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Post by baza on Jul 26, 2017 22:47:03 GMT -5
As a refused spouse, you have probably been handing out free passes to your avoidant spouse like a demented bus conductor.
The refusive spouse insists on getting a new car just like the neighbours. You go along with it. You give them a pass.
The refusive spouse calls a halt to sex. You go along with it. You give them a pass.
The refusive spouse insists you go to their family for Xmas every year. You go along with it. You give them a pass.
The refusive spouse doesn't like your family / friends / associates, so you gradually drop them off. Another pass is handed out.
You hand out passes for all sorts of things. Who your friends are to be, where you live, how you raise your kids, what church you attend, etc. And, in the interests of “keeping the peace” or “not upsetting them” or “not creating a scene” you have given up enough free passes to have effectively trashed your autonomy.
Or perhaps you have given out all these free passes in the mistaken belief that at some point, your forebearance is going to pay off by your refusive spouse actually reciprocating and doing something that you’d like.
However, whatever your motives are and were, you have been handing them free pass after free pass.
Here’s the thing though.
There is no such thing as a free pass.
Someone pays for it.
And in these scenarios’s, that someone is *you*.
*You* pay.
You pay, in spades, with your frustration and unhappiness and your lack of autonomy.
You pay, by your disenfranchisement from the decision making processes in your deal.
There’s no free passes.
*You* pay for every last one you hand out.
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Post by allworkandnoplay on Jul 27, 2017 0:50:50 GMT -5
Spot on analysis, as usual. When you pay out so much in these passes you bankrupt your soul. It is a steep payment to "keep the peace, " as you say. Allow me an analogy, as one who continues to give out the free passes.
You are an emotional ATM - an ETM. You don't even have to be like the bank teller, who might actually strike up a conversation. No, you are just a computer, a robot going through the motions to give your partner what they want to avoid conflict. You get tired of trying to change the PIN, because she always has your number. You are stuck in one place and cannot move. But this really is not so terrible, right? After all, she goes on about her day and only drives up when she needs that pass, which fortunately has become less frequent over the years. You are fairly miserable, but the extremes in emotion and conflict are mostly in check so you take that as a win and think about how much worse it could be, and how much worse it used to be. But there is this strange sensation that you can't quite shake; this urge and longing that you can't explain and can't escape. You start to long for her to drive by and push your buttons. You want the contact, you yearn for it. You want to give her that pass just to have something positive near you. When you got together you wanted her to be happy, and this is one thing you can do that gives her some happiness in the marriage. Shouldn't it be enough to make someone else happy? But at the same time you want to recoil as she reaches for you. As her fingers near the keypad you wish you could pull away, run away, but you can't. You are frozen; planted in place; against a wall. So you take a deep breath and a sigh and give her the pass, again and again and again...
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