The Nine Rooms of Happiness: Loving Yourself, Finding Your Purpose, and Getting Over Life's Little Imperfections (21 page)

Enter the world of the Internet, where your social life can be whatever you want it to be. Facebook Man is a new phenomenon—you once had to go to your high school reunion to reconnect with that guy who sometimes pops up in your fantasies. The answer to “I wonder whatever happened to so-’n’-so?” is now just a few clicks away. People from your past are now at your fingertips 24/7. You are free to imagine this person, in all his potential perfection, as your long-lost soul mate. He laughs at your quips and flatters your ego. On Facebook, you get to edit your storyline and present to the world the side of your personality you like best.

Meanwhile, at home, all hell can be breaking loose. But on Facebook you are the persona you present to the world, in albums and funny comments and “shared” content on your wall. You can give a quickie thumbs-up, and it’s like you’re reminding them: “I’m here…” And then wait and see if anyone nibbles on the baited hook.

“I have connected to this person online who I knew in college, and he really digs me, but I don’t think it would necessarily work out. I just love to check my in-box and see what he’s written, and usually it’s so flattering and funny that I blush. It makes me feel like we’re dating or something, when in fact I am married and not even interested in looking at another guy in real life. Still, it makes we wonder what I’m capable of. I mean, I love my husband and he loves me, but this person makes me feel much younger, more alive, sexier. But then I think,
If my hubby loves me even when I look a wreck, isn’t that the real thing?
I should be happy that he appreciates me, even when I think I look horrible. My kids still want to
snuggle, and when I later look in the mirror I think:
They see me as a beauty, and I see a mother who’s let herself go.

“Facebook Man doesn’t know that, though. He just knows that I’m a busy working mother who has a good head of hair and can type out a funny turn of phrase. And that’s exactly what I want him to know. Nothing else. What part of me needs this? It cuts into time with my husband, because he thinks I’m working and he just goes to bed without me. If I didn’t need my ‘Facebook Man fix’ we’d probably have more fun together, watch a movie, even have sex.”

Fiona is in the wrong room. She is not in the office (where her computer is located) or the bedroom (where she thinks she should go to spend more time with her husband). She is in the bathroom, where the image of herself in her real life isn’t what she wants it to be. And on Facebook she can imagine that best version of herself that she wishes she could re-create, even though her life is booked up with the twins and a job and all the other to-dos on her list that keep her from getting to the gym and eating healthfully. Meanwhile, her online “lover” is reflecting that perfect image of herself back, and she loves this view of herself, so she thinks she loves him.

Facebook can function like a grown-up version of Harry Potter’s magical mirror where you see only your heart’s deepest, “most desperate” desires. It’s called the “Mirror of Erised”—
Desire
spelled backward—and for Fiona that reflection would be a cleaned-up version of herself, as a pulled together and attractive woman, not one with thirty-five extra pounds and nothing in her old wardrobe fitting. She wants to see herself the way she was before the babies: slender and sexy and appealing to everyone, herself included.

Many women find themselves flirting for all the wrong reasons. They flirt not because they are so unhappy at home, but because they constantly need positive affirmation. In fact the husband may say, “Honey, you’re beautiful, and I’m still attracted to you,” but because the woman isn’t happy with herself she devalues his opinion and thinks:
He’s an idiot. Because I hate myself, now I hate anyone who loves this version of myself.

Fiona needs to get back to that place where she likes herself, even if it doesn’t mean acquiring the perfect pretwin flat-abs figure. Instead she has to define the new version of herself and who she wants to be now.

Catherine points out that Fiona is split. On Facebook, she’s that gorgeous, flirtatious girl of her fantasies, and at home she’s the frumpy mom in sweats. Splitting is a defense mechanism; it can happen when you need an escape hatch, like when you’ve had a big life change or are under undue stress. You create this fantasy version of life, where it’s all good over here, in one area, and all bad in another. But both are exaggerated, two extremes of the spectrum. Fiona has to integrate these polar opposite sides of her personality, which means finding a comfortable middle ground where she can like her life.

Fiona doesn’t have to give up the fun side or the mom side of her identity. She can be the awesome do-it-all woman of her Facebook profile, the fun-loving wife her husband married, and the upbeat energetic mom who directs all that energy to her kids. The point is to be her best self within the context of her family, not finding a fix outside of it in order to be happy.

So Fiona has to stop splitting and start integrating. She needs to get to the bathroom and take care of herself: start to exercise and eat right, get a new haircut, and look her best so that she can be the person she wants to be for real, not just a Facebook fantasy. The pearl: Integrate, don’t separate. Meaning: You can be a complex woman. The key is to appreciate the whole person with all the many different facets of your life.

Amanda loves her husband, Dave, but doesn’t feel passionate about him these days. In fact, a mother of three—ages three, five, and eight—working part-time as a radiology technician and shuttling the kids around 24/7, she’s angry that he doesn’t seem interested in the details of her life. She remembers feeling passionate about Dave, a paramedic, when they first dated. “I can still think about our first kiss and get that butterfly feeling in my stomach!” She has numerous stories about how much fun they had back then, and how adventurous they were, skiing the backcountry, camping out in the desert, and having sex all the time. “But that was before we had kids and had to get serious about building our family and careers. We just don’t have that much time together anymore…the kids have been our joint focus, and all the rest of our energy gets poured into our jobs. We both like to excel at work and have gotten lots of compliments on how hardworking we are. It’s very important to us both.”

Amanda still believes Dave is the guy for her. He’s smart, honest, loyal, loving, a wonderful husband and father…plus he’s good-looking. She isn’t planning on having an affair, but isn’t shutting that door completely. “I mean, there isn’t anyone I have in mind, but on occasion I feel that little zing when I’m talking to a handsome man who is really interested in what I’m saying and intently listening to me. It’s a turn-on!”

Amanda is conflicted about her work husband. “I really don’t think we have crossed the line, but he is so attentive and always remembers to ask about my mom’s health as well as complimenting me on a nice outfit or new haircut. I really like the attention. Dave has been pretty busy with work and coaching soccer for the kids, and he doesn’t seem that tuned in to what’s going on in my life.” Amanda was okay with that arrangement until another mother at a soccer game showed an interest in Dave, listening to his stories and laughing at his silly jokes. Amanda was intensely jealous and suddenly realized what was happening to her marriage: She
was losing the connection to her spouse, and he was picking up friendly signals elsewhere. It was a wake-up call.

Amanda is realizing one of the universals of marriage: The early child-rearing years can be some of the toughest on many couples. They lose touch with each other as the kids become their focus, and they prioritize everything else first and each other last. They are failing to connect on a regular basis, and intimacy often gets overridden by the daily grind. It’s easy to channel all that emotional attention to your kids at home and your colleagues at work—the people you’re around the most. You have to make an effort to spend quality time with your spouse. Sometimes it has to wait until the last hour of the night, after the kids go to sleep and before you collapse into bed, exhausted. It may even need to be scheduled. Maybe you have a natural rhythm of connecting, but otherwise you have to put it on the to-do list…preferably near the top of that list.

Though Amanda isn’t cheating physically, she has crossed an emotional line, and she knows it. “I love him as a friend, and that would be so uncomplicated if he were a woman, but because he’s a man I feel guilty, so I don’t tell my husband about it. I know he’d be pissed.”

Catherine says Amanda is disconnecting, and getting her emotional needs met elsewhere. She has transferred her feelings from Dave onto Matt. Part of what’s making her do this is that Dave isn’t showing much empathy for her hectic life, or her mom’s health problems. She’s acting out by overinvesting emotionally with Matt and has started to withhold her thoughts and feelings from Dave.

Amanda saw at that soccer match that this isn’t a harmless game. “I thought,
Oh my god, he’s adorable and if I’m not nice to him, some other woman will be and I could lose him.
I made my way over to where he was and started chatting warmly and complimenting him on raising such an athletic daughter. He clearly liked that, and I realized how rarely I ever say anything nice to him anymore. In fact, I don’t give him much of anything anymore, and I have to start doing more for him.”

Amanda needs to understand that this all started because she was angry at her husband for not reading her mind, which is not something he
(or, last we checked, any man) can do. She shut him out and then he started paying less attention to her, and that became a vicious cycle. The two of them need to talk and share their grievances. She has to acknowledge that she is participating in the deterioration of their marriage. It’s easy to focus on your spouse’s shortcomings, but far more helpful to look at yourself and assess what’s going on inside.

Amanda was acting out rather than expressing how she felt. She needs to start letting Dave know what she is feeling and going through, and listening to him as well. She needs to start confiding in her real husband and stop putting so much attention into her relationship at work. If she wants to salvage her marriage, she has to start emotionally investing her time and effort at home. The pearl: No man is a mind reader. Tell him what you need.

Charlotte says she loves her boyfriend, but making love is often less than inspiring. She wants to marry him, but after three years, their sex life is still banal. From the get-go, he just never had the moves. He used to make her heart flutter by walking in the room, but that wore off, and then she got even more critical of the fact that their sex life never had fireworks. “Basic is the way I’d describe it. Nothing bad, but nothing amazing either. I mean, I’ve had one-night stands that were more memorable than any of our nights together. And I get frustrated, because I really love him, but I’m not turned on by him most of the time.”

Charlotte broached the subject gently with Shep one time, and he
said, “I think our sex is pretty great,” and beamed at her, implying that he was just happy being with her in bed.

“For him, it feels good no matter what,” she says. “Shep doesn’t ask how it feels for me, since he assumes it’s fine. He doesn’t know what to do for me. I’ve tried to tell him, but it seems to me there is only so much you can communicate verbally on that front.” Now he’s trying even harder to make her happy and she doesn’t want to hurt his feelings.

To her great dismay Charlotte had a one-night stand after a late night out drinking with friends recently, and it was amazing. “On some level, I wanted to find out if the boring sex was my fault. I had to know: Had I lost it? But also, I just wanted to have hot, steamy sex, and I knew this would be my chance. Shep was out of town and he’ll never know. But I feel bad, even though we’re not married. I can’t tell him, but I also think it’s partly his fault because I am so
not
satisfied. It’s almost like being hungry: If there’s no food in the fridge, you have to go out for dinner. It’s just a physical need. We all have them.”

Now Charlotte is wondering whether she should get married to Shep—if she is cheating now, what’s it going to be like in ten years? Will she have what it takes to stick with him and make it work? She is at a crisis point in her relationship and needs to answer this question pronto.

She’s rationalizing, says Catherine. On the one hand, she’s right: We all have needs. On the other, she is in a committed relationship and telling herself that she can break the rules. She has to decide whether she wants to be Shep’s partner. If she chooses to stay and work at their relationship, then she has to sit down with Shep in a neutral space (kitchen table, here we come!) and talk about what is going on with her, emotionally and sexually. Tell him what she is feeling and believes she needs to be satisfied. One of the problems is that she’s not communicating well enough—and that may be because she doesn’t know what she wants clearly enough herself. So Catherine says Charlotte is acting out by cheating rather than expressing her dissatisfaction to Shep.

Charlotte
thinks
she told Shep how she feels, but he didn’t get it. She’s trying not to hurt his feelings by disparaging him in bed, but she’s hurting
him behind his back in a way that’s far more damaging and could ruin any future marriage in the long run.