We were vacationing on Kauai and it was Diane’s birthday and it was not going well.  I was out of sorts and grumpy, hadn’t gotten a card or bought flowers and we were not scheduled to go out to a nice restaurant for dinner.  Diane was disappointed because her birthday wasn’t meeting her expectations and her unhappiness further exacerbated my feelings of not being good enough.  I was feeling depressed and Diane was upset. So we started talking. 

It turned out that at about the same moment that I had judged Diane’s body unfavorably when she was running on the beach, Diane was feeling insecure about her body.  I think these mutual upsets arise simultaneously as it is difficult to determine if I had the thought first and Diane picked it up and reacted to it or whether Diane was feeling insecure and I picked that up and had the judgment.  Anyway I hadn’t said anything because I was ashamed about having the thought and Diane didn’t mention it until we started to explore what was going on.   That was one thing.

Then we talked about my lack of doing something special for her birthday other than the vacation itself.  I tend to discount birthdays, while Diane makes a big deal out of them, so we were at odds there.  Because Diane was upset (feeling ignored), I was feeling guilty and not good enough and somewhat hopeless as to how to rectify the situation.

What we decided to do was declare the following day as her birthday and do it more consciously.  We had a marvelous day that next day, I got a card and a flower, we swam and had fun at the beach, we made love in the afternoon and had a great dinner at a local restaurant.  By being able to talk about what was going on for each of us without blaming the other, and then to let that past go without resentment, we were able to declare a “groundhog birthday” and have a wonderful time – the kind of time we both wanted.

For me this ability to turn a bad situation around has made all the difference as it gives us permission to make a mistake that unintentionally upsets our partner, without it being an irreconcilable event.  And it allows us to learn from our mistakes so as to have our future more conscious and enjoyable.  You can bet that I will do Diane’s birthday differently next year!