Those of us who have been on the Forum for a while (for me it's been three years; I first made contact with the Straight Spouse Network through a peer counselor and posted on the Forum in September 2016) know that there are certain patterns of response that follow after a partner's disclosure or our own discovery.   
 
   When a new person comes on the Forum, oftentimes they exhibit a pattern of response that elicits from one or more of us farther along on this path/journey a comment saying this, something like "It's common that..." or "Don't be surprised if..."  These comments fall into categories I privately think of as "It's not unlikely you will do/think/feel the following," or, "It's not unlikely your partner will do/think/feel the following." (Somewhere on the forum in the past year or so I actually did write a post about these patterns of response, how so many of us, for example, arrive here focused on our partners and concerned for them and not ourselves, or how we want to help our partners along "in their journey," etc. etc.; a cursory search didn't turn it up, but if I find it, I'll re-post it). 

   The forum includes a "First Aid Guide," one that is like triage care: you're in shock, here's what you can do to treat it.   I have often thought we need another guide, one that can alert those just confronting the situation to some responses they might encounter in themselves or in their partners.   I personally have found that understanding there are patterns of response, and what they were, helped me both to to understand my own and my (ex)partner's behavior, to respond to it with more understanding, and to gain some control over my behavior.

   I understand the truism of "You hear what you want to hear, and you see what you want to see," as Harry Nilsson has the Rock Man say in "The Point."  That is, I understand that one can't hear or see something until one has arrived at the point one is ready and able to hear or see it.  So a guide can't save anyone from the agony attendant on this situation we are thrust into.  But I also know that what others here did say about those likely responses and patterns of behavior helped me get there faster.  To know, for example, that my now-ex would ramp up his feminizing with every new step, that it was like an addiction, gave me an understanding of his behavior so I could understand what I was seeing as it happened, and not just react to each new moving of the goalposts.  

   Do you all think this would be a useful thread?  Maybe even a useful thread to follow the one that is the First Aid thread?  (That is, get pinned up at the top?)  If so, could you please contribute your wisdom?  

   

  

Last edited by OutofHisCloset (September 27, 2019 8:34 am)