A Failure To Communicate

As the old movie line goes:

"What we have here is a failure to communicate!"

Of course, what movie were talking about is actually irrelevant. I don't remember and I don't care. n the grand scheme of things, the source is not important. What is important is the fact that there is a failure to communicate here.

And what to do about that is going to be a question that I am going to need to consider.

It all started a few weeks ago when Sally and I had a "sleep over" and we spent the first part of it talking with each other. Normally, I like that. In fact, I am really craving the opportunity for her and I to actually talk with each other not just have sex. Don't get me wrong, I am still a tremendous fan of the sex, but as we are in this time of transition, I am thinking more about the future than I am just about short-term pleasures.

I am quite clear that over the course of time that she and I have been together, our relationship has primarily been sexual. Historically speaking, there have been boundaries in our relationship. It's never been a case where she's been free to be with me and I have been free to be with her. We've not done the typical "getting to know you" type activities that other "couples" do. As we started off, it was enough that we were attracted to each other.

Now that I am seriously considering the possibility that I might be in a position where we might actually choose to spend the rest of our lives together, I recognize that the relational foundation that we have isn't sufficient for "going the distance."

In a certain sense, this is kind of scary. Why? Well, I've seen enough examples of people who connect in "lust" only to find that the relationship doesn't last.

At this stage of the game, I am at a crossroads -- I could choose to give up Sally or I could choose to give up Kate. No matter which one I choose, there will be a sense of loss that will be significant. What makes it worse, in considering Sally as my choice, is the risk represented by our current relational foundation.

I know there's no guarantees either way, but at least with Kate, we do have more of a traditional relationship in place right now. It doesn't require any backtracking or remedial effort to plug any gaps. This is something that I cannot say about my relationship with Sally. And it's also not like that I am really unhappy with Kate, despite there being some challenges in our relationship.

So part of what brought this conversation up was an exchange that we've had before -- she thinks that I take offense at things that she says, I hold onto them and bring them up to use later (sometimes many months later) to get back at her when I feel like I have been wronged. She also feels that I do not trust her as much as she trusts me.

I have plenty of space for her to think what she wants to think. I also don't consider myself a "saint," so I recognize that I got my issues as well. We talked about this for while and got to a point where I thought it was fairly well resolved. As it turns out, I was wrong.

A few days ago, someone contacted her from her past that she had told me about.This particular person is someone that she'd had a sexual relationship with. She knew that if she had ever heard from the person again, there was a direction that this conversation was going to go -- he would try to get her back into some form of relationship like they had before.

When this person made contact, she told me about it. I trust her implicitly and didn't have any issue with her talking to him. Nor did I have any expectation about what they were going talk about. So she starts sending me messages with what this person is saying to her. so I asked her a simple question -- "how did you handle it?" and then she told me that she "answered his question."

I thought to myself "OK, that's fine, but that really didn't answer my question." It's not like I was expecting her to say anything specific to the person, but given the level of detail she was sharing with me about what he said, I kind of expected that she would say "and to that I said __."

Nope. I didn't get that. I got this ambiguous response that left me hanging. Over the course of the next minutes, she continues to provide me with additional commentary about what this person was saying. So here I am, only getting one part of the conversation and seeing this go on over the course of (now) 20 minutes, I am now wondering what's actually being talked about. I finally made some smart ass comment about "if you're happy with the way things are for you, then he can go fuck off. That's the end of the conversation"

Initially, she got a chuckle out of my remark. Then she asked me "it almost sounded like you got a little jealous there for a second..." Well, looking back on it, I think there may have been some of that in what I was feeling, but I was legitimately confused about what was happening in their conversation. Now, 30 minutes into the conversation, I make another comment about how generous she is to stay in the conversation with him... And this is where it all goes south!

She immediately starts in on me telling me that I am making assumptions about what's happening and that I don't trust her. She tells me that she starting to get upset and then starts to lash out at me. She goes as far to say that maybe that she was right the other night and shouldn't share anything at all with me.

Why did she think this way? Because I have done similar things a long time ago. Therefore, whatever I am doing now is merely an extension of what I have done in the past. Which is also what I'm going to do in the future. Additionally, she also accuses me of being insecure and not trusting her. She then proceeded to follow that up with a few hurtful bits about how if she really wanted to do something, she wouldn't tell me about it -- she'd do it and keep it a secret.

Here is where she and I have a serious disagreement!

I find it quite ironic that she jumps to the same level of "assumption" that she accuses me of, but fails to recognize that in her own actions. Secondly, I also tried to explain to her why it occurred to me like this. Apparently she felt perfectly justified in giving me the ambiguous answer and not letting me know that the exchange was over.

In the end, I knew that trying to argue this out on IM wasn't going to do either of us any good. There's no way that she was going to be able to see what I was talking about, nor would I be able to convince her that I really did trust her.

I also know that if we were together in the same room or on the telephone with each other, that exchange would never have taken place. Never!!

She would've told me about it, I would've heard it, (likely) cracked a joke and that would've been the end of it.

I am not afraid of having arguments, disagreements or even fighting with her. In the course of a relationship, these things happen. It's not all fun and games, I realize that. Sometimes you have legitimate disagreements and sometimes you just act like schmucks. In the end, it gets resolved and life moves on.

I also recognize that there is a lot that she does not know and/or understand about me. I am not a "normal guy" and I don't act like one. And I am clear that the years that she has been in therapy have contributed to her thinking about myself and others in this way.

And I refuse to be shaped and judged solely by my history and some narrow psychological viewpoint. If that's the view she has of me and wants to continue to think that, then there's not much that I can do to change that point of view. That doesn't mean that there isn't something that I can do!

If I ever got to the point where I was clear that this was the case, I would leave her in a heartbeat.
Yes, you heard that right. I would leave her in a heartbeat!

Don't get me wrong, I do lots of stupid shit in life. I am not perfect nor do I claim to be. At the same time, if I'm going to be damned, I'll have it be for something that I've actually done, not for someone's perception or opinion of me.

If she and I ever get the chance to be together for the long term, I am intent on seeing that our relational foundation is sufficiently reinforced that we have the best possible chance that we can in starting off. Ultimately, there are no guarantees. We could do all the right/good things and still fail. I think that my relationship with Sandy is a perfect example of that.

Of course, it takes two to play this game. I'll make the first move and be willing to be wrong. If she doesn't move, then she'll have herself to blame. It won't be because I won't try.