Kirshenbaum, Mira - Too Good to Leave, Too Bad to Stay

• Every time you think of the two of you doing something together and yet don’t even bring it up, you’re limiting your contact with her.

• Every time there’s a real opportunity for some kind of intimacy and you let that opportunity slip past, you’re limiting your contact with her.

• Every time there’s a decision to be made, instead of discussing it with him you just go ahead and make the decision on your own, you’re limiting your contact with him.

We all do these things in our relationships some of the time. But if you realize that you do everything possible to do these things most of the time, then you’ve got to see that avoidance like this means you’ve already said your relationship is too bad to stay in. We talked about safety a while back. If your partner’s disrespect makes you feel so unsafe that you stay away from him in ways like these, then it’s time you gave yourself permission to physically leave a relationship you’ve emotionally left already.

STEP #26: RESPECT THAT DELIVERS

What a sad and murky issue this business of disrespect is! On the other hand, if the last two guidelines apply to you, think about how happy you’ll feel to get on with your life. And if they don’t apply, it’s nice to know that in those two aspects things are okay in your relationship.

Still, it’s time for a boost, something positive to think about. Fortunately, the area I want to turn to now is also very important. It’s the way respect that really comes across can make a relationship too good to leave.

In all the work I’ve done with couples, both therapy and research, I always ask one person, “Do you respect your partner?” and I always ask the other person, “Do you feel respected?”

I’m long past the stage where I’m surprised by what I hear in response to this but I’m still shocked: the respect that actually gets through to Jane from John is actually small compared to the respect John thinks he has for Jane. It’s almost as if respect in our relationships were like some of those awful charities that get exposed from time to time where only a tiny portion of the contributions reaches the people who were supposed to be helped.

But every once in a while I run into a relationship where the respect really does come through. It’s not just that your partner says that she respects you—she makes you feel it. And she not only makes you feel it but it actually makes a real difference in your life. Here’s the question that gets at this:

Diagnostic question #26. Do you feel that your part ner, overall and more often than not, shows concrete support for and genuine interest in the things you’re trying to do that are important to you?

This goes far beyond and is really very different from your partner’s saying you’re a “good person.” This is really about your partner’s delivering support and interest about the things you care about in life that are hard for you that you’re trying to do something about.

For example, a person can complain about how his partner criticizes him, but suppose he decides to go on a diet because that’s important to him and yet it’s hard for him, too.

If his partner is supportive and helpful and interested and concerned, that’s respect that delivers. If she does solid, practical things to make him feel she wants what he wants for himself, that’s respect that delivers. If she does everything she can to make his losing weight easier and to increase the odds of his being successful, or if she can really tune into what he needs the way he needs it and not her preconceived image of what he should be needing, or if she can listen to him talk about how hard it is to lose weight and convey the sense that she really wants to hear what he has to say, then any of these is respect that delivers.

Sasha’s Story

Sasha had complained about her iffy relationship with Willie for a long time to all her friends. She was working as a junior researcher for a large mutual fund company and Willie, an environmental activist, constantly criticized her job, her profession, her company—basically the whole environment she was trying to make a career in. His criticism wasn’t toxic for Sasha (it didn’t make her feel bad about herself, for example) and because on some level it was just Willie being Willie it wasn’t really so obnoxious that she started avoiding him.

Still, it would have been nice to hear words of respect. There was another big negative in the relationship: it bothered Sasha a lot that Willie could barely earn a living as a writer and organizer for one environmental cause after another. Like a lot of women starting out in life she kept wondering if she could do a lot better than the guy she was with.

Coming Through. An opportunity emerged for Sasha to get on track for eventually becoming a portfolio manager and actually being in charge of one of her company’s many mutual funds. Instead of being one of the researchers she could be the performer, the director, the star. Her work load suddenly increased enormously. It was no longer a matter of looking up business data for eight hours a day and then going home. Now she had to actively seek out investment opportunities and not just check up on them but point to the ones that would be winners. If she worked hard and did well she could create an entire future for herself.

And Willie amazed her. His opinion of the business world didn’t change, of course. But he “got” how much Sasha cared about what she was doing and how difficult it was for her and how hard she was trying to make it happen. Whatever doubts Sasha might have had about Willie’s respect ended here.

He treated her like a worthwhile person who was doing a worthwhile thing. For example, instead of his complaining about how hard she worked and how she was never home for dinner, he made dinners that would keep and that they could eat whenever she got home.

Her head was filled now with all the companies she was researching as possible buy recommendations to the portfolio manager she was auditioning for. And anticapitalist Willie listened with interest and patience to all the fretful details Sasha talked about. He asked questions. He even offered up ideas of his own.

All this was a revelation for Sasha. Whatever disrespect Willie’ d shown before had been nothing but words, verbal chaff. When it was a question of actually making a delivery of something real, Willie delivered respect that made an actual difference in her life. Her doubts about the relationship ended.

Gold Threads Among the Slivers

It’s very easy when you’re in an iffy relationship to not see real treasure because it gets lost with all the junk, like a fabulous antique that can’t catch your eye because it’s in a store filled with second-rate secondhand furniture. But there was real treasure for Sasha and there might be real treasure for you. Here’s the guideline:

GUIDELINE #26

If you feel that your partner shows support for and interest in the things you’re trying to do that are important to you, and does so in ways that are substantial and concrete and that make a real difference to you, then most people who’ve been in your situation have said that they’re in a relationship that’s too good to leave. Quick take: Being there when it counts is respect that delivers.

If you said no to question #26 and this guideline doesn’t apply, that doesn’t mean your relationship is too bad to stay in. As long as the lack of positive respect isn’t harmful and doesn’t literally drive you away from your partner, there can still be a satisfaction-producing core to a relationship with someone who doesn’t provide the kind of support and interest you’d like. It may not be ideal, but you can still live with it.