What You Can Change _. And What You Can't - Martin E. Seligman [67]
KATE: Rinsing isn’t enough. I’ve told you a hundred times: Dishwashers don’t scour plates.
JONAH: Yeah, I have to wash the dishes before you wash the dishes.
KATE: Can’t you just be a little help around here before you start complaining?
JONAH: You don’t seem to realize that I’ve had a hard day at work. I don’t need this shit when I come home!
The crucial spot. His temper is flaring. Jonah should now use this as a signal to deploy his DESC skills.
JONAH [describing]: The last time we did the dishes we got into a fight. [expressing] This makes me feel sad and hopeless. It also makes me feel angry. [specifying] Next time we do the dishes, I want you to rub my shoulders while I scrape and rinse them. [consequence] If you don’t want to do this, I’ll just do the dishes alone next time.
A final bit of advice, concerning fighting in front of your children: I am not naive enough to think that even if you take this chapter to heart, you will never again fight in front of your children. Fights happen. There is one solid piece of research on the subject of fighting in front of your children—if you must. It concerns resolution. Children who watch films of adults fighting are much less disturbed when the fight ends with a clear resolution. When you fight, go out of your way to resolve the fight, unambiguously and in front of your child.
10
Post-traumatic
Stress
I want to live so that my life cannot be ruined by a single phone call.
Federico Fellini, La Dolce Vita
THIS IS the saddest chapter of all.
“How’s your son, Tommy, doing?” inquired an old customer of Hector’s. Hector had sold him an insurance policy a few years before, and they hadn’t run into each other since. Hector burst into tears.1
Although it had been five years since that awful October evening, the memory and the pain were ever fresh. Tommy, fourteen, had been the center of Hector’s and Jodi’s lives. The family ate breakfast together every morning, and Hector and Jodi included Tommy in almost everything they did. Every Saturday was Tommy’s special day with Hector: just Tommy and Hector all day long.
Norma Sue, Tommy’s seventeen-year-old cousin, was always in trouble in her hometown of Chicago, so her parents sent her to live with Hector and Jodi in their small Iowa town to straighten her out. Tommy was particularly enthused about helping Norma Sue, and tried to get her active in the church youth group.
One Monday evening, Tommy persuaded Norma Sue to go to a youth-group meeting with him. She drove. About an hour later, Jodi dropped by her office and took a call from Hector. Hector said that there had been a small car accident, but that both kids were okay. To put her mind at ease, Jodi called the hospital and was told to come right over. Jodi went there and waited, and when Hector arrived with the police, she saw that he was hysterical. She knew immediately that Tommy was dead.
The five years since have been an unending hell for Jodi and Hector. Jodi, formerly ebullient, has been suicidally depressed ever since. She has lost all motivation to do anything. She never went back to her office, and now barely keeps house. Once or twice a week she wakes up from terrifying nightmares, which often depict Tommy surrounded by “bad” kids, pleading with his mother to protect him. She relives that Monday evening every day of her life.
Hector has barely hung on to his sales job. He used to be a regular member of the million-dollar club, but he hasn’t come close since Tommy died. Weekends are even worse for him because that was the time he always devoted to Tommy. Every time the phone rings, Hector almost jumps out of his skin. He can’t talk to anyone—especially Jodi—about Tommy because it would hurt too much.
Last month, Hector moved out and Jodi filed for divorce.
Tragedy used to be a part of everyone’s life—the human condition. Until this century in the West, more than half the population thought life was a vale of tears. Not so now. It is not unusual to go through an entire lifetime without tragedy.