How To Deal with a Partner in Therapy

It's all about them, but it's about you too.

Photo by Marcel Strauß on Unsplash

Another week another kick to the groin for the men who have loved me in this life. What can I say? I’m a nightmare dressed like a daydream. I jest, because actually, I think the lessons here are pertinent to all kinds of relationships. I could have headed this ‘How to Deal with Friends in Therapy’, or ‘Parents in Therapy.’ Perhaps it’s just how to deal with therapy—the culture and language of it, the feelings of betrayal, the judgement and sense of one-sidedness—when someone you care about is in it, but you are not.

The kernel of this piece sprouted mid-week when, at 1.47am after finally finishing my 16^th hand-stitched napkin for a work event I was hosting at home, I realised that the wash—a load full of kids’ uniform—was wet in the machine. Yes, we’re back on chores, but I promise it is only for context. Descending the intrusive-thought triggering staircase into my cellar, I opened the tumble to find it chocca with another load. After clawing that lot out, emptying the drier tank and cleaning the filter, I put the wet uniform on to dry and got into bed circa 2.18am in an absolute rage. WTF. Why is it always my job? Even when I am in the most heated moment of my working rhythm, stretching my already finely tuned stamina to the max, how can I still be in the basement at 2am?

I stewed and then sent some choice words in a Whatsapp to the man soundly asleep next to me, ready for him to receive with his alarm like a cup of cold sick. I also, unfairly complained that he hadn’t helped me with my work. I say unfairly because he did ask if there was anything he could do several times before turning his full attention to Man City vs. Real Madrid, but I was in the melee of bedtime while also trying to stitch or whatever the hell I was putting myself through, so I just didn’t have the bandwidth to curate a list for him. Of course, it could be argued that he does have a set of eyes and a steamy load of just washed clothing isn’t invisible. As I personally can see so clearly how to help other people, it is hard to believe how others can be so blind to it. But this is my cross to bear and I acknowledge that my own anxieties about the day ahead catapulted my response into warp speed, aka, a step or two thousand too far.

After the ensuing pre-7am explosion which resulted from the taste of cold sick, we simmered down as per. Until that is, the next day, when he uttered the words which felt like a cold blade to the carotid artery: ‘my therapist does advise that you seek help.’

I’m sorry.

What was that you just said?