Criticism

I got a great  piece of advice last week from Diane Sawyer.

Last week I saw her interviewed on Oprah and she talked about her marriage to Mike Nichols. She said the best piece of advice she was given for marriage was: “Criticism is just a very poor way of making a request—so could you maybe just make the request?"

Brilliant. “You are selfish and lazy” is just a really poor way to ask: “Can you help me?”

Now lets see if I can do it!

Unexpected Gifts

A challenge this weekend became a gift.

On Friday I came home to find that John’s ex-wife had been to our home and left a pile of pictures and cards on our doorstep. It was creepy and felt like a scary intrusion. When I found the stuff I had to make a quick decision. We were heading into a long weekend that we’d planned to have some romantic time together. I was upset by the intrusion but didn’t want us --or me-- to devolve into anger and accusation. I realized standing on my doorstep—key in hand-- that this could become a blow up or we could do this differently.

I prayed.

John arrived a few minutes later and I showed him what I’d found and said, “Let’s do this differently.” We went inside and talked. I told him what I felt and my fear, and he told me what he felt and his fears. We agreed that we had to do something. John said, “We will respond as a couple, and as us, and as we.”

Instead of fighting we talked. Instead of losing the evening we made dinner and watched a movie. Saturday we talked again about what to do. He said this is happening to us as a couple and we will respond as a couple. He drafted a letter to his ex-wife that we edited together and both signed. The conversations were not all easy. We talked about hurt and fear and the future trouble that this might cause.

I kept praying to change my thinking, my beliefs and my behavior. I felt myself stretching and being stretched. I didn’t get mad. We held hands when we talked. We heard each other and decided together.

Sunday night watching TV we thanked each other. We had in fact done it differently. We had our sweet weekend and we had become closer as a result of working out a solution together.

Last night, coming home from a concert, we talked in the car and realized that this weekend was a turning point. Facing this unsettling situation together had helped us recommit as a couple. It was a gift.

The All Nighter

Maybe we needed to clear the air. Maybe it’s the frustration of the legal, financial and medical all colliding like three cold fronts. Maybe it’s the dynamic of a relationship that needs a blow-out the way the earth needs a storm to clear and rebalance nature.
Last night was an all-nighter, the blow-out and the storm.

Today we woke to warm weather and partly cloudy changing to warm sun.
We are changed for good or ill. Painful things were said. Tender things were cried.
We said the unsaid and the unsayable.
We go on.

More than Just Talking

So we talked about sex and pleasure and not shrinking from a life of sensuality and pleasure. I was surprised that all my worry about talking the man talk with excess concern for delicacy and ego was unnecessary. Turns out John’s ego is not located in his penis. Another positive feature of this great guy. The bonus was that it began a shift to a new level of learning about each other. It makes sense now that when, in the Bible, they say that a man and a woman “knew” each other they were not being euphemistic.

Conversations at Chemo

It’s a funny thing. We end up having these important conversations while he is receiving chemotherapy. It’s a public setting and stressed in its own way. Surrounded by people who are sick or dying or getting well. Caregivers sit at the feet of their loved ones. There are several TV’s on and lots of chatting and joking and movement as nurses check machines and add bags of chemicals and insert IV lines and jam needles into patient’s chests. In the middle of that, almost accidentally, we fall into these profound conversations about our lives, our relationship and our love. Maybe, surrounded by all that living and dying it’s not surprising after all.

Being Real

Today I decided to take the risk of being real. This morning after we made love a huge wave of sadness hit me. Just a tsunami of grief, regret, sadness that would not lift. I did Pilates, drank coffee, said prayers, did my hair and make-up. But it would not shift. Was it the sex? Feeling close and then the rush to leave the house? That echo of other days when lovemaking was followed by hurried good-byes? Was it the weather? Cold and rainy and the first prediction of snow? A sadness and missing my other life when a snow day was fun and meant laughter and play? Was it cancer and caregiving--Always at the ready to break my heart? All I knew was that it was heavy on me and would not shift.

Now on top of that was all the internal “good girl” and “good girl friend” voices telling me that I need to be happy and bright and upbeat. The inner voices, Thanks Mom--that says “don’t be a drag” and “he doesn’t want to hear from you when you feel sad.”

But then I thought, “So is this a real relationship or not?” If we are a couple then he gets to see the good and the bad, the happy and the sad, the easy and the hard.

So I decided to be real and I called him and left a message saying how I really felt. I decided not hide who—and how—I am.

Our Relationship with Cancer

It is a double whammy. Negotiating cancer and the relationship. Today we had an OR talk. OR is “Our Relationship” a standard feature of the new relationship: who are we, how are we, where do we go from here, your friends, my friends and why I spend more on shoes and organic food and why you wait for sales and never buy expensive produce.

But now you toss in cancer and chemo. Is he really this selfish or just feeling sick? Am I codependent or a good caregiver? Is he unwilling to make an effort or just tired from the chemo? Is this my habit of pulling away or am I reasonably cautious about what I and we are facing?

I long for familiarity and fear it at the same time. Cancer changes the trajectory and the timing. I want to relax. Ready for that time of no fussing of being able to go “as me”. Can I skip shaving my legs? Can he floss in front of me? Wearing the old tee shirt for pj’s? For any couple there is loss and gain in reaching that familiar place. Less sex, a different romance but more and deeper love. How much is making an effort and how much is taking it all for granted and the pleasure and security in knowing you can. But cancer changes that too. The future is not just ours but belongs to cancer too. We can say what we’d like to do someday but cancer is keeping the master calendar.