in love, Marriage 824 Words

They Didn’t Ever Fight

Never. Not one time did I see my parents have a fight. I was born into a home with a dad and a mom and a big sister and I never saw my parents fight. My parents were married 59 1/2 years when my dad passed away, in my home, and I honestly never saw them have a fight.

When I was growing up, they made sure that we knew they didn’t fight. It was like a gold star they proudly wore, the “We Aren’t Like All The Other Couples Out There. We. Don’t. Fight” prize.

I was well aware they did not fight because I heard it regularly, and then observed it daily. Dad would get up and go to work. Mom would get up and take care of us. I would get up and go to school. The reverse happened as the day wore on. By the time dad got home in the evening, I was expected to defer everything to his will…didn’t matter what television show was on that I had watched 2/3 of, or what conversation I was in with my mom – if dad wanted a different show or to take my mom away for a conversation, not only did it happen, but I was considered ungrateful and inconsiderate if I expressed frustration.

As the years of my youth rolled on, we lived in detached peace in our home. No one ever really asked me anything about how I felt, or what I loved, or if I had fears. No one connected with my soul, and I got kudos for the good stuff and punished for the bad. I got adept at covering the bad, at just not talking about it. I learned to shield the responses of my spirit, my deep down, to protect it from injury. I learned to tell what would please my lovely, we-don’t-ever-fight parents and hide any of my questionable thoughts. Or actions. Or decisions. Or fears. Or hurts. I could wordsmith with the best of them, rewriting a situation or an incident so that I looked good, or at least, not as bad.

But inside, I was crushed and crumbling.

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I did not know it, because it was all I knew. But I gained great skill at shaping a message not only to those on the outside, but to myself. Since there never were fights between my parents, I knew any tension in the house or in our family life was because of me, right? And since no one ever talked about being scared or fearful, if I had those feelings, it must be me, right? But I just kept all that to myself, and figured out how to pretend I didn’t hear those voices.

As HUSBAND and I have worked so hard on ourselves, and on our marriage, these scary, tightly wrapped layers have begun to peel off my being. I don’t blame my sweet parents, oh no. They were trying so hard to be great together and great to us and their way of being great was to not have anything in our lives or in their lives that was un-great. So they were doing the same thing they were so effectively teaching me: pushing down any feelings and hurts and fears and pains as best they could. My therapist likens it to floating on a ball in a pool…you have to constantly try to keep that ball carefully centered and balanced precisely under you and it works and it works and you adjust and it works and you change pressure and then POP! Out shoots the ball from under you when you least expect it. If that happened, my parents would quickly grab the ball and put it back under themselves, balancing carefully…adjusting…and never acknowledging the ball had escaped…

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And so did I, for my youth and for 27 years of marriage.

I don’t balance the ball anymore. I have learned to allow myself to really feel, to grieve the sad things and rejoice in the amazing. I’ve learned to be realistic about my fears, and to find solace first, and then hope with the overwhelming promises of God lived out in Christ and evidenced by the beauty from ashes that is my life. I’ve ventured into the amazing place of freedom through vulnerability, and sharing my shattered soul, finding that it can really meet the other tattered soul in the oneness that marriage is meant to be.

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But it is luring, and a regular fight for me not to retreat back into my deep down. To make myself stay exposed and risking. I have to make sure I never, ever forget that the safe place really wasn’t safe at all but actually a place I was dying a slow death, and that out here in the risky places are where I found I could love. And be loved.

love heals

 

21 thoughts on “They Didn’t Ever Fight”

  2. Oh! Sweet friend! They’ve all been good (your blog entries) but this one gets to the real down-low: we’re all broken and need to accept who we are and do the work to reveal that even to ourselves. Wow. So motivating and powerful. Then when that work is being done we can experience the ultimate release into freedom, as you express so eloquently. Praise God he never leaves us in the pit but gives us all we need to rise again!
    Oh how I love you!

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    1. I look at my life now and see how I fought with everything I was NOT to see, or reveal, my own brokenness. And the outrageous dichotomy is as you wrote – that is where the freedom really is. Now, I only wish I hadn’t wasted so much time… I love you too!!

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    1. Oh WatchMe…you are an inspiration to me too! We each have such unique experiences, yet are bound in commonalities in this drama. I am grateful beyond words for this community, and for you. Hope you have a great day!

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  4. Isn’t it strange…how we grew up thinking things were “normal?” Even if we questioned that normalcy, or even got a taste of what real normalcy was…the normalcy we grew up with became sort of the measuring stick for our own lives.
    Too often, we realized the truth….too late.
    The only thing I ever saw my parents fight about…was me. If my daddy took up for me, it caused a veritable war..not only with my mama but my sisters as well.
    In my so-called marriage, we fought and fought often…mostly about what his drunken mama did and said to me. His inattention to his children and me….I thought was normal. It’s what I saw growing up.
    By recognizing how you grew up and not “retreating back into your deep down” you are stepping into the light, as it were. At least, it seems like that to me.

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        2. Well, shit….is that the problem? LOL. I used to do that to my children….they would be showing me something and I would shut my eyes and say “I can’t see it.” They would giggle and say “you have to open your eyes.” They were so much fun…then.
          OR…maybe that’s the problem. My eyes ARE wide open.

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  8. I never saw my parents fight either. Of course they divorced when I was 10. I think the lesson was similar. I think I associated fighting with divorce although I’m not sure why. You would think it would be the opposite. I do know I prided myself on bring that wife that didn’t nag, demand, or complain. And we never fought. Maybe we should have.

    I sometimes wonder though if the way your parents did things, in the respect that everything revolved around your dad, wasn’t the right way. I’m going to write about this one day but I’ve seen so much of women doing their own thing, being a separate entity from their husband, and then everything ends. Then I see one of my bffs who married almost 4 years ago and everything revolves around her husband and family life. I realize 4 years isn’t that long but still… they appear happy. I don’t necessarily want to be one of those women who is attached at the hip to my husband but there’s a part of me that wonders if that’s not the way to a successful marriage.

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