My Passive-Aggressive Life.
Passive Aggressive behavior is a form of covert abuse. When someone hits you or yells at you, you know that you've been abused. It is obvious and easily identified. Covert abuse is subtle and veiled or disguised by actions that appear to be normal, at times loving and caring. The passive aggressive person is a master at covert abuse.
Passive aggressive behavior stems from an inability to express anger in a healthy way. A person's feelings may be so repressed that they don't even realize they are angry or feeling resentment. A passive aggressive can drive people around him/her crazy and seem sincerely dismayed when confronted with their behavior. Due to their own lack of insight into their feelings the passive aggressive often feels that others misunderstand them or, are holding them to unreasonable standards if they are confronted about their behavior.
Common Passive Aggressive Behaviors:
Ambiguity: I think of the proverb, "Actions speak louder than words" when it comes to the passive aggressive and how ambiguous they can be. They rarely mean what they say or say what they mean. The best judge of how a passive aggressive feels about an issue is how they act. Normally they don't act until after they've caused some kind of stress by their ambiguous way of communicating.
Forgetfulness: The passive aggressive avoids responsibility by "forgetting." How convenient is that? There is no easier way to punish someone than forgetting that lunch date or your birthday or, better yet, an anniversary.
Things John has forgotten since Tuesday: a vitally important letter for Medicaid that was overdue Monday; agreeing to go out for groceries by noon so I could work on the food for Willow's party.
Blaming: They are never responsible for their actions. If you aren't to blame then it is something that happened at work, the traffic on the way home or the slow clerk at the convenience store. The passive aggressive has no faults, it is everyone around him/her who has faults and they must be punished for those faults.
John likes to blame himself for most things, but whenever I give him three or four examples to illustrate a pattern of behavior, he explains away every example and acts like they don't illustrate a pattern just because it happens every single time.
Lack of Anger: He/she may never express anger. There are some who are happy with whatever you want. On the outside anyway! The passive aggressive may have been taught, as a child, that anger is unacceptable. Hence they go through life stuffing their anger, being accommodating and then sticking it to you in an under-handed way.
John goads me, pushing me until I lash out at him. He has plenty of overt anger too, but he doesn't feel comfortable letting it loose until he's gotten me to lose my temper first, so he can feel like it's not his fault.
Fear of Dependency: From Scott Wetlzer, author of Living With The Passive Aggressive Man. "Unsure of his autonomy and afraid of being alone, he fights his dependency needs, usually by trying to control you. He wants you to think he doesn't depend on you, but he binds himself closer than he cares to admit. Relationships can become battle grounds, where he can only claim victory if he denies his need for your support."
When I tell him I can't take care of him the way he wants me to, he gets offended because he "can take care of himself." A man who can't eat or sleep and drinks coffee all day, then beer all night, isn't taking care of himself.
I have ceded control of the entire house to him. He has it all the way he wants. When we moved in, he fought me over the way I decorated the top of my dresser, and he won. The more control I let him have, the more control he passive-aggressively demands.
Fear of Intimacy: The passive aggressive often can't trust. Because of this, they guard themselves against becoming intimately attached to someone. A passive aggressive will have sex with you but they rarely make love to you. If they feel themselves becoming attached, they may punish you by withholding sex.
Obstructionism: Do you want something from your passive aggressive spouse? If so, get ready to wait for it or maybe even never get it. It is important to him/her that you don't get your way. He/she will act as if giving you what you want is important to them but, rarely will he/she follow through with giving it. It is very confusing to have someone appear to want to give to you but never follow through. You can begin to feel as if you are asking too much which is exactly what he/she wants to you to feel.
1. I've been begging for counseling since this time last year, when I was attempting to process the feelings of betrayal engendered when he put my former sister-in-law Molly's needs ahead of mine. Five months before we moved, in December, he got the number to a place that did low-cost counseling. For Christmas, I told him all I wanted was for him to call that number. For my birthday in February, I told him I wanted him to call that number. In late March, he told me we were moving soon, so why bother? And then much later he told me he never wanted to call that number because it was a religiously affiliated counseling center. But he didn't tell me that when I asked him at Christmas or my birthday, so I never had a chance to look up another center.
2. I fought to get him into the individual therapy he told me he knew he needed. He'd always say we couldn't afford it, even though he'd spend $30-$70 a week on beer.
3. He told me two years ago he'd design a tattoo for me. In August of last year, I won a certificate for $100 worth of tattoos, and he told me he'd design that. I have one month left before my certificate expires, and no tattoo design.
Victimization: The passive aggressive feels they are treated unfairly. If you get upset because he or she is constantly late, they take offense because; in their mind, it was someone else's fault that they were late. He/she is always the innocent victim of your unreasonable expectations, an over-bearing boss or that slow clerk at the convenience store.
This is John all over. When I told him I had trouble depending on him, he got upset and called me mean. He cried, and asked me why I attack him. I don't appreciate all the things he does for me, and when I say they're what he wants and not what I want, that's my fault too.
Procrastination: The passive aggressive person believes that deadlines are for everyone but them. They do things on their own time schedule and be damned anyone who expects differently from them.
John only does this when it's what he perceives as personal time. His wakeup ritual takes two or three hours. When I asked him at 10:30 to go to the grocery store by noon, he said okay as long as he could have some coffee first. Then he sat on the couch and watched TV for twenty minutes, and then we were interrupted by some friends dropping by. They were gone by 11:45. John made coffee and went upstairs to drink it and "wake up." At 1 PM, he came downstairs to get more coffee. I reminded him about the grocery store, but he wanted to go upstairs and "wake up" some more. He said he wanted to finish some of HIS work, and it wouldn't take five minutes. But with that cup of coffee, it would've been at least half an hour before he came back downstairs. I was already behind, I was unable to keep getting ready for the party until he came back with that stuff, but it was completely unreasonable for me to ask this of him because he hadn't had enough coffee. The slightest deviation from the projected course of events leads to hours-long delay in many situations.
The Passive Aggressive and You:
The passive aggressive needs to have a relationship with someone who can be the object of his or her hostility. They need someone whose expectations and demands he/she can resist. A passive aggressive is usually attracted to co-dependents, people with low self-esteem and those who find it easy to make excuses for other's bad behaviors.
The biggest frustration in being with a passive aggressive is that they never follow through on agreements and promises. He/she will dodge responsibility for anything in the relationship while at the same time making it look as if he/she is pulling his/her own weight and is a very loving partner. The sad thing is, you can be made to believe that you are loved and adored by a person who is completely unable to form an emotional connection with anyone.
The passive aggressive ignores problems in the relationship, sees things through their own skewed sense of reality and if forced to deal with the problems will completely withdraw from the relationship and you. They will deny evidence of wrong doing, distort what you know to be real to fit their own agenda, minimize or lie so that their version of what is real seems more logical.
Passive aggressive behavior stems from an inability to express anger in a healthy way. A person's feelings may be so repressed that they don't even realize they are angry or feeling resentment. A passive aggressive can drive people around him/her crazy and seem sincerely dismayed when confronted with their behavior. Due to their own lack of insight into their feelings the passive aggressive often feels that others misunderstand them or, are holding them to unreasonable standards if they are confronted about their behavior.
Common Passive Aggressive Behaviors:
Ambiguity: I think of the proverb, "Actions speak louder than words" when it comes to the passive aggressive and how ambiguous they can be. They rarely mean what they say or say what they mean. The best judge of how a passive aggressive feels about an issue is how they act. Normally they don't act until after they've caused some kind of stress by their ambiguous way of communicating.
Forgetfulness: The passive aggressive avoids responsibility by "forgetting." How convenient is that? There is no easier way to punish someone than forgetting that lunch date or your birthday or, better yet, an anniversary.
Things John has forgotten since Tuesday: a vitally important letter for Medicaid that was overdue Monday; agreeing to go out for groceries by noon so I could work on the food for Willow's party.
Blaming: They are never responsible for their actions. If you aren't to blame then it is something that happened at work, the traffic on the way home or the slow clerk at the convenience store. The passive aggressive has no faults, it is everyone around him/her who has faults and they must be punished for those faults.
John likes to blame himself for most things, but whenever I give him three or four examples to illustrate a pattern of behavior, he explains away every example and acts like they don't illustrate a pattern just because it happens every single time.
Lack of Anger: He/she may never express anger. There are some who are happy with whatever you want. On the outside anyway! The passive aggressive may have been taught, as a child, that anger is unacceptable. Hence they go through life stuffing their anger, being accommodating and then sticking it to you in an under-handed way.
John goads me, pushing me until I lash out at him. He has plenty of overt anger too, but he doesn't feel comfortable letting it loose until he's gotten me to lose my temper first, so he can feel like it's not his fault.
Fear of Dependency: From Scott Wetlzer, author of Living With The Passive Aggressive Man. "Unsure of his autonomy and afraid of being alone, he fights his dependency needs, usually by trying to control you. He wants you to think he doesn't depend on you, but he binds himself closer than he cares to admit. Relationships can become battle grounds, where he can only claim victory if he denies his need for your support."
When I tell him I can't take care of him the way he wants me to, he gets offended because he "can take care of himself." A man who can't eat or sleep and drinks coffee all day, then beer all night, isn't taking care of himself.
I have ceded control of the entire house to him. He has it all the way he wants. When we moved in, he fought me over the way I decorated the top of my dresser, and he won. The more control I let him have, the more control he passive-aggressively demands.
Fear of Intimacy: The passive aggressive often can't trust. Because of this, they guard themselves against becoming intimately attached to someone. A passive aggressive will have sex with you but they rarely make love to you. If they feel themselves becoming attached, they may punish you by withholding sex.
Obstructionism: Do you want something from your passive aggressive spouse? If so, get ready to wait for it or maybe even never get it. It is important to him/her that you don't get your way. He/she will act as if giving you what you want is important to them but, rarely will he/she follow through with giving it. It is very confusing to have someone appear to want to give to you but never follow through. You can begin to feel as if you are asking too much which is exactly what he/she wants to you to feel.
1. I've been begging for counseling since this time last year, when I was attempting to process the feelings of betrayal engendered when he put my former sister-in-law Molly's needs ahead of mine. Five months before we moved, in December, he got the number to a place that did low-cost counseling. For Christmas, I told him all I wanted was for him to call that number. For my birthday in February, I told him I wanted him to call that number. In late March, he told me we were moving soon, so why bother? And then much later he told me he never wanted to call that number because it was a religiously affiliated counseling center. But he didn't tell me that when I asked him at Christmas or my birthday, so I never had a chance to look up another center.
2. I fought to get him into the individual therapy he told me he knew he needed. He'd always say we couldn't afford it, even though he'd spend $30-$70 a week on beer.
3. He told me two years ago he'd design a tattoo for me. In August of last year, I won a certificate for $100 worth of tattoos, and he told me he'd design that. I have one month left before my certificate expires, and no tattoo design.
Victimization: The passive aggressive feels they are treated unfairly. If you get upset because he or she is constantly late, they take offense because; in their mind, it was someone else's fault that they were late. He/she is always the innocent victim of your unreasonable expectations, an over-bearing boss or that slow clerk at the convenience store.
This is John all over. When I told him I had trouble depending on him, he got upset and called me mean. He cried, and asked me why I attack him. I don't appreciate all the things he does for me, and when I say they're what he wants and not what I want, that's my fault too.
Procrastination: The passive aggressive person believes that deadlines are for everyone but them. They do things on their own time schedule and be damned anyone who expects differently from them.
John only does this when it's what he perceives as personal time. His wakeup ritual takes two or three hours. When I asked him at 10:30 to go to the grocery store by noon, he said okay as long as he could have some coffee first. Then he sat on the couch and watched TV for twenty minutes, and then we were interrupted by some friends dropping by. They were gone by 11:45. John made coffee and went upstairs to drink it and "wake up." At 1 PM, he came downstairs to get more coffee. I reminded him about the grocery store, but he wanted to go upstairs and "wake up" some more. He said he wanted to finish some of HIS work, and it wouldn't take five minutes. But with that cup of coffee, it would've been at least half an hour before he came back downstairs. I was already behind, I was unable to keep getting ready for the party until he came back with that stuff, but it was completely unreasonable for me to ask this of him because he hadn't had enough coffee. The slightest deviation from the projected course of events leads to hours-long delay in many situations.
The Passive Aggressive and You:
The passive aggressive needs to have a relationship with someone who can be the object of his or her hostility. They need someone whose expectations and demands he/she can resist. A passive aggressive is usually attracted to co-dependents, people with low self-esteem and those who find it easy to make excuses for other's bad behaviors.
The biggest frustration in being with a passive aggressive is that they never follow through on agreements and promises. He/she will dodge responsibility for anything in the relationship while at the same time making it look as if he/she is pulling his/her own weight and is a very loving partner. The sad thing is, you can be made to believe that you are loved and adored by a person who is completely unable to form an emotional connection with anyone.
The passive aggressive ignores problems in the relationship, sees things through their own skewed sense of reality and if forced to deal with the problems will completely withdraw from the relationship and you. They will deny evidence of wrong doing, distort what you know to be real to fit their own agenda, minimize or lie so that their version of what is real seems more logical.