It wasn’t so much that things had gone wrong, more that they were never right. So it was a great relief to get the metaphorical cards out and lay them, face down, on the table. Let us take a seat at this table, the better to understand the situation.
The first card to be turned up was Tom’s: ‘ I’m so afraid of hurting you that I tiptoe around things. I mean, I’d really love to play 5-a-side on a Saturday and have a few jars with the team afterwards. But it wouldn’t be fair to you, leaving you alone at the weekend.’
Alice turned over her ace card at this early point: ‘I really don’t want to have kids. I feel trapped already and having more ties would be scary. It would be great to feel free. But I know you want kids, so I’m just living in dread. ’
Tom could sense a flutter in his gut : ‘Why have you never said this? I didn’t know you felt trapped. As for kids, I guess I just assumed we’d have some. I’m lost for words. ‘
Alice fingered another card and turned it over: ‘I grew up with a sense of duty which my parents always put first. I was Akela to a group of cubs for years, for God’s sake, always the first person people asked to help with babysitting, I was….reliable. So duty always trumped happiness or being a bit lighthearted and mad with friends. When we met, I think the same thing happened. I was committed to you without thinking about my own needs too much. And I’m starting to wish I had some freedom to look at what I really want…and need.’
Another revelation was in the offing as Tom tipped up the next card: ‘Thing is, I sometimes feel hemmed in. You always want things to be done just right and I don’t find that I have much to offer that won’t offend you. I’ve stopped suggesting things, so you won’t get upset. I’m trapped too, in a way.’
The upturned cards continued to show a high level of disaffection with the relationship. It became evident that neither wished to hurt the other, and yet neither was receiving much joy from their life together.
What to do? Break their commitment and go their separate ways? Alice finds her sense of duty a heavy burden. Tom is feeling constrained by his imagined sense of what will upset her. They have some major obstacles to clear – kids being a serious one.
Not my problem. I’m just a voyeur, a connoisseur of tricky human conundrums. Free as a bee. It’s a hobby. Seems like human commitment can be a mask hiding- suppressing- real wants and needs. ‘For the sake of the kids’, ‘because I said I would’ , and so on. It’s a choice.
Anyhow back to work. Don’t mind me, I’m just a fly on the wall with a counselling certificate and high-level language skills.
