Behave Yourself

Behavior is as behavior does

We are loved because of our behavior

Later, we are hated because of our behavior

We think we have the unconditional love of our spouse

We think we can offer it to them too

But what we don't realize is that once our behavior changes - as it often does due to excess anger, impatience, lack of communication and misunderstandings etc. -

that we will lose that love because as our behavior changes, we are percieved differently - as a different person

we are thought to have different values and motives

we are no longer trusted

we seem like a stranger

We don't think how we behave is important,
and we never learn to improve.

Yes, we all want to be loved unconditionally, for who and what we are, no matter what we do or how bad we act.  Bad behavior, bad temper, acting bad in whatever way - we challenge others NOT to love us like a little child.  But let's face it - it is hard to love others when  they behave badly all the time, every day, wearing on us, stressing on us, making life difficult, unpleasant, and unhappy.  How do you feel when others behave badly ?  How do you react ?

Of course, we still love them, but maybe we don't like them very much and maybe we can't get along with them, maybe we can't live together harmoniously.  Unless we all face that behavior does matter, and accept that we ourselves could be hard to like, or love as much, hard to get along with - that our bad behavior could be "ruining" our own lives and making it too hard for others to be happy too.

Look - my husband loves me to the ends of the earth.  He will do just about anything for me.  But how much would he have still loved me if my behavior had been as bad as it could have been ?  Before I met him, and by the end of my 3rd and worst marriage, I had racked up some pretty awful behavior tantrums just because I was genuinely, deeply, hurt, angry and upset.

I was capable of terrible episodes of being upset.  I would get so hurt that I was capable of great destructive behavior.  And by the way, I don't drink, take drugs or smoke or take anything to get high - never have.  I could say some pretty terrible things and scream very loud.  I could throw and break things, jab a knife through my photograph.  I might jump out of the car when pulling up to a stop light and walk home or run away and hide.  Or I could sneak off out of the house and walk into the night and hide in the bushes all night to make a man worry.  I could jump in my car and drive across a median or drive crazy to try to kill myself.  I could drive to a downtown area and go to the top of a tall building to try to jump off.  I could go off and hide in a hotel room for days just to punish a fellow.   I even used to bang my head against a brick wall, or bang myself on the top of the head with a shoe !!  Yikes !

So how married would I be, I wonder, if I still did these things even to my angel of a husband?  How many years of that could you take ?   I couldn't stand my own behavior !  Luckily, he got very little of those kinds of episodes.

Now when I first met my Superman, my husband, during our 6 month courtship / engagement - as I said, I was still the same easily upset bad behavior girl who was divorced 3 times before.  And this was before my depression returned, before I knew about the vitamins and my treatments.

So I had the same happy but unpredictably sensitive personality I always had - like lots of girls and lots of boys - of 31 like I was or any age - most of us never grow up - we don't know what it means or how it happens.

Now my husband, then, my fiance - he was into some health nostrums, as he would call them, and just generally has a healthier brain chemistry than I do.  He just doesn't lose his cool as easily.  So when things would come up in discussions that got me hot under the collar, and I wanted to let him have it -- there was something about him not getting mad at me even when I was mad and would start to get a little personal.  I would be thinking some of my usual hell-hath-no-fury type of thoughts and I would want to hurl them at him.  But he didn't make things worse by reciprocating.  He was so darn sincere and caring that I would see him out of the corner of my eye in a still moment like in a movie... and I could see - "He doesn't deserve this ( the horrible thing I had ready to say to him )."  And I didn't say it.  I would start to calm down.  And it might happen a few more times during that same discussion, where my r-r-r-rage would want to come out.  And because he was able to bear my anger with kindness and patience, yet hold his own on what he wanted to say with reasonable-ness... in those moments, I was saved, I was freed, a little at a time.

And it wasn't too long into the marriage that I began taking supplements.  My point, again, was to ask that if my behavior had never improved from the way it was in my third marriage, would I still be married to my 4th and beloved husband of 19 years ?  I really doubt it.  Part of the problems with the way our emotions work when we are easily angered - at least it did for me - is that we feel that it is the other person who is making us mad and unhappy.   I would have been so unpleasably critical, that I would have felt he wasn't the right one, again.

So how is it that I am I still very happily married ?  Because I found out by accident while treating my depression, how to chemically improve my behavior.  Did I do it under some ultimatum from him?  No.  He never said a word.  I have done it for my own happiness and survival.  And alive and happy I am.

Sometimes both of the people need chemical mood tempering and it's harder when you are both unstable like in my horrible third marriage.   We spent maybe 75% of the time upset, very upset.  Fighting and arguing and emotional trauma chips away at the love you had and you can't stop thinking of leaving.

The extremely rare times when I have gotten upset with my husband in these latter years, it is usually or I could say almost always because my treatment was off - I might have been lax on taking my pills for a few days or I had been out of a certain needed vitamin for a while.  But even though we work things out fairly well, even when I'm not my treated self, we can feel somewhat traumatized.  It can take a day or two or three before all traces, however subtle, of the rupture in our atmosphere are gone.  It is damaging, even to us, but it does heal over when there aren't more fights.  Because of our supplements, and our intentions, we hardly ever fight - maybe once a year ?

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This is what we are missing here on earth.  It's an old bible saying about "turning the other cheek."  Don't overreact - it's not a religion thing. The bible has many biochemically inspired statements.  It is what we all need to do to help each other have saner, happier lives.  Just look at how we are now with road rage and hostility and blame.  And in our own families and homes - the ones we hurt the most are the ones we love most of all.  And it's so often over tiny, insignificant things.

You must ask yourself - is this anger equal to the irritation ?  Does this person deserve this much anger ?  Did they really intend to harm you ?  Did they harm you ?  If we, ourselves did the same thing, would we want to be treated this badly over it ?  Is this much anger fair ?  Not returning anger for anger actually helps the other person be better.

We feel entitled to "go off" on anyone who "makes us" even just a little mad.  We are extremely generous with judgment and hostility and deficient in patience and understanding.

The things we think are so important, often are so trivial when it comes to the worth and value of the other humans in our lives.

If we feel that we have the right to punish others with our anger, then no wonder some take it so far as to shoot and kill others just to punish and satisfy an animalistic emotion.  The less anger in life, the better.  The better we can think, and act, and the saner we will be when it matters most.  When we are upset and angry, we believe in hateful things a lot easier - we lose sight of reality - we become "unsane" with rage.

At those times, I believe we are literally functioning from our animal brain, not from the higher cerebral cortex.  It has been shown that teenagers' brains don't finish growing until into the 20's and it can be shown through imaging which part of the brain they are using to think things through.  It's the lower, animal part of the brain (can't think of the name of it - have to look it up on the tape later).  I believe that many adults with poor nutrition, or from other causes, still drop down into this part of the brain when angry.  Without my supplements, I would be there often !  But with supplements, I literally feel that I am "in the clouds" of my brain, where more beautiful thoughts reside.  Where all things are possible and patience, understanding and forgiveness are the thoughts that occur, rather than, anger, hate, murder, and suicide.

Are we acting like this because we are bad people with bad character ?  I don't think so.  I don't think that of myself.  I just didn't know any better.  I wanted so badly to be better.  Nothing made me so unhappy as my own upset emotions.  I just didn't know I could be any better.   Now I do know, but I am better because the supplements make me better by preventing such quick and negative emotional combustion.

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You can preserve your marriage;
be an example for your kids.

I adore my husband. He is my Superman. He takes his supplements everyday. He laughs at me instead of becoming annoyed or irritated. We never fight, unless we are out of certain supplements or if I don't take mine !!

With my supplements, I never even think of bad names to call my sweetheart husband.  When I don't take my pills, I am more impatient and the word "stupid" pops into my head more.   Then I know I'd better grab my pills and take them !  We must try to preserve that preciousness of our spousal relationship.

Hubby & Me

Do we have a boring artificially polite relationship - no!  We have a fun, funny, interactive, love-affair, friendship :)

Do I walk around all "love and peace" - no - believe me, I have a personality !  I can bitch, moan and complain about my 15 dogs always being in the way, or about this and that.  I have my pet peeves about things but not usually about my hubby, but just normal household things.  I think I'm a fairly normal "lady of the house" in those ways.  But it's the quality and the degree of the emotion that's important.  Behind most complaining I might do, there's usually a twinkle and a smile - a sense of humor about it all.  It's just not serious stuff.

But when the emotion crosses from where you can laugh at yourself, to where you are hot, upset, angry and personally offended... that's where you start to get into trouble.

We must learn to turn it around and ask, "Why am I so upset about this?"  Do you want to kill someone because they broke a dish ?  Even if it is justifiable anger, don't let it turn into justifiable homicide - and I am not kidding.  Family members kill family members at an alarming rate, just from escalated anger.

Without chemical help, some of us are just not physiologically capable of feeling or acting very much better, if at all.  Now that I know better, even without my pills I would be a little better as mentioned above - but I would suffer so much more.  Without chemical help, things just hurt my feelings more whether I want them to or not, and there's not a darn thing I can do about it.  I don't always act upon my thoughts and impulses, but I suffer terrible pain and agony, and feel suicidal when very upset.  I will discuss this more in other writings where I have written about my feelings during an incident of upset when I had not taken my pills for several days.

With supplements, it's like filing down a rough fingernail - more things said just smoothly slide by and "don't catch" and a lovely, productive day isn't suddenly ruined by terrible random emotions

Love and peace ;)

Melody Clark