Fighting and making up

My previous relationship was with a man whom I started dating when I was 20. It was a very torrid unhealthy relationship. We fell in love right away as well as in hate. We had huge horrible fights, the type that my parents used to have when I was little. I am biased as to who caused the fights but they mostly had to do with his selfishness and a little bit about my insecurities. This relationship lasted for 3 years, sometimes off and on, and it did a number on me emotionally and physically. I’ve always been pretty skinny, but I lost 25 pounds in those 3 years and I was down to about 85lbs, which is too skinny. Anyway, when we would fight, we would make up almost immediately. It was a rollercoaster that would last all night. We would fight for an hour, then talk for 2 hours and then make up and then I felt fine again. I would go from feeling angry to feeling horrible to feeling vulnerable to feeling relieved and happy in a few hours. The making up part was usually my doing. I would chase him down when he wanted to leave, I would demand we talk about the issue and not go to bed angry, and I did this because of this tremendous enormous fear I had of him breaking up with me. I don’t know if this is common with most women, but I felt like if we stayed angry he would have time to think about why he was angry and break up with me and I didn’t want to allow him to have those thoughts, or so I thought. I think this is what made me needy and insecure. Well, eventually he cheated on me, I broke up with him, there was a lot of drama, he moved away and I got over him, although it was much more complicated than it sounds.

I met my now husband a few months later and the relationship with him was very different, very healthy and very fulfilling, although not perfect, it was a 180 from my previous relationship. Early in my relationship with my husband we used to fight now and then. I was the same way about it though as I was with my ex. I would want to make up quickly, I would want resolution right away, which was harder for my husband because he is the type that just needs time before he can talk about something. This irritated me to no end because I didn’t want to give him time, I wanted to cry and cuddle and for him to tell me he loved me and he was sorry.

But oh how things change. Maybe its because I’m married, maybe its because I have higher self esteem, maybe its because I feel more secured in my relationship, but I don’t have that need to make up right away anymore. I could completely ignore him for hours and let him come to me when he is ready to apologize, or if its my fault, I take time to apologize to him. I have very little anxiety about it, and I’m perfectly okay with it. I can even go to bed angry now. I don’t know if that’s good for us, but it works.

My husband is very passive aggressive. Last night we got into a small meaningless argument about why I was nagging him about something. This was before he had taken a bite of his dinner I cooked for him, well him being passive aggressive he took his plate and went to the garbage to throw it out, I told him to not throw it out, and he did it anyway, then he just replied that he wasn’t hungry. I was upset because he could have just put it away for lunch or something, and that was the end of the argument. I went to the den, he stayed in the family room, we didn’t say a word for hours and then I went to bed. When he got in bed he said sorry for throwing away the food and I said its okay.

However I was still mad this morning and I will continue to be mad for the rest of the day when we both get home tonight. I have no intention of making up until I’m over it, and that’s okay with me. It’s also a little do to with giving him back a taste of his own passive aggressive medicine.