A Real-Life Example
I had told my partner that I would be picking up my kids from their father’s house and bringing them over for a swim. We descended on the house in a whirlwind of activity, getting bathing suits on, getting towels, and playing with the barking dogs, creating a lot of noise.
My partner was eating dinner in front of the television and turned up the sound so he could hear his program. My daughter, who is mildly autistic, was bothered by the loudness, and I was finding it jarring as well, particularly as I needed to ask him a couple of questions. I asked my partner if he could pause the movie for a few minutes until we got outside. He made a face but turned it off, and went down to his computer instead.
We ended up with very different stories about that interaction…
I was very angry. I assumed he made the face partly because he felt inconvenienced, and partly because he was judging me for giving in to my daughter’s demands over his comfort (we had had previous disagreements about how much we should accommodate her sensory issues vs getting her to adjust to the world). I felt that because he had known we were coming over, and that we would only be inside the house for a few minutes before we were out at the pool, that he was being unreasonable. I felt that making a face and leaving the room were passive-aggressive criticisms of us, with the emphasis on aggressive.
Later when we talked, I found out that his version of events was: He had a stressful day. He was looking forward to having his dinner in peace and finishing the last part of a movie he loved. He didn’t realize that our arrival would be quite that soon, and would interfere with that plan. He was feeling inconvenienced by having to turn off his movie in the last five minutes as he was enjoying it very much, and the face he made reflected that. But, it didn’t have anything to do with my daughter’s request or how I parent her. Though he made the face, he realized it was a reasonable request so he did turn it off and didn’t say anything critical about it. In his mind, the face was an involuntary reflection of his initial, automatic reaction, and not within his conscious control. Because he responded reasonably after that, he felt there was nothing for me to get angry about. In fact, he felt frustrated and upset that I was angry.
As we calmed down and compared our stories, I realized I have an underlying assumption that: Making a face is a passive-aggressive criticism, particularly if it’s not acknowledged. It’s ‘dirty’ or distorted communication. “Everyone knows that!”
My partner has an underlying assumption that: We can’t control our automatic initial reactions; we can only be held responsible for our actions, not our thoughts (thoughts that might fleetingly show up on our faces!).
One of the most interesting things was just to see that we have different assumptions about this common occurrence, and to try to see how the other person might have a different story. Was it possible to see our versions as neither right or wrong, but just the way we saw things? Was it possible to try to see how the other person might interpret things differently?
It was a good day-to-day example for me about seeing how storyline works in each of us, and how difficult it is to separate the bare facts from the stories, the interpretations, the assumptions.
Next: Seeing, Not Judging
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