Game # 9: Getting you to change who YOU are

So next time- you change your approach. Now you’re on eggshells. You are kind, loving, humorous and “light” hearted. You say “Hey sweetie” or whatever pet name you may have for him. “I don’t mean to bother you and I know you have things going on, but I really would like to talk to you about some stuff I’m feeling/thinking, or something I heard from another- saw -with -my- own- two- eyes- today, so I was wondering if you have some time if you’d be willing to listen and to discuss it with me.”

This time, you believe, he certainly can’t say that you are being too angry, too uptight, too wound up, too “crazy”-he can’t accuse you of coming on too strong, being controlling of him, or out of emotional control, or accosting him in anyway. Surely he will now be willing to give you what you need and want-because now YOU’VE changed. You changed the things he complained about, YOU changed the “to do” list that he never really came right out and said that you needed to-it was just implied. Suggested. Hinted at, as a clue for Scooby Doo, that if maybe you DID change, perhaps he would change too. You’re not sure, because he never uses “I feel” statements. He doesn’t even say “You MAKE me like this”-for now, anyway-but the message was loud and clear-there is something deficient and wrong about you, that causes him to act the way he acts. You’ve begun to believe it.

You wonder what happened to all the accolades, the “special-ness” he had you feeling in the beginning that you and he were, the times of telling you that he’s “never felt this way before with anyone”, or that “You are the first women who….(did something great/made him feel great in some way.) You wonder what happened to the safety and security you once had that you mattered to this man, he cared about you and maybe hasn’t cared about anyone in a long time like “this”, and the sweetness and “niceness” that he quickly poured on you when you first met him. Now you feel that you must be perhaps doing something to tarnish his illusion of you, and if you just changed his complaints, he’d go back to how he was-or produce what you just intuitive “know” is there deep down, the “good” guy.

And yet once you’ve “changed”-once you’ve done a complete 180, you are torn. Deep down there is a part of you that is seething on the inside that you must pull teeth, “kiss his ass”, or have to change anything about you when he is doing YOU wrong, in order to know why, or to have your needs met-what you are rightfully entitled to know and have- and he still doesn’t. Change, that is. Give you what you need and want. On the flipside, the other part of you believes that what he is suggesting about you might really be the problem, so you begin to feel bad about yourself. It’s not him. As he is suggesting-it’s you.

Even with you changing your approach however-it will still be you that‘s the issue. You may still get the silent treatment. If he breaks it long enough to respond to you, now he will say you took him wrong, you are too sensitive, he was only joking-again, YOU aren’t getting HIM. If you don’t live with him this is easily accomplished by not returning your calls, answering your texts or emails, and you wonder why he doesn’t seem to care enough to want to address any issues between you at all. Why he doesn’t seem to see it-his role in this- or care about it. What you’d LIKE to do, is blow up his phone with texts, leave voicemails INSISTING that he face you and answer to you, but instead- you wait. That nagging other voice inside you is agreeing with him, that it might just be you.

When he finally does get around to responding to you or willing to communicate and address your grievances-usually days later-you are told “Sorry, I’ve been (fill in the blank.)" And typically, he has been doing something “busy” that would make you look horrible for being upset at his inattention. He’s been doing something for his kids/ex-wife/grandmother/mother/sister/brother/best friend/boss….he’s out running around doing for, giving good and taking care of everyone ELSE in the world BUT you. How could you possibly be angry with him for that? If you even dare to protest, he then makes you feel that there is something wrong with you for not understanding this. “Well you know that my kids/grandmother/mom/family/job etc has to come first. Maybe I am the fool to think you’d understand that.” Fool, indeed.