Looking backward...but only to move forward TWO

[sage]

Hi Karen! Nice to see you!

It's time for your essay quiz. How could you have reacted differently to h's reaction to the parking/location sitch? What exactly did you do? Could you have remained silent, or cracked a joke or something?

Oh, all I did was get irked in response (internally) and say something like "I've already said three times what the directions said. Could we try those now?"

No big deal, actually, and we rallied just fine.

The reason why I posted about it is because I very rarely feel reactive to h anymore (and he frankly gives me very little "bad stuff" to react to!) and I think I was getting a bit cavalier about how HARD it is to not be reactive when it's in your face...IOW, I think I was getting a bit too big for my britches thinking "yah, I can always be calm in the face of anger. Yah, I'm totally non-reactive and non-personalizing. Woohoo! I'm cool!" You know, stuff like that.

So, yes, I could have handled it differently -- starting off by not personalizing or interpreting his response to me (not thinking "why the heck is he MAD at ME?" "what's HIS problem?" etc) and I certainly could have sloughed it off. Next time!

Also, why exactly makes you so uncomfortable about your convo's w/him where you are trying to validate and support him? Are you afraid that you will seem insensitive like you have in the past? Or were you too busy to listen to him before, etc.?

I'm worried about falling into old patterns (not being validating because I was too busy putting my own thoughts out there, not listening fully, running roughshod over his emotions, etc). I also must admit that I still very frequently have thoughts of "what would ow have said/done/blah blah blah here?" -- kind of like I'm still holding myself up to the EA and ow and feeling like there must have been something WRONG with me for him to turn to her.

So, sometimes I just bump into a place in me that still needs to heal

I do have to say that h's positive feedback to me helps a great deal but I hate relying on that to feel positive about how I interact with him.

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Picked h up from the train. I think he was worried because he said he would be on the earlier one and wasn't so I had to wait 30 minutes for the next one. No bother to me, though, I kind of like the waiting time in the car -- I had a book to read (one of the "R" ones that I tend not to read in front of him since he has interpreted that act negatively in the past) and I've also been listening to a CD of short stories ("Runaway" by Alice Munro) so I had plenty to keep my busy. I let him know that.

The tempo of the evening felt weird. h was wired and tired ( ) from his first day back at school - it sounds like it was a full and draining one. We cooked dinner (VERY successful! Steamed broccoli with garlic and hot pepper flakes; potato and garlic ravioli with marinara sauce; french bread) and then went upstairs. h said that he was going to do homework but then decided not to. I read Karen's post and then settled in to watch some TV.

I have to admit that I felt irked/sad for much of the night. I just felt like tears were under the surface for much of it...I guess I was revisiting old hurts

We went to bed pretty early and got up an hour late! No gym this AM. We'll go tonight. I was still very much in self-protective mode this AM. h is probably confused not my intention at all but I'm just feeling a bit like some scab or other got ripped off a bit. Not sure why. I'll get over it.

Have a good day planned...might take a page out of Pam's book and actually do something that will be a challenge -- reaching out to some networking contacts I have re. non-profit work! Wish me luck!

Guess tonight will be going to the gym and maybe watching the Tivo'd "NYPD Blue" from last night!

Sage