I walked through the grocery store feeling pretty down on myself. Sometimes I am not happy with how I handled a conflict with my husband. Today is one of those days. I hold myself to such a high standard. I expect that because I am a trained therapist that I need to do a stellar job handling conflicts with my husband, my children, and anyone else I may get upset with. I expect so much of myself. I beat myself up as I shopped.
I am practicing taking control of my thoughts. I heard myself being very critical of myself. I decided that it wasn’t helping me. It was just making me feel badly and nothing good could come of all my self criticism. I decided it was time to dust myself up, pick myself up, allow myself to be human, and to work towards doing better next time.
We ruminate on situations:
I should have done this.
I should have said this.
Why did I let that happen?
Why did I say that?
Why did I act like that?
Why wasn’t I calmer?
I can do better.
We go over things in our heads and we torture ourselves. The only way this type of processing helps is if we evaluate what went wrong and what we will do better next time. The next time you find yourself ruminating over something, I want you to ask yourself if that is helping the situation or just hurting yourself. You don’t need to punish yourself. Switch it from ruminating to evaluating. Evaluate what went wrong. Find the pieces that you could do differently next time and set out to practice doing better. The goal is to do better every day. Every day is a new day. Today I will brush it off and do better. Instead of ruminating I want us to evaluate. Let’s dive in and evaluate together.
People wear the word busy like a badge of honor. It’s like this buzz word. “I am soooo busy!” I am not trying to act like I am so important, but I do feel busy a lot of the time. I have three children, my husband, a job, pets, volunteer work, the house, errands, friends, family members, etc. keeping me busy most days. As I type this, I am also doing laundry while my dog stares at me to walk him.
When my husband asks me to help him with stuff at work, I always have good intentions. I always want to help him. When he gave me a project to do, I said yes without even hesitating. I didn’t think through the hours it would take me when I said yes. I love to say yes to people. Especially to my husband. I also don’t tend to think through how long things will take me.
I took on this project and began working on it. Like I always do, I plunged in and wanted to complete it all in one day. After hours and hours of work and some complaining, I still had hours to go. It was completely unrealistic to expect myself to do it in one day. I need to have more realistic expectations of myself in general. This is a theme in my life.
My husband didn’t like hearing me complain (I need to only complain in my head), so he grabbed the project from me and told me he was taking over. He didn’t know why he asked me to do this and didn’t like that he gave me so many hours of work.
My husband works so hard. He is such a hard worker who puts in very long days at work. As I worked away on a Sunday, the last thing I wanted to see him do was start working when he should be resting and regrouping for a busy week ahead. He runs multiple companies and is a very busy man. I didn’t want to add more to his plate. We both had really good intentions for each other as we began to fight.
Lesson number one:
Remember what the intentions are. Our delivery sucked, but we both had good intentions for each other. What is underneath the behavior?
Seth took the work away from me and refused to give it back. He stood in the hallway fighting with me and keeping it away from me. He began to work while standing and arguing with me and my anger grew and grew. We were both acting like two year olds having a tantrum. I am not impressed with how either of us handled this.
Lesson number two:
This is when we needed to be self aware. This is when we needed to say: “It is time for us both to take a time out from each other. Let’s go get space and come back together in 5-10 minutes to discuss calmly.”
Seth continued to keep the work from me, and I continued to get angrier. I told him I was going to be very angry if he didn’t give it back to me. After going back and forth many times and acting like children, Seth gave it back to me. I instantly went back to work as I felt like we had just wasted a lot of precious time arguing.
I sat there working away for hours and Seth came back to apologize to me. Seth can definitely act abrasive and like a brat and he always comes back to apologize. I would like him to skip being:
Abrasive
Bratty
Stubborn
And just act sweet and rational but I can’t expect either of us to be perfect.
I can act:
Stubborn
Bitchy
Bratty
Angry
And I don’t like myself when I do this. I don’t expect either of us to be perfect. One of the many reasons I fell in love with Seth is his desire to grow and do better. He is always looking to improve himself. We both are. We work to grow and do better together. Not only do we want to have a good relationship that gets even better in time, but we also want to be a good role model for our children.
What will we do differently next time:
I am going to tell you one of my very favorite words: pause! Next time we need to catch ourselves and pause in the moment. We are acting like brats: pause. We are acting too stubborn: pause. I am being bitchy: pause. Seth is being abrasive: pause. Pause and take a deep long breath. If we can do better after a pause – go for it. If we can’t, take a time out and think and calm down and then come back together.
I’m not proud of either of us and how we acted – but I know that we will learn form this and will try to do better next time.
The project is complete, and I saved Seth from hours of work that he didn’t need to add to his already huge load. I’m proud of myself for getting it done among the list of other things I need to get done.
I will pause.
I will take a deep breath.
I will have reassuring and compassionate self talk.
I will take time outs as I need to.
I will not expect perfection from either of us.
We will continue to laugh together, learn together and love one another,
Rebecca Greene, LCSW-R
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Whinypaluza Notes:
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If you are looking for a supportive community, come join the free Whinypaluza Mom Facebook group. I created this as I wanted us to have a place where we can talk about tips, strengths and challenges we are having. It is another step I took to help everyone to know that you are not alone. Come take part in my June birthday challenge! Jump in and join the group and bring a friend with you! I love to give away prizes. This group is private so please find me on Facebook at Whinypaluza or Rebecca Greene and message me to ask for an invite. I’m also on Instagram @becgreene5 and @whinypaluza_mom. I am also on Tik tok @whinypaluzamom.
The Whinypaluza Schedule:
Whinypaluza Wednesdays: My weekly blog comes out every Wednesday. I am always open to your topic requests. A new Vlog (video blog) also comes out every Wednesday night on Facebook and You Tube live at 9:00 PM Eastern time to discuss the blog. If you would rather listen to a podcast than watch a Vlog, you can wait for the following Wednesday and the Vlog is released on my Podcast.
Family Fridays: Every Friday morning a new Podcast is released. Most of my episodes on Fridays are me discussing parenting and marriage with experts on the topic. If you would rather watch the Podcast instead of listen, you can watch the Podcast instead of listen, you can watch it on You Tube. If you would like to be on my Podcast or know someone who would like to please message me on Facebook or Instagram or at whinypaluzamom@gmail.com
Special Note this week:
Due to a football game, we probably won’t go live until 10:00 PM on Wednesday night to discuss this. Tune in and join us. Please feel free to comment and join into the converstion.
