So a few things have happened in this past week but there is something fresh in my mind that I am choosing to write about in this entry. Last night we had a bit of a scare with the Dog. The dog had gotten into something potentially harmful to her and it was my fault. I kept the issue to myself for a while while I tried to convince myself that it wasn’t a big deal and that she would be fine. I think I was afraid to tell my wife at first because I wasn’t sure how she would react, I didn’t want her to be mad at me, and I think I just didn’t want it to be my fault if the dog got sick.
When I finally worked up the nerve to talk with my wife about what had happened, I was caught of guard by her reaction. She was stressed and upset, and I feel like I got mad about her reaction. I had an expectation that she would put her feelings aside and support and comfort me through the stress I felt. My expectation was that my wife would bury her feelings and put me ahead of her own feelings. I feel that my expectation was routed in the everyday sexism that my wife is less important than me because she is a woman and that she is expected to serve me her husband because she is my wife.
That moment of my sexism and being mad that my wife dare to have her own feelings instead of putting me first and serving me with comfort and support, kicked off a series of events where I proceeded to make things worse. My actions continued to be sexist. I ignored my wife repeatedly, I argued with her feelings, I lied to her, and I did not care for her. I treated her as less important than me, because I am the man and I cannot be at fault. She is the woman and she has to accept me. Like so many past moments in our relationship I treated her as trash that was less important than me and I believe that it is routed in my sexism. I am lucky she has stuck with me as long as she has.
Who is to say that things would have turned out differently, but I should have never expected my wife to put aside her feelings to focus on serving me. I am sexist for expecting her to serve me while burying her feelings. I am responsible for my own feelings, it is up to me to make myself feel better when I am stressed, it is up to me to forgive myself for making a mistake. It is not up to my wife to take away those feelings for me. If I am to treat my wife as an equal I need to expect her to have her own feelings, and not to put them aside to serve me while hers never gets focused on.
As far as things with the dog went, we called the pet poison helpline and they advised us that she would probably be fine. We monitored her and today she seems to be feeling normal.
Talk next week