Passive Aggressive Husband

How to trust his behaviors?

alfaprima — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 18:49:49 +0000

Balancing trust with self-preservation is a very difficult balancing act….If you want to keep your trust on your husband’s intentions to treat you well and always defend your interests, then you can’t be second-guessing if he is doing passive aggression against you, right?

If you decide that is impossible to be for ever watchful, and then give him your best shot at helping you (“I need the car with the full tank of gas tomorrow early, so I can go to this job interview, could you take care of it?”) only to discover that he “forgot to do it,” where that leaves you?

 Frustrated? Yes…
 Scared? Even more!

The first time you discover you can’t count on him solve a need for your very important project, a crack appears in your perception of the trust existent in your relationship. This is a sad discovery: “I can’t trust him.”

This is not easily forgotten. Every time you need to ask him for something be it trivial or important, a nagging question appears in your mind: will he do it in time? Or will I only get a silly excuse for his absence?

This is not easily denied. Now you need double guarantees, to ask and ask again about the fulfillment of the promise, about his delivery of whatever he promised. You are stuck in a no win situation, where, if he is really angry at you, he will play you at his will. You will get lots of stories, little confidence in what he says.

How can you go on? Now you have a double burden: decide if you are going to share the inevitable tasks of married life, (and having to do them anyway later) or doing them before hand and be done with them, and avoid this endless conversation about his duties. Whatever you do, it gives you the lingerig feeling that this is not the life you dreamed of.

Is there a way out? Proceed with caution, and be ready to hear outrageous accusation about being too controlling…

Here are the steps:

Ask for help: “I need you to take the car to the mechanics this week, before Friday 6:00 PM”
Confirm: “I will ask you no later than Wednesday night,”
Say what will happen: “I need you to tell me if you have a problem with this taks. If I don’t deliver my work Friday evening, we will lose the client.”
Alert him: “If you have a problem with this issue, it’s better to share it with me now, so we can make other plans”
Close the deal: “I need to know that I can trust you with this project, very important for me.”
Finally: keep in mind that you need to have also a Plan B, for if he fails to deliver at the last minute.

If things go well, you can praise him and show your happiness. If there is a non-delivery, then you go to Plan B without any warning or other conversation. Be fast, act in a sure way and don’t leave any possibility for him to imagine that his non-delivery will stop you from doing what you need to do.

After several repetitions of this dance, perhaps you can begin again saying: “Now that we both know that certain tasks need to be done regardless what we would like to do, and can’t be stopped, I would like to know if I can trust you with this new task…..”

Nora Femenia is a well known coach, conflict solver and trainer, and CEO of Creative Conflict Resolutions, Inc. Visit her blog and signup free to be connected to her innovative conflict solutions, positive suggestions and life-changing coaching sessions, along with blog updates, news, and more! Go now to http://www.creativeconflicts.com.

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How do I detach from a passive aggressive husband?

alfaprima — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 00:34:38 +0000

In a very kind letter, Rosy said:

“In my own way to learn detachment, there were several moments I do remember as very important for me:

The first thing I decided to do: I completely stopped opening a conversation with him about the future of our relationship.
Then, I completely stopped touching him or getting near him in a loving way…and watched his reaction”

You probably are surprised, and asking: is this what I need to do?

YES, to reconnect with your own feelings, you need to detach. It doesn’t mean you don’t love him any more; it means you are opening your own space to get to know who are you and what do you feel…

If you perceive that he is ready to look like he will open up a conversation, (because you are strangely silent) saying something like “what do you think we could do…” just wait a bit more:

—Go and do the dishes, play with the cat, go to the bathroom, do something else, but do not accept his invitation to take over the conversation about “where do we go from here..”

—Focus your attention on watering the plants, feed the dog, take out the trash, but don’t engage.

—Instead, take the time to sit down, and explore your feelings…how do you feel? Angry? Exhausted? Hopeless? Own any feelings appearing inside you: there is only one way to recover yourself and is through owning your emotions.

—Cry, yell if you need to, but don’t let him see you, or communicate any of these feelings to him.

Stay in this contained situation until you feel that you own your feelings, and that you can manage them. You are not at his mercy, but you can control yourself.

This kind of detachment separates your own feelings from whatever he tries to make you feel; ends confusion and makes you the owner of your own power. Is a temporary emotional separation that allows you to recover the person you are and center in yourself. Without this centering, any “talk” with him will confuse you again, and make again feel that you are lost….Just take control of yourself, and center!

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How to enjoy Valentine’s Day!

alfaprima — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 20:23:32 +0000

Let me tell you something…the deep wish under all this Valentine’s Day claptrap is something we don’t dare to mention the rest of the year:

TO HAVE A SECURE BUT EXCITING LOVE RELATIONSHIP!

How do you combine the two things?

Secure is boring….exciting is dangerous….so what gives?

For the rest of us, ensconced in a healthy but boring routine, we pay a high price for security. The excitement of the novelty is gone, and we learn to appreciate routine as a safety blanket, only punctured here and there by the occasional fight. We can be secure like this the rest of the year…why is this invention of a Valentine’s Day coming to challenge our security?

Because we do remember! Before the fights, the cold shoulders and the dissapointments, there was excitement! When you fall in love, there are certain chemical changes in your brain that make all your vital perspectives shift into high gear, where the world is brightest and we are soaring in it. You feel the love in all your cells. Your pulse quickens, and your heart beats faster, and the feeling of anticipation of good things to comer is all over you.

Every time we produce a feeling or a thought, we can be sure that it is based on a chemical track in our brain. The love excitement felt by the chemicals in the brain is highly addictive! And we all need that burst of dopamine in the brain that makes us feel alive, excited, connected and successful…

Now you wonder where all this excitement is gone…some days it looks like everything is dull and gray, and the only hightened feeling is either boredom or fear. What can you do to feel better in Valentine’s Day?

Of course, the first suggestion should be to try to change the dynamics with your spouse, inviting him to do something different which can take both out of the dulling routine. This suggestion is only to be followed if there is a bit of reciprocal trust left.

You need to trust that your partner will not use this opportunity to damage you again. If you think that is safe, let’s talk about how you can get the Valentine feeling back.

You need to generate in your brain (and his) the dopamine-producing activity: both of you need to do something together that is completely new for both.

This new activity, being it visiting a new place, learning ballroom dancing, or joining a new group activity will provide the challenge to the brain to begin producing the results you expect.

Be sure that you are relaxed and confident that, if the attempt does not give you the results you want (re-connecting him with you) you’ll have a safe way to go back to your home. The best disposition is not to expect too much, but just do it for the sake of Valentine’s Day! And don’t forget to bring some chocolate!

Neil Warner

I’m the “relationship guru,” and my main focus is to increase the quality of love-based relationship experiences. In this ground-breaking guide I offer useful strategies on healing a difficult angry relationship with love and compassion. You don’t have to stay in an unhealthy relationship one more minute. Let us share our tools with you today.

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Passive Aggressive Wife: Do You Know Her?

alfaprima — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 19:29:49 +0000

From all the correspondence, postings and requests we receive, the overwhelming majority are desperate wives complaining about their husbands. We have initiated this blog, which reaches sometimes 500 hits a day, to help those wives find ways of preserving their marriages and diminish or control the relationship pain so as to get to a place of peace and understanding. And, in the extreme cases where the wife wants to leave the relationship, we also provide support for this process.

Guess what? Here and there, we receive a letter from a husband, asking: what about my situation? Do you have any advice for the victim of a passive aggressive wife? Or my loneliness and suffering have to be ignored?

So, here is your initial response. More will come, of course, but this is the first take on this issue…how can you recognize a PA wife?

The main challenge to think about this question comes from traditional female education about being passive and obedient. Girls are still socialized in this way in many parts of the world; and being subservient and self-denying is accepted and encouraged. How can you be any more obedient? Or…how do you show your anger by being obedient, if being obedient is showing off how a “good wife” you are?

Well, you can be too obedient….you can kill any initiative from your side which risks making your husband feel not valued or appreciated. He will not have anything to complain about, or at the same time, anything to rejoice about!

One of the favorite arenas is the sexual arena. If the wife always waits for him to take the iniciative, is she being complacent or saying that she is not really interested? This question will appear in the mind of the husband, and after some time, he will begin to feel under appreciated.

Again, how do you denounce this? How do you complain about “perfect wife behavior,” taken to the extremes?

The few husbands already telling are describing a passivity that leaves all initiatives on their shoulders, a blank acceptance that smothers all enthusiasm and the impossibility to comment on relational issues with her without having a tantrum.

Perhaps we should think about the modalities of passive aggression used by a wife to express her anger without words. Perhaps you have other examples to share?

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Learn to detach from passive aggression

norafem — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 06:25:53 +0000

We have been talking about the difficult skills of “detaching” from the emotional impact caused by the passive aggression.

Detaching is observing the behavior without showing a lot of emotion. If you do not react strongly, you do not give the passive aggressive person the emotional control, nor do you give them the opportunity to turn the tides and focus on your anger rather than on what the passive aggressive person has or has not done himself.

This personality type relies on his partner’s sense of self-doubt so that he can force the conversation into dealing with her suppossed problems instead of reaching a decision about improving his behavior.

Also, learning about this behavior provides the basic self confidence you need to confront the behavior… it helps with the detaching when you know what can happen next.

You can use the detaching also to re-direct the focus on yourself. Once you know what you are dealing with, and become more confident in your own capacity, they are less able to instill the doubt and make you the “bad person” and themselves the “injured” party…

Detaching is also ignoring as many of the games as you possibly can. You are going to be served with a variety of responses….it’s best to look at them as if you were at a theatre, and imagine that you are going to be surprised again and again….Remind yourself: “What next will he do?”

Whatever the reasons the passive aggressive person has to do what he does, like: searching for attention, deploying a sense of victimhood, following the inner need to exact revenge ( from a real or imagined slight from you). or just to show you that they do not have to do what you want them to do… and so be in the superior imaginary position, they want you to be aggravated by their resistance. If you show that it does not matter in such an important way, you are detaching.

If you do not react emotionally, then they do not get the reward they were seeking and this emptiness should eventually discourage their behavior.

Detaching means a consistent lack of emotional impact, regardless what they do. Is like you are blunting their ability to hurt you. This has to give you enough emotional freedom as to negotiate what you need from him from a more secure and powerful footing.

Finally: When you DO have to confront them, do it in a very calm manner. If you stay in control, they cannot only “hear” you better they realize that you are serious.

Also, make sure that you can and will follow through with whatever you say you will do…. They will call your bluff. Let them know that it isn’t personal… That it isn’t a “payback” but that you cannot tolerate the offending behavior and state the consequences if they do not stop doing exactly this kind of behavior.

Neil Warner

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You are invited to a teleseminar!

norafem — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 22:33:54 +0000

Did you ever wonder how to deal with your PA husband but had no one to turn for advice?

Or just wanted to get someone with an external perspective to advice you on how to approach a specific situation that has been troubling your mind for too long?

Or you wished to have someone from the inside, sharing with you her experiences?

If that is the case, then we have news for you! It happens on January 19!

In association with Ladybeams, the owner of the interesting blog named: http://padontstandforpaloalto.wordpress.com

we will have a FREE live teleseminar offering our best strategies to improve your life! Yes, you will have the opportunity to ask your questions, listen to the answers, type your comments and in general, share a supportive environment with other people in the same situation.

Moreover, we will talk about the launching of a new ebook, offer more tools to improve your life soon, and an important deal for all of you attending!

Once you register, you can have the new ebook with a 50% discount!

REGISTER HERE: http://passiveaggressivehusband.com/ask/

Waiting to hear your questions in the Teleseminar, so we can have a conversation about how to help you. Please, Register Now! THANKS.

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Tips to manage difficult husband’s behaviors

norafem — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 06:02:39 +0000

Amy Sutherland, an exotic animal trainer is offering her learnings training wild animals in captivity as transferable to manage your husband’s behavior.

Even when this suggestion can appear as preposterous, there is much wisdom in this approach. If you are really at your wit’s end, why not to try this?

The first step is to detach. You need to teach yourself to be detached, able to see any behavior from your husband in an impersonal way, and to stop taking his faults personally, (like avoid seeing his dirty clothes on the floor as a personal affront, or a symbol of how he doesn’t care enough about you).

The second step is you should reward behavior you like and completely ignore behavior you don’t. This means not only stop nagging, but learn to block from your perception the behavior you don’t want. You become more and more “blind” to that behavior…..and only see what you can appreciate.

If he is doing his usual passive aggressive routine, being silent and leaving you in a vacuum, don’t escalate into a full blown discussion. Don’t ask for a solution, don’t repeat your question, and don’t issue a deadline. Just go about your life, undisturbed.

In Amy’s words, “When a dolphin does something wrong, the trainer doesn’t respond in any way. He stands still for a few beats, careful not to look at the dolphin, and then returns to work. The idea is that any response, positive or negative, fuels a behavior. If a behavior provokes no response, it typically dies away.”

In the next opportunity your husband is raising his voice, trashing things around and looking upset, you can try to say nothing, and keep doing what you are doing.

It can take a lot of discipline to maintain your calm, but it helps to think that his mood is probably not related to you. There are several sources of his discomfort, and usually you are not his problem….and if he insists on telling you that you are the problem, is because he is nervous. If you don’t escalate the fight, and try to stay calm, he will calm down.

This strategy is paired with constant recognition. Whatever positive action, even if it is bringing the groceries from the car to the kitchen, needs thanks from you. If he is doing more, like doing grocery shopping alone, you can even give him a kiss.

All this strategy applies also the concept that whatever you focus on, it tends to take center stage: if you focus on a negative trait of your partner, like his tendency to be late for appointments and dates, then this trait will become prevalent and it will negate the perception of other positive traits that attracted you to him before.

Of course, it’s difficult to find aspects to praise when you are upset and dissapointed with your partner, but this can be a new way to frame the relationship and take you out of a dissapointing rut.

Here are some extra ideas that you can consider:

Every time you need to ask him about some changes needed, begin recollecting the good things done;
Try to find a positive thing to comment on daily;
Don’t you dare to mention his negative aspects without talking about how good the positive ones are, first.
If the results are awful, you can always praise his good intention;
Be very creative and find unexpected aspects to praise: a busy person that accomplishes everything could be praised for her constant smile, or his good disposition even along the busiest day;
Don’t be mean, don’t link praise with immediate critique: “you did well, but forgot this part.” In this case, the “but” will cancel the praise.

Apply this techniques for a while and you will see a change in the quality of your relationship, having more trust, and pleasure in the mutual company.

Neil Warner

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When my new life begins in 2010, I want…”

norafem — Sat, 19 Dec 2009 03:55:46 +0000

For the New Year, I know what I want;
It’s the same wish I always knew:

If having someone at my side:

He will not make the rules – tell me what I do, where I can go, decide by himself who spends the money and what it’s spent on.

If accepting someone’s love, this love will not be:

Conditioning approval and love to my doing exactly what he wants;
Always right while I’m presented as always wrong;
Forcing me to accept his sense of humor as right and my answers as “merely too sensitive.”
Controlling me with his disapproval, name-calling, demeaning putdowns, blame and guilt.
Blaming me if he is angry on his own life.

And if I’m so nice as to accept, value and respect him, I don’t want to be under the illusion that because I love him and I’m nice to him, he will change and control himself.

This will only confirm him that he can get away with the crime of controlling and abusing me. If I want to keep the peace, I will have to be strong, let him know of my limits and say STOP! when he is hurting our relationship and me….

When my new life begins in 2012, I will stop making excuses for his behavior and have the courage to say STOP! every time my personal integrity is pushed around.

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Healing a Passive Aggressive Marriage?

norafem — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 21:13:38 +0000

Is it possible for you to do something to help your passive aggressive husband? It takes courage to go beyond the frustration and anger to see him as a good person trapped in his own old fears…and ignore the thousand frustrations he makes you go through every day.

If you are not extremely angry with him, and have kept a healthy sense of curiosity (”Why in hell is he doing this to himself”?) perhaps you have discovered the pattern: the moments in which he goes back to being a scared child, hiding from commitment and adult love.

Your own brain is telling you: “when X happens, he does Z”…and this is the pattern you are looking for. Try doing this behavior once more, on purpose, and see if he goes in hiding automatically.

So, now you know something else: his pattern, or the sequence of grown up situations that force him to retreat.

The most difficult part is how to share this information with him in a casual, non accusatory way: can help him see the pattern, which is usually the toughest part.

If you can explain the pattern to him just when it is happening and not be too judgmental, or taking him too seriously, that would help. Something in the vein of: “Have you noticed that situations like (facing my whole family together at the holidays) make you cringe? It also happened last year, can you see that? …what can we do to improve this situation?

I’m following here Louis Clichot “The whole psychological point of being passive-aggressive is to spare oneself the messy implications of experiencing one’s anger. And it’s not easy getting a grown-up man to say he’s feeling like a child inside. Their feeling of repressed anger is so intense; it has never been dealt with in the family of origin and he could never bring it out, so it feels like a mountain of anger for him.”

If you show him that you are not accusing him, and that this behavior is something both of you can watch, evaluate and improve, it gives you a different point of view in this situation. It’s empowering for both the idea that passive aggressive behavior could be perceived and demolished with support and humor.

Neil Warner

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Verbal Abuse as a Way of Spouse Control

norafem — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 21:06:55 +0000

In a toxic relationship, the balance of power is manipulated by one side as to keep the control over the other person’s thoughts and behaviors.

In order to make their partner feel inadequate or weak, the controlling person will use verbally abusive tactics as shame, belittling, name-calling and sarcasm. In this way they grab the more powerful position, relegating the other person to a gradually weakened identity because they own sense of value is chipped away.

How do you recognize verbal abuse? There are so many open and covert ways of abusing another person, that here we will mention only a few.

The easier to pinpoint are cruel “pet names” and obscene name-callings, those same behaviors that make a very comic movie story based on the humiliation of another person.

We all have innate ways of perceiving abuse delivered to us… Besides the emotional reaction in your gut, or the constriction in your chest, or shortening of your breath, or having the constant headache…? Yes, those also can be indicators that you have been hit by some self-esteem demolishing projectile.

Where is this habit of using verbal abuse coming from? From our families of origin, of course!

Toxic families use verbal abuse as part of their communicational style. We all can remember those opportunities in which our humiliation provided fodder for our relatives’ endless fun. At the moment, few of them were realizing the lasting impression of those humiliation feelings in us, probably still with us after all those years.

Sarcasm can be harmless, part of healthy bantering while interacting with peers and it only gets to be damaging when it is the only way others refer to you…then your reputation will be permanently damaged. It is acceptable when it is mixed with positive comments, appreciation and recognition of your skills or good qualities.

Destructive sarcasm is delivered using a special voice tone, a particular body position, and probably causes damage because you are open to others’ input. If you are expecting a positive feedback, or even needing it to build your self-esteem, then you are vulnerable to other person’s sardonic comments. This person can use the opportunity to control you using only denigrating sarcastic comments.

Criticism is a special way of abuse: it has to be consistently negative, (never mentioning positive aspects) and leaving no door opening for future improvement (”you are always so obtuse!”) to cause real harm.

Surprisingly, there are lots of spouses nowadays who believe they are doing a good job providing only negative criticism to their loved ones. This is only cause for pain and resentment (”How can’t he see what I’m doing well?”)

Put-downs are a subtle way of control (“If I can describe you as less than me, therefore you are an inferior person”) in which you refer to the other person’s characteristics or actions in a demeaning way, either in front of them or talking about them with others.

Name-calling is a cruel game, where anybody can portray some harmless personal characteristics now described as stupid, ugly, not worthy, etc. It can be especially damaging if the name calling is done using body parts of the other as the target, like: stature, weight, sexual characteristics, etc.

If it easy to detect when people are controlling us by doing abusive behaviors.

It is truly frightening to consider a double whammy in the behavior: the toxic, controlling partner will use charm and seduction to maintain their grip, only when convenient to cheat the weaker party in believing that there is love together with criticism.

They will dish out just enough good words to make their weaker partner feel that there is something worth holding on to. This gives the victim the false hope that the relationship just might be worth saving, and so he/she postpones the moment of reckoning where they see that all respect is lost and leave.

Most of the victims of toxic relationships are stuck in them by the vague hope that recognition and respect can be produced any day soon. Needless to say, what remains is, sadly, only more verbal abuse and control.

Neil Warner

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