Desensitivity Training
Probably not what it sounds like…
I’m too sensitive. I know this, not because I’ve been told by my mother and LK both, but because I can see how I react to things. I have a “rich interior life” that no one sees, thankfully, and I think way too much. Way, way, too much. As a result, I’m overly sensitive to a lot of really stupid things.
Case in point,Final Straw by Snow Patrol. Now, that might seem fairly safe. Some rather bland pop band not unlike many, many others. So why would I react so strongly to it? This led to a rather unpleasant “discussion” with LK and I. We’d been out and, as we pulled up, some song by Snow Patrol came on the radio. LK coos that it’s her favorite new song and turns the volume up. I asked who it was and she told me. Suddenly, I was nauseous. I sat for a moment and listened, but it got to me too much. Sadly, I apparently whispered my explanation to LK, who couldn’t hear me over the song. I sat for a few more seconds then I had to get out of the car. I felt the adrenaline sprint through me making me shake, but with rage or fear or just simple pain, I don’t know. She chased me, demanding to know what’s wrong and, finally, I choke out “That’s how I knew”.
“Knew what?” she asked me, bewildered.
“Knew that my ex-wife was cheating on me.”
You see, one night after being at one of the men’s support group meetings that I’d been attending, she and her daughter were playing that CD. It was obviously not new and I hadn’t seen it before. I asked her where it came from and she told me that a “friend” gave it to her. Now, in most situations, I suppose, a man might accept that answer, but, and I say this without any animosity or exaggeration, my wife didn’t really have any friends, by her own choice. Really. I am not lying or exaggerating or anything for effect or the sake of a good narrative. It was that precise moment that I knew, for sure, that she’d been cheating on me. There wasn’t any other explanation in my mind that could put that CD in her hand. Certainly not the lie that she told me.
But, all that aside, my point is that it shouldn’t bother me anymore. I should be past the fact that she did what she did. God knows, I was no angel either, though, I never cheated on her. Small comfort, considering. So, a couple of days ago, I made up my mind that I was going to get that CD and listen to it until those feelings burned their way clean.
I’ve been listening to that CD for two days now, letting it loop over and over and over. Funny thing is, though they’re not my favorite band, and I think their music is somewhat bland, overly “emo” and not all that original, they’ve started to grow on me.
