| | We had our first session with the "pre-marital" counselor yesterday, and i'm really just thoroughly disappointed and frustrated. Counseling is a pre-requisite to getting married in pretty much any church. I was super excited about doing it, and now i'm just super let-down. I was just expecting something wildly different because of how highly recommended this guy came to us. He's the marriage counselor for the whole diocese and so i'm not sure what choice we have in who we talk to...so i guess we'll just roll with the punches.
First, Dude just had a bad vibe, man. You know how some people just make your hairs stand on end and make you put up your shields?
It was the little things, like the fact that he completely ignored me the entire time. About 40 minutes in, he asked, "Guinevere, do you mind if i treat you like a potted plant?" and i thought he meant we were going to role play and Matt would have to water me or something. So, i just busied myself with photosynthesizing and let the men have their manly talk about men things while i was a plant. Then he never got back to the plant analogy, he just meant, "i'm going to ignore you for the rest of the session, as though you were a plant". aha. Matt and i talk things through--a lot--so none of the things he and Mr. Treat-Guinevere-Like-A-Plant dude were talking about offered any new startling insight--i'd heard it all before! I'm really hoping this is some kind of strategy and that next time he'll talk to me more, perhaps allowing matt to be a plant? [this isn't useful to us, but i'm sure it's great for some couples!] I didn't even get so far as to mention the fact that i have a brother. I got as far as saying i went to Sewanee, majored in forestry, am employed in my third post-college job and that my parents are married. He then wanted to talk about the seminary at Sewanee and i said that the seminary is the graduate school but on the same campus, and that i was there as an undergraduate and majored in forestry and he said, "Ah. Forestry! So you're a Michigan State Grad, eh?" I said, "No, i just got done telling you about Sewanee, remember?" and he gave me a brushed-off apology and started talking to matt again. Clearly, he wasn't listening while i was talking about undergrad at Sewanee. Damn him. At the end, he asked me what i had learned during our session, and i smiled huge and said, "Absolutely nothing!"  and then had to pay him...
Anyway, i was so angry with how the conversation went that i had a super hard time getting to sleep and woke up sore and cranky.
He gave us homework: a 7-page questionnaire with impossibly ambivalent questions that i'm having a hard time answering .... so i decided to edit them somewhat. He keeps referring to my "future partner" for instance. It ticks me off cuz matt's already my partner, so i crossed out the "future" from every single question and it makes them easier to answer. Here's one of my answers, for instance:
Q: "When you (write a positive comment about your future partner):
A: SING
Q: "I feel (write a positive emotion that you feel):
A: GROOVY
but i'm second-guessing myself because i don't want him picking apart these responses....the questions and my answers seem relatively meaningless, since matt and i discuss everything important and unimportant already, every day!
some more examples....
his Q: Love is usually having to say:
my A: Love has nothing to do with what you say.
Q: Describe some of the ways to best help your children grow and mature.
A: I'll have to have them first. Each child (read: human being) is different.
Q: In a happy family, children should be:
A: loved
Q:...and not
A: puppets
...that last one is so true...
|
| | Posted 1/24/2008 1:40 PM - 56 Views - 4 eProps - 3 comments
- recommend
  - recs0
- share
- email
 - sent0
|
