Angry Resentful Child

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

Probably, by the same analogy, we like it when we are surrounded by happy, joyful and positive people, because we understand how to interact with them. To put it even more bluntly, we enjoy being around such people, because we are not required to make any effort to please them. Nothing is required of us at all, we can just hang around (a chic expression, which in Russian most often has a negative connotation, something like “hang out nearby”, “spend time together without doing anything serious”) and not spend additional energy resources. And if people around us, for the most part, are unhappy and unhappy, and we cannot get away from interaction, then we either do not know how to communicate with them and how to behave, or we understand that we need to somehow “energetically invest”Into this communication, and we, more often than not, do not want this.

Imagine that you are visiting friends who have a small child. During your visit, the baby is full, happy with everything, nothing bothers him, he smiles at you and does not cause trouble. "What a cute child!", You think, "next time I will buy him a present, let him be happy."When you leave, the baby begins to be capricious, whimper, cry, but you don’t care, you are no longer there, and you don’t have to do anything to return the child to a “joyful” state, this is what mom or dad or the dog Beetle is doing., and they, most likely, do not share your opinion that "the child is cute". Here I smoothly come to the concept of "resources" that we have and that we can use in communication with others. I emphasize the word "we can", because whether we use it or not is an open question.

In my resource theory, there are four: time, attention, money, and love. An important point: they are not interchangeable and none of them can be "thrown out" as unnecessary, although, according to my observations, this is exactly what happens in dysfunctional families, both in the relationship between parent and child and between adult partners. For example, a husband may think that if he buys his wife everything she wants (the resource “money”), then this is enough, and nothing else needs to be done; or the wife thinks that if she spends several hours a day cooking and cleaning (resource "time"), then she should not do anything else. A similar situation with children: "We feed you, drink, dress and buy toys, what else do you want?" Will such a family be happy? I think no. Will such a child be happy and grateful to their parents? No, because food and toys are not enough, this is only a resource "money", but where are the other three?

When I return home after an arbitrarily long absence - it can be either a couple of hours or a couple of weeks - the first creature that meets me is my dog. He jumps, barks, tries to lick my nose, dances around, runs from me to the sofa and back, and I know from experience that until I devote a few minutes of full and undivided attention to him, he will not lag behind, and he does not care, maybe I need to sort out the grocery bags, or say hello to my husband, or even take off my boots and jacket first. He needs to express that he is glad to see me, that he missed, that he is unhappy with the fact that I disappeared somewhere instead of being at home with him, and only after he has enough hugs, he will calm down and give I have to change and disassemble the bags. From the point of view of the dog, money and time do not matter, the most important thing is attention and love. If during the day he becomes sad or cold, he comes up to me, and I know from his look that he wants to “get on the pens”, and I cannot say: “Wait, let me finish the article for half an hour,” he needs right now. After all, if you feel sad or cold, you don't want to wait half an hour or an hour, you want to be hugged, wrapped in a blanket and made delicious tea right now, right? The same is true for a child, I think, but my article is not only about this, but about why it is often much easier for adults to "get rid" of a child with the resource "money" or at least "time", after which they quite consider their own parental duty fulfilled.

Roughly speaking, a dysfunctional relationship is one in which partners choose (explicitly or implicitly) not to spend their resources on another. Possible reasons:

1) You are not worthy of it (you did not deserve it), 2) I have better things to do

3) My resources are insufficient.

Remember our example of a happy baby? As long as he is happy with everything, parents do not need to spend additional resources on him, and they are satisfied with it. This often happens in adult relationships - while the wife is cheerful and happy on her own, the husband is satisfied, and if she suddenly becomes sad, and even, God forbid, for a completely incomprehensible or frivolous reason for a man, he does not know what to do or pretends not to know. I do not believe that all men are sociopaths, completely devoid of any empathy (the most striking example is Sheldon Cooper from the TV series "The Big Bang Theory"), rather one of three reasons from my theory works here.

- Oh, what kind of women do they have in general, there may be problems, again I thought of everything for myself, she was offended, it's okay, she will cry and stop! (depreciation);

- I have not read the news, the cigarette has not been smoked and the film has not been finished, should I give up everything and react to some female tantrums? (I am the navel of the Earth, she is here to please me);

- Yes, how do I know why she sulked, I have nothing to do with it, let her go to a friend or to a psychologist (with me everything is all right, this is her personal problem).

I don't think it is necessary to analyze the reasons why some men believe that women are not worth their attention and that the latter should "know their place", but most likely this is due to how they were raised (not what they were told, that they saw themselves in their childhood, how dad treated mom, this is the most important "basis"), within the framework of this article I am interested in the third reason when a man does not have sufficient resources. This is true for both women and parents.

What is the “angry offended child” inconvenient for? The fact that he demands from me (if I am a mother or father) the expenditure of my personal resources. What do parents do most often? They give a toy (resource "money"). If it doesn’t help - another one, and if it doesn’t help either, or the child is older, then it is regretful to be distracted from very important “adult” affairs and switch to the child. It is necessary to understand what exactly is wrong, and for what reason the child is offended (resource "time" and resource "attention"). If a problem is found, and you know exactly what the child is offended, there are several options: to brush it off (oh, what nonsense, you didn't even need to ask), try to switch attention (yes, yes, you see, we figured it out, go now play or watch TV) or give your child love. And if you now say something in the style: “I don’t know how,” then most likely there is my third reason, you simply don’t have enough love to be enough for yourself, your partner, and your child.

The client and I analyzed the situation in which she, if she quarrels with her husband - for any reason - and he becomes angry (and if you dig deeper, then offended), prefers to "withdraw into himself", shut up, shut down, avoid communication and just wait until he “calms down”, and since this situation is familiar and “frequent” for her, we were looking for how such a pattern of behavior is beneficial for her, how it is convenient and what “saves” from what, if such a word can be used. I spent a long time spinning the questions, trying the options, and one of the questions “clicked” like this: “Why shouldn't you do when your husband is angry and offended?”.

I don't need to love him.

We dug further, and found that in childhood, if a girl did something wrong, according to the mother, the mother often told her phrases in the style: “You are bad now, and when you are bad, I don’t love you (or“I don’t need you”). In this case, “bad” she was in the meaning of “uncomfortable”, not doing what the mother wanted, not behaving the way the mother likes, and if you think about it, the child is rarely comfortable at all, he has his own regime and his own desires, he wants to sleep, eat and write when he wants, not when his mother is comfortable. If my theory is applicable, then the logic is simple: if someone (in this case, a family member) behaves in an uncomfortable way for me, that is, it becomes “bad” for me, then I relieve myself of the obligation to “love” him in the sense of “wasting resources ". In many articles about "toxic mothers" you can find similar examples: if the child did something that the mother did not like, no matter what, in fact, the child is not at all clear and not obvious, then what does the mother do? Condemningly purses his lips "chicken ass" and withdraws himself, they say, "sit and think about your behavior." And how can you think about this if the child does not even know what is wrong? What is the payoff to the mother? No need to waste resources. No need to waste time, attention and love on the child, you can leave everything to yourself.

My next question is: what exactly is the problem? Your child, not a foundling, you yourself decided to conceive and give birth to, why not “invest” resources in it, isn't this the essence of parenting? And here I will come to the "third" reason, which I spoke about above, "my resources are not enough." In this case, the resource "money" is inapplicable, and even the resource "time", because it is not about time, as such, but rather about setting priorities, which is more important - spending time with the child or cleaning the floors, in this situation, "resources "Is attention and love.

Why is it difficult for us to pay attention to loved ones? Because we do not know how to give it even to ourselves. What is the first association (or picture) that comes to mind if you hear the phrase “A woman should pay attention to herself”? We bet you thought about a manicure and a "take a bath"? The manicure is important, the bath is pleasant, but it has nothing to do with attention. Attention is something like a question to yourself: “How are you today, my dear? Are you happy, are you happy? Are you warm, girl, are you comfortable? " And if the answer is “no”, then what needs to be done to make the answer “yes”, and here you need to highlight the moment in color, font, exclamation marks that your female happiness and joy depend only on you. About the fact that no one else is responsible for "the happiness of a single woman", I wrote in the last article ("Is a man obliged to make a woman happy?").

Let me give you an example. When a husband comes home from work (in this example, a woman is a housewife, or works from home), what does he need in the first place? Attention. Many times I have heard complaints from men, how much it hurts them that the wife does not even come out on the doorstep, having heard that her husband has returned. Well he came back, and came back, dinner on the stove. Tea, not a baby, you can handle the scoop. Here's another for the sake of some kind of husband to give up their affairs. But he wants to be shown that he is important, listened to, be around. 15 minutes of undivided attention - at least. Why can it be difficult for a woman? First: there is no skill even to myself to pay undivided attention at least 15 minutes a day, second - for these 15 minutes you need to put the interests of your husband (read: another person) above your own. These 15 minutes are for him, not for you, and your resources are not for you, but for him. And if there is a reaction immediately to the first two reasons, which I wrote about above, "You are not worthy" and "I have more important things to do?" The child drew a picture and runs to his mother, to show - "Oh, not up to you now, I have borscht on the stove." The husband carved a nice detail out of wood and called his wife to show them - "Oh, I spent 2 hours on such nonsense, I'd better take out the garbage, and in general my floors are not cleaned." If you dig even further, then our lady is 100% “victim”. “I reckon myself and sew up for them, and they are doing some nonsense. I don’t run to them for praise when the borscht is cooked and the floors are cleaned!"

I think the resource “love” works in the same way. You cannot give to others what you yourself have little or not enough. A textbook example: on the plane, when they tell you about oxygen masks, they say that first you need to put on the mask yourself (yourself), and then the child. Nobody will say that this is "selfish" and that it is not allowed, this is pure safety technology. If you cannot breathe, you cannot help the other person in any way, and if you do not have enough love for yourself, you cannot give it to another. You can give your irritation, frustration, fears, neuroses, but not love. Why you don't have enough love is a very good question, and how to start “generating” it too. The easiest way is to look for joy in your daily activities and give thanks for what you have.

Think about this as well. From the point of view of esotericism, your partner reflects you, and if your husband (or wife) behaves like an “angry offended child”, then look into yourself, most likely, you will find exactly the same in yourself. And we know what to do with it. Love and attention.

Treat yourself with care, you have a single copy.

Yours, #anyafincham