there are always a range of awkward but
legitimate things we want and need to
complain about in a relationship why do
they never call us during the day do
they truly have to spend quite so long
at work every evening why are we the
ones who have to initiate sex every time
the questions might be sound but there
are two ways we can guarantee that
expressing our grievances will end in
humiliation the first is to choose the
path of bitterness bitterness is rage
that's been muffled by shame we resort
to bitter attacks when we don't deep
down feel that we're entitled to protest
and when our complaints have to seep out
in a gaseous form from below a bedrock
of compliance oh I suppose it was
another oh so busy day at work again we
might say our lips quivering Oh with our
voice Reedy and I see we asked mockingly
Oh your phone must have been out of
batteries right the target of our rage
knows well enough that we are annoyed
but we have neither managed to impress
them with the justice of our complaint
nor move them with a rendition of our
dependence and vulnerability
we haven't stirred their conscience or
pulled their heartstrings we've just
made it very easy for them to think us a
pain a second equally disastrous path is
that of fury we say nothing for far too
long and then abruptly give way to
disproportionate and seemingly
unreasonable anger over one particular
ostensibly minor incident we deposit six
months worth of surreptitiously
accumulated fury and thereby make
ourselves an easy target for accusations
of insanity our response truly is out
sighs in relation to what is apparently
at stake it was only one missed call or
a dinner that went on for an unforeseen
half an hour but that of course is not
why we're so upset nevertheless the
accused has no difficulty in smiling
benignly reminding the invisible jury of
their fundamental decency and labeling
the process
Fusion unbalanced swept along by rage we
may also make the mistake of forgetting
to restrict ourselves to pointing out
that our partner did a bad thing
we overplay our hand and charge them
with that far heavier offense being a
bad person which gives them all the
encouragement they need to avoid the
task of introspection and to trust that
we are unhinged and mean when in truth
we're merely desperate and sad at the
root of both bitterness and fury lies a
feeling that it's not legitimate to ask
someone to love us properly to look
after our needs or to be kind we can't
complain well because we're ashamed of
ourselves and some we're convinced of
the essential rightness of humiliation
as ever the conviction will have a past
in the psychological history of the
person who is launching bitter Bob's or
hurling insults there is typically
something a great deal more poignant to
behold a child who was at one time made
to feel that their needs were irrelevant
that an angry father or a depressed
mother would not listen and that all
attempts to express themselves calmly
and logically would founder we cannot
complain properly if we do not first
believe that we have the right to do so
tragically our repeated failures to be
heard only confirm our initial
background thesis that we are
undeserving wretches to master the art
of successful complaint we need to trust
that we're not as our past would have us
believe
forever worth ignoring we are allowed to
feel unhappy to let our partner know as
much and to expect restitution and
understanding they probably didn't do it
on purpose anyway something it might be
hard for us to believe until we can
bring a degree of self-love to bear on
ourselves when we start to trust in our
right to be upset we can also take our
time prepare our case and level our
gripes with strategic intelligence
with the other person never to
understand or to be lastingly mean we
would also know full well that we had
the capacity to walk away we aren't in
relationships to suffer in silence or in
fury we may have come from unhappy
muzzled childhoods
but it's the prerogative of adulthood to
be able to complain we simply need to
give ourselves the space and compassion
to learn to do so successfully
which means with an absence of sarcasm
or rage
the marriage box available now in our
shop contains the secrets to a
successful long-term union to find out
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you