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Parental Discord in the Dynamite Couple

 

     Samantha, the fifteen year old daughter of Daniella and Mark https://shirahvollmermd.wordpress.com/2010/08/25/dynamite-couple/ has a terrible time waking up in the morning to go to school. Daniella insists that there should be natural consequences; she does not wake up, she misses school, end of story. Mark feels, although does not insist, that Samantha needs a little help in the mornings and so perhaps he should go into Samantha’s room to help her get out of bed. Howevever, since Mark is afraid of Daniella’s wrath, he avoids asserting his instincts. One morning, Daniella wakes Samantha up, and helps her off to school. Mark is enraged. “Why does she get to break her own rules, but if I did that, Daniella would never let me hear the end of it?” Mark asks with a despairing and depressing tone. I turn to Daniella, “did you explain to Mark why you broke your own rule?” “Well, I wanted her to go to school,” Daniella replies, seemingly unaware of how confusing that would be for Mark. “Yes, but did you help Mark understand why you were not consistent? I repeat my question, trying to be gentle, at the same time as I wondered why I have to ask this obvious question. Daniella looks at me rather annoyed and says “well, it is the beginning of the school year, so I did not want Samantha to start off on a bad note, but yea, I guess I could have explained that better.” Mark rolls his eyes.

     Poor communication, the root of most marital discord, rose up again for Daniella and Mark, leading to more despair and helplessness. Despite years of working on their relationship, Mark still feels ineffective and Daniella still  feels misunderstood. We talk about how Mark needs to learn to assert himself in a nice way, so that he can discuss his intuitive thoughts about how to raise Samantha. We also talk about how Daniella needs to put herself in Mark’s place so that she can see how confusing her behavior can be if she does not articulate the rationale behind her inconsistent behaviors. There is a long silence. Both Daniella and Mark seem to be in deep thought. For a moment, the room feels hopeful. Each partner can see their own contribution to the discord. Each partner has calmed down towards the other, while at the same time, Daniella and Mark began to appear as if they felt bad about their own behavior. There was no apology, but there was peace. There was a sense of moving forward-another baby step.