Session 7 - Parents influence how we love

Transcription of session 7 – Love and marriage (oppositional thoughts), research interview conducted by Miss Sleeping Beauty. Interviewee: Lime Green.

Sleeping Beauty (SB): “Hi Lime Green, please can we confirm that you are aware your session is being recorded for research purposes?”

Lime Green (LG): “Yes, Miss Beauty, we can.”

SB: “Thank-you. I trust you are well. Thanks so much for all the time you have given to this project. This is our last session, so please feel free to fill me in on anything that you feel you haven’t touched on yet.”

LG: “Sure. Shall I carry on with the free-thought style?”

SB: “Yes, that would be great.”

LG: “I must admit that my memory isn’t too good, so I may end up repeating things I have already said. Sorry if I do.”

SB: “That’s ok. Don’t worry about it. I have to sift through it all for the final research thesis anyway. I’ll only use the relevant points in summation. Straight transcript is a pain to read through, so feel free to let your words flow :-)”

LG: “As you wish. . . As I recall I went through all the rooms of the house the last few times. Hygiene, meals, sleeping patterns, television. . . Other stuff does sit on my mind though. Things like expectations. People, including myself, have these expectations of the way they want things to be done. I have high standards. I expect clean. I expect an adult human being to clean up after himself. I expect help to be offered when I’m battling. I expect my significant other to pay attention and remember what I say. The sad part is, as I say all of this, I can hear friends voices in the background whispering: “You expect too much Lime, you really do.”

But do I? Why is it a lot to expect the person who loves me to want to help me? Why shouldn’t an adult be able to put his own socks away or in the wash basket instead of leaving them on the floor? Why should I have to clean up after an adult? And as far as remembering what I say is concerned,  I read a book called “The Road Less Travelled” and in it the author says that when you love someone you remember, you actively pay attention and get involved in being part of their story, even if only by listening and remembering and following up to check on them. It isn’t something forced or a mission or something that you tell yourself you “have to do or else!” No, it’s a natural inclination towards that person to help them and uplift them physically, spiritually, emotionally and mentally. You desire nothing more than for the person you love dearly to become a better person, and ultimately be the best person they were created to be. You desire to give and help and be there, a part of their journey.

To say that the expectation of genuine love in your marriage is “asking too much”, literally floors me. What’s the point if I’m the only one practicing ‘love as a verb’ and taking care of him and trying to uplift and help him without his participation in anyway whatsoever? Where does he even get the reasoning that non-participation is acceptable? Maybe it’s because he’s a guy and his mother told him he’s perfect, or society has bred him to be a chauvinist, or the church has told him that women are inferior to him; or maybe he’s narcissistic and/or egotistical. Whatever it is, I don’t like the results, which in therefore leaves me alone, unloved and uncared for, which is what I’d be in that kind of relationship anyway.

Why would I voluntarily enter into a contract where I am not loved in practice, where my expectations are seen as too much, but his are not? The mere thought of it sends my soul into complete claustrophobic suffocation. Love gives, unconditionally, and I can do that. I have done that with my family already; but I’m not going to step into a voluntary relationship and legally say I’m going to give give give and it’s ok for him to take take take. I can’t do that. I won’t do that.

Giving and taking. That also leads onto finances. Both of Cinderella’s step-sisters, maybe due to karma, maybe due to the ignorance of women in our land, whatever it was, both of them got married and are now divorced from men to took them for a financial ride. They literally screwed them. One had Cinder’s sister sign surety for his business and loans and everything; then all of it went belly up and he left her for a rich woman in the East. He left her with debt she is going to have to pay off for at least the next ten years! While he is island hopping! Her other sister’s husband was retrenched and he didn’t tell her. For two years he went on taking out loans and going gambling in his depression, all the while acting like business was great when she asked: work was “fabulous” and he was getting promotions! Meanwhile he was shifting debt in bits and pieces, cashed in her retirement policy, cashed in their shares in Cinderella’s-ex’s successful design company. Then her sister gets home to debt collectors emptying her house of all appliances and whatever was of value to start paying off her husband’s lies. The trust was broken. The marriage was over. She had to sell the house, which had been her brother-in-law’s royal wedding gift to her, and use the funds to make sure she was out of debt. To top it off, in the divorce settlement her husband tried to claim alimony from her! Turning it around in court to say that it was his wife’s fault that he was depressed. Mind you, I don’t get on with her myself, neither does Cinderella, but that’s not the point, he made an open-eyed decision to marry her and love her and be there as a husband in that relationship. Bam. Overs.

These are only two of so many stories where men have financially ruined their wives and done it without remorse or even the slightest inkling of guilt or comprehension that messing someone around like that is just wrong. The problem? Both guys were great suitors, romantic gentlemen, excellent actors and unbelievably ‘made for their wives’ (ha ha, maybe they were, but that’s just my sick sense of humour, not my point here), yet after the wedding vows were taken truth rolled out like puss from an infected wound. I have trust issues of my own, never mind others, especially when it comes to giving my everything, and I know I would give it all, but for what? To be swindled out of what little I have? To be brought down to insecure, used, abused and spat out? My self-esteem would take years to heal and rebuild itself after something like that. So many of my friend’s husbands have been Jekyll and Hyde’s.

 I only want honesty and honesty just doesn’t seem to be a priority in the 21st century. If you’ve been retrenched, tell me. If you’ve fallen in love with your secretary and you don’t love me anymore, tell me. If you’re gay and need to come out the closet, tell me. We’ll make a plan in love and respect for one another, we’ll work through it so that we can both walk away without regret in the best way possible once we’ve dealt with the emotions, but do not be scared of me, do not let fear of failure, fear of your truth, fear of anything get in the way of just being honest with me. I can handle anything when I know the whole deal, when I know what’s going on at the heart of the matter and how to work it and make a plan so that some good will come out of the process somehow. There is always a somehow for good to happen, if you’re being open and honest, but so many of these guys let fear control them and not love, and that is not a marriage, that is selfish ego and unresolved insecurity.

My grandfather always said, “Get married and live off one income, that way you can face anything together.” I reckon he was right. So often it’s money that gets in the way of love. I think of Tim and Rapunzel and how he’s gone off chasing the fame and trying to get that inheritance from the Wicked Witch, and that’s all about money. The poetry he writes for her is incredible, that’s love. Money gets in the way of love. Fear of having enough money, providing and being what society expects a “man” to be, gets in the way of love where you are in it together, no matter what happens. With both of you earning, it should be pro-rata contribution I reckon. My bank account, your bank account and our joint living bank account. We both put 50% of our income into the joint account and that’s what we live off in union, then the 50% we keep is for our own personal needs and necessities, gifts and appreciations. Fair and square. Then you both sit and check the joint bank account each month and make sure that you are living within the means and not bowing to the Disneyland neighbours and all their wealth, or trying to match them with stuff.

 I’ve tried to have this conversation with guys before. Sorry for me, not a chance he is going to divulge his income, and most of them have decided I’m a Gold-digger. Seriously? Me? If I could take all the money in the world and burn it to go back to the barter and trade system, I would! Of course, many women are Gold-diggers and I’ll bet those guys have been burnt by them. Many men are insecure in that they aren’t happy with what they earn and are continually putting all their energy into “how to make the million”; it is such a waste of head space! Some admit to, or don’t, waiting for their inheritance to kick in, because then they will be sorted for life. I laugh at that, with the rate of inflation, without any tertiary education or business skills, do they really think a little inheritance that they are too under-skilled to manage is going to last? Whatever.

A pity most of them have already inherited more than enough from their parents. The older I get the more obvious it is that there is a lot of validity in this whole “Generational Curse” story. I think I already mentioned passing on bad habits, but on top of this there are also the character traits of a loveless marriage, like that is the norm. Couples who stay together in bitterness, purely because “What other option is there?” Fathers who are ungrateful and don’t show appreciation to their wives, and vice versa. Unhelpful spouses who expect to be waited on hand and foot. Sometimes some of the royals who come in here for their tucks and ‘treatments’ honestly have no idea on how to even lift their own fork. It’s a joke! Yet, they know no different. It’s their ‘norm’; their parents brought them up that way. The way parents deal with honesty and conflict; that gets passed down too. Anger management, ways of showing affection, or the lack of displays of affection, the openness of discussions about money, faith, religion, emotions and all the other intricacies of being a human being, all of those are initiated by our parents, or in some cases by the Nanny who is paid to be the parent. We’ve had sick and broken children come into this hospital where the Nanny has been far more of a mother and father than either parent knows how to be. It is the saddest and most de-motivating thing to watch. Your own child can’t have a conversation with you, you can’t hug your own child, you don’t know how to talk to your own child and that child grows up with the life-long knowledge that his/her parent preferred a stranger to look after them. The scope of damage to that self-esteem must be beyond soul-destroying. Still, can you blame the parents? The grandparents very possibly created the situation, created by the great-grandparents and so on. And it carries on getting exponentially worse from generation to generation. How can I marry someone who doesn’t want to hold his child? Not that I’m interested in the children thing, as the generational curse between my absent father and my “you haven’t done anything with your life” mother, that has been handed down to me, probably isn’t one that should ever be continued. It should stop with me.

Then there is the other side of the coin. The Mommys-Little-Soldier boys. The ones who will never grow up. The ones who are wanting an exact replica of their Mothers in all Oedipus’s grandeur and tragedy. Where the wife isn’t great because she doesn’t cook like his mother, clean like his mother, love him like his mother or make him feel like he’s the only one in the world, like his mother. Ugh. Such a relationship is not one that any woman should have to deal with, yet there are mothers out there who are creating this scenario and letting their self-importance as “His Mother” be more important than “His Wife”. Yes, there is a balance, yes, she is important and needs to be included, but in a healthy manner, not in a “my mother is better than you” manner. Rose Red’s mother-in-law is the worst; I swear my sister has the patience of a Saint! I would’ve killed her interfering-self by now. Cinderella’s sister’s ex-mother-in-law didn’t even knock before she entered their bedroom! Seriously? She had a cottage on the property and her son gave her a key to their house, and during an intimacy session, in walks mom and son was ok with it! I ask you!?!? No. It’s just a no.

I was actually chatting to a friend the other day who is now a divorcee and she was so exasperated that she said “Lime, I don’t even know what a healthy relationship looks like. I didn’t have one with my husband, my parents are also divorced and I have a terrible relationship with both of them. What does a healthy relationship look like?” I shook my head at her. Although I’m not divorced, I never got to see my parents together, or my half-sister’s parents for that matter, my sisters’ relationships do not feel healthy to me and I certainly don’t have a the best relationship with my parents either. It’s all duty and do as you’re told on my side. So I really couldn’t give her any advice. I just sat there listening, because I love her to bits and even though I don’t have an answer, that’s not going to change.”

SB: “So true. I love what you have said about love and honesty and that so many people don’t know what a healthy relationship even looks like. But we’ve run out of time again. I know your schedule is really busy, but if you can think of other things you want to share, then let me know. I’m still fairly flexible with the time I have left to gather information for my thesis. So please keep me posted. I’d love to keep hearing what you have to say.”

LG: “I’m sure I can make a plan Miss Beauty, we can always make a plan. I’ll be in touch. Have a great afternoon.”

SB: “Thanks Lime, you too.”