Still life with complaints

I am on a business trip this week, and I asked my parents to stop in and see the family while I was gone (just because I wasn’t sure what state of mind Wife would be in). My father’s report indicated that things were pretty normal, at least towards the beginning of the week. But of course “normal” for Wife involves a lot of more or less mechanical griping. What is interesting in this discussion is just that I have never really talked about this before with my father (although of course he can’t help but to have noticed it) ... I guess out of a sense that I owed it to Wife to be loyal to her in that respect. I have less of that sense these days.

Dad: Yesterday your mother and I went to [your town] to return some boxes of clothes to Wife and to see how she and the boys are all doing, and everyone had quite a nice time. That afternoon, your Mom and I sat in the very neat living room having an ever-so-nice chat with Wife, while Son 2 went out and [played] and Son 1 played war games on the computer. That evening I brought home Chinese take-out for all. We left for home around 9:00 pm.

During that whole day, there was only a brief mention by Wife of the troubles between you two. We listened sympathetically to her complaints. She seemed more sad than angry about your current situation.... Son 1 even remarked on the fact that she and I didn't fight. Maybe we were both on our good behavior. She only mentioned the [discarded] books once when we first arrived and noticed how neat the living room looked. She never spoke about D.

I cannot catalog her complaints here. There was very little time to talk about them; ... and having not been a fly on your wall over the past few months or years I cannot attest to their veracity. I can relate some of them to you and see if you recognize yourself in any of them. Maybe I can help from the perspective of an additional 25 years of married life. We had our rough times too.

Hosea: As for Wife’s complaints, I have heard a lot of them although maybe not the ones she has mentioned to you. Some of what I have heard, I have heard directly from her; in other cases, I have heard from friends of hers who asked me "Is it really true that XYZ?" The complaints in the latter category have been almost universally false, sometimes outrageously so, although occasionally there was a barely discernable granule of fact hidden at the bottom around which she had built an array of fabulous corroborative details intended to give an air of verisimilitude to ... well, you get the idea. The complaints that she has made to me in person have often (not always) been a little less fantastical; but they have still displayed a remarkable misperception and misunderstanding compared to what I remember happening. Certainly the points of intersection between Wife’s stories and my own recollections are startlingly few.

Dad: Perhaps the important thing is not the substance of the complaints or their objective verity, but just the fact that she is making them. It suggests that something is not well with her, which we have known for some time, of course. You might attempt to assuage some of her unhappiness by a conciliatory gesture here and there. Of course you know what works there and what doesn't. Most people are alike in that we all want others to treat us with kindness and respect. A concession here and a loving gesture there can go a ways toward healing hurt feelings. Sometimes that's hard to do when the person with the hurt feelings has just made you madder than hell. Sometimes when children "act out" the psychologists tell us they are testing to see whether mom and dad still love them. I don't think we change all that much when we get older. We still crave being loved. Anything which reassures us along those lines can go a long way toward assuaging life's pains.

Hosea: Oh, but she has always complained about fictional stuff. What makes this any different?

Dad: You mean this is not a novel development? She's been doing this all along? Possibly since you were first married? That puts some things into a new perspective. I recall she came for a visit once without you [to attend some conference], and she stayed with us overnight. That evening all she did was complain about you at length. All we could do was listen to this litany of malcontent. None of what she described sounded anything like you. Your mother and I were so upset that we ended up taking it out on each other and had a big fight over "nothing" the next day. We didn't say anything to you at the time for fear of making you angry at us, since you were pretty stoutly defending her in those days.

And actually, I remember something that happened during the Christmas season before you and Wife were married. A month or more before Christmas, when your mom and I were visiting at her mother's, she told us that she was planning her annual big family bash and, since you and Wife were now living together, that we should consider ourselves part of the family. She made us promise to come to the party, which was to be held a few days before Christmas. Although we did not know anybody in this extended family except Wife and her mother, we said that we would certainly try our best to attend.

As time progressed, Wife’s mother evidently began to feel overwhelmed as she anticipated the upcoming event, and she complained to you and Wife (although saying nothing to us) that we were trying to "horn in" on her family party and that she just couldn't handle the (two) extra bodies. You, as the family diplomat, were assigned the task of breaking the bad news to us. The next time you and Wife were over at the house, you invited me out for a walk and started to explain how Wife's mother’s party was strictly a gathering for her extended family, and that our attempt to invite ourselves was not welcome.

Personally, we were relieved, because we weren't exactly looking forward to this party. Your mother has never liked large groups, and Wife's relatives were all strangers to us. But we were very confused about how Wife’s mother could insist that we come to the party, and then, a month later, concoct the fiction that we had forced ourselves on her.

Later we got used to her double-bind technique, and learned to roll with it. It was easy to ignore Wife’s mother and her shenanigans, because we didn't have to live with her. But Wife has, it seems, inherited -- or adopted -- some of her mother's ways in that she will put people into a double bind so that no matter what they do, it's wrong. Am I being unfair? Is my observation incorrect? You are with her daily; I see her only occasionally. Is it possible that I am the only one she does that to?

Hosea: If you grow up in a family that speaks only Swahili at home, you probably learn to speak Swahili by second nature, without even being aware you are doing it.

I guess I should have let my father know long ago that he wasn’t insane to have seen this behavior. And I have to wonder why I myself put up with it for so long ...?