approval seeking

Old 05-06-2007, 07:19 PM
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approval seeking

So, I am in an interesting situation, I work with my spouse. Its her business. I work for her but we are both professionals so I really work with her...

That said, I find that I, without even realizing it, really want her approval and if I do something that results in negative feedback, I find that I get really hurt by it. I know this stems from the abusive childhood at the hands of alcoholic parents where I was constantly seeking for approval as some form of proof that they loved me... but this is a totally different dynamic.

How does one deal with this situation?

Levi
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Old 05-06-2007, 09:15 PM
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Hey there Levi,

I worked with my ex, we both owned a small business, so I can relate a little. I gotta run to a comitment right now, but I'll get back and post tomorrow.

Mike
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Old 05-06-2007, 09:28 PM
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Look forward to hearing from you on this Mike! I sure don't want my lady to become my ex, she is amazing and I love her so.

Levi.
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Old 05-06-2007, 10:19 PM
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Originally Posted by leviathon View Post
So, I am in an interesting situation, I work with my spouse. Its her business. I work for her but we are both professionals so I really work with her...

That said, I find that I, without even realizing it, really want her approval and if I do something that results in negative feedback, I find that I get really hurt by it. I know this stems from the abusive childhood at the hands of alcoholic parents where I was constantly seeking for approval as some form of proof that they loved me... but this is a totally different dynamic.

How does one deal with this situation?

Levi
Ive BTDT. Sometimes the best solution is to just talk to the person involved. Why dont you just tell her what you told us and ask her what she thinks the two of you should do about it.
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Old 05-06-2007, 10:53 PM
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Recognition is the begining.
It was all interconnected for me , unresolved anger,
negative inner voice, guilt..etc.
I continued to seek approval from my alki-father,
even when people told me to stop.
It's suttle..but it's was always there for the longest time.
I just applied the principle of what u learned in AA and
new things I learned here at SR.

Removing the negative inner vioce was my first step
in this process...I imagine there's different ways.

I bascailly did a 4th step, just pertaining to my father.
A lot of why my my thought process was a certain
way, my perception of life, my emotions, my reactions-action.
The behaviors i established as a child to servived, effecting
me as an aduilt.

Just continuing on my recovery and loving myself more.
Yes..to out grow my father...I flet guilt even as I was taking
these steps.

But it has liberating
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Old 05-06-2007, 10:54 PM
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I have worked with a significant other in the past. My suggestion is to be open and honest. First tell her what you admire about her, ask her what she thinks is positive about the work you do, ask her where you can improve, and if she is sharing with you in a negative way...let her know how to make suggestions in a positive way.

Starting off with a positive, will allow her not to on the defensive. Another way is to pick one day out of the week that is a "work meeting" where you can discuss what went right and where both of you can improve. It might be a nice bonding experience.
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Old 05-08-2007, 07:24 AM
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Thank you for your sharing, that is helpful. I will put those words into action in my life. We started with that today.

For her the biggest issue is that she is the "boss", not so much of me, but of the staff (9). She does the admin, she does the HR, she does the oversight of managing the firm. I am a lawyer, as is she.

When I came to work with her, I was clear that I did not want to run a business as it is not an interest of mine. I told her clearly that I would work hard with her and help bring money into the firm so that the financial side of her stress, which was huge, would ease. It has done exactly that.

Unfortunatley, she seems to need assistance with the other stuff and I just don't want to do that. She wears it all. IT is a great stress for her and I am struggling. Part of me is like, well, it is her company and she was doing that before we got together; but the other part of me is like, she is my sweetheart, she is stressed and I want to help. Problem is that I do not handle hugely long hours well any more. I work my 10 or 12 and then go home. That's it. I need rest to keep from burning out.

I don't do weekends unless it is for trial preparation. She has finally started doing weekends off too. This has helped other than that she is clearly on edge b/c she is always picking at things. She is insecure about things and at times I get frustrated with it. I ask her, why don't you go see a counsellor or something to help you deal with this stuff b/c I can't deal with it all... that's not what a spouse does. Her resposne, the local counsellors, etc., are not great; can't talk to pastor b/c it is a small town and he will spill stuff out... he's not good at keeping confidences.

These all sound like excuses to me. I get frustrated with it. This all reminds me of me when I was trying really hard not to deal with my problems. There was always an excuse. The reality was that I simply didn't want to accept help.

Wow, this is really insightful, she was previously married to a man that thought it was perfectly alright to sit at home and be supported and to not offer anything in return. She became over compensating to deal with that. She worked incredibly long hours to pay the bills, a lot of which he racked up, and to support both her and him. The list of crap from this fellow is long.

The insightful realization I had just now is that she probably grew to only rely on herself, but at the same time to resent the other person. She also could not talk to anyone b/c as a Christian, she grew up with a disfunctional christian father - schizophrenia - and all that entails she could not detach from this abusive man, could not discuss his flaws (tried with her sisters and they all told her to work harder on her marriage, to give him more sex, etc.). In short, she stayed in a loveless disfunctional marriage for five years b/c of her Christian obligation to the man she married.

A further realization, she likely has a lot of baggage from that relationship that she is needing to deal with and like it or not, she has to go to counselling to get it out.

Its funny, just writing this stuff out helps!

Thanks all. Levi
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Old 05-09-2007, 08:13 AM
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Sounds to me like you nailed it Levi. She seems to be putting you in the same box with the other guy and her old coping mechanisms are coming out.

I still have times when I say or do something totally unexpected to my husband, when I have to tell him that it's not him that I'm reacting to, it's my old baggage, and have to apologize for my behavior. I usually explain to him what the baggage was and that I don't expect him to change his behavior, but I want to let him be aware of what button he pushed.

Sounds like she's not aware of even having buttons, forget being able to work around those buttons. And it sounds like you're starting to resemble a great big button for her. I wish you much luck in working this out with her.
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Old 05-09-2007, 05:46 PM
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Wonderful thread, love all the posts.

I see two entirely different issues here, which can easily get tangled up.

I found that in my "toxic" family it was extremely important to be liked by the adults. As a child I expected that being liked would result in not getting hurt. Now that I am an adult and have witnessed other "toxic" families I realize that I was wrong. There was _nothing_ I could have done to protect myself. My alcoholic parents were completely random in their behavior. I could have been a potted plant and would have been treated exactly the same.

The problem was that as a child I could not understand that, so those random times when I did get some non-injurious attention I _believed_ that it had been my behavior that had protected me. A whole childhood of that resulted in a deep belief that in order to get "love" of any kind I had to "buy" it with my behavior. I had to do something physical in order to be worthy. Mop up the vomit, fix meals for my younger brother, listen attentively to my mother's incoherent, drunken blubbering, lie to the school teacher about my health, etc. etc.

As an adult I brought those old "love lessons" with me. I felt that in order to be a loveable man I had to perform physical duties. Work late, maintain the cars, paint the house, build furniture, mow the lawn. I had no concept that being the "handyman" around the house was _not_ the way to be loved. I believed that love is something I "purchase".

My early attempts at dating were failures. I showered my date with gifts and favors. She got a little tired of that and wanted an emotional connection. I detected her displeasure and reacted with even _more_ gifts and favors, she got more tired and we quickly spiraled out of the relationship.

When I learned how to have a _balance_ between emotional connection and physical activity I was able to have meaningful relationships. Due to my poor health I am no longer able to mow lawns or paint walls. My g/f doesn't care, she'd rather we hire it done and that I just hug her tight and let her vent all about her stressful job. (She works for the school system with severly ******** children)

Working with family is a whole different kettle of problems. My ex wife and I were both very entreprenurial. At one point we had _three_ different companies going at the same time.

what worked for us was to _completely_ separate work from family. We _never_ talked shop at home. Kept a separate corner of a room for work stuff, and when we moved into bigger digs used the spare bedroom. We _never_ talked about family stuff at work.

In addition, we treated our business relationship as business. She owned 51% of one business, which made her the _boss_ and me the employee. I gave my suggestions and let her make the decisions, good or bad. Other times I would own 51% of another business. Those times when we forgot those rules our emotions got very tangled very quickly.

We also kept our money separate. Different checking accounts, different investments, different ownership. I owned my car and she owned hers. She owned one house and I paid rent, we had some rental property which I owned and she paid as an investor would. The result of all this is that we never fought over money. Not ever. We were completely independent of each other in financial and business matters, which allowed us to focus our marital time on marital issues.

If you are into 12 step recovery groups it's part of Tradition 2 and 7.

Following the traditions in our marriage worked very well for us. Until her pill addiction took over we were able to get along wonderfuly well and never had more than mild differences of opinion. We did get tangled up in our issues from time to time. Sometimes she would get into over-working as a result of her own ACoA issues, sometimes I would. We were able to work thru those without major drama because we followed the AA traditions and removed the big stumbling blocks of money, property and prestige from our relationship.

Mike
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Old 05-09-2007, 06:29 PM
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Sounds like the business has outgrown her. I read someplace that a lot of small business owners have that problem when they become sucessful. They just cant give up control. They feel like they have to oversee everything or it wont get done.

You need to persuade her to hire an office manager or a secretary or whatever to take some of the load off. From the sounds of things she needs help. Thats why shes stressed. And not from you. If youre working 12 hour days then youre already doing your part.
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Old 05-11-2007, 01:59 PM
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Thank you all for the input. I really do appreciate it.

I have to be clear, i do have issues too. I realize that I do not handle conflict well. My initial reaction is to largely ignore it and to keep moving. My second reaction is to confront it and try to resolve it. If it persists, my general reaction is defensive and that is problematic.

I have recently seen that regardless of how "little" something may feel, I do need to learn to express it in a way that is safe so as to prevent things building up. Sometimes, it seems, the "little" things can build up inside and be a bigger problem than they really are.

I am learning that I am insecure about being loveable. I am a great lawyer. I am good on my feet in court, I can remain objective, I am able to argue the law, etc. So in terms of my profession, I am fine and confident. She is really good there, but lacks her own confidence in her abilities there; so, I am trying to support her by reminding her that she is good, etc... .

In contrast, for me, it seems to be about things like, her and I exchanged rings, not engagement yet, she is still married, but promise rings . A while later, I bought her a nice silver bracelet. She put on the bracelet and was excited, rightfully so, then without thinking said well if it is too much, I could just take off the ring... I, of course, became horribly hurt that she would want to take off the ring that I gave her as a symbol of my love... but rather than try to talk about it, I just told myself "you are over reacting, let it go...". Later in the day something came up and it all came out.

Not good. So the moral of the story seems to be that when something like that triggers something in me, which it did, i should talk about it rather than letting it build up.

I left it because I thought this was a result of my childhood and me feeling dumb b/c it should not be a big deal, etc., but it obviously really mattered to me and as she loves me she would have understood that... I guess the reality is that because of the messed up childhood I had, I have a hard time understanding what is important and what is not important and I have an inherited ability to put my "needs" aside and that results in anger.

Levi
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Old 05-15-2007, 03:34 PM
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Originally Posted by leviathon View Post
So, I am in an interesting situation, I work with my spouse. Its her business. I work for her but we are both professionals so I really work with her...

That said, I find that I, without even realizing it, really want her approval and if I do something that results in negative feedback, I find that I get really hurt by it. I know this stems from the abusive childhood at the hands of alcoholic parents where I was constantly seeking for approval as some form of proof that they loved me... but this is a totally different dynamic.

How does one deal with this situation?

Levi

i do that all the time.you must realy love and or respect her.no big deal
unless you are totaly cheesy with it and she calls you out on it and makes fun of you.or do you catch your self giving yourself pats on your own back in front of her like ,look what i good job i did,or boy i realy nailed it that time dident i.that is kind of lame,but i do that to.seriously ,i can get pretty cheesy sometimes..O whell.
maybe you don't do it that way and insted you just do allot of work and do it very good and work very hard.And if so I say you are a model employee.And she is lucky to have a freak like you.if aproval of your wife is good for buisness then i say run with it man.Of coarse i don't know how over the top you are or are not with it.maybe it is out of hand if it is bothering you enough to get advice about it.Maybe not i dont know.You could lighten up on your self she is after all your wife.and if you want to kiss her butt ,then go for it dude that is what shes there for.
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