1309 Neglected Control

As I mentioned in an earlier essay, psychologists have determined what goes wrong with relationships. It turns out there are only two things that all arguments boil down to: One or other of the partners feels neglected or one or other of the partners feels controlled.
Sounds like they have it all figured out, right? Don’t control your spouse or lover, or don’t make him or her feel neglected.
Wrong.
Try as you might, you still have no control over how your partner feels. They’ll feel however they damn well please, and you aren’t going to control or neglect them out of it.
You could give your girlfriend flowers on a day when she really doesn’t want to be reminded of being in a couple, she wants to be her. Giving her flowers makes her feel like you’re trying to push her more deeply into the responsibilities of a relationship.
She feels controlled.
Here you were trying to make her happy and what she feels is you’re trying to make her do something, anything... So, feeling neglected yourself, you take flowers off the list of things to do. A couple of weeks from now, she feels neglected. Why don’t you ever give her flowers?
The whole situation could be reversed. It could be her that’s dusting your apartment or cleaning up your empty beer bottles. Bringing over doilies to spruce up the arms of your Barcolounger. She doesn’t want you to feel neglected, you feel controlled.
The point is, how a person feels often has little to do with what the other person does. Some relationships just leave you feeling vulnerable as a raw wound.
And whether the air on it is hot or cold, it’s still sensitive.
Better to have a healthy scar.
Get over it. Take control of your own feelings. So what if your heart looks like the mouth of a catch-and-release fish. You’re still swimming aren’t you?
America, ya gotta love it.