Surviving Narcissism Exploring life after marriage to a narcissist. Learning and thriving by sharing our story. – Jesse Blayne

I’ve been around the block a few times — sometimes even stomping my feet while I make the pass.  I know that, in some cases, a few deep breaths, or a glass of water, or a handful of nuts, or a self-imposed time-out just won’t do the trick.  Hell, I’ve even chugged the glass of water, grabbed the handful of nuts, marched outside, and come storming back in to start scrubbing the floor.  By then, I’ve gone way beyond the 15 minutes, and it’s still not working.

This is when I get serious.  This will sound like a contradiction to the 15 Minute Tricks, but it’s necessary to get inside my head for this approach.  I force myself to sort through all the tangled thoughts that are swimming around in my brain.

An aside …  One day I’m getting my haircut by this gal that I love who runs a beauty shop with her sister.  They are chatting about this book that one of them is reading.  It has something to do with “Women are Spaghetti and Men are Waffles.”  How can you not enjoy an analogy like that?  Besides, I absolutely adore spaghetti.  I guess the premise is that women have every thought they’ve ever had wrapped around every other thought they’ve ever had.  And all those thoughts are standing at the ready to wrap around any new or potential thoughts.  Men compartmentalize their thoughts into neat little boxes, like the sections of a waffle.  I’ve got to get that book.  Anyway, I find that I’ve been enjoying thinking of female brains as plates of spaghetti, and male brains as a bunch of boxes with lids.  (I don’t really like waffles.  And I admire a guy’s ability to put a topic or thought into a box, put a lid on it, and return to it later.  Sometimes they decide they don’t like, never have liked, that thought, and they never go back.  I wish I could do that.)

So I’m going with the plate-of-spaghetti analogy.  In that plate of spaghetti, or pile of thoughts, there are usually a couple thoughts that seem to be festering among the other relatively innocuous thoughts.  The plan is to ferret out the one or two thoughts that seem to be poisoning all the others.  The poisonous thoughts are the ones that do me in.  I can deal with all the mundane issues.  I begin to sort out the thoughts.  I’ll see if there’s anything I can do about them, and take some kind of action.

Maybe your laptop is away for repairs.  Maybe your laundry is multiplying and making its way down the hall.  Maybe toys are littering every corner of the house.  Maybe your mom can’t seem to find a way to say anything without hurting your feelings.  Maybe the leaves are piling up and waiting for you to go at them with a rake.  Maybe the furnace only comes on when you fiddle with the switch on the thermostat.  Maybe the person you want to spend the rest of your life with lives 2000 miles away.  Maybe you haven’t the slightest  clue what to fix for dinner.

Here’s what I do:

Grab a trash can and some sticky notes and a Sharpie.  Write each individual thought on its own sticky note.  (Okay, I know that there isn’t a female over the age of four who has had only eight thoughts running through her brain at one time.  I do realize that the reference is “spaghetti” and not “manicotti”. )  Put “laptop” on one, “leaves” on one, “dinner” on one, his name on another, “Mom” on another, “furnace” on one, “toys” on another and “laundry” on the last note.  Now place all these notes on the counter in front of you, in no particular order.  You know, from experience, that when you are overwhelmed, the laundry can be just as daunting as the distance between you and your love.  Really look at those notes and ask yourself if there is anything you can do about each thought.

• You can fuss with the thermostat, or you can make the call to the plumbing and heating place.  Get out the phone book and make the call.  Put the note on the cupboard.   Pitch this note after the furnace is checked.  Leave the phone book out for another note.
• Promise the kids you’ll play the game that they can agree on if they can find where ALL their toys live, and put them away.
• Sort the laundry and get a load going in the washing machine.
• If you haven’t figured out, by now, that your mom isn’t going to change, then the problem is with you, not with her.  Throw the “Mom” note in the trash.
• Grab the phone book and call to have a pizza delivered for dinner.
• You can’t do a thing about the distance issue.  Sure, you could pack up your family, load the U Haul and drive across country, only to land at his door and have him say, “Hi!  What are you guys doing here?”  Throw his note in the trash.
• The folks at the computer repair place told you it would be 7-10 days.  You are on day 8.  Quit thinking about it.  Put the note on the cupboard until that situation resolves itself.
• In the time it took to do all this, a wind picked up and the leaves are on their way to the neighbor’s yard.  Pitch that note, too.

Put on some music, like “I’m Yours” by Jason Mraz, pour yourself a well-deserved glass of wine and sit down to play “Sleeping Queens” with your kids.  You should be able to get one game in before switching loads of laundry and answering the door for the pizza guy.