Dear Sappho
I have finally come to the realization that I am a henpecked lesbian. I know I’m not the only one. Please ask your readers if they are they inclined to submit or willing to surrender in order to placate or please another? If everything you do or say appears to be wrong in the eyes of your significant other, you may be henpecked.
My girlfriend uses harassment and persistent nagging to get her way 98% of the time. I still love her but I don’t know how much longer I can live with her. Counseling failed to solve our disputes. In fact she acted like a self-righteous parent while detailing all my faults and none of her own during counseling. Our counselor pointed out that her behaviors appeared authoritative and dominating to no avail. She quit counseling and I continued, focusing instead on my self-esteem.
I would like this woman who I have loved long and hard to just live and let live. I long for her to appreciate my contributions and not dwell on what she considers to be my flaws. I’m always wrong and she’s always right - without exception ` from the way I eat, talk, walk, or conduct my day, She puts words in my mouth and reads thoughts from my head, none were which I thought or said. Is this considered mental or emotional abuse? Is it possible to break this pattern or should I just look for a new place to live while I still have any self-esteem left at all?
Dear Mentally and Emotional Abused
ReplyDeleteYou have my compassion and sympathy. Your description of being hen pecked is also a perfect description of being dominated. Dominators are bullies. This is not a lesbian problem, it is a domination problem.
Dominators occupy by unreasonable demands, they exert superior control and influence from advantages, which they have mastered, i.e. the home, the hearth, the heart. It is not really a partnership and I noticed that not once did you call her your partner. A partnership means all parties have equal vested interests, assets, voice and responsibility.
One example of being a hen pecked “mate” is the submissive one will not be able to talk to, or have friends because the other is so insecure she will get mad. The dominator leads a double life, hers and yours. She second guesses all of your actions and plans as inferior to hers in a constant game of maintaining her superiority. It's unhealthy on every level. It’s a dictatorship and a sham relationship that becomes a prison.
We probably build the blocks for such relationships in childhood. When dominators teach children to become submissive as a way to get along, these children may find capitulation easier than resisting powerful dominant forces that they are powerless to overcome.
When children do not have enough emotional and social support to become emotionally and psychologically separate from their parents, they develop an artificial or a false self. This adapted self can be either deflated and co-dependent or inflated and counter-dependent. The true self operates from a sense of integrity, personal authenticity and connection to wholeness. We must recognize and emphasize unconditional love as the force that moves humans forward in both their personal development and their spiritual evolution.
Domination is Leadership style gone commando, without regard to the subjects it relies on to have power over. In other words she needs you more than you need her. (:~) Its time for you to set some boundaries. If the walls of the relationship crumble because you wish to participate in your own life, then let the walls of Jericho fall.
We live in a dominator system from the top down, we use hierarchy to control religion, class, education, the media, and apparently “love,” all in an effort to maintain the dominant forces that rule. It’s also known as a hegemony when a group of dominant forces have visible or invisible power and control over others. The cure is to recognize and emphasize unconditional love as the force that moves humans forward in both their personal development and their spiritual evolution.
When you question authority, you test domination. Who gave her more authority in your life than they gave you? When children are taught to become partners in their life’s, in the lives of others, then responsibility to the whole becomes more important that the power of the dominant. You have no power over any one’s life other than your own. You cannot control her actions, only your reactions. Set both of you free by refusing to be dominated by events and powers that have none of your best interests at heart. Smell the freedom and inspire others deeply by acting on it.
Love, Sappho