5 Steps for Better Living?

2002-06-04 - 8:49 a.m.

First of all: If a certain someone would register with Diaryland I would be able to sign her very own guestbook obsessively instead of feeling compelled to reply to her in my own entries...which could get boring. We have email for such things. Not that I'm a great letter writer. Or punctual or anything.

Blah.

Second of all: I have lost my ability to fight. I have things I need to express to Pookie (ie, most of my rantings here) yet somehow, when it comes down to it, I end up feeling wrong and petty and stupid and inarticulate. That is not a way to be in a relationship. So, things I must say to Pookie:

One: Please let me get more than a soundbyte out before you explain your side of things, because my side is never simple enough to be explained in a soundbyte without eliminating context.

Two: I'm sorry that you are in a state of constant stress. I understand that your work term is hugely stressful, just as I understood that your school term was hugely stressful, just as I understood that your being a waiter was hugely stressful. You are making great progress in slaying your demons and confornting your weaknesses. Yes, your program is forcing you to take down your walls and barriers, and that can be a painful process. Unfortunately, that means that the 3 hours a day I have with you, or the all-too-short weekends, are also the times when you can't deal. You can't listen to me talk about politics, you can't listen to me talk about problems at work, you can't listen to me talk about problems with my online chat groups, you can't listen to me talk about my favourite tv shows or what I saw in the news. It makes you upset.

Unfortunately, that leaves me with very little to talk about. What did the cat do today? How was my ride home? Was work busy? The cat is a demon cat. The ride home was uneventful. Work is always either too slow or too busy.

I need to be able to talk with you about other things. I need to be angry at other people in your presence. I need to be able to live my whole spectrum of emotiuon with you. Because if I don't, when you ask me what is wrong there is no context. The task seems so monumental, because if you don't know that I'm upset about George Bush, online Roleplaying, somebody at work, and how lousy Buffy is this season then I have to explain all that to you before I can explain how I feel.

Three: You need to develop a thicker skin. Because I'm always afraid to say things that might hurt or upset you, until -I'm- hurt or upset, and by that point what I'm saying IS hurtful, and passive aggressive. If you can handle the little things, then maybe they won't get bigger. This goes for sex, too. If I'm not in the mood once, that does not mean that I will never be in the mood ever again. This is a continuing issue with us, and it's feast or famine at this point, and that's not good, either.

Four: I have issues. You aren't going to have me talk about them all at once and resolve them in one conversation. You must remember that while you are doing this IPS training, you have a full support group and at least one trained person there to guide you. You also are in an environment where you are challenged every day. I am not in such an environment, and I likely won't be in it for some time. You can not expect me to keep up, or to make the same progress in the same areas as you. If this is not acceptable, then at least try to put your frustration aside until you are finished the last 7 weeks of the program, and then we can begin to discuss where we both are in respect to development and maturity, etc, and if we are still an acceptable match. I think we will be, but you may have other ideas.

Five: And this is probably a personal attack, but saying I have passive aggressive tendancies is a case of the pot, the kettle, and the colour black. We can go on and on detailing each other's psychological failings and end up nowhere.

And that's all, for now. I can guarantee that I will lose all my ability to convey this tonight when I bring it up.

Cheers,

The Magus

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