Upon my return to therapy, at the end of my first session, I asked my therapist how I can process emotions without being swept away by them. His response was to give me homework the next week. He wants me to pay attention to each time someone pushes my buttons and then fill out a worksheet. These are the four questions he wants me to address:
- Identify the people who frequently “press your emotional buttons.”
- What emotions do you feel when these people press your buttons?
- How do you usually respond when these people press your buttons?
- What could be an effective way to disable these emotional buttons (that is, disable the button while feeling the feeling)?
I didn’t need to wait to fill out #1. I am painfully aware of the people who press my buttons, and the main ones live under my roof.
So far, I am beginning each response to #2 with anger. I guess that is progress because I used to react with shame, guilt, and fear of no longer being loved. Now it just p@$$es me off. Underneath the anger is sadness and frustration with my husband and mostly frustration with my kid.
For #3 – How I respond varies depending upon the situation. I was surprised to discover that my husband actually presses my buttons more by the things he doesn’t do than with the things that he says or does. Because he is typically not around when I discover the latest thing he failed to do, I don’t really react since he isn’t around to react to it. It’s more just grumbling in my own head.
I actually had to call a friend and ask if “inaction” counted as button pushing. She said it did, so I am including it. I think it is an interesting thing to note that inaction is what is really bothering me the most with him. Of course, the week is not over yet…
And then there is #4, which remains completely blank. How can I disable these buttons? I have no idea. With my husband, I mostly choose to stop caring. The sad thing is that, the fewer behaviors (or inaction) I care about, the less I care. That can’t be healthy for a marriage.
With my son, I actively choose not to go head-to-head with him because that is counterproductive. I have to step away and think through how to accomplish what I need to accomplish in a different way. Some strategies work nicely, such as rewarding him for making good choices. Other strategies, such as trying to reason with him, don’t work very well at all. He has a variety of special needs, which makes parenting him a challenge since none of the tips in the parenting books work for him.
I am going to keep trying to fill out my worksheet, but I fear that #4 will remain blank.
Photo credit: Hekatekris
Faith, I understand about the fear of not knowing what to put in the blank for #4. One of the things I did when I was doing the process of trauma resolution and I had to fill in blanks was I’d put something absolutely nonsensical in the blank – just as a holder.
So for instance my answer to #4 might look like – I could pretend I’m a flower and then I don’t have buttons, I have petals that are pretty and feel caressed by the sun and the sting of a hard rain.
Anyway, what that helped me do was to see past where I was currently seeing and it wasn’t until I’d exhausted all the nonsensical answers that the real answers started to show up.
I know it helped me
I do some work with the inaction by calling it passive aggression. Not the simplistic passive aggression which deals with what the person is saying in at the time, it is about the actions that they do not take that have effect later.
To date it has not lead to uncaring in that I no longer care about the person it is just I choose to not care to interact with the person. I have to date not seen any change in anyone’s behavior rather they choose to find someone else to practice their passive aggression on.
Sometimes I will see a spurt of not being passive aggressive. To date that has merely a pause in the behavior and no real change. Sometime people do actually change. I am getting that if I am not all worn out I can tell when change has really happened.
I really had to much going on in trying to get through each day to have the energy to be aware of the behavior.
@Minna- I really like that- I felt some peace just picturing what you wrote. That could work in a variety of situations. When you don’t know how to react or handle a situation just fill it in with something nonsensical.
Hey, Faith! For me, frustration always stems from unmet expectations. When I feel that frustration at my hubby for the undone things, it’s usually because I had an expectation that he would do it, and then he didn’t, and I take it as a failure on his part to do what he was supposed to do.
I once read a book called “The Superior Wife Syndrome” that helped a lot with this. Now, we sit down every now and then and talk about what needs to be getting done by whom, setting up the right expectations for both of us.
When I feel that irritation when something isn’t getting done, I turn it from being frustration to being a cue that it’s time to sit down again and talk about what the current expectations are.
One thing that came out of this was that I, too, had not been meeting expectations on things for him. So, it was both humbling and helpful.
I think your worksheet process is great! It’s always a learning experience when there are blanks you can’t figure out!
Not to pry, but what buttons are being pushed? For #2 you said anger is your feeling. Anger at your husband and kid or anger for what their behavior reminds you of and the emotions triggered from there? What things is it that your husband isn’t doing? Does he know he is suposed to be doing it?
For answer #4 it is about resolution. Once you can clearly define what it is that is irritating you can find a way to resolve or correct it.
For example, when I call the family to the dinner table and they take five minutes to get there, I was pissed! I would think “How dare they take their time after I cooked! How rude and disrespectful.” (There is the button) How did I feel? Angry and devalued. I made them dinner and they didn’t seem to care. I responded with yelling and resentment. How could this be handled differently? (My therapist helped with this resolution, but it has gotten easier with practice to come up with my own.) Five minutes before dinner is on the table I dispatch one of the kids to tell everyone dinner will be ready in five minutes. And guess what? It works. As we reviewed this behavior it was traced back to my childhood. When my mom called us for dinner, we jumped and came to the table out of fear. I don’t want fear or stress at my dinner table ya know 🙂
I am sure your therapist will help you answer #4 if you need help. (I love to help and if you want to post a few specifics maybe along with the rest of us we could give you a couple suggestions.) This is a really great way to better understand what triggers you and why. You can do it!
I suggest feeling the feeling first, and then what you need to do differently in future will come to you.
-SDW
I do not have a psych degree. But for $200 an hour, I can also throw your own question back at you — with a worksheet.
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I’ve been doing quite similar work recently, Faith. I often got mad at work because I felt I wasn’t recognised for who I am, instead treated sometimes like a machine. I allowed myself to feel the rage about this. As SDW says, feeling the feeling is the main thing. Resolution followed quite naturally, and not in a cognitive way but I realized that that depth of rage wasn’t really appropriate for the work situation. It went back to my feelings of not being recognised as a human child by my abusers, I was triggered. I came to evaluate then, later on, that at work I can be recognised for some things e.g. meeting my targets, contributing to a meeting, but they aren’t in the business of recognising my full humanity. There was a bit of mourning work attached to this process – no, a lot of mourning work – and, funnily enough, I now care MORE about my job and think less of quitting it. Good luck. Feel the feeling is the thing to focus on!
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