Quote: In reality, she mimicked how her mother acted with her coaches as a child, complaining loudly at Isaiah as to why he was sitting out (instead of calmly talking to the coach after the game). MIL had ripped W as a child for not trying hard enough and not winning enough public acclaim for her. She just couldnt' stop herself tonight, carrying on loudly until I could hear S5 whimpering in the background.
Boy, Gabriel, this one hit close to home! My FIL is a bit of a workaholic who drove his kids to work extremely hard from an early age (no kidding - working construction all summer and Saturdays from the age of 10 or so in the family business). My H speaks with great bitterness about how he was working so hard while all the other kids in the neighborhood were playing and enjoying their vacations. But at home, he often reenacts his father's role - it drives him CRAZY if the kids just lounge around on a weekend day.
Now I understand that there's this terrible voice in his head, all the time, telling him "you're not working hard enough! You're not good enough!" - and, as hard as it can be for those of us who are near him and receive the fallout, what we get is only a small fraction of the abuse he heaps on himself.
I suspect your wife has a similar critical voice in her head.
How can this information help you? Well, in my case, I think I ASSumed my H knew I was proud of his accomplishments - but I didn't realize how much he needed me to say it OUT LOUD. Because I didn't realize that I needed to drown out that negative internal critic of his.
So try some words of affirmation on your W whenever you can sneak them in. And - you better be the one to go to the sporting events from here on in
