A Hair in My Soup

Angry feelings that we are not allowed to voice in our daily work worlds, or which we don’t admit to having, are often vented on our partners. We hurt the ones we love most. We have always had dogs and cats. Animal hair is part of our daily environment. Approaching a bowl of chicken and dumplings, Sylvia’s equivalent of liquid love, Eddie sarcastically snarled, “There’s a hair in my soup,” whereupon, Sylvia dissolved into sobs. After two hours of damage control, Eddie said, “It wasn’t about you; it was about my graduate prelim committee. I’m stressed and angry.”

From then on, we learned to recognize that kind of outburst by the code name “a hair in my soup.” Stopping the action and identifying the outburst as such allows us to more quickly move on to the real issue and prevent further hurt. Do you have code words that help give you safe conduct as a couple through life’s minefields?

Can you create, or watch for opportunities to create, some code words?

Share knee to knee.

Credit “Wonderful Wednesdays”
Yawn’s Publishing