Intimacy & Desire: Awaken the Passion in Your Relationship (41 page)

Sue exploded at me. “You’re not listening to me!”

“I’m
listening
to you. I’m just not
agreeing
with you. And I’m not reacting to you. Your truth doesn’t become more correct when you yell, no matter how deeply you feel it.”

“You’re invalidating my feelings and making me feel insecure.”

“I’m not here to validate your feelings. I’m here to help you cope with your feelings because they’re running your life and the lives of the people around you.”

“I’m not sure I feel secure enough to work with you.”

“I agree. You don’t feel secure with me. But if we wait until you feel secure with me, I won’t be much help to you. If I only operate within your tolerance level, you won’t develop more tolerance. And if I don’t bring things up that make you nervous, I’m of no use to you.”

“How can I work with you if you make me nervous rather than secure?”

“What use is there in working with me if I do what you want?”

“Well, I don’t feel secure with you!”

“Well, I don’t feel secure with you either.” My response took Sue completely by surprise.

“Are you saying you’re afraid of me?”

I paused for a moment to break cadence, and eased my voice. “I’m afraid
for
you. You’re not an easy person to confront. I figure there’s a reasonable likelihood you’ll storm out of here and never come back. If I do my job, there’s a good chance you’re going to fire me.”

Sue’s response was instantaneous. “I’m not going to fire you. You’re the only one who’s not afraid of me.” Sue switched tracks so quickly it was hard to keep up with her. I noted her ability to do that.

“Oh … Well then, that makes me feel more secure.”

“Why does that make you feel more secure?”

“That makes me less afraid for you and less afraid of being out of a job.”

Sue laughed. “You’re not afraid of being out of job. Your practice is full.” She pulled herself together as quickly as she fell apart.

I smiled. “That’s right. But it makes me less afraid for you when I watch you pull yourself together when you’re losing your grip on yourself. Why are you afraid that I’m afraid of you?”

“I bully people and yell a lot. I could make you feel inadequate.” Sue’s acknowledgement was breathtaking.

“You see yourself do that?”

“In my better moments.” This was indeed one of Sue’s better moments. She was taking a leap of faith.

“Well, if this is one of your better moments, you’re welcome to lose it whenever you like, because it’s a pleasure to see you when you pull yourself together.”

What made Sue settle down? I didn’t let Sue run over me or get around me. I didn’t tell her what to do, but I also didn’t turn away from seeing what she did (and didn’t) do. At first she was furious with me. I managed to stay with her and not react. Moreover, I offered her a collaborative alliance, which she never expected. I talked to Sue straight, and her functioning rose.

Until now it had been clear Sue’s functioning could deteriorate rapidly, and she was often at her worst. But Sue had lots of strengths. There was something basically decent about her. This was more important than all of her limitations, fears, and weaknesses.

When Sue began to raise her Four Points of Balance, her talents and creativity could finally blossom. She was remarkably creative, inventive, and smart. When her overall functioning was poor, she was abrasive and demanding. When I didn’t blow her off, and actually listened to her and talked to her—more closely and directly than she was comfortable with—Sue’s functioning came right up. She felt, looked, and functioned better for several days.

When I helped Sue pull her functioning up to a higher level, she handled things quite well. But she couldn’t maintain this on her own, and fairly quickly her functioning began to diminish. Her self-doubts and feelings of emptiness returned, and she was less able to quiet and calm her anxieties.

Two weeks later Sue and Joe were locked into familiar patterns. Only now Sue was more despondent about it than before. She’d had a glimpse of how life could be—how
she
could be—and now it was gone. She was winding herself up and drowning in despair. Minutes into our next session, Sue was raging.

“Everything is falling apart. This therapy isn’t helping. I thought I was getting better. You’re not helping me.”

Backing away from Sue now would create a catastrophe. “Were you better?”

“This therapy isn’t helping. I’m screaming at my children.”

“Were you better?”

“I can’t do this!”

“Were you better?”

“You’re not helping me!”

“Were you better?”

Sue started sobbing. “Yes. I was better.”

After a minute I spoke softly, “You’ve had a glimpse of who you can be. You couldn’t have done that if you didn’t have the raw ability. You just can’t maintain this level of functioning by yourself—not yet. But if you pull yourself together and stop despairing every time you stumble, you’ll get better at maintaining it.”

Sue did exactly what I thought she would do. Only I didn’t think she would do it so quickly. Sue’s functioning improved on the spot. She still had snot running out of her nose, and her cheeks were wet. But she wasn’t berating me as she spoke. She talked to me as if we had an alliance.

“I saw myself.”

“What did you see?”

“I saw my mother. I watched myself manipulate my daughter into doing something I wanted her to do. When she resisted I started to yell at her. I frightened her, and she would have done anything to make me look less scary!” Sue sobbed, “I am a
monster
.”

I gave Sue a minute to grieve. “At the risk of invalidating your feelings, that’s not what I see. I see someone who has pulled herself together from a deep emotional crash in record time. Someone who has never pulled herself together this quickly in her life. I assume you were amazed at the improvement in your own functioning. You miss it. That’s why you’re crashing now.”

Sue looked at me through tears and chuckled as she blew her nose. “You know, you really piss me off when you see me so clearly.”

Our interaction gave Sue something to hold on to when she finally confronted herself. Because how you go through gridlock determines how you get into it, Sue was in a good position. Joe had something going
for him, too. He witnessed our interaction and saw her response. He saw her improvement with his own eyes. He applied to himself all the things that helped Sue.

Joe was adamant he did not want to get divorced. Instead of blocking his memories, Joe reviewed vignettes of his childhood, his parents’ remarriage and two divorces. He remembered crying himself to sleep because his world was crashing around him. He watched his mother and father become disappointing failures as parents and as people. Joe became determined his children would not think of him the same way.

Joe decided he would do absolutely everything he could to keep his marriage together, short of violating his integrity. He had to stop selling himself out to his anxiety—or Sue’s anxieties for that matter.

What were Sue and Joe thinking as they went through the crucible?

Sue was thinking,
Joe will never take care of me again. He’ll have higher expectations for me. I won’t be able to get away with as much. He’ll expect me to handle my own anxiety. He won’t give in to me. I’m afraid. I’m scared
.

Joe was thinking,
If I don’t give in to Sue, she’s going to turn up the heat until I fold. Maybe I should just give in now. Once I start this and I piss her off, there’s no backing out. If I do Sue will eat me alive
.

This led to a conversation one night in bed. Joe said to Sue, “I will confront myself any way you ask. I will talk to you about anything and everything until we are blue in the face. I will do whatever I can do to keep our marriage together. But if you leave now, we’re through. I will not do to my children what was done to me. So there will be no trial separations. I’m not saying this to threaten you or give you an ultimatum. And I don’t want to do something stupid and make you angry. I want to say this so you can hear I’m not threatening, but dead serious: Either you stay and we work this out, or you can leave and we are through.”

Sue said, “Do you love me?”

Joe thought for a moment and then proceeded slowly. “I’m … I’m not going to talk to you about that now.”

Sue started to escalate. “What do you mean, you’re not going to talk about whether you love me?!”

Joe felt the blood drain from his face. His stomach sank and his heart
raced. His mouth went dry and his jaw trembled. The muscles in his face twitched as he fought to keep himself under control. With as much evenness as he could muster, Joe spoke slowly. “I’m not going to talk to you about whether I love you because that’s not what we’re discussing. We’re discussing whether or not you’re going to leave. Everything I could say to you, I have said. Look for yourself and decide whether I love you.”

Sue felt a combination of anger, surprise, and respect. She didn’t say anything, but the immediate de-escalation was striking. The tongue-lashing Joe expected didn’t happen. A wave of compassion for Sue swept over Joe. He said, “If you would figure out how to love yourself, we would all be much happier.”

Joe looked down and his hands were shaking. He held them out toward Sue. “This is the strangest damn thing. I’m shaking, my heart is pounding, and I’m terrified. I’m afraid we’ll divorce, and you’ll beat the crap out of me. And in this same instant, I have this profound sense I’m doing the right thing, and I’ve never felt more whole in my life!”

Sue was also having a unique experience. She saw Joe doing the most forceful thing she had ever seen him do. He had never stood up to her so boldly. But Joe wasn’t talking to her like an adversary. He was relating to her like a partner going through a shared experience linking their fates. They were having a profound moment of meeting.

Sue knew her usual tendency was to trump any stand Joe took with a more forceful stand of her own. She could see herself flinging at Joe,
Well, we’ll see about that! I’m leaving!!
She could imagine taking the air out of Joe’s newfound sense of wholeness, and enjoying it. But Joe made it clear there was no turning back. Sue knew Joe pretty well, and her mind-mapping said he wasn’t kidding.

Besides, their interaction made Sue less inclined to escalate. It was impressive watching Joe master himself. Sue was shocked and impressed.

Sue said, “Okay.”

“Okay what?”

“Okay, we don’t have to talk about whether you love me.”

“Oh.”

Things were quiet for a minute. Sue began to weep softly. “I don’t want to leave. I get so desperate. I don’t know what else to do.”

“I don’t want you to leave either. But I don’t want you threatening to leave every time you don’t know what else to do. I don’t want to live with you having one foot out the door. I’m not living with that again, and neither will my children.”

“I think that’s fair.”

Joe was surprised Sue didn’t fight this to death. The tension went out of the air. It was like Sue finally stopped standing on tip-toes and put her heels on the ground. She was much more relaxed when she spoke. “I’ll think about what you said about it being better for everyone if I could learn to love myself.” Sue smiled at Joe, and he burst out laughing.

Sue said, “Why are you laughing?” She was starting to laugh, too.

Joe said, “I can’t believe how nervous I am! I’m so relieved this isn’t a disaster.”

“I am too.” Sue reached out to take Joe’s hand and smiled at him. She was crying again.

“I feel incredibly alive!” Joe was ecstatic.

“I do too.”

For a moment Joe thought about initiating sex. This was a terrific moment, and he suspected Sue would say yes. But he decided against it. Nothing was more important than sending Sue a clear message: “
This is no longer business as usual.”
Besides, he was already feeling better than he usually did.

In the weeks that followed, there were noticeable changes between Joe and Sue and how each functioned individually. They were visibly more relaxed as they sat in my office. Sue was more solid and unequivocal as she spoke. “I can see the difference. We’re still fighting, but not as much, and things don’t flare as high. That’s a huge difference. The big thing is I haven’t talked about leaving one time. Neither has Joe. We’re kinder to each other. I like the new Joe a lot.”

“I like the new me, too,” Joe chimed in.

Sue looked softer than I had seen her before. “We made love four times in two weeks, which is a record for us. I think we surprised ourselves.”
Sue blushed. “We had rear-entry intercourse. I liked it. I need more practice, but I think I could relax in that position.”

Sue exposed her sexuality to me in a way she had not before. This rapid, dramatic improvement in Sue’s functioning testified to her resources. Many poorly functioning people are capable of similar improvement once they finally apply their Four Points of Balance. They create a stable foundation upon which their other abilities and talents can build.

I admired Sue and Joe for a moment and gave thanks that I
could
admire them. It’s wonderful to watch people riddled with fear and anxiety finally make an abrupt about-face and function differently.

IDEAS TO PONDER