I wonder if it wan't "manipulation" as a conscious choice, but simply "struggling" because you weren't as far along in your healing as you are now? It's a gift to have six years of therapy behind you and to be so self-aware...my guess is that many people who aren't as far along in their healing still react emotionally - and maybe sometimes, inappropriately - to things, because they are still learning to understand and contain their own reactions. I wonder if this is where you were at?

Last night, I was talking to my H about our pets. We have a very very old cat that I love and that he hates. I was asking him how he could love the cat when it was young, and turn against it when it's old. It felt like an intellectual discussion to me - just a friendly debate, with no big emotions attached - and my H got REALLY angry at me and lashed out. I was surprised and hurt. We talked some more and he said that he realized that he is still really sad about the pets that died when he was a child and that he doesn't want to become attached to animals anymore. I asked why he didn't just tell me that in the first place, and he said that he COULDN'T tell me, because he didn't even know until right then. It reminded me of me, and how I lash out at him sometimes because I am reacting to something in the past but don't even realize it.

I don't think he was trying to manipulate me...I think he was just reacting from where he is at, right now. It didn't feel good, but it was a learning experience for him, and for me, and I guess we both know him a little bit better now.

My T believes that we all have a drive to heal and be whole, and that our behaviors are attempts to get ourselves to that place. That doesn't make our behaviors "right" or even make them make any sense, because often we haven't learned healthy ways of coping, reacting, being.

So...I wonder if you were consciously manipulating, or just reacting from a place of hurt and confusion and fear?

Be gentle with you. "yuck" feels like such a harsh reaction to your healing self.