Chapter Five: Communion, Page 2

Helping Doesn’t Help: Samantha and SteveSometimes one person wishes to help, but the other does not want to be helped, and this can create conflict. Samantha and Steve were consulting me. Steve was the athletic director at one of the local colleges. Samantha was a stay-at-home mom. They had three children under the age of five.To open the first session I asked, “How can I help you?”They were sitting at 90° angles on adjacent coaches.Samantha was the first to answer, “We used to love talking together when we were courting. We couldn’t wait to see one another. Or anyway that was how I felt and I thought Steve did too. Steve told me every detail about the time we were apart and I did the same back to him. Each of us talked and listened equally, each about half the time.“Now Steve doesn’t have anything to say to me. I feel shut out of his life. When he comes home, I tell him about my boring days with the children. Sometimes what I have to say about the children is not boring. But I am living in a children’s universe. I have little adult contact. I feel like a nanny or wet-nurse, not like an adult or much less like a woman.“Steve is my main contact with the world outside the children and he doesn’t share with me the stories of his work and his sports world. And I even like sports. I learn more about what’s going on with his teams from the newspaper than I do from him. Something has happened to our communication and I don’t know what.”“Why are you here, Steve?” I asked.“Because Samantha wanted to come.”“Do you see the same communication problems in your marriage as Samantha?” I asked.“No,” Steve replied. “When I come home there is a lot to do. I pitch in and try to help. I will change a diaper or put on some rice for supper or feed the middle one or pick up toys or give baths. It’s always something. There doesn’t seem to be any time to talk.”“The children are always down by 8:00 P.M.,” Samantha said. “And then you are watching ESPN. I ask you to turn off the TV and you do. I try to start a conversation by telling you about my day. You listen. Then I ask you about your day and you say, ‘nothing happened’ and then you turn the TV back on. Isn’t that right?”“I suppose so,” Steve answered.“Then the next morning I get the paper and I read where the girl’s basketball team won the conference title. And you didn’t tell me.”“I’m sorry. I forgot,” Steve said.“What really happened was you didn’t want to talk to me,” Samantha said. “You would rather watch ESPN. How do you think that feels that your husband would rather watch pro basketball than talk to his wife or perhaps make love with his wife?“But I get it. I don’t expect us to be making love when you don’t even consider me worth talking to.”“Steve,” I said. “Can you see that Samantha feels rejected and abandoned by you?”“Yes,” Steve replied. “I can see that. But I am not intending to do that. I don’t know what to say. I love Samantha. It is pretty much like she describes. I guess I don’t share much with her. Maybe I’m just too tired. I don’t really understand it myself.“Well let’s try to have a conversation about your day now,” I suggested. “Steve, can you begin?”“Yes, I guess so,” Steve answered. “Well I had to go to an alumni lunch today. I had to introduce our new football coach so I had to write my speech. Then after lunch I came here. One of the parents of a player on the girl’s softball team complained to me about the coach yelling at their daughter. So after this I’m going to go to watch the girl’s softball team practice. If I see something I don’t like, I will have to have a talk with the coach. I dread that. Then I have to go watch intramural soccer after that. I will come home exhausted.”“You don’t have to go watch soccer,” Samantha said. “And the girl’s softball coach is a jerk and you need to talk to him about how he treats his players. If he doesn’t straighten up, you should fire him.”Steve didn’t respond. There was silence for a time.“See? That’s what happens,” Samantha said. “Steve just stops talking. The conversation is over. If we were at home in the living room, the next thing that would happen is that the TV would suddenly come on. Then I would give up and leave.”“Do you think you said anything that may have shut Steve down?” I asked.“I don’t think so,” Samantha answered.“I think maybe you did,” I said.“What did I say?”“You told him what he should do,” I said.“I was just trying to help. He always comes home tired. I was trying to help him take care of himself.”“Steve, does Samantha’s help do anything for you?” I asked.“No,” he said. “It only makes me feel stupid or guilty and then I don’t want to talk to her.”“Do you have anybody to talk to who will listen to you instead of helping you?” I asked.“My friend Mike,” Steve answered. “He teaches English. We get a beer together sometimes at Jed’s after 5:00. He listens. He does not give me advice or help. He just listens and understands how I feel and he talks about the politics in the English department. I know nothing about academic departmental politics, but I listen. I can’t help him either but I think my listening makes him feel better and I know I appreciate Mike for listening to me and understanding how I feel.”“But I want to be your partner,” Samantha said. “I don’t want to just listen. I want to help.”“Your help doesn’t help,” Steve said. “I don’t tell you how to be a mother. I don’t tell you how and when to breast feed. I wish you expressed more milk so I could feed the baby too, but I do not know how you could manage the children and do what you do. I don’t think you would like me trying to help by telling you what you could do.”“No I wouldn’t,” Samantha said with an edge to her voice. “In fact if you told me to express milk more, I would be furious. You have no idea how hard it is to do what I’m doing and then you want me to express milk for you so you can feel like you have your turn at bonding with the baby. That sounds all well and good in theory but you have no idea what effect that would have on me.”“Are you listening to what you are saying, Samantha?” I asked.“No,” she answered. “I am too angry.”“Well, maybe this anger is what Steve feels when you try to help him. Maybe he thinks it would be better for him to say nothing than to tell you how angry you have made him, when you try to give him help he didn’t ask for. He understands his job—from being inside the job. There is no way you can understand the demands of his job just as there is no way he can understand the demands your children place on you.“That’s right,” Steve said. “I wish you would just listen, understand and respect that I know what I’m doing. When you offer help and advice, I feel like you think I’m stupid and that you know something I don’t.“It is my job to oversee intramural sports. I have to make sure referees are there and that players who are injured are taken to the emergency room at the hospital. I wish I could come home but I can’t.“And yes, I know the girls’ softball coach yells at the girls. I want to help him find the good in himself. I don’t want to just treat him as he treats his players. It is more complicated than that. He wins games. Most of his players like him. I’m not going to fire him.“It is easy for you to make these suggestions but it just shows me how much you do not understand and how useless it is for me to talk to you.  I don’t want your help. I do wish I had your understanding.”“How can I be a part of your life if I can’t help you?” Samantha asked.“You can respect that I know how to solve my problems better than you do,” Steve answered. “When I tell you about a problem, instead of trying to fix it, you can tell me about how you feel lost sometimes too. I don’t want to hear that you know what to do, while I don’t. I don’t want your simplistic solutions that show me you haven’t got a clue.“In my time, in my way I will figure something out. What I need in a partner is someone who believes in me and trusts that I will find my way. And yes, I would like to be able to talk with you and trust that you will listen, really listen without thinking you have to fix something. Helping me doesn’t help.” Samantha wanted to help. She wanted to give Steve an answer, to fix his problem, to rescue him and to be his hero. She must have tried to help many times only to fail and with each failure she only tried harder. And the harder she tried to help Steve the more he resisted her help.It is a sad outcome when people are motivated with good intentions and hearts full of love. Later when the chapter discusses communion, witnessing and testifying, you will see how Samantha may have helped without solving Steve’s problems.