Thursday nights were therapy nights. We did this every week or every other week for a few months. Trying to recall our routine, I think it must have been every other week, but then something tells me that we had weekly homework or that we would be asked “how was your week.” The frequency only matters as an indication of our brief, but intense dedication. We were dedicated. 7 pm was our session time. We’d usually walk the dog and grab a bite first, sometimes at the house, sometimes at the pub, sometimes at the Mexican restaurant. The pub, the restaurant, and the therapist’s office were all on the same block. It was kind of a one stop shop for all of your emotional needs.
I began this blog post on a Thursday. I wanted to make a declarative statement about Thursdays, and the only sentence I could come up with was Thursdays are for therapy. I liked the repeating “th” sounds. Of course, a statement like that can’t just hang out there in the open without some sort of observation, or follow-up, or explanation.
Sure, the pub was fun and the Mexican food was good, but the thing is, and this may sound weird, doing couples therapy for those few months was a truly rewarding experience. Cherish might be an overstatement because it was seldom easy, and often unpleasant, but I do look back on it with a type of fondness. I can remember being quiet and nervous on the walk to therapy. Sometimes, we were both quiet, as if we were saving it for the therapist. Afterwards, we would often embrace on the sidewalk just around the corner from the therapist’s office. As I reflect on the experience, I’m struck by the beauty of two people opening up and trying to do better. It’s so easy to walk through life without ever trying to understand the self or others beyond the superficial. Therapy, when done well and consistently, is a reflective and deeply curious process. It teaches you how to approach difficult subjects with understanding and grace. It teaches you how to open up and be a little fearless. In some respects, I’m proud of the effort we made. I admire any couple willing to do the hard work of really getting to know each other… any couple willing to learn how to work through conflict in healthy and productive ways.
Reflecting on my experience in therapy, I wish we had done more of it. The initial plan was to work through some of the recurring issues of competing needs/preferences and learning how to better communicate those things, and then get into some of the family of origin stuff. I think we had gotten to point where we felt we had made adequate progress and decided to stop. We never got to the family of origin conversations, which was probably a missed opportunity. That’s usually the heart of where the triggers are.
This week has been one of those weeks where various threads seem to be tying together into this notion of conflict and therapy. It wasn’t just a declarative statement about Thursdays that made me think of therapy. Earlier in the week, on Valentine’s Day, I went looking for a photo to share on Facebook. The photo was of a note my friend found here on the streets in State College. The note seemed to be notes to self for a man going through therapy and trying to rebuild or improve his relationship. It includes phrases like “waves of emotion are normal,” “reassuring = dismissiveness,” “change what the past means to us,” “stay with her in that moment,” “stay in place of curiosity & compassion,” and “That must be a really hard place. Help me understand this better.” When my friend first showed me the note I was struck by the sincerity of it, but also by the fact that these things had been written down – like a grocery list. For most of us, that type of deep listening doesn’t come naturally. We forget that we can probe with statements like, help me understand this better. When people we care about are struggling, we tend to jump into solutions mode (or worse, we tell them to get over it, or it will be fine). We want to be reassuring and supportive, which sometimes has the effect of seeming dismissive. This is where therapy helps.
I looked for and reread that note on Tuesday. On Wednesday morning I began listening to an On Being podcast which was an interview with Amanda Ripley. The conversation was about high conflict, what it is, and how to get out of it. This too had me thinking about my experience in couples therapy. An early lesson we learned, which seems obvious but is difficult to keep front of mind in times of conflict, was to put the issue in front of us and to keep the focus on the issue. In high conflict, we tend to put our focus on the “other” as opposed to the issue. High conflict often involves threats to identity. We resort to oversimplifications such as as “you always do this,” or “you never do that.” In high conflict, people often focus on the wrong issue and make mistakes that they later regret. We never used the phrase high conflict, but we had one or two issues that seemed intractable and seemed to be spurred more by historical triggers and bad interpretations of intent than anything else. As a way to short circuit some of those things, we were learning to use “I feel statements” as opposed to “you are” or “you always,” etc.
Interestingly, during the podcast, Ripley suggested that in scenarios where there is good conflict, people can sometimes walk away feeling euphoric… and I wonder if that’s where my “fondness” for the therapy sessions came from. Sue Johnson, a well-known couples therapist whose work I’ve referenced before has written about similar findings – mainly that by working through good conflict, couples can heal wounds and become more deeply attached.
I tend to think of myself as conflict averse, and for the most part I am… But what I’m realizing is that my aversion is to high conflict. I have little patience or tolerance for “drama.” I don’t like demonizing others or name calling. In high conflict we often end up working against our best intentions. We chase away the outcomes we desire. I don’t particularly like arguing, but I don’t mind conflict. I’ve also come to recognize that in conflict, voices tend to be raised (something I’m not always comfortable with), and intent makes all the difference. There seems to be two different reasons for why people raise their voice during conflict. I don’t know if they are mutually exclusive, but I suspect the intended effects are very different. In many cases, I think people raise their voice because they literally feel as though they are not being heard. This is a defensive and reactive stance, but is easily addressed through acknowledgment. The other instance seems to be in an attempt to belittle or intimidate, to control the tone, pace, and direction of the conflict. The first is good conflict, the second is high conflict. While I suspect both arise from a feeling of certainty in one’s position, the defensive posture seems to say, I respect you and want you to hear me, whereas the aggressive posture seems to say I have contempt for you and will shout you down. Two people can work through feelings of not being heard, but contempt is much harder to work with.
As I’ve contemplated my relationship with and to conflict, I find that I want to work through things as opposed to burying them and resenting them later. I suppose it’s why a lot of my dates had the tendency to get pretty deep pretty quickly. I write as a way of addressing conflict (often internal). I try to live openly and transparently as a way of reducing resentment. Anymore, I feel that life is short, so let’s work through the hard stuff which has a way of enriching the good stuff. However, working through interpersonal conflict requires a level of safety and security. It means not keeping a ledger, not using words as weapons and practicing grace and forgiveness over and over. I haven’t encountered many people with whom I felt comfortable enough to pursue healthy conflict or where I felt the relationship was worth working through conflict – let alone therapy. As I look to hit the road and maybe try again, I’m hoping I’ve developed a reasonable toolkit for addressing conflict and diffusing high conflict. And maybe Thursdays can be for thoughtfulness (and also Mexican food).