Too funny. Makes you wonder where all those power players get their training. This world really is upside down when the rectum gets to the top.

Saw therapist today. Talked about the facts and emotions behind the RID feelings. Came to an interesting issue, sorta new for me. Namely,

sometimes a couple butts up against an issue that's just too too painful for one partner to discuss. One raises it; the other somehow shuts down; the first one eventually retreats.

Question to me: what happens then. My tentative answer: when I try to push too deep for her comfort, I back off... in what I'd call the chessed of not imposing pain on her (or the marriage).

That might be a chessed to her, but how does tha leave ME feeling? And... new info here: I hadn't realized how abandoned and alone and unloved/-able I feel when those overtures are rejected.

And gee, when I'm feeling that isolated etc, what's been my drug of choice for DECADES? Yup. Act out... to counter the feeling of being all alone when my wife won't join me in the deep deep dark discussions. I think I'm doing her a chessed by not overstepping her comfort zone, but that may not be true. It IS true, though, that I retreat into various acting out ways to medicate feeling alone, abandoned, etc. Wow.

Bingo: a trigger I hadn't even realized. Triggered by a rejected attempt to get "too deep" about topics of mutual interest.

As to the question of how to fix the feeling of rejection, or fix our inability to discuss it, or even just fix my wanting a fix of se*uality to feel intimately connected again... that's my new topic for upcoming compulsive posting .

Ouch... but if I'm gonna share the intimate thoughts I've posted these past few months, there's no reason to stop now. Any opening words of chizzuk or insight as I jump in?

Briut, you're moving in the right direction. You've identifed an issue that pains you and you can now seek to address it in a healthy way.

I understand not always being able to talk to your wife, for whatever reason. I am of the opinion that it is sometimes better not to burden a person (unless there is no other way). Some things, whose importance you may see as gigantic, are of only casual importance to others. Sometimes, even if you did share, the person may not be equipped for the type of listening and understanding we need. We aren't perfect. And we are growing.

So then, who do you talk to? Well, have you considered the Hisbodedus practiced by Breslov chassidim? It is a way of holding private, informal conversation with G-d. It also serves as a nightly heshbon. This is very therapeutic, very unwinding. And it satisfies your inner need: to be heard and understood (among so many other good things). It is simple. Even an am haaretz can do it. Anyone. Just take some time, an hour each evening, and talk to G-d. Just talk. Let it all out, and know that He is there, listening to every word. If you cannot do an hour, do 30 minutes. Even if you run out of things to say, be there. This will help you and your home.

Look through the Internet for more info on hisbodedus as practiced by Breslov. It's worth it. But really, it is as simple as explained above. There is also a book called, Jewish Meditation, by R' Aryeh Kaplan. It touches on this method, among other things. But just keep it simple. I recommend hisbodedus.

Briut, hatzlocha rabbah and purest sholom bayis. I am sure you will come out on top.

So, sometimes we can't "connect" in our deepest areas of concern.
And sometimes, her physical form doesn't have everything I want.
And sometimes, we're each carrying other kinds of resentments.

But the quick fix is always there, to make things right.
Quickly. Perfectly. At least for the short haul.

And only then do I realize how that very fix... separates us further.

What a mess. Gotta do more thinking.

And to all my GYE buddies out here: sorry I'm posting so much and moving around so much. Thanks for reading, and posting, and just being around. It's difficult to imagine where else I could take the conversation of what we like to do with our and why and how often and what's going on beneath the surface. Maybe to early Mincha .

Okay, guys, now I'm getting confused.
The chizuk email quotes Dov.
If he's talking about the same kind of "one step at a time" thought I was having a couple of days ago, then I've got to backtrack and do a little more thinking. Arrgh, I HATE thinking. Especially about THIS stuff. But I'm not seeking comfort, I'm seeking the truth. Aargh.  Anyhow, Dov was quoted as:

Dov Continues:

After re-reading my post, I just wanted to add:



The trick is to accept that this stuff can actually be done incrementally. It's weird, but true. Every addict I know has discovered that he can actually get a little bit better today - even though that seems like we are just being louder hypocrites! But we discover that we aren't hypocrites if we admit that we are just unable to be totally honest, change Employers and finally give our lives to Hashem, etc., etc.... now.

Part of us screams that it's either all or nothing... and that is a lie. So be brave enough to seem hypocritical and take one measly step today with all of us.

Briut.  I can't bring a thing to the table.  It's taking me a while to read through the thread.  You are worth the effort.  I have to think and feel, and ask myself and H" questions.  I just wanted you to know, with much gratitude. 

Deep and dark to me has turned out to be a trick of the yetz.  Problem is, in that private-most world I feel most real.  And I want that to be seen and valued by my other.  Unfortunately, it has turned out for me to be a place where I grieve that childhood is over, and that I missed that particular train.  She can't kiss the ouey.  This is just part of what happened to me and it's a wound that doesn't heal.  It has it's plusses, like empathy, and tenderness and not having to work so hard to be loved.  I just got that it ain't happening.  Nothing fills the hole, no matter the phenomenal craving.

You say you feel isolated when she won't join you, rejected, and most importantly, triggered.  But didn't you really start out already isolated when you approached her?  Weren't you looking to have the isolation comforted.  And then you were thrown back on the isolation again, the wound, that doesn't heal.  To tolerate and accept my woundedness, and the intensity of the feelings, is a moment by moment thing for a guy like me whose all about me.

This is all about you and H", not, from my experience, about me and her.  She hurts, I hurt, most everybody seems to hurt.  I'm not entitled to be comforted by her, by H" by the stuff that looks out from my computer, gazing, just to me, in my special little private world where I'm most me.  I have to give that idea up.  I missed it coming up.  Too late.  This is being a human, with longings, physical and spiritual.  I once read this in an Askenazit siddur:  "What is man if not his soul.  And what is man's soul if not his deepest longing."

For me the entitlement and the resentment that I don't get to have what feels like I'll die without.

Forgive me if I'm preachy.  I'm still all about me, and maybe something between the lines will be useful.  If not, have at me.  I need my wings clipped, I'm sure. 

1daat: thanks so much for that meaningful post. Can't put my finger on it, but it has spoken directly to something very deep, something that needs to hear and be heard.

Let me take some time before I reply further.

But lest any of us think that all this posting (and in my case of the last few days... ALL ALL ALL that posting) is just whistling in the dark... your words might be very important to me right now. Thanks for being H's shaliach.

1daat wrote on 15 Jun 2010 05:21:

Aha. Now I see what hit me.

It's that my feelings of isolation and rejection didn't start when she shut down. They started back when I realized I was feeling isolated in the first place, and made the approach to her in the hope that she'd take my extended hand and help me feel more connected.

When this doesn't work out, though -- and I'm feeling even more rejected than before -- I'm blaming her double for what was probably not her "stuff" in the first place. So if I can't "rely" on her presence to fix the isolation and rejection, where can I turn? I suppose the answer is esa ainei el he'harim, but I need a little bit of time to really see that.  Oy.

THAT's the piece that resonated, 1daat. Thanks. Oy. The work of a lifetime....

Briut, I remember crying like a baby as I told my brother about my ordeal. I cried and cried. But then I reached a point where I realized, There is no word that I can tell this man, no tear that I can cry, that will take away this hell I am in. It was then that I hit me, totally, that I need to take this up with G-d, more so than I had already.

People have their limits. We need them, they help us through, but ultimately, we need to square things away with G-d, daily. I read a post by Elya on acceptance. It had to do with taking our circumstance, whatever it may be, and accepting it. It is in this way that we are surrendering to G-d. This is a rough paraphrase. But that is what I got from it. I am trying to do this acceptance thing every day. Taking my account of myself in honesty and, accepting it, leaving it with G-d.

Maybe this will help with your feelings, too.

Thanks for that, Tshuvahilaah.

It's been far too heavy here. So, a little levity.

Someone in my extended family once botched the serenity prayer. Liked it so much that they never went back. The line, which I STILL use, is:

"the courage to change those things I cannot accept."

(After all, for whom was the entire universe created, anyway?!)

Hi Briut.  b/oy are we on the same page about a lot of stuff.  Maybe a few more ideas?

"When this doesn't work out, though -- and I'm feeling even more rejected than before -- I'm blaming her double for what was probably not her "stuff" in the first place."

Maybe it's not her stuff in the first place, and maybe it is in the second place.  Kinda depends on HOW she doesn't take your extended hand.  If she's gentle about it, then, yeah, I guess I'd probably say, (if I were there with a video camera and looked at it one frame at a time for about 90 days) that not getting some comforting is just lumps ya gotta suffer.  You went in suffering and alone, and came out suffering and alone.  Ain't about her. "Gonna be a heartache tonight" (still remember goyisheh music, sorry.  We ain't all ffb).

BUT: If she's in some subtle or maybe even gross way being dismissive or avoidant or contemptuous, then, (after careful examination of the video replay) I guess I'd say some of what's going on in your heart DOES have to do with her stuff getting stuck into you ("in the second place"). And I don't care what anybody says, I'm no Tzaddik gamoor, that's rejecting and it hurts. 

"So if I can't "rely" on her presence to fix the isolation and rejection"

Yeah, relying on human beings to be reliable about taking care of that ache hasn't worked out so good for me, and I get increasingly desperate and angry and resentful, and then I'm just gonna do whatever I need to do to get some of that comfort right here and right now.  So get out of my way, I can't help it, WHERE'S THAT COMPUTER!!

"where can I turn? I suppose the answer is esa ainei el he'harim, but I need a little bit of time to really see that.  Oy."

Always and forever reliable Harr Ha'kadosh.  Not always and forever reliable are us shabby folks down here.  But lots of us are trying to learn to be there for someone other than Mr. It's-all-about-Me."  Like how you just swept me up that first night I posted, so alone and dark and isolated, and you just invited me in, gave me some chizuk and direction, and I wasn't so alone.  Miraculously.  So H" uses us shabby folks sometimes to, indeed, give some comfort to the deepest ache--sometimes, unreliably, without being entitled to it. 

I know I make my deepest ache, which is about how far away from Him I feel right now (still pretty flat but doing the drill day by day), I know I make this ache about my aching for some comfort from FOLKS.  But for me, just an ahm ha'aretz, I need a lot of Him and at least SOME from folks, too.

So when they reject, I need some lovin at the human level even if it's not going to heal the wound.  Maybe just a little warm milk?  Is that asking too much?  (well, actually, sometimes it is, I guess).  And yes, I agree, ultimately, the only Yeshuah is H"'s.  But  a little milk, is that really too much to ask?

What a ramble.  Oh, speaking about levitating, have you heard the senility prayer?

1daat wrote on 16 Jun 2010 06:17:

Yep, my life's story. Suffering and alone leads to desperate and angry and resentful. My search for "reliable" can easily bring me to real tears.

Who would have figured that I need to fix this before I can really fix my lust issues. I mean, it would be easier to just cut off my and be done with it. But that wouldn't help either. So here I am, facing my "alone" place where even Hashem seem to reject my actions. (Notice, I did NOT say "rejects ME.") Help.

It is somehow incredibly comforting to know that I'm not alone on this site in all this. Really. Thanks for "coming out."

And as to the senility prayer, I could sure use a little laugh. Please post it here -- I seem to have forgotten it in some senior moment .

By the way, yesterday I finished Day 100 on this trek, otherwise known as 170-1 clean days. Wow.

I've got thoughts on the subject, but need to put them together before posting. But I'm open to "mazal tovs" and chizuk even now [hint hint]....

Day 101.