Temperament Counseling the Big Bad Wolf: Fifth Installment
This was the second full counseling session and we began to delve into specific complaints. BBW’s complaint about Javelina spanned a wide gambit. Here they are in his own words in list form.
- Javelina did not want to spend any time with him
- Javelina had abandoned the family
- Javelina spent too much time at work
- Javelina demonstrated her neglect by not getting the children to school on time
- Javelina was irresponsible
- Javelina’s behavior was causing BBW to become disillusioned with their marriage
- Javelina’s suggestion that they end the marriage was more evidence of her culpability for the problems
- BBW felt she was being disobedient to God’s will to consider divorce
- He denied his marriage was collapsing stating things “weren’t that bad”
When Javelina interjected that things were that bad, he immediately began trying to convince her that she was wrong.
In order to clarify the severity of the situation for BBW I began asking him the following two somewhat pointed questions.
“BBW, what can be accomplished when one person in a disagreement tries to control the situation by attempting to manipulate the other?”
and
“Do you think a marriage can be kept going by sheer force of will?”
At this point BBW became angry. He attempted to vent his anger by blaming me for the marital difficulties they were currently experiencing. Although, I was amused that he would assume this posture I knew the proper technique was to assume an attitude of confidence and directly, simply and clearly state the limits of behavior that I was willing to tolerate. This action I took in a very decisive manner. As he had expected to draw me out to engage in a pointless argument, thus evading the core issue, this took him completely off guard. His manner deflated and he was cleared flustered by my response.
I allowed him to ramble for a few minutes and then explained to him in no uncertain terms that their marital issues existed wholly independent of any interaction either he or Javelina had ever had with me, and accusations designed to deflect responsibility onto me would not be tolerated.
He was angry for some time. I quietly waited him out. Silence is a powerful tool that many are uncomfortable with. Eventually, he succumbed to it.
Near the end of the session Javelina had to leave. When the audience for his behavior began to be removed he settled back down and we reopened the dialog.
In order to establish a therapeutic rapport after his acting out behavior I began to speak to him about ways in which he could more positively express his anger and disagreement. At this point he began to speak non-stop in an effort to overwhelm me with his position. I made a short, firm, forceful but calm interjection and informed him that this was not an acceptable manner for interacting with me and restated my refusal to tolerate it.
He became angry again. Again, I confronted him and pointed out the ways in which I would accept his participation. I then outlined some techniques that would allow him to positive address his anger issues. He was quite taken aback and left the session “huffing and puffing” in an abrupt manner.
Post session notes:
I have been involved in many hostile interactions and counseling session over the years, and presenting a confident, firm yet nonthreatening posture has always served me well. However, it isn’t for everyone and you really have to know your antagonists. You should know that neither BBW nor Javelina kept the appointment for the session scheduled for the next week. Neither did they keep the appointment scheduled for the week after that. However, on the third week they returned to counseling for session three.