Learning to Trust Myself

[heatherg]

Has he ever said what he thinks an appropriate consequence might be? Hopefully it's not saying you're sorry until he thinks you've said it enough because S4 may have a beard by then.

No, he's never said. And if I ask what he needs from me he will say he doesn't know, just that he has definitely not gotten it yet. I don't say "I'm sorry" very often. I don't want it to lost it's meaning. I've said I'm sorry.....maybe I need some help on this. How many times do you have to say it? Do you just bring it up out of the blue and risk ruining a relatively good evening by dredging up these memories?
S4 with a beard, holy cow, now there's something to envision, lol.

But he wants everyone to think of him first and nobody's going to. Sucks for him. Not just for this trip but because his life is going to get more and more miserable until he figures out how to be happy letting other people do what they want sometimes.

I think this is a good observation. And when you throw into the mix that I haven't been very receptive to his tactics, I haven't given him much in the way of validation or consideration. I need to work on that. I find it really difficult to be loving and show love to someone that I don't feeling loving toward. But perhaps you have to fake it til you make it as has been suggested by others. What do you think?

So I think you can look at his affection this weekend more as a compromise than as trickery. He wants something from you so he tried to give you something in return. It's up to you whether the compromise is acceptable or not.

Yeah, I see what you are saying. In effect, I guess I've decided that compromise is not acceptable to me. Exchanges are expected in life and I think that's pretty normal. I've often heard the term "currencies" and I see where it has a very important place in life and in relationships. But to me, the trades need to be relatively similar in nature if you're going to "expect" anything in return. For instance, if you give back massages willingly, someday when you're back is sore and you ask for one from your partner, you should be within reason to expect she will give you one. If however, you give back massages and then someday expect a new motorcycle, well that's a different story. In the same way, H displaying affection toward me and creating a welcome environment for me in his apt does not warrant an exchange whereby I am expected to alter my interactions with my family. Not "like" exchanges. Am I whacked or does that make sense??

Now, if he says, "I'm not going and S4 is staying here with me" that would be obviously be an unacceptable form of manipulation.

See, to me, that would be outright control. Manipulation is creating or modifying circumstances surrounding a situation so as to create the outcome you want and can be used in a positive way such as in DBing. It's positive in these circumstances because we are giving in the hopes of receiving, we are hoping to change the dynamics in our lives by first changing ourselves. So it is manipulation to the extent that we are modifying some of the circumstances, i.e. our behaviors and reactions in order to create the outcome we want. But we don't take away the choices of the other person to respond to our changes or to make their own decisions. Depending on the extent of the "modifying" and "creating" that is involved, manipulation starts to swing the pendulum toward control. And when someone makes a statement similar to "this is the way things will be", well that is on the far right extreme of outright control because you greatly limit the other person's decision making capability and the latitude they have to give a response or reaction. Whoa, ok, did all that just come from me?????