Whoosh…. This one is a little more personal – a bit more specific. It’s not TMI, so its safe to keep reading… and yet, it makes me feel awkward about sharing it. I am wondering, “Do you need to hear the story to get the lesson?”
(And, let’s be honest, I’m worried about how you might judge me).
However, it’s a moment and a feeling we have all experienced, in our own way, with our own story.
Here is this week’s Therapy Thursday lesson.
It was huge, but sort of glorious, too. And it sat on the side of my house for a couple (few?) months.
It didn’t bother me at first.
But after the first few weeks, every time I saw it, it made me feel…. irritated. Angry. Resentful.
Who was have guessed that the root of tree trunk had so much power to annoy me?
Yes, you read that correctly. The root of a tree was the bane of my existence that summer.
So, there I was. Agitated as I sat on the couch, facing Ken. Telling him the story I am now telling you.
We had cut down a tree in our front yard. It had been smack dab in the middle of the front yard. It was big and scraggly, and it blocked the view of the front door from the street. (Side note: That blockage triggered what I refer to as my “home security issues”, but that’s a story for another time).
So it had to come down. And it did – easily. Yet the trunk remained. Huge, hulking, roots buried deep.
Undaunted, my (then) husband and our friend (“karate Steve”) wrapped stout tow straps around the trunk, dug around the bottom of it, and, with a lot of effort (and the horsepower of Steve’s truck), pulled it out of the ground, leaving a huge, gaping hole in my front yard.
I was ECSTATIC.
Somehow, (I can’t remember how), they dragged it over to the side of the house, where it sat.
The intention was to let it “dry” out a bit. Over the next couple weeks, my (then) husband would periodically hose out the chunks of dirt that were embedded in every orifice of that root system. He SAID he was going to chainsaw this giant tree root into chunks, toss the pieces in the back of his truck and dispose of it. But weeks passed. Summer is fleeting in Alaska, and there are only so many sunny days to golf.
So he golfed. I brought it up a few times over several more weeks, suggesting that we hire a tree removal company to haul it off. He didn’t want to spent the money and said he would get to it. The tree trunk remained.
My ecstasy over its removal waned and my irritation with its continued existence on the side of my house grew. And every time I went past it to go into the backyard, my frustration mounted.
And it wasn’t something I could ignore as I walked by. It was HUGE, really big- so big that we joked about cleaning it up and put a glass top on it and using it as a table base in our dining area. So big that you had to go around it to get to the gate to go to the back yard.
So big that it loomed over me, mocking me when I walked by.
Fast toward to the therapy session, where I was venting (read: ranting) about how frustrated I was with my (then) husband’s lack of follow-through.
Two things came out of this session:
- The observation
- The resolution
The Observation
First, Ken made me identify the underlying thoughts and emotions that were masked by my anger, frustration and irritation.
UGH. Therapy. Making me work and acknowledge the REAL emotions.
So here they are (and I HATE putting in writing for the world to see):
It hurt my feelings.
It made me feel as though my wants were unimportant.
It made me feel unimportant, and UNLOVED.
Of course, this admission to Ken spawned a whole OTHER conversation digging into the “why” of my feelings. (A therapy breakthrough for me? Maybe?!)
And it came down to this: I did not like feeling as though the things that were important to me were unimportant or dismissive.
It wasn’t that I expected him to dispose of it immediately. But I did expect it to happen. And I had asked a few times, and been “dismissed”, for lack of a better word.
One of my weapons (as mentioned in previous posts), is my fiery tongue, quick comebacks and ability to pierce egos with my sharp words. However, in an effort to NOT be like my mother, I did not like to yell, threaten or tantrum. So my polite requests had fallen on deaf ears, and that hurt.
I could think of no other way to address it “peacefully” and productively, but I also didn’t want have one of those moments of “brutal honesty” where my fury and my weaponed words were unleashed.
But I was sad and hurt and covered those “weaker” emotions with anger.
The Story within the Story within the Lesson
Ken paused thoughtfully, then asked me if hiring someone to remove it would cause a financial strain or hardship on us.
It would not.
He paused again, then told me a story. It was about a woman who had repeatedly asked her husband to repair a hole in the floor, and, like me, she had been repeatedly ignored.
After the third time she had asked (and been dismissed), she hired someone to fix it. Her husband was angry that she hadn’t waited for him to fix it, but her reply to him was calm, reasonably stated and candid. She had asked him to do something for her and he said he would do it. He had not followed through. It was important to her, but was not important enough for him to do what he had promised to do (within what she felt was a reasonable amount of time), so she made the decision to hire someone to have it fixed.
Her needs were met, his unwillingness to get it done for her was moot, and there did not need to be any further time, energy or discussion since the matter was resolved.
And THAT was THAT.
The Resolution
Ask, then Act.
Or, to be more clear…
Ask
Ask
Ask
Act
Then move on, and let any lingering frustration or resentment about it go.
After all, the third time is the charm.
Epilogue
I followed what I call the “Third Time’s the Charm” rule, and ended up calling a tree company, Tall Trees, to grind the stump down and haul the wood chips away.
Several days passed before my (then) husband noticed the stop was gone.
Like the husband in the story, he was irritated that I had not waited for him. My reply was the same as the woman’s in the story.
And that was that.
I’ve carried that rule into other aspects of my life (and other relationships), and it has prevented a lot of unnecessary frustration, harsh words and conflicts.
3 Comments
This was an amazing post and I’m sure you helped so many people by sharing your growth.
Sheli, the work you put in to get to the bottom of your feelings was not easy. Sometimes you really have to dig deep. Definitely worth the effort. And in the end you were able to move forward. Bog hugs to your younger self
I had similar situation with a huge tree that my husband hired someone to cut down last fall. It was full of spruce bark beetles. He paid low fee to have a lumberjack cut off top 10 feet that dropped like a big Christmas tree. Then there were big logs left in place and my husband was going to dispose of it all.
It sat through the winter littering the yard in front of our house.
It sat in spring as the bugs were getting ready to hatch the following spring.
I asked, what was his end game?
He realized he hadn’t really thought it through as the logs were very heavy and would take several trips to wood lot to dispose of. I realized he had best intentions but wasn’t really able to follow through.
I took it upon myself to call a tree service while he was out of town for work. It was too expensive for them to cut up the big Christmas tree topper but very reasonable to pick up and dispose of the big jumble of logs. They came that afternoon!
However, the big tree topper remains in the woods next to our house. We haven’t discussed it all summer. When I see it I am amused. We will get to it eventually…