Fear Is Real

While the tone in our house is greatly improved, sometimes I worry.  I worry that once these kids are gone, so too, will I be.  I am afraid that my anger, while ebbing, will not completely dissipate.  I am afraid one little thing will set me off and I will leave, never to look back.

Yesterday my daughter got home from school and went into the kitchen for a snack.  Usually my husband isn't home from work yet at this time.  I let my kids eat what they want.  They are young adults and know if they are hungry or not.  They know we eat dinner together every night and what time that happens.  They are the judge as to what they can handle after school to still have an appetite at dinner hour.

My daughter asked if she could have a breadstick.  My son didn't like what we were having for dinner Sunday night and asked if he could order himself Pizza Hut.  I was fine with that, as long as he paid.  He had some leftovers and he wasn't going to eat them so I told my daughter that was fine.  My husband went into the kitchen and she was heating up a breadstick and a small slice of pizza.  He accused her of lying...he didn't say those exact words but it was implied.  Then he told her that was a meal and since she was eating so much she could skip dinner.  My daughter was very mature and told him not to comment on what she eats.  She was calm and was not disrespectful at all.  He would not let it go.

I lost it.  Of every single thing he does, THIS makes me the most insane.  It makes me sick.  I have told him no less than 50 times why I can have these conversations with my daughter and he cannot.  A daughter is a father's jewel.  I could have been 300 lbs. as a child and my father would have thought I was the most beautiful perfect girl that ever graced this earth.  He told me he doesn't think she's "fat" but that she shouldn't eat all that.   Same thing.  To a young girl, hearing that from her dad, implies she should be ashamed.  I have been over and over this.

Of course, his first response, "so you can say these things and I can't."  My reply, "ABSOLUTELY!"  He mimics me.  He tries to deal with situations the way he thinks I would.  I have explained to him a million times, he does not see my whole day with my kids.  When he sees me snap or put my foot down he did not see the 10 times before that that I tried to be rational and reasonable.  He is not home all of the time.  I'm not going to recap every minute detail for him every night.  He just doesn't get it.  When I lose my temper, my kids don't bat an eyelash.  They know they have pushed and I am now letting them know the discourse is at an end.  Period.

My daughter had gone to her room, which is cavernous.  What we were talking about downstairs was not about to be heard by her but that is all he was concerned with, her hearing us.  I told him that of every thing he does to anger me (and the list is long) THIS is the top offense.  He kept saying I shouldn't be yelling so she could hear me.  He blamed me for making it worse and that this is where her issues were coming from.  Let me clarify.  I was NOT yelling.  I was trying so hard NOT to yell that I am pretty sure I actually strained some neck muscles exercising so much self-control.  He was deflecting.

I told him this.  I told him to stop trying to take the focus of the conversation off of his behavior.  We have had this conversation with the kids not even in the house.  I have calmly sat down and told him that he was leaving scars on our daughter;  that I was very afraid she would have issues with eating disorders down the road if he didn't desist.  I told him I had talked to our daughter about this (she broached the topic, not me) and it really bothered her when he clocked her eating.  She is 16 years old and a size 3,  she is really a size 1/2 but I buy 3's so she can have them a while.  He has no clue how tiny that is.  I have said it calmly.  I have said it in anger, in frustration, in desperation.  Still, the lights are on and nobody's home.

He has no depth.  He just doesn't get it.  I have a degree in psychology.  I have handled my life and my family like I would any client.  Everything I say and do is with an eye on the future, it is done with the knowledge that this is staying with my children.  It's not a moment or a word.  If I treat my kids like animals or possessions or something I "control" am I turning out the best human being into society?  My children have always been people to me.  Since they were tiny little babies, I have treated them the way I treat everyone in my life, with respect and dignity.  I am a mother not a prison warden.  They were never "something" to me, they were "someone."

He doesn't realize how much his words affect us.  He doesn't understand that this is all imprinting little subliminal messages into our psyches.  Even if words are not said with intent, the implication is there.  Even if they are said carelessly in anger or desperation, the damage is there.  I do not speak perfectly.  I say lots of things I regret.  I ALWAYS go to my children or husband afterward and apologize.  I explain that my words were hurtful and I regret them.  I tell them I cannot take them back and I didn't mean them but the only way I can prove that is to try harder next time.  I am human.  I make mistakes.   We all do.  I try never to repeat the same offense twice.  How sorry am I if I keep doing the same things over and over?

My frustration with my husband is that I've told him how this is wrong.  I have explained calmly and succintly why he cannot do it.  How unevolved do you have to be to keep repeating things over and over again?  He accused me of "yelling" yesterday.  I told him either I speak to him in that tone or drive a knife through his skull, which was really what I was wanting to do.  His choice.  Once he picked his jaw up and put his eyes back into his head, he went with the yelling.  Maybe there is some hope for him yet.