Turning Down the Volume

I gave a recap of our horrible vacation here.

At the end of that one evening that started out with me trading shouts with my wife and her sister, my wife kept me awake begging me to get therapy and get drugged for my "rage". I calmly and quietly asked her if I had ever... ever... come out of the blue and just started yelling at anyone. She had to answer no.

It is true, my temper has been a problem for me in my life.

It was a problem when I was a kid, and I learned to control it by the time I was a teen. Now that I think about it, I think I got a handle on my temper about the time I started masturbating to orgasm. Coincidence?

Anger has never been a problem for me professionally. If anything, there are times when I should have displayed anger and didn't.

It hasn't been a problem while I drive (no road rage from me).

As an adult, it has never led to a physical fight or violence.

I don't throw things, hit things or people, kick things or people, push people, or break things.

I don't berate or insult others.

I scream... loudly and angrily... often I'm screaming questions... "Why did you do that? What do you expect me to do?" Or refusal, such as "I'm not going to do that!"

It was never a problem in any of my past relationships – I don't recall that I ever yelled at a girlfriend except perhaps with one who would have already been yelling at me. But sometimes with my family, and that now includes the family I have made, I yell. My wife has correctly noted it is when I think I should have control over something, but don't.

With the kids, it was "STOP [fill the in blank]!" I say "was" because when my wife sat me down to point it out and why it was a problem, I stopped.

Even when the yelling is a response to an angry or yelling statement from another adult, I shouldn't be yelling as often as I am.

But I refuse to drug myself when I know behavior modification can work.

My mind is the last thing that is mine.

I'm not sure I have a need for outside help based on something that happened under very unusual circumstances, and things got better after that, as least as far as I'm concerned. I haven't yelled since. But my wife would argue that it has been a pattern.

Maybe it is.

Your Baby Daddy's Momma

Dear Margo thinks things stop being sins as time passes. "Not Getting Through" wrote into Dear Margo:

I am currently engaged to a man I love everything about (well, most everything). However, his mother, who I refer to as "monster-in-law," tries to control everything.

She can only do that if he lets her. This is going to be reality for the rest of his life, unless he changes it.

My fiance and I have a baby together, and his mother stepped in, even before the baby was born, to tell me what I had to do.

Maybe she assumed if you were foolish enough to get knocked up out of wedlock and keep the baby instead of adopting out or getting married immediately, you needed the help. Are you really engaged, or does it just sound better to say you are because you have a kid with him?

For instance, she told me I was not to potty-train my child until she was 3 because she would not be ready until then.

So what? You're going to get all sorts of advice from lots of people.

She even resorted to calling our daughter a "mistake," saying she was born out of sin because we were not married.

Unless you planned to get pregnant out of wedlock, then yes, the pregnancy was a mistake, or rather the actions that caused it were a mistake.

We were both hurt by this.

The truth hurts. You know what hurts more? Children not having married parents.

You chose to raise a baby with and shack up with this guy, and you get his relationship with his mother as part of the package. Deal with it.

Margo responded:

For one thing, the potty-training age she has set is late, by some people’s lights, and the sin thing is way off the mark.

Now this is hilarious for Margo to write, since sin is "missing the mark". Yes, sex with someone who isn't your spouse is a sin according to the Bible. You're free not to believe it, but not to deny the Bible says what it does, because we can all check for ourselves.

A granny who thinks the kid is a bastard is so 18th century.

Circumstances change, but truth doesn't change. The child is not lesser. The parents are being lesser.

Part of the Problem

I'm taking this opportunity to remind any reader of this blog that I am a sinner. In my words, thoughts, and deeds, I often miss the mark big time, falling shorter from the holiness of God than a stepladder at the bottom of the Grand Canyon is from reaching the Moon.

When analyzing things here, I often pass judgment on the ideas and actions of others. This is not to say I don't mess up – I don't want to give the impression that I think I couldn't be torn apart in a similar fashion. But I am not the standard, and while I often will refer to my own experience, I do not hold myself up as the standard. There is an objective right and wrong, and we should all strive (myself included) to do right and not wrong.

As a follower of Christ, I am convinced that my sins are forgiven and that I fellowship with Him. I throw myself upon the mercy of God, knowing I can never "make up" for all of the wrong I have done and all of the right I have failed to do. The bad news is that I have committed moral crimes against God, and there should be punishment for moral crimes. I have been part of the problem. The Good News is that Jesus is my Lord and Savior – and He provides the solution. His solutions are bigger than all of the problems, thank God.