In a Bind
Dear Dr. Katz
My husband often loses his temper whenever I give him a bad school report about our son and I can't stand it. I stopped giving him bad news reports because I fear he will lose his temper with me. When he finally gets the report card he gets doubly mad both at the report and the fact that I was keeping things from him. What can I do?
-In a bind
Dear in a bind
Two different things seem to be going on. The first is that your husband is not taking responsibility for his own out of control behavior and his part in stifling communication between the two of you. The second is that you are treating your belief that he will lose his temper as a definite fact. In your letter you indicate that he "often" loses his temper but evidently sometimes he doesn't. I know that when you believe he is going to lose it you feel upset and that feels emotionally true but it might not be factually true. If you first check out the validity of your belief by asking him if he would lose his temper with you should you give him a bad report about your son then you will really know where you stand. You can't solve a problem if you don't really have it. Let's suppose that your belief is valid and he says yes he would get angry. Then you can put your bind in his lap so that he has to take responsibility for it by for example saying "now look here husband, you want to hear all the news about our son good or bad and you don't want me to hide it from you. I don't mind doing that on the condition that I not get punished for trying to please you and I do feel very punished when you yell at me. So what's to be done? I will try to give you what you want if you are willing to try to give me what I want". Should your husband actually commit himself to trying to control himself, then he would be more likely to succeed at doing it. Either way, you won't be in the bind alone, he will be sharing it with you and in unity there is strength.
- Dr. Katz
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