Sunday, August 28, 2011

I don't want to talk about avoidance issues

We were sitting around talking about argument styles of couples.  I (proudly, I might add) piped up that The Guy and I rarely fight and certainly not in public.  My sister looked at me and announced That's because you're both avoiders!
Oh yeah, that.  Well, I stand by my first statement.
When we were taking pre-wedding training, our minister and his wife had us fill in a survey that we could graph out into our confrontation styles.  I figured it would be interesting -- I work as a crisis worker for a living and The Guy was in management for quite a few years.  Certainly we could handle some conflict.
Colour me surprised when both of us scored highest in Avoidance and Peace Maker.  I guess our career lives are a little different than our personal lives.  Shocking, right?
It immediately brought to mind one of my favourite WKRP episodes.  The boss man, "Big Guy" Arthur Carlson and his wife, Carmen, were a couple much like that.  They spent most of the episode doing what they thought would make the other one happy.  They were both miserable in doing it.  
I can see that happening here.
I have been an avoider my entire life.  I have avoided chores,  I have avoided bed times (like right now!), I have avoided uncomfortable moments, I have avoided confrontation.  I would rather ignore things that are unpleasant until they go away or explode in a firey crash of things I cannot look past.
When I approach an issue, I have a few different techniques, each less helpful than the last.  In one, I start the conversation like this: Dude, did you seriously not refill the toilet roll?  Really? In another, I frostily ignore the issue until it becomes glaringly obvious that something is wrong and results in the offending party to brooch the subject with me.
These are the ways I do things.  My particular favourite is when I attempt to be constructive and/or mature and somehow end up saying the one thing that would cause the most amount of damage in a relationship.  Considering I can do that quite well accidentally when I'm trying to be funny, imagine how good I am when I put my mind to it?
In a family of procrastinators, I am still on of the best at avoidance.  Give me a situation that needs a tangible solution, I am there.  But give me an awkward situation where something needs to be addressed thoughtfully and carefully with consideration for people's feelings that may result in unpleasantness?
Well, I don't want to talk about it.

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