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07/03/22 - 3:36 p.m.

My girlfriend and I had an argument today. And my position was that she was way too upset, and she shouldn't just dump it on me -- all this uncontrolled and unfocused anger about somebody else.

And I was prepared to dig in and keep on "asserting a boundary," or whatever you want to call it. But somehow that all dissipated this afternoon. I still found myself wanting to make lunch for her, and after "asserting that boundary" so many times, I figured it was okay to hear her story.

And then she began by acknowledging and recognizing that I have a legitimate interest in keeping out of her "line of fire" when somebody's made her that angry. Somehow that let the air out of my balloon. How do you keep wagging your finger when someone's already conceded your point?

I feel a little bad that I pushed back as hard as I did - but she's not holding that against me. My only question now is: does that mean this is all done and over with? She talked everything over with a friend (and "got it out of her system....")

It's not that she's angry that bothered me; it's that she just seemed out-of-control angry yesterday, like she might lash out at anyone in the room. And we never talked out that.

Is this one of those rare moments where we don't need to?

I guess the big breakthrough was when I realized why she was so angry. It's not that she'd skipped lunch or just had a meltdown over some real-world snafu. In a way it was something smaller and bigger -- just something that somebody said, but something jaw-droppingly wrong, some wildly mis-timed criticism. Maybe I just had to laugh. Or maybe I realized it was that kind of mad she'd been feeling -- so, not an all-consuming anger at the unfairness of the world. Just that exasperation when a friend ticks you off.

And yeah, I did assert a boundary. She'd started an angry speech to me about how "It's my turn to talk about how angry I am..." And I totally cut her off. Mostly because I just won't put myself on the receiving end of that. (Her friend told her later I'd set "a healthy boundary.") So a professional counselor (her friend) is giving me a pass -- like it was actually an appropriate response.

And at the same time, I'm giving her a pass. Because I got away with re-asserting that boundary. (Multiple times.) And because I found out later she wasn't actually feeling that out-of-control anger I'd been worried about. Or maybe just because we both calmed down and were able to talk -- so what's there left to be leery of?

And when it's good -- which it is, nearly all of the time -- well, then it's really good. Heck even this wasn't so bad, other than me worrying about things that weren't actually happening, and her having to endure my boundary-setting a couple times before we got around to talking things out. Couples stuff -- but still just a minor, afternoon storm that came and went on what's still a beautiful lake.

Or something like that.

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