend a lot more time talking and he's more open and confiding about stuff at work, he comes home by dinnertime (I've always tried hard to have us eat together as a family even when it's takeout food) or calls me immediately if something comes up so that I can adjust dinnertime if I want, and he's become very, very affectionate in the ways that I really like. And, yes, as the LD (lower drive) spouse, I've found that my desire for him has increased and that ML seems to feel "closer".

Gee, this all sounds easy. But, while my behaviors are fairly easy to change and I see a change in my husband's behavior (I had decided to make the changes simply because they were the right thing to do even if he didn't change any behaviors), what I'm finding is that old attitudes and fears about vulnerability are being exposed like the nerve in a tooth. After being "the pursued" throughout our relationship, the new behaviors make me feel unbearably vulnerable at times, and I'm having trouble sleeping and handling this without those old feelings popping up. And, I saw a little, but deliberate, passive agressive behavior from my husband last night, so it's probably reasonable to assume that he's feeling some discomfort, too (based on past experience and past comments, he's probably convinced that these changes are only temporary and will stop if he isn't on perfect behavior). I know that if I give up, things will go back to the way they were (except this time I'd also have to live with the newly discovered knowledge about our marriage and me), but that if I can maintain the changes and weather both my discomfort and my husband's discomfort, we have a real shot at a truly good and loving marriage, something I never saw when growing up and seldom see now that I'm an adult.

The concept of soothing (self-soothing?) from what I've heard from you guys is probably going to be something I really need to understand and apply, so I'm looking forward to the book's arrival.
Michelle

[eyesopened]

Hi NOpkins,
Very good advice. Ironically, I did just this with my mom (we had a very difficult relationship when I was in high school and college--if my mom was a movie character, she'd be the mother in Terms of Endearment), but we're very good friends now. In fact, I'm probably closer to my mom now than anybody else except my husband.

Several years ago, during an ordinary phone conversation (not confrontational), I told her that I felt that she didn't love me or thought I was a "bad" kid because of some of the things she'd said to me when I was a kid. She started crying (which made me feel horrible) and said that she never meant those words, that she loved me, that I was a "good" kid, and she was proud of me but that she just didn't know what to do sometimes and did the wrong thing. Also, she was afraid that if she praised me, I'd be "stuck up". I never thought that years of feeling hurt could be undone by a few minutes of honesty, but they were.

Unfortunately, with my husband, I'm as much at fault as he is. Instead of confronting him immediately, I'll let something fester (and often the "something" is really "nothing" ), sometimes for years (I'm quite good at dredging up things from years ago), until it starts to affect me. Either he picks up on the fact that I'm angry at him (and he usually doesn't know why) or I'll say something. After that, it's as though we're in a bullfighting arena, and I'm the matador with the red cape and he's the bull. I get in a few verbal jabs (kind of like those spears they use to rile up the bull), he's wondering what's going on and is feeling pain and anger. Then things escalate to the point that I may as well be waving a red cape at him, and he charges verbally, sometimes physically (holes in the wall, broken furniture, etc.). He's angry and in pain, and I'm feeling very much in control albeit angry, too. You have no idea how much I hate writing that.

For some reason, reading Michele's books and some others recommended on this board, and writing and reading posts on this board and other DB boards, has forced me to confront myself, something that 3 years of therapy, including a couple of years in marriage counseling, never did.

The chapter in PM on normal marital sadism will probably be uncomfortable reading.

[eyesopened]

Cathy,
Wow, you really know about this. First, I'm very sorry about your husband. I watched two family members do something similar despite the rest of the family trying to show them they were hurting a lot of people, mostly their children.

You and your son have great insight, and I think you're right. I've noticed that when I'm in my seething stage (dredging up old hurts or brooding over a recent one), my husband's very attentive and loving and on his absolute best behavior. Unfortunately, I'm getting what I wanted (such as him being home for dinner), which makes me more angry (as in "do you have to be afraid of losing me before you'll do what's important to me"), and eventually things either escalate into a full blown fight or eventually cool back down.

He does need lots of reassurance, and again I have to take a lot of responsibility for that. I've been going back through things he's written to me and old conversations and taking his accusations at face value. One thing that he repeats is that he always felt as though I had one foot in and one foot out of our marriage whereas he was the more committed one. The hard to face truth is that he's right.

I'm the one who's left a few times for weeks, sometimes months, at a time, who expects our marriage to fail and is always making plans for leaving (not even "change or I'll leave", but "I'm surprised that we lasted this long, and I'm not happy, but we should stay together for the kids" and the latest "the kids are almost all grown now, and I don't see any reason for us to stay married once they're grown and gone"), and who actually filed for divorce many years ago.

But, I don't really want to leave him. What I really want are ironclad guarantees and proof that he won't leave me, that we can weather whatever happens in our lives together, that he won't stop loving me, that if he knows how much I love him and want him he won't use it against me, and that he even won't die before me. And there's no such thing in life.

You are absolutely right, too, that he (and I) need to learn to fight fair. If I can put aside my pride and resentment and give him the reassurance that he needs, perhaps we can both learn to fight fair. At least last time, things didn't escalate, and we did ML later that night. Maybe we need to do something I read about in one of the relationship books. The husband and wife agreed to take their clothes off when they started fighting, so during their next fight they stripped. It worked for them to defuse the tension, maybe it might work for us (at least for those fights in private, probably not a good idea for fights in the car).

[NotATLDave]

Assertion of my Differentiation

Exercise 1: For the past few days I've been following my C's advice and not letting my W's mood be anything to do with me. Thanks to Gottman, I was able to read her body language a little better and instead of asking if I did something wrong, I could tell she was just overwhelmed by her mom coming to visit for 4 days. I asked if she needed any help etc. A lot of differentiation is "state of mind" rather than behavior.

Exercise 2: While watching TV. I did a little mental exercise and told myself to have no fear. I then leaned to W and asked "when we go to bed tonight, I would like to get naked with you and do a little bit more than cuddle. You have every right to say no." As I asked her, I could see every muscle in her body tense up with anxiety but she said a (less than enthusiastic) "sure". I completely held on to myself through this and I would have loved it more if she said no because it would have given me some more material to challenge myself with. Unfortunately it might be hard to know whether my decreased anxiety is do to self-soothing or the fact that I got some sex. Anyway, I just realized that the anxiety she was feeling wasn't completely her lack of desire. It was the fact that I'm raising the level off differentiation and it's creating tension for her. It's her tension...not mine. She can not honestly say in C next week that I pressured her. She can admit to feeling pressure, but for the past week, I've completely ceased my "tests of her conviction" that she was worrying about. I'm sure she's a little worried that I would have gotten weird over her response if it was no but I wouldn't have because "I don't need her desire to validate myself or feel less anxious". I just am going to be "me"...a guy who looked at his W and decided that it would be nice to ML with her.

I'd be curious if I violated any Schnarch's principles in this.

I do admit that I'm having the same quandary as Cemar in that despite all differentiation in the world, some of us just want more. Maybe my W will start to see the new me and the balance will change. I think the extent of behavior changes needed is mostly in the form of "disclosing what I want despite the response". Her desire problem now belongs to her because for the foreseeable future, I'm going to ask her once or twice a week to have sex with me....wait...is that sadism? God this is confusing. Schnarch is making us walk on 2x4s.

[Tim2point0]

I could be wrong, but I think part of what you may be missing is the need to have regular conversations with your W about the issues you (both) need to work on. The reason I think that is because all the stories in the book take place in the context of regular weekly visits with Schnarch (MC/ST), who regularly queries the couple looking for clues to their difficulties and feeds back to them suggestions about what the underlying issues might be. You might ask your C about that... as I say I could be wrong, but the changes don't just magically "happen", something has to keep it in motion, and I think that something might just be regular dialog. For instance, if I want to make an issue over kissing, then the first step would be for me to initiate some pleasant discussion geared towards seeing if she would be agreeable. If not, then there would have to be some discussion (possibly ongoing) about the reason(s) why not. It would be during those discussions that she would have to finally confront herself, being finally unable to offer a plausible reason or reasons not to indulge my stated desire. Does that sound like what you understand?

[NotATLDave]

Tim, that's the reason we are going to a C. I hope she can help draw this stuff out. If not, I better start saving my money because Schnarch is freakin' expensive to visit. I think what I'm doing right now is one piece of the puzzle. My W has not yet confronted herself on her issues and I've made it very easy for her to avoid it in the past.

At any rate, here's what happened with my "assertion" last night. It was actually "textbook" because of her reaction and was really a good test for me and another opportunity to disclose without fear.

Remember, she said "yes" to the idea of naked cuddling with "union" (meaning spoon with penetration while we (or just she) falls asleep). She got into bed in her "frumpy" nightgown and cuddled up to me and rubbed my back a bit. She then asked "is this ok?"...I said "sure" not realizing that she meant "this is all we're doing". I then said "oh, wait a minute, I thought you were asking if the rubbing felt good...I thought we had agreed to do more". She sat up, made angry noises, took her gown off, laid back down and said..."ok, let's go" in a really pissed off "whatever you want a-hole" kind of way. I laid there for a minute running my fingers over her back while she was anticipating that I would "assert something else between her legs" but mini-me wasn't feelin' it (for good reason).

At this point, I let her know that I *really* don't mind if she doesn't want to do it. She said "...I told you I would so I'm honoring my word...I said yes because I didn't want you to feel rejected and then get weird with me in a couple of days". When she realized that I wasn't making any moves on her, she asked "what's wrong?". I calmly said..."first of all, I don't feel rejection anymore. Secondly, I'm not going to wait to get weird in a few days...I'm going to 'address it when I see it' and it won't be anything but a criticism of the behavior..not you (thank Gottman for that one). Third, having sex with you when you are this state of mind is just wrong. Fourth, I have been very happy and relaxed this week; I've been taking care of business, training for my race and "doing my thing" along with being a very attentive guy...and...". She interrupted me with "you've been great all week and really helpful and wonderful". I continued my sentence "I was looking at you today with your hair in those cute braids and I thought that it would be really nice to ML to you tonight." She melted and became very sweet to me. We talked a little bit more about the fact that she can say "no" or say "let's just cuddle", or "let's MB together", or "quiet union", or "manual" etc. I let her know that my request to ML is a bid for deeper intimacy. We both got really relaxed then.

I stroked her neck and at this point she was relaxed and nice, I was (more) relaxed and mini-me came to life and I she led me to do exactly what I had intended to do. We laid there until she fell asleep...no effort to O or anything...just "union". She was asleep in 10 minutes.


Analysis...

1. Her attempt to dishonor her own word was a violation of her integrity. What used to (before PM) drive me nuts was that she is extremely responsible and "true to her word" with everything except ML. It used to piss me off but after PM, I feel like I'm "in on the joke".

2. The aggressiveness was a means to "train me" back into my less differentiated self so she could avoid dealing with her own issues. This also explains another incident like this where she got aggressive despite having the session be on the calendar. Thanks to PM, I'm almost laughing at this which in itself is a sign of greater differentiation. She's now fearful because the ball is moving into her court. I'm thinking that things might get worse until she decides to address her issues. I hope the C can help us through this.

3. When we did "hook up", I wasn't trying to validate myself by making attempts to physically "please" her though I tried to be thoughtful...I knew that her goal was to go to sleep. I respected that by just "lingering" with occasional movement.

This whole episode, from the time I asked her to ML to the time we fell asleep was about an hour. I was able to "hold on to myself" the entire time. I made no attempts at self-validation or reflected senses of self.

Now I just desperately need everyone on this site to tell me how great my improvements are and what a great guy I am and how strong and brave I am...just kidding.

[Tim2point0]

Dave, sounds like a great beginning! Kudos on holding onto yourself!

On your analysis, I'm not sure about #1... it may not be *quite* that dramatic... I think I'd phrase #2 that she was "trying to hook you into previous responses so she'd be on familiar ground", and I think you're spot-on with #3. Great story. I love that you got her to melt...
BTW, that idea of yours of how to fall asleep is something I've never HEARD of before, much less thought about! Talk about self-control!