How to handle a line of questioning

[Trying123]

Last night my husband (pwbpd) became upset over the fact that he’s explained to my teenage daughter multiple times how he would like the dishwasher loaded and she still loads it “her way”. He had even purchased her an Apple Watch with the agreement that she would load the dishwasher correctly. Needless to say, the watch changed nothing.

I was sitting on the couch playing a game in my phone when he came into the living room and said he wanted to take away my daughter’s phone and watch until she could show him she could load the dishwasher the correct way. I said that I agreed with taking away the watch since it was tied into the dishwasher agreement. Cue the dysregulation.

When he becomes dysregulated, one of the things he does is ask loaded questions. Virtually a line of questioning that forces you to answer in a negative way that scues the argument to his side. They are logical questions, it’s the malicious intent behind them that bothers me. So my question is, is it best to answer his questions and let him “take his win” as he sees it, or set a boundary and leave?

Last night I set a very messy boundary. After about a half hour I texted him and used SET. He seemed to respond ok to it until I got the text asking me if I was excusing my behavior, an indication he was still dysregulated as he wanted me to take the blame. I stayed gone for about 2.5 hours and he was still dysregulated when I got home but he left me alone.

Any thoughts? Advice? Commiseration? Thanks!

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[Outdorenthusiast]

I am sorry to hear this, as I know from personal experience how frustrating this can be!  Ok, this is never 100% easy in my experience - but it boils down to listening to the words and guessing the feelings behind the words. In S.E.T. it is about empathizing with how they feel, not what has/has not been done.  Logically you probably did what any normal person would do.  However in my experience I have to recycle back to more empathizing with her feelings that are being triggered.  It may take several times until I get it right.  I also have to keep calm and empathize, empathize, empathize.  I don’t change my truth or apologize for it anymore, but I may empathize with how that truth may make her feel.  I also let her know I will support her and empathize that these are tough emotions she is trying to sort through - but I don’t solve her emotions - I let her sort through them and self sooth.

Lines of questioning in my experience is that the underlying emotions haven’t been empathized enough, and she doesn’t “feel” heard.

[Trying123]

Lines of questioning in my experience is that the underlying emotions haven’t been empathized enough, and she doesn’t “feel” heard.

I think you nailed it with this statement. He doesn’t feel heard. I’m still a work in progress when it comes to validating his feelings and last night caught me off guard.

So for instance when he said, “Are you going to do anything about this? Of course not! Because then she would hate you!” I could’ve said something along the lines of, “I hear you don’t trust me to take care of this problem. I promise to talk with her on Monday and warn her about the dishes.” Yes?

[Chief Drizzt]

I think you nailed it with this statement. He doesn’t feel heard. I’m still a work in progress when it comes to validating his feelings and last night caught me off guard.

So for instance when he said, “Are you going to do anything about this? Of course not! Because then she would hate you!” I could’ve said something along the lines of, “I hear you don’t trust me to take care of this problem. I promise to talk with her on Monday and warn her about the dishes.” Yes?

Interesting that he said you wouldn’t do it because “then she would hate you…” I get this all the time from my wife when it comes to our teenage daughter.  My wife is always saying she is the one that has to be the bad guy all the time.  I don’t get that at all.

Your response is something similar to what I would say.  I works half the time for me - but not always.

One thing I’ve got going is that my wife wants our daughter to check in with us all the time to let us know where she is going.  I personally find this over the top since she is 18 now and also because we have her on i360 which lets us know where she is all the time anyway.  Any way I told my wife last night “I will talk to her about checking in with us.”  It worked then but if my daughter doesn’t check in with us it has the potential to blow up…

[Outdorenthusiast]

So for instance when he said, “Are you going to do anything about this? Of course not! Because then she would hate you!” I could’ve said something along the lines of, “I hear you don’t trust me to take care of this problem. I promise to talk with her on Monday and warn her about the dishes.” Yes?

Or… you can also try... “ I am feeling that this extremely frustrating for you, it is really bothering you, and you feel disrespected, and unsupported  (or insert feeling here…)….is that right? “

This is the feelings part.  It has less to do with your action/inactions and more to do with calling out and guessing their feelings so they feel heard…. That at least stops the repeat questions because you nail the underlying “feelings” issue…