FEST Writing Group

 I’m posting what I wrote this last November in preparation to be interviewed for the  January 2023 Clinical Conference on Aging.

The interview  was recorded with Priscilla Friesen on Nov 18.22. Since then, I continue to get emotional and miss my husband multiple times every day, and,  I’ve been using my increasing energy to address the ongoing emotional process in our nuclear family,  my family of origin and the extended family, along with personal business I’m am learning to manage which requires my attention. My  goal is to resolve the business issues adequately so that in a couple of years I would be able to die with a sense of having discharged my responsibilities to the future in this regard.  I’d like to be able to say the same about the emotional process.

Regarding this effort to do my best with our family emotional system,  I make mention below of how my effort with Bowen theory was important to Tom.  I’ve attached a list he made while having fun thinking about this sometime in the past, I can’t exactly recall when.   Another time, Tom  sent me to a symposium with some teeshirts he had had printed with ideas about triangles,  like “Tell me about your triangles”.  As an early draft resister in the Vietnam War, Tom had been around the block with standing up to social pressure from the beginning of our relationship.

Applying Bowen Theory around the illness and death of my husband

 My relationship with my husband had a lot to do with how I felt and what I did over the course of our marriage and the reverse was true as well.  This is what I am calling co-regulation in which Tom and I regulated the functioning of one another to the degree of our functional and emotional interdependence, whatever it was and became, over a 53 year long relationship, and 48 years of marriage.  My relationship with Tom stimulated emotional reactivity and calm in me as well as affecting my level of functioning towards my independent goals and in the family, as I’m system, as I’m sure it did for Tom as well.

             Day to day my/our functional level, anxiety and emotional reactivity determined in significant measure by the state our relationship and our mutual attention and reaction to one another. This affected mood, decisions, and the use of the mechanisms to manage anxiety such as borrowing self and leaning on Tom when I was unsure about what to do or what to think, triangling, and the person-to-person relationship.  Also, I think of some docking-like function of Tom’s always being there, so for instance where when done for the day there was easy company that made life comfortable. Longer term, my/our functional level and emotional reactivity played out in the decisions, plans, goals we shared and had differences about.

In response to the intense feelings of loss I had that followed Tom’s funeral and my children and other family and friends going home and back to their lives, I noticed that I could imagine Tom’s presence and feel something like his presence, and I would be comforted. This was   consistent with a pattern between us in which he would help me with my anxiety.  I continue to use this, imagining Tom and his presence, and this comforts me even as I am sad that he is not there. I hypothesized that learning to live with out Tom would involve either more self-regulation in areas where I had depended on him, and/or more affiliation with others for connectedness and co-regulation elsewhere.   After Tom’s death I definitively prioritized relationships and did not push myself towards goals beyond what I could do without time pressure or obligatory stress. This is maybe an undersold version of applying theory, or at least one I had not considered before and that is recognizing my togetherness needs, the one’s that come with my level of differentiation, and acting with respect to them – this seemed essential.   A year out after Tom’s death, I’ve shifted some, having more energy to focus on goals.

Applying theory to my relationship strategy following Tom’s stage 4 diagnosis June 5, 2018.

 When tom was diagnosed with a terminal cancer with only months to live, I decided it was important to bring my best to the relationship which I reasoned would be of benefit to Tom and his health and hopefully contribute to his longevity. This was a shift toward functioning up that has been for me a first principle in the application of theory when I encounter difficulty, following my baseline reaction to avoid or attack. With this challenge I emphasized attention to emotional self-regulation following defining myself in the face of a difference with Tom.   I called my strategy define and repair by which I meant to connect with Tom rather than react to his reaction if he had one.  Emphasizing this aspect of the process –that I could maintain or repair the togetherness gave me courage to act in a way Tom might object to  and I very much didn’t want to upset him and maybe cause harm. I was equally focused on the maintenance of our connectedness as on my definition, both being aspects of being my best. For instance, my asking the doctors questions about treatment about concerns Tom didn’t share disturbed him  because he feared I was disturbing the doctor, yet it was important to do so. (One example. continuing oxaliplatin /neuropathy. With many things big and small define and connect was my principle.

This led to planning trips we took to places important in our history and some important places in Tom’s history before we met.  The trips resulted in a level of contact between us that was very meaningful and clarified important aspects of our relationship as it was established in our early years. One outcome of that review was it came clear to him and finally to me that my mission in the family and my profession as a psychologist being guided by Bowen theory was as important to Tom as it has been to me.

As time has gone on certain aspects of the theory have become more salient to me: the persistence of the emotional system and the problem of seeing it with emotional objectivity. As to the persistence of the emotional system: I think my youthful understanding was that progress meant changing patterns. But with more emotional detachment and less personalizing following more observation and understanding of the emotional system, I think of progress as occurring much more in the realm of emotional reactivity than pattern. One example was an exchange I had with Tom when he was finally in untreatable decline after 3 years post diagnosis. Around certain differences we had around things we were both invested in, Tom’s automatic was to put me down in the manner of his father to his mother.  I did not react happily to this, and we had talked about it, and Tom recognized it. In this instance in his last months of his life, such an exchange occurred about something.  I thought about it and as part of the exchange I asked if he still needs to do this put down of me when we have a difference? Tom considered and wryly observed that apparently, he does. We both had a chuckle. What had emotional maturity brought? Humor and emotional objectivity about the persistence of the pattern, but without the tension from personalizing and reactivity to it at least in many instances.

Applying theory following Tom’s death, November 10, 2021: From Co-regulation to self-regulation

Since Tom died, I’ve been using waves of grief toward self-regulation in this way:  The same principle as paying attention to reactions – what do they signal – is there something to define/ redefine in the day to day or in understanding the long-term trajectory of my life, Tom’s life, our marriage?

Converting emotional reactivity to observation and definition.

Day to day: Example of watching the election results. On this last November 8 election, I watched returns on TV with interest as Tom and I did together for many elections. I remembered this and him and then suffered a pang of grief.  I wondered would I always be watching the elections by myself going forward?  The question answered itself, not if I take steps to have company.  I texted someone about the returns and felt better.

The bigger picture and my long-term interests: my effort towards a more factual understanding of our history and how I understand our story. The trips we took visiting important sites of our history formed a framework Tom and I had for talking about our life together, repeatedly and in most all its aspects, successes and failures all, in the 3 and a half years following Tom’s diagnosis.  This has helped me think about my way forward. Long story short, after we married, I found Bowen theory.  It became my mission to try and operate with awareness and courage to get outside the emotional system, and to teach others in my profession about the principles of doing this. Tom’s mission, in addition to and as part of supporting us with his work and raising and supporting our daughters, Tom had a mission of b supporting me in my theory-based mission. Finding myself with energy for this mission again only very recently, I embrace it more fully as it has come into clear focus how Tom believed in me in this effort.

Following Tom’s death, I needed to be with family and friends, and this has been my priority. I’ve had a large network attentive to me and I credit the decades of being attentive to them, showing up for many important events in their lives and working at relating to everyone around tensions and cutoffs that exist in the relationship systems or emotional units.  I relied on my children and their families, my brothers, my cousins, my nephews, my old and current friends, my book group and my neighbors and my colleagues.  Tom’s sister who lives 20 minutes from us continued visiting me every week as she had been doing throughout Tom’s illness and before. One of Tom’s sisters in law kept close tabs on me.  I would say everyone has welcomed me and let me be me.  In the year since his death, my network of relationships, cultivated and maintained over my adult life, have served that docking function I relied on Tom for, of being there and letting me be me. My youngest daughter invited me to travel with her on business to Europe and we had a lot of fun. My two little grandsons, both quite connected to Tom, one sharing his birthday and the other being his namesake have been a source of wonder and delight.

Now, a year after Tom’s death, I am becoming again more goal directed. That includes in the family system. For instance, I am thinking again about my functional position in the various emotional units such as the nuclear family, families of origin and extended families, with regard to  the challenges going forward. I’m back to attending to the events that are always occurring in the lives of others in large families like Tom’s and my own. This is different from the nuclear family I grew up in which was cut-off from my mother’s family and in tension while depending almost solely on my father’s family of origin as extended family.

The importance of my efforts to the family system.
Strategy: Stabilize myself and be as present, connected, and separate as I can be.

Anxiety and failure to mature emotionally leads to the use of psychological and relationship mechanisms to rationalize one’s functioning in a way that hijacks theory and uses it in support of the emotional system instead of in support of differentiation. This is not being a wise elder.

 Emotional objectivity plays into recognizing where my efforts did not result in the predicted outcome.  And so to do good it’s important to acknowledge and re-examine.  One area where I had to re-figure and change occurred as our children became adults – shifting away from I positions telling them what I think to a more observant role with them that honors differences and the principle that it is their life and their own thinking, often different from mine, that will guide them. That included leaving their relationship to their dad with them.  They express missing him a lot.

As I’ve gone through this period of my life, have I become a more detached and skillful observer, a more skillful detriangler? A more skillful connector? In short: more capable of being outside the emotional system while relating to all involved?

It may be that the natural process of emotional maturation involves all the above as one ages. Theory lends a hand here and probably enhancing capability in the elders for stabilizing the family and community.  Remember the African elephants.

TOP TEN REASONS TO BUY MURRAY BOWEN COLA! By Tom Havstad – in the 20th Century probably
10. “It’s the Natural Selection.” (C. Darwin)
9. Al the other species drink it!
8. “Just says NO to drugs.” (N. Reagan)
7. Recommended by practically no medical doctors.
6. Recommended by practically no psychotherapists.
5. Not a lite drink, found tohave long-term health benefits.
.4 Reduces anxiety (related to life on earth).
3. Can be stored in a cool place for the next generation.
2. It’s the only cola endorsed by “The Great One”, Murray Bowen himself.
1. It’s the only systems cola – when you drink it, the rest of your family gets a little less thirsty.