Communication is King

I feel like the title of this post says a lot. Communication - and I mean GOOD communication - is so amazing and just makes such a huge difference for...everything. But let me back up a little bit and explain why I feel like shouting this from the rooftops of...well, let's just say I don't live in a city so I wouldn't be shouting from particularly tall rooftops but that doesn't mean I'm less emphatic about this.


Back when I last posted here, about two and a half weeks ago (yes, I pulled out a calendar and actually figured out how long it had been) I was in a particularly bad place. My post was about being in that place where I just didn't feel like I could keep pushing through and, sure enough, shortly after writing it I had a little breakdown/meltdown and ended up crying on the phone with Eric for a little while. That helped me feel a little better - just feeling that connection to him and knowing that we were in this together and we would figure it all out - so I wiped away my tears and headed off to see my adorable niece and sister-in-law which helped to further cheer me up. But that doesn't mean that things were all hunky dory (seriously? who uses that term?). I was still feeling totally stressed, still had a looming announcement to make at work (which is my church) that I'll be leaving in June at the end of the church year, and there was a lot of stress going on between Eric and I. But at least for right then I was feeling a little better.


So, over the next (referring back to my calendar) week things continued to be stressful. I was crazy busy with work stuff getting ready for the service that I'm in charge of (SO glad that's only once a year) and things between Eric and I were continuing to be difficult. We were just struggling to talk and be able to really hear each other. We were really trying, I truly believe that, but we are both very stubborn by nature and we had taken opposite stances on the subject of how to handle the condo/mortgage. We just weren't willing to budge, partially just because we didn't want to give in to the other person and neither of us react well to having someone butt heads with us or try to force us to change our minds.


But then things all of a sudden changed. This is going to be tricky to explain but Eric gave up trying to convince me that his side was the right side and just figured out how he would be okay with going along with what I wanted to do. And what he would need to do in order to be comfortable with my choice was something that would result in us spending less time together which made me really sad and ultimately made me give up clinging to my side. So all of a sudden we had each let go of the thing we had been clinging to for months and we were finally able to talk. It was crazy and amazing!


And then something else amazing happened - a few days later we had a second Realtor come to give us another opinion on selling it and we got a hugely different number from him on what we could sell the condo for. A number so much better and closer to what I thought it should be based on research I had done. And all of a sudden we had this new door open to us!


And then something else amazing happened - we kept communicating! We have continued to talk about all kinds of things. There was something really bothering me for a little while and I wasn't sure how to bring it up with Eric so I used a technique he suggested and I wrote him a letter about it. It was fantastic! I was able to sit down and really think through what I wanted to say, read it over multiple times to make sure I really got my message across without being angry or mean, and sent it to him while he was at work so he would have time to read it and process it before coming home to talk it through. And we talked about it and we have kept talking! It's kind of crazy to feel like this but it's so freeing to feel like we can just TALK!


So, if I didn't think communication was important before, I definitely think it is now. Things are changing so much for the better and I'm so thrilled about it! Right about now I feel like we can tackle all kinds of things (but at the same time I don't really want any more problems for at least a little while!). Who knew!?!


Yours,
Penguini