If/when I am ever in another long-term relationship, I refuse to be in charge of regulating another adult’s emotions.
It seems this responsibility is assigned to people when they enter a relationship, according to our societal standards of one, but it seems unhealthy.
There’s a difference between taking responsibility for treating someone poorly, and being assigned the task of regulating someone’s emotions. The first is a personal responsibility to not be an asshole – to the best of our abilities, of course. No one can ever not be an asshole 100% of the time. The latter means that when someone feels a certain way, I know it is not my responsibility to be an emotional band-aid.
For example, if I feel angry, it is not my partner’s responsibility to get me back to emotional equilibrium. I am in charge of that emotion, and I am responsible for dealing with it accordingly. Of course, sometimes talking it out with someone helps – but that’s a technique that we use to regulate our own emotions. If my partner expected me to make them feel better, then that would be unhealthy. No one should have to do that. No one should make someone else do that.
This is a skill that needs to be honed. After all, humans are irrational, and we act on emotions all the time, rather than working through them. Fuck, I know I do. We’re sort of good at it – most of us don’t go around stabbing the first person who annoys us that day. We can certainly do this for ourselves.
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