Her Side: Words for Pain and Healing

When we are being hurt with words by the one whom we love the most, it feels like we have two choices: stoically retreat and accept the pain being dished out, or fight and hurt back. I have tried both, and neither is satisfying.

With one, you become the punching bag for your partner. Later, you feel like you assumed sole responsibility for a situation with dual accountability. With the other, you distribute the verbal blows to the one you love the most. That’s because you’re hurting so much, and you don’t want to be the only one in pain.

Once painful words are “out there,” what do you do? As a woman, I want to heal, nurture, and save. I want to smooth away the tension and “fix” the situation. I want to make my husband feel better, regardless of how I feel. Unfortunately, in attempting to make him feel better in uncomfortable situations over the course of our marriage, two things have happened.

One, is that I have unknowingly allowed him to avoid processing and working through his own feelings, and two, I have discounted my own. Over time, this dynamic has led to an unhealthy relationship.

I am slowly learning to deflect my husband’s emotions back to him, thanks to the help of a good therapist. My own emotions deserve my attention, and I am responsible for processing what is really going on inside of me, not for figuring out what is going on inside of him. This process has changed the dynamic between us. Maybe it will help us both grow.

Perhaps there is a third, healthier option for those tense moments between partners, one that doesn’t inflict pain and suffering. An option in which we can apply what we’ve learned from our past mistakes and make the future more fulfilling. “His Side” wonders if our future actions can affect past experiences. I think it’s the other way around.

What makes the future so full of promise is the time travel forward where we can apply the lessons we’ve learned from our mistakes in the past. The process of getting there may include discomfort and self-reflection, but I’m ultimately okay with that because I believe that that is how we can learn to find words that build each other up rather than tear each other down.