The Day I Almost Yelled At My Husband (How the Law of Acceleration in Marriage helps to keep your emotions in check)

By Fawn Weaver on Friday, April 11, 2014

The Day I Almost Yelled At My Husband

The speed of my feet was no match for the flood of thoughts rushing through my mind. I walked quickly up and down the residential hills of our community.

“How dare he do that? After I opened my heart and our home so his parents could be comfortable, how could he be so thoughtless?”

Keith and I were in our early years of marriage and it had only been a few months since his parents moved in with us. When we extended the invitation, I made one very important request.  Please, no junk food in the house.

Ten years prior, I’d spent six months slowly losing 25-pounds and had maintained the loss.  One of the bedrocks of my weight-loss success was not keeping junk food in the house.

A few months into our new living arrangement, I woke up to the aroma of freshly baked pies and just about hit the roof.

The smell had been wafting through the air-conditioning vent of our bedroom for hours. After not being able to sleep because my sweets-loving body wouldn’t allow it, I finally got out of bed and went in the kitchen. 

To my dismay, Keith’s Mom was happily making homemade pies – lots of them.

I could feel the anger rising inside of me.

I returned to our bedroom, anger directed at Keith, “This isn’t right. It’s not right. I’ve done everything I can to make them comfortable…”  I was upset with him because I’d asked him to address the issue on an earlier occasion and he didn’t.

I knew if I stuck around for even two more minutes, I would be embarking upon the first argument ever with my loving husband. So I bolted.

I threw on my tennis shoes and decided to walk until all the angry voices in my head quieted down. For the first hour, those voices got louder and louder.

“You have every right to be mad!” one voice said. “You should call Keith and give him a piece of your mind!” another one jabbed.

What was going on at that moment was an example of what I like to refer to as the Law of Acceleration in Marriage.

In 2010, Toyota drivers began reporting incidents of their cars accelerating while they were pressing on the brakes.  One Toyota owner shared his story with a local paper.  For thirty miles, he swerved in and out of traffic, pounding on his brakes, at one point narrowly missing a big rig.

A police officer responding to the driver’s 9-1-1 call pulled up beside him and instructed him to hold down the brakes with his full might while engaging the emergency brake.  Finally, the car came to a halt.

What Toyota drivers were experiencing is what so often happens to us when our spouse hurts, disappoints, or makes us sad. Rather than sticking with the original emotion—that place of vulnerability—we allow the voices in our head to cause us to accelerate.  When we zoom ahead, we go from being hurt to angry, from disappointed to frustrated, and from sad to mad.

The day of the “junk food incident,” I knew if I didn’t get out of the house—right then, right there—I was going to lose control. So I kept walking.

I was gone for six hours (only stopping twice, once to leave a message for Keith letting him know where I’d gone and once at a diner to get something to eat). By the time I returned home, I’d completely silenced the voices and was able to share my hurt from a place of vulnerability.

We talked about it. I expressed why I was hurt. He expressed his difficulty in trying to make me happy while wanting his folks to feel comfortable in their new place.

Keith saw my side and I saw his. We decided not to say anything to his folks so they could continue feeling comfortable in their new home. Instead, we designated a “junk-food cabinet” and I simply stayed out of it.

In reading this, you might think I lost this battle. But I can assure you the outcome was completely worth the loss. The moment I returned from my walk, Keith’s eyes met mine, he pulled me into his arms, embraced me, and told me he was sorry.

In that moment, I understood firsthand the law of acceleration in marriage and how to put the brakes on my thoughts to ensure we could communicate heart-to-heart rather than head-to-head.  

Until Monday…make it a great day!

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Fawn Weaver

Founder at Happy Wives Club
Fawn Weaver is the USA Today® and New York Times® bestselling author of Happy Wives Club: One Woman's Worldwide Search for the Secrets of a Great Marriage, adopting the same name as the Club she founded in 2010. The Happy Wives Club community has grown to include more than 900,000 women in over 110 countries around the world. When she’s not blogging or working on her next project, she's happily doting over her husband of nearly eleven years, Keith.

 

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  • http://www.modernmarried.com/ Maggie Reyes

    Fawn! We are so in sync (as usual!) Just this week I was telling a friend of mine – you two have been talking “head to head” you need to start talking “heart to heart” and I was telling my friend – you have to go first. We had a really long talk about this because they are both awesome people who are quite stubborn and head to head wasn’t getting them anywhere *and* from my outsider’s perspective I thought, if they don’t start heart-to-hearting soon, they are going to grow apart. Thank you for giving this ‘behind-the-scenes’ look at how to do it – SO NEEDED.

    • the best wife 4 him!

      Your just as stupid as fawn then! :-)

      • http://www.happywivesclub.com/ Fawn @ Happy Wives Club

        Stupid? Now, that’s one word no one that has ever met me would ever say. This I will say, I speak my heart and remain vulnerable with my husband and with this community. Sometimes that vulnerability opens the door for criticism. But that’s okay. The only thing I can do is remain authentic and true to my life and marriage. And if that doesn’t appeal to you, no worries at all. We’re all so different so it would be odd if everyone saw things the same as me. Have a fabulous weekend.

      • http://www.osasandgodwin.com osas R.

        that is not a good word to use dear…..

    • http://www.happywivesclub.com/ Fawn @ Happy Wives Club

      Thanks, Maggie! More often than not, the arguments couples have are over such small things that become huge. I was happy I learned this message early on and have been able to use this tactic (and the one I talked about on Wednesday) to share how I feel in an effective manner. Like Keith says, “It allows us to ease into conversations instead of crashing into arguments.” I just love that.

  • lvgrunt022912

    This girl in this story is a friggen moron. Getting mad over junk food??? Seriously?? God I feel sorry for your husband. Then she says she went out and got toast and hot chocolate?!?!? WTF???? Isn’t they junk food?? My lord this woman is stupid!!!!!

  • the best wife 4 him!

    I totally agree with you ivgrunt022912! There is no “right way” into having a perfect marriage.. she is fighting about her mother in law because she brought in “junk food” … that is HER goal to keep “fit” if she wanted it so bad… I WISH I HAD THE CHANCE TO MEET THE WOMAN WHO RAISED MY NOT SO PERFECT, PERFECT HUSBAND TO ME!

    • http://www.happywivesclub.com/ Fawn @ Happy Wives Club

      Is there such a thing as a perfect marriage? I’ve always thought that two imperfect people usually make an imperfect marriage. Mine certainly is imperfect. But it’s perfect for me. This doesn’t say we don’t make mistakes. It doesn’t mean we don’t share what is on our mind – and I mean exactly what is on our mind. We wait until we can say it in a way that is received positively. If you didn’t get a chance to read the previous post (http://www.happywivesclub.com/this-marriage-tip-changes-everything/), it might be helpful to read that prior to judging. But then again, it’s completely up to you. If your marriage is all you want it to be, then you don’t need a post like this at all and that’s all good. No judgment here.

    • iyasostuff

      If there’s one thing I’ve observed about Fawn it’s that she never asks anyone to be like her. She shares her stories, and if there’s something you can learn from it, then go ahead, if not, then shake your head, and move on to the next blog. I too wish you had the chance to meet your mother inlaw, then perhaps you would understand that no matter how wonderful someone is, they will sometimes do things inadvertently that will hurt you. Maybe junk food is not the thing that bothers you, but maybe it’s the way they treat your kids, or maybe it’s how they visit unannounced, whatever it is… it’s there, and being married is about trying to balance all of those concerns and hurts and still maintaining the relationship – especially with your “perfect husband to me” husband…
      Bashing someone who is sharing her personal life to help others is probably not the best way to express yourself… maybe create your own blog and share your own tips and advice, and then we too can learn from your own experiences.

      • http://www.happywivesclub.com/ Fawn @ Happy Wives Club

        Thank you for this response. And I’m so happy to know my heart comes through to those reading these posts. You are absolutely right. I have no desire to change anyone. I’m a big believer in doing what works best for you and our family. But if something I’ve experienced can help, by all means, I want to share it – with grace and love. Thanks again.

  • the best wife 4 him!

    And plus! You get mad..he gets mad.. you really need to let it out while its hot or you’ll just drop it and forget about it… maybe YOU should take notes from my husband and I!!

    • http://www.happywivesclub.com/ Fawn @ Happy Wives Club

      If it’s important, it seems like you’d be unlikely to forget it. But I could be wrong.

    • iyasostuff

      sometimes when you get it out when it’s hot, you end up causing much more pain…and then you regret it… (at least that has been my experience)… but hey, if that works for you and your husband, then *shrug* no one is asking you to stop…

  • iyasostuff

    Thank you so much for sharing this… Marriage has a way of exposing those hurting parts in us (not sure how to express it better) to someone else it may not be such a big deal, but to you it’s such a big deal, and it seems the only person you can get angry with is your husband – the man you love so much. It’s so hard to go from a place of hurt and pain, and so much easier to just be angry and to hurt him because you feel that he has hurt you, and he doesn’t even seem to care… but in the long run, the most important thing is sharing your heart, and when you do, you realize that he’s not as “heartless” and mean as he may seem at the moment… now if only I can just remind myself of this everyday…
    thank you, thank you, thank you… I learn so much from you all :-)

    • http://www.happywivesclub.com/ Fawn @ Happy Wives Club

      You are so right. It is easier to cover your vulnerable emotions -hurt, sadness, disappointment- with more aggressive emotions like anger. But more often than not, getting angry causes even more hurt (to ourselves and to the one we’re trying to explain our hurt feelings to but can’t because we never communicate quite as well when we’re mad :) ). The good news is you’re working on it. We all have things to work on so don’t feel bad at all. Just keep creating the marriage of your dreams…one day at a time.

      • iyasostuff

        Thanks Fawn :-)

  • Charlotte K

    It’s just not always possible to go for a six hour walk. And not always advisable either. What about responsibilities? I can’t just leave 3 kids alone because my husband hurts me. That would be very irresponsible and a hurtful thing to do. And what did those parents feel about you just leaving them like that? If I had done things like that, my husband might have been just as able to say sorry as yours was, but the atmosphere in the house would have been one of uncertainty and unhappiness.

    Please don’t think I am criticising you, but I really don’t believe that solution would work for a lot of people. I believe me and my husband needs to talk about things, in the right way I agree, without yelling at each other, but walking out of the house like that for 6 hours is just as much venting your anger as shouting is. It makes the other person feel guilty.

    Communication is key in every relationship including marriage, not making the other person feel guilty. To have a marriage where you never fight but instead vent your anger by not talking and walking out on each other is not admirable in my opinion.

    • iyasostuff

      I don’t think she is saying that taking a walk for six hours would work for everyone. I know I couldn’t take a walk for six hours, but I could probably go to the other room and read a book, or watch some YouTube videos, or whatever to help you relax and think things through… but what she’s trying to say is that sometimes when we are hurt, we are quick to want to speak out of anger instead of the hurt, but we need to give ourselves time and space to think it through, and think about how we would hurt our spouse, and whether it would really solve our problems… she’s a walker, I’m a reader, you’re a ______ (fill in the blank), but whatever we choose we must remember that speaking in the moment (in the anger) is not always the right thing to do…

    • http://www.happywivesclub.com/ Fawn @ Happy Wives Club

      Hi Charlotte! Oh, I wouldn’t recommend a 6 hour walk for anyone :) . Now that I understand how to shut down the voices immediately, I’ve not had to take another walk in all our years of marriage that followed this. So please don’t take this as a recommendation of what another couple should do. The only point of this is to show an example of how I’ve applied the law of acceleration (or better yet, how to prevent it) in my own life. And it was sort of a part B to the post that came before it: http://www.happywivesclub.com/this-marriage-tip-changes-everything. Hope that makes better sense.

  • Katie Leppo

    I believe that when you blow up into an argument while your emotions are hot that it does create more drama and can take even more time to talk it through with your spouse. I have learned my in first year that you can’t let your anger get the best of you. I would sit for awhile, or wait till after work, then I would approach my Hubby with a clear mind and we could discuss it together. If you go into it flat out crazy you’re likely not to hear him at all. You just talk over each other and the problem is still not resolved. You can not be selfish in a marriage. I agree with you Fawn. Although I can’t get over homemade pie as junk food lol but that is just a difference we share and people should expect and respect that of your life. I hope you have a fantastic day, and Thank you again for your loving and lovely advice.

    • http://www.happywivesclub.com/ Fawn @ Happy Wives Club

      You are so right, Katie. I probably shouldn’t refer to homemade pies as junk food. It’s really sweets that are a challenge for me (I could actually go an entire day and only eat pie…so that’s my problem :) ). But now that you’ve said that, I think I’ll change that word in the post as to not be confusing. Thanks for that. And thank you for your kindness.

  • Mrs. B

    This is a great article Fawn! My husband and I have been married for 17 years. Throughout this time, we have both worked hard in learning how to deal with conflict effectively and in a manner that did not cause additional harm. I was way worse than he in situations like this. Being an emotional creature by nature, he would make me mad, I would make a mental tape recording and then replay it over and over throughout the day. By the time I was ready to address it, I had worked myself into a ‘rage’ and it felt like the offense had happened 100 times when that was simply not the case. So in an effort to save my mental sanity I developed rules for myself. First, I no longer rewind the tape. If the situation is something that I can not let go then I have to address it before the day is out and when I am calm. Instead of just speaking from a place of anger, the time allows me a chance to get my thoughts together and depersonalize the situation. I think one of the things that makes us so mad is because we can sometimes take things so personal and tell ourselves that our spouses meant to do ‘that thing’ to intentionally harm us. We all know 95% of the time that is simply not the case. When you take the personal feelings out of it, it can defuse the situation quicker than you think. Like others have already mentioned, each couple has their own way of communicating and should know and do what is best and healthy for them. I believe there are times when things need to be addressed immediately and there are times when it will be better to wait. However, there are also times when things don’t need to be addressed at all. A wise wife with the goal of building her house and marriage, knows the difference.

    Love your blog Fawn and the ladies that stop by to chat! Keep up the great work.

    • http://www.happywivesclub.com/ Fawn @ Happy Wives Club

      Thank you so much, Mrs. B! Love this! “…there are also times when things don’t need to be addressed at all. A wise wife with the goal of building her house and marriage, knows the difference.”

  • amina

    I hope to publish my message! I want to testify the world how authentic
    this caster is. I can say from his 1st message that I felt much more
    confident with him than with any other caster. It is obvious that he is
    not here only for money but truly to help people. I thank God I choose
    him to cast a spell for me. When I read all the bad reports about so
    many casters I was freaking out to send him so much money but now I don t
    regret it a second! Henry gave me a phone call only 3 days after I
    finished the ceremony. Honestly, I wasn t thinking it would have been so
    fast. I didn t even recognize his voice, it was such a long time I
    talked to him for the last time! Only 1 week after the end of the spell
    we met up and we made love all night at his place. It was fantastic and
    emotionally it was even better than our very first date! Everything
    happened as he promised and I thank him for ezizaoguntemple@gmail.com
    sincerity. Much love.

  • http://www.osasandgodwin.com osas R.

    Fawn,
    the bible says, paraphrasing that” there is rejoicing in heaven for “one” soul who give his/her life to christ.”…underline “one”. Thank you and Thank you for this club, words are not enough to say how grateful i am. you have change one person’s life, character,and way of life….you have help her to become a happier wife,she knows how to handle marriage challenges better because of you,She can control her anger because you decide to write a post which is personal to her……..every time she reads a post from you or other bloggers, she looks up to the Heaven and say Thank You Lord.No matter what others say or think about your post, remember ‘one soul’ and that person is ME.

    make today a great day!
    Osas.

    • http://www.happywivesclub.com/ Fawn @ Happy Wives Club

      Thank you for this!

  • BC :)

    Fawn, thank you for sharing this, in the post about you and your husband not arguing, I had wondered if that meant not getting mad or irritated with each other. It brought a tear to my eye reading this because it shows how much you love and respect yourself and your marriage by doing all you could to not disrespect either by waiting SIX hours to set your mind straight. That’s beautiful and I don’t think you lost at all. I think that was a great resolution for all of you. Thank you again got sharing and teaching!

    • http://www.happywivesclub.com/ Fawn @ Happy Wives Club

      Thank you so much, BC.