Three Year Step Back?

You may have heard of the Seven Year Itch. The Seven Year Itch is a concept that happiness in marriage decreases after seven years. It even has an extensive Wikipedia entry.




In my personal experience, there has been a three year step-back. In my first real relationship it was logical, high school and college differences, people growing up and more individual. When it happened in my marriage, it was more intense. It hurt more. It had a domino effect that hurt others and still impacts them today. But it was also clearly a bad mix, a poor match of personalities and souls.




When it happened in the next relationship, I attributed it to distance, complications, my inability to be more open to communication and expressing my feelings. But the idea of it being around three years did creep in. To be honest, I tried to blame the idea that I had an expiration date in relationships as an excuse for my failures in this particular one.




The next time it happened, I think I caused it because I thought it was going to happen. That's confusing. Right. I get that. But I was enjoying this relationship and then I felt I had to get really serious because three years was on the horizon. I even told her I had a three year trend. Which I can't imagine was a fun thing to hear. So I panicked. I went too hard, too mushy, too commitment. Then in reaction, I pulled away. Dating a yo-yo is complicated and confusing. So that ended close to three years as well.




Since then, years now, nothing has come close to three years. Until the past month. I'm closing in on three years with my dog and due to some work changes, my schedule is different. We are around each other at different times than she is used to.




As I have been home more during the day, her routine has been upset. She is confused why I am home during the day. Why I work nights and come home not ready for bed. So she's started falling asleep on the couch and not coming to bed. She will lay in her kennel at the previously normal time that I would leave in the morning. Then come and whine at my feet as I work on the computer, confused, maybe worried that I forgot to go to work. In short, closing in on three years, this relationship is changing as well.




In reality, I know that this current chaos has more to do with a change of routine than the perceived three year itch. But with extra time on my hands, the mind finds extra reasons to worry. My brain is constantly looking for connections, for reasons, for explanations for why I have not achieved the things I think I should have.




The vast of my interpersonal relationships are flawed, strained, distanced at best. Is this because of the natural flow of life and relationships? Or could it be that I expect things to end and create a self fulfilling prophecy that creates that end even when it shouldn't?


According to the Oxford English Dictionary, a self fulfilling prophecy was coined in 1948 by Robert Merton to describe “a false definition of the situation evoking a new behavior which makes the originally false conception come true." Could it be possible that I have used this self fulfilling prophecy to consistently undermine my relationships because I expect them to end eventually? It's not the worst idea I've ever had.


Could it also be that this period of underemployment, working more hours at more jobs but less income overall has impacted my self perception and self worth, even to the extent that I think my dog is drifting away from me, just as every other close important one on one relationship has eventually?


Last night, I couldn't sleep. I lay in bed. My dog soundly asleep on the couch. Was it because she was tired of me? Had I driven her away just like everyone else? Or was I making a mountain out of a mole hill. Perhaps she was just sleeping upstairs because it was ten degrees warmer and she fell asleep two hours before I even began to attempt to try.


After thinking too long about the possibilities, about the seemingly obvious existence of a three year step back in my relationships. I fell asleep.


Yet, in the morning, as the sun finally broke through, barely breaking the cloud cover of yet another cold and snowy morning, the pup was there. Sometime in the night, she had curled up next to my side. We lay there as I scratched behind her ears and sighed. And I thought, perhaps the terrors of the dark of night, perhaps those ideas that I was unlovable, that I had an expiration date on every relationship, maybe just maybe I was mistaken.


Or maybe she was just hungry. With this much paralysis by analysis, every day is an adventure.

My own worst Enemy?

Does a joke create negative momentum? Am I really my own worst enemy?

Two events in the past 48 hours have caused me to consider if that maybe my history of sarcasm, self deprecation and pessimism has gone too far. Perhaps, all the snide remarks, the "if only" and "worst case scenario" statements that I have made for nearly 20 years have created such a negative environment around me that it's become it's own momentum.

Over the top? Hogwash? Maybe. Probably. Yet consider these two events.

A. On Monday I was confident that my fantasy football team was going to prevail in this weeks completely unimportant and meaningless statistical match up. I had a 35 point lead with my opponent left with a singular player on Monday night. I went so far as to say, and this is a direct quote,

"As long as Cam Newton doesn't score 37 points I should be fine."

I was confident but portrayed that in sarcasm and worst case scenario thinking. What happened? Cam Newton scored EXACTLY 37 points on Monday night. Surprising? Yes. Impossible? No. Newton seemingly did that all year in 2011. He's clearly capable. It was simply timing. Not bad timing. Because fantasy football really shouldn't factor into good v bad in life.

My response to this was typical, "Just my luck" It's such a habit.

B. Last night a friend brought to my attention, just how much I slam on myself. While it may have come off a bit harsh, she was completely right. I can't even count how many times in a day I make a self deprecating comment, joke or personal slight. It's nonstop. Name the category, I've got a line. Height, weight, divorce, diet, dating, age, nerd, goofy, theater, horrible person, the worst...etc. I do it too often. I need to make an effort not to do it.

The second part of what my friend said was harder to hear. But no less true. People who constantly verbally beat on themselves tend to do so because they truly believe it and/or they're begging for someone to contradict them. "You're not short", "You're not old", "You'll meet someone" etc. It's nice to hear those things. But it's exhausting to have to constantly say them to the same person over and over. I need to hear those things in my own head. Not from someone else.

So does this mean that I am my own worst enemy? That my negativity brings negativity into my life. Or that I can always find the worst case, the least positive outcome, the dark shadow in every rainbow? The esteemed website Wikipedia claims the following about "Self Fulfilling Prophecy"

"A self-fulfilling prophecy is a prediction that directly or indirectly causes itself to become true, by the very terms of the prophecy itself, due to positive feedback between belief and behaviour......In other words, a positive or negative prophecy, strongly held belief, or delusion - declared as truth when it is actually false - may sufficiently influence people so that their reactions ultimately fulfill the once-false prophecy."

So yeah, it would seem that given that definition, and the anecdotal evidence previously presented that I can be my own worst enemy - when I focus on the negative.

I have so many positives in my life. I have a home, a job, a car, a kick ass Lego collection, friends, family, future, memories, adventures (past, present and future) and so many more. I've done, lived and experienced some wonderful, captivating and amazing things. Perhaps if I keep my mind focused on the positive, I can be my own best ally.

In short, I'm going to try to be less of a pessimistic piss-ant.

P.S. My apologies if your web search for the Christian Slater TV series My Own Worst Enemy led to you to this page. I'm not just being negative when I say, it sucked. If you want Slater, go watch Heathers or Kuffs - they're vastly superior. Of that I'm positive.

P.P.S. Also my apologies if a search for Lit's "My Own Worst Enemy" brought you to this blog. And now it's in everyone's head. You're welcome.