Pause (part 1)

Before you (me) lose your shit on your partner... take a beat & do these things.

not my husband's burrito

My husband makes a burrito nearly every morning for breakfast. He also has a *tendency* to leave the ingredients for said breakfast burrito all around the kitchen, while he goes to sit down and eat. This is, of course, the moment I enter the scene and notice all the things, and all the mess and find myself in a negative spiral.

Let me set the scene;

• There is cheese, hot sauce, and tortillas on the counter. The pan he used to cook his eggs is still dirty. The kids all need something, the dog is trying to eat the kids’ breakfasts, lunches haven’t been made and I am likely only a few sips into my coffee.

• I start to tell some “stories” about this mess, like:

  • He does this every single day. There are no exceptions.

  • Why am I married to such a slob? This is so disgusting.

  • Does he even care about our home? Does he even realize how gross this is?

  • Who does he think is going to clean this up? He definitely expects me to just clean up after him.

Now, for most of us, the stories we tell come to our brains so quickly, we may not even notice that we’re making them. I can go through this list of negative thoughts in 3 seconds without even registering the initial emotion - I’m overwhelmed. It immediately turns to blame.

So, instead of losing my shit… because, lest I remind you - this happens in my kitchen, a lot - I have to practice (and yes, it is an *active* practice) some cognitive restructuring.

Cognitive restructuring is a therapeutic technique used to identify and challenge negative or unhelpful thought patterns and replace them with more balanced and realistic ones. It's a core component of cognitive behavioral therapy and is used in various mental health treatments.¹

Here are the steps:

1. notice your negative thoughts.

2. challenge the negative thoughts.

3. replace them with balanced alternatives and/or aim for the MGI (most generous interpretation)*

This is what it looks like step by step for my (almost) daily burrito-gate:

1. Automatic negative thoughts: My husband is really messy and his ingredients are all over the kitchen and he clearly has no regard for anyone but himself. I bet he thinks I’m going to clean up after him.

2. PAUSE. This is key. Taking a pause before any reaction or response will be the difference in a potentially constructive conversation or a fight. Breathe. Notice the feelings and move to challenging them. I am overwhelmed and frustrated.

3. Challenging the automatic thoughts. I then ask myself, is he the only person contributing to the mess here? (no, I also have things lying around the room and maybe the sense of overwhelm is coming from something more than just his burrito. Could be the gaggle of children we made, the dog, the unmade lunches etc. etc.)

   1. What else was he doing this morning that may have contributed to this scene? (he was also making eggs for the baby and getting the other kids their breakfasts);

4. *MGI. Look for the Most Generous Interpretation of the situation/his actions. Can I make up a “story” or provide the most loving interpretation of events?

   1. He is not creating mess intentionally; he was busy trying to make everyone food at the same time; he wanted to eat it while it was hot. I can understand all of that. I am going to trust that he will clean it up after he eats.

      1. (side note - 90% of the time he does clean up after he eats so I have learned to wait it out and make peace with our differences of “clean while you cook” vs. “clean after you cook” philosophies.)

5. Can I let this go? *this is the question that will either make this a fully internal process (steps 1-4 inside my lovely brain and then drop it) OR, it needs to become a conversation. [‘The conversation’ will be part 2, next week! Stay tuned!]

Now, this may seem like *a whole lot* of internal talk/work to manage each time your partner does something that annoys you. Yes, it is. (Firstly, I promise fighting is way more work and creates far more issues short term and long term) And, second, this process gets easier. Once you learn this framework, and practice it - I promise it becomes very intuitive.

• Invitation to you (hot tip): write these steps on a few post it notes and place them in the areas that tend to be your trigger rooms (kitchen, bathroom mirror, closet - etc.) use it as a guide to start internalizing the restructuring. If it is right in front of you, it will be easier to stop and pause.

Please let me know what you think about this approach, my husband’s incorrect cooking philosophy :) and/or any questions you may have!

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with gratitude,

Sasha

1. https://www.healthline.com/health/cognitive-restructuring