Healing: Hearing with Love and Not Fear.
I am constantly amazed that my wife puts up with me. Over the last 23 years, she’s had to deal with so much because of my weaknesses, flaws and idiosyncrasies. There isn’t a day that goes by that in some way I don’t make life harder for her.
It’s never been intentional, and I think she realizes that, but just because something isn’t malicious doesn’t necessarily mean that it isn’t malignant.
And there are days when I think it gets really old.
Maybe it’s my crazy diet, which makes it hard for her to show love through service (if my wife loves you, she cooks/bakes for you), or maybe it’s my incredibly powerful A.D.D. that makes me a nightmare to keep on track in the office, and forces her to have to remind me incessantly about getting things done.
Or maybe it’s the way that I get locked into an idea, where my A.D.D. reverses itself into a pathological hyperfocus that makes me blind to things that I really need to see.
But there’s something far worse about living with me, and I know it drives her crazy.
Because of the fears in my heart about my self-worth, and struggling to understand every day why she would want to be with me, I overanalyze everything.
If that doesn’t sound too bad to you, just imagine that every word, every action and every reaction that you express is being evaluated and slotted into a profile that allows me to understand you probably deeper than you understand yourself.
Sound ok so far – because if it does, I can assure you that it isn’t.
Of course, my ability to read people can really help, even in our day to day interactions, but there are times when my fears drown out the things that she is really trying to say, and that can inhibit closeness in our relationship in a way that is difficult to live with.
In every romantic relationship, every pairing of two souls trying to make it through this crazy universe, there is an element of listening to each other.
It could be about your day, or your frustrations, or your fears, or just the usual struggles we all have of trying to find our way in a world that makes little to no sense.
And for all of my considerable skills, I often struggle to listen to her without hearing the sound of my fears.
Because when she expresses her frustrations, I hear that I am not making her happy. When she is tired, I hear that she is working too hard, because I am not successful enough.
When she stresses about money, I hear that I have not yet provided for my family in the way that I feel I should. When she is weary from the everyday insanity of life, I hear that I have not yet done enough to look after her.
And because of the way I read every gesture, she never has the chance to be herself without knowing how it will resonate within me.
Which has to be exhausting.
So I’m trying to focus more on how I can be a better husband for her, in spite of my fears, my failings and my shortcomings. I try to listen to her, and not react with my usual distancing and quietness.
I try to be there when she needs to vent, and to ask her the questions that will give her the space to talk freely, openly and honestly about the emotions deep in her heart, so that she might be heard over the sound of my fears.
And heard without someone trying to make suggestions about what could be done to change things.
Which is the ultimate respect I can give her, allowing her to be and to express herself without judgment, without analysis, and without reaction.
Because when I focus on loving her more than on fearing for myself…. Well, I think that is the way she deserves to be treated.
So I’m working on it, even though I fail many, many times.
— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings