Different Class
My husband and I come from different socioeconomic classes. I grew up poor, on food stamps, getting water and electric shut off... His dad designed some cameras used in big screen movies and has... A lot of money. It's hard sometimes for me, and I feel awful about it. I'm able to be supportive and empathetic 90% of the time. But once in a while, he'll be venting about a problem (generally his childhood), and I just get in my feelings about it. I don't let it on, but in my heart, it kills me. It's hard to listen to him lament his circumstances sometimes. His Dad didn't spend enough time with him as a kid, but he's always been financially supportive. Recently he was complaining how his parents gave him an allowance, but eventually stopped giving it to him (because he wouldn't do his chores). I just was screaming in my head at least you HAD an allowance. If I wanted anything, I had to work for it. And I mean literal work, not help around the house. I feel like a bad person, and while I understand his struggle, it's hard to be his therapist about it all.
@pandaprincess9 Yep, his story is hard to empathize with. He wasn’t doing his chores and his parents had the audacity to not pay him. Like he is so special that he should have everything WITHOUT working for it. I wonder if that was his “real” complaint. You said he felt his dad didn’t spend time with him. Here is this child with every material benefit but feeling somehow unloved. Why, in his head, is he returning to the past and being upset about this seemingly little thing? Are there things in his current life that is making him feel that little kid who didn’t get enough attention from his dad?
Maybe trying to figure that out isn’t really important. You don’t have to be his therapist. But if you find yourself in this situation again, what to do? You’re not required as a spouse to always be empathetic. If you focus on the stated details of his complaint, it’s totally understandable you would get upset. Maybe a strategy at those times is to just focus on the upset itself. Say to yourself something like, “What my husband is saying doesn’t make sense to me, I’m getting upset because he doesn’t seem to have a valid complaint I can relate to, but at this moment he is upset.” That might center you in your emotions about the situation. But then how do you respond to your husband? Maybe ask some follow up questions, possibly even with the admission that you’re having a hard time relating to his complaint. “Honey, I’m not sure I understand, it seems reasonable that a parent would withhold allowance under certain circumstances, so why was that significant to you?” It might help your husband reflect on his actual complaint and be able to verbalize it. Or maybe just cut him some slack - humans can get upset about the dumbest things in the world - road rage for example.
