crossing the line

Either you're right or you're in a relationsip
~Anonymous

Question:
Much of the literature advises “no contact” with a person who is abusive.  Sometimes I think I should do this with my husband.  Other times I’m not so sure.

I see a pattern in my life.  I've been the victim before.  Actually, I've been thevictim a lot! My boundaries have been violated by friends, family, colleagues... so I must be the common denominator.

My partner is working on himself. He is becoming more self-aware and the incidents of verbal abuse are getting fewer and farther between. He is in an anger management group and starting to look at his behaviour.

I don’t want to blame myself when my husband crosses the line (the literature calls this “blaming the victim”) but doesn’t every conflict have two sides?  Shouldn’t I be owning mine?

Answer:
It’s easy to lump “abusers” into one pile and “victims” into another, and say never the twain shall meet.  This might be the only recourse in a relationship where the abusive person is so defensive that there is only ever one side to every disagreement. Your boundary is not really being crossed because, in the abuser’s mind, there is no “you”, just an annoying voice that needs to be quashed, controlled or silenced. It is a no-win situation and no-contact may be the only option.

But sometimes a black-and-white solution like no-contact is not the only answer.  In fact, in the majority of conflicts, even when one partner becomes abusive, the dynamics are usually more nuanced.  Both sides may need to do some work on maintaining boundaries.

Like you, I have noticed that most victims are repeat defenders just as most abusers are repeat offenders.  Without blaming the victim, I wonder: are victims possibly missing cues that might forewarn them of violence?

I recently read that victims of physical violence tend to push back on their abusive partners. Maybe they are misreading or ignoring a potentially abusive situation and failing to back away before it escalates? This may be especially true in a relationship where there is a pursuer-distancer dynamic.

“Distancers” get easily overwhelmed by strong emotions.  They need downtime to self-regulate (hence the famous dictum to “breathe”, “take a time-out” or “count to ten”).  The “pursuing” partner, rather than back away when the distancer becomes unavailable, attempts to bridge the gap by getting physically closer or asking what is wrong and trying to fix the problem.  The distancer, threatened by the encroaching pursuer who seems to be ignoring their need for space, feels warranted in pulling further away or pushing back harder and begin at this point either to sulk and go silent, or raise their voice and yell at or insult their partner.

Distancers often feel it is unfair to be called out for “abusive” behaviour. They see their partner as having provoked them. While pursuers do not deserve to be blamed for their partner’s violence, they may need to do their work on containing their emotions rather than acting them out.  They may be just as impulsive as their abusers.

So, to answer your question, it is quite possible you both need to work on your side of the conflict, even if only one of you resorts to verbal or physical violence.  When you work on your dynamic together, you become allies rather than opponents and stand a much better chance of managing conflict before it gets to the point where someone crosses a line.

show some respect!

Respect yourself and others will respect you

~Confucius

Question:

How do I get others to respect me?

Answer :

I’m asked this question regularly; by parents in regards to their children, children in regards to their parents, by women in regards to men, and men in regards to women…

Everyone wants to know how to stop people from treating them in ways they don’t like.  They figure there must be something they can say or do to get them to change.

But they can’t.  Not anymore than posting the rules in my house can get anyone who enters my home to obey them.

I always ask people, “Who’s the only person you can control?”  And everyone always answers, “Myself” but then expects others to stop doing something they don't like when they ask them.

But it doesn’t work like that.  Even if you ask them politely, using your scary voice, or a megaphone.

So how do you get others to respect you?  By respecting yourself.

That means: if someone is treating you in ways you don’t like, then leave, end the conversation, hang up, go away, move into another room, whatever…  But don’t expect others to leave you alone, go away, shut up and do whatever you want them to.  Your boundaries are not their problem; they’re yours.   

Take care of your own boundaries and, if you don’t like how others are treating you, respect yourself and don't stick around.

after the affair

[Note to readers: all published exchanges are edited to remove any identifying information about the querent.]

Question: 
My wife and I separated because I had an affair.  Although I ended the affair as soon as she found out, my wife started seeing someone else as soon as we separated.

Now we both want to get back together.  I’m really happy about that, but my wife says she needs time to end her relationship with this new guy.  I want to give her the time she needs but the thing is: I can’t stop looking up her activities on Facebook, and I’m jealous, especially when I see her online at the same time he is, after she’s just told me she’s going to bed.  She isn’t.  She’s chatting with him!  We were making progress there for a while but now it seems to me like she has no real intention of stopping the relationship she has with this person.

I'm finding it really hard to deal with this situation and I wanted to get your opinion on how I can effectively set boundaries without it coming off as being inconsiderate or mean from my end.  

I feel as if I should just ask her what their status is and whether she has told him that she is strongly or seriously working things out between us.  Or maybe I should give her time to do it on her own without my mentioning it and seeming jealous. What do you think? 

Answer:
I can understand your distress!

The first thing I would advise you is: tell her how you feel.  By this I mean, not your observations or judgments of her, but your loving feelings for her, i.e. "I really care about you, I am not interested in any other woman and I want to be with you again".  Do not "confront" her about her stuff in a way that is harsh or judgmental.  She is probably scared about putting all her eggs in one basket with you again.

The second thing I would do is tell her that you cannot work on your relationship with her if she is seeing someone else, and that, if she is with you on going forward as a couple, you need to be exclusive and absolutely transparent with each other.  You will both have a lot of work to do to regain each other’s trust, and to do this you need to close the "exits” that you have used to escape intimacy.

Finally, and this may be the hardest thing for you to grasp (as it is for all of us when we find ourselves in situations beyond our control): setting boundaries is something you do on your own turf, not on hers.  The only person you can control is yourself.  You cannot tell her what to do or change her behavior, but you CAN change yours.  So, if it bothers you that she is on FB after having told you she is going to bed, then you should tell her that you cannot have a relationship based on deception and that you are withdrawing from the relationship until she ends it with the other guy.  You don’t need her to do anything, but you do need to act on your own sense of violated boundaries.  She will then have to decide if her relationship to you is important enough to change herself.

Hope that helps!

Informing versus Consulting

Most people with boundary issues have two different problems: one with drawing their own boundaries, and another with recognizing when their boundaries are being drawn for them.  

My last blog post addressed the first problem and talked about the importance of showing your boundaries rather than just stating them.  This post is about the second problem (which is actually just the flip-side of the first): how to know when someone is crossing your boundaries when drawing their own!

I came across a good example today:

A mother told me she was in the car with her son heading home for supper after picking him up from classes.  She stopped at a family friend’s along the way to collect a parcel and asked her son to go in and get it for her.  When the son came back to the car, he gave his mom the parcel and announced, “Here’s your bag; I’m staying for supper”.  His mother told him that she had already planned the meal and that he should have asked her first.  He said “Mom, you’re crossing the line.  I’m not a kid anymore and I don’t need your permission”, and he left.  Mom was disappointed and hurt but didn’t want to be a nag so she just drove away… 

What is wrong with this scenario?  

Well, the kid is certainly old enough to make his own supper plans; there’s nothing wrong with that.  He’s not breaking any rules.  Mom is old enough to make alternate supper plans; she's done it tons of times before.   So what’s the big deal?  

The deal is that Mom was informed, not consulted, about a decision that involved her.   Her son not only planned his evening, he planned hers as well.  She didn’t cross any line, he did. 

Nobody wants to be told they have to ask permission to live (especially not teenagers!), and I am not advocating that.  But when someone doesn’t check in with you about plans that directly affect you, it is more than thoughtless.  It’s a violation of your boundaries.  

You cannot tell someone what to do, but- if it involves you- ask to be consulted, not informed. 

boundaries

"Show me this mind of yours" 

~Bodhidharma

 A lot of people have boundary issues in their relationships.  

Parents with boundary issues usually don’t know how to deal with their children when they ignore or break house rules.  Friends with boundary issues usually don’t know how to get away from investing more of their time and energy than they had wanted into their friendships.  Lovers with boundary issues usually end up over-functioning and turning their partners into co-dependent under-functioners, an imbalance that they end up regretting and then, often, complaining about but cannot seem to change.

The problem is one of an inability to defend our boundaries, an inability that often gets projected outward onto someone (our child, friend or partner) whom we accuse of having violated us when it is we who have set ourselves up for the violation.  In essence, we have violated ourselves. 

I hear a lot of people say “Yeah, well, I TOLD him the rules”, or, “I TOLD her what I wanted”, or “I TOLD him to leave me alone”.  We TELL people our boundaries but the problem is it doesn’t DO a damn thing!  That is because we haven’t SHOWN them what they are.

Showing our boundaries is the only effective way of defending them.   We do this by shaping a situation to suit our own needs and by refusing to be a part a situation that is not what we had in mind.

How?  Well, definitely not by talking about it.  You have to translate speech into action, or non-action, as the situation requires.

For example:

The mother who tells her son to get his homework done before supper has to stop feeding him supper before the homework is done.  The man who finds himself waiting for a friend who (for the umpteenth time) is over thirty minutes late, has to leave.  The lover who has asked her boyfriend not to flirt with other women has to disengage from the relationship until he changes his ways.   The goal is not to withhold privileges, but to create the kind of situation and relationship you want to be a part of.

Stop defining your boundary.  Claim it.