wisdom wrote:TatteredKnight – very much appreciate your comments and prospective! Would very much love to know much more detail on the $#%^ tests. “Learning about $#%^ tests, understanding them, and passing them instead of failing them.” How about some specific examples of $#%^ tests? Even the name itself, “$#%^ test,” certainly speaks volumes on how they must be exceptionally trying to the uninitiated! Also, how about some details on how do you pass a “$#%^ test”? Any great writes ups from past posts? Please spill!
Welcome!
There seem to be a couple of different, albeit similar, things that people mean when they say '$#%^ test'. The first is the general type that all women use. This is her testing her partner's strength, and to pass it you merely have to be able to rise above her teasing or pettiness:David Deida wrote:So she will test you. She might not be fully conscious of why she is doing it, but she will poke your weak spots, especially in moments of your superficial success, in order to feel your strength. If you collapse, you've flunked the test. You have let your woman deflate you. You have demonstrated your dependence on her for external validation. Even if you just made a million dollars, you are a weak man. Your woman cannot trust you fully.
If you remain full and strong, humorous and happy, your truth unperturbed by her testing, then you pass the test.
-The Way of the Superior Man (Ch. 15, Stop Hoping for Your Woman to Get Easier)
The more serious type of $#%^ test is what we often see in this forum. She will deliberately cross one of your boundaries, to see if you are strong enough to defend it. This is no different to when a wolf takes a nip at the leader of their pack - they aren't making a challenge for supremacy, quite, but they're testing for weakness. If the alpha wolf lets them get away with it, then pretty soon there will be bloodshed.
TK wrote:She will test you, constantly, to see if she can control you. Don't let her push you or manipulate you. She'll yell and scream when you stop jumping on her command. She will push every button she can find to try and get you back under control. She will rage at you. Always stop and think it through. Don't be afraid to apologise if you were in the wrong, but never just assume you were, and never apologise when you were in the right. If you were and it's just another shit-test, tell her directly "your anger is your problem, not mine" and give her some space to get over it. She'll rage even harder when you say this - that's part of the test. If she can intimidate you, you fail, and she loses respect for you. If she can't, even if the night ends on her stomping off to the spare room yelling "I'm never speaking to you again" over some ridiculous thing, you pass. Her respect for you goes up, she feels safer and more committed in the relationship, and believe it or not she finds you more attractive.
Examples from a post on another forum:
http://www.nomoremrniceguy.com/forums/showpost.php?p=263362&postcount=37 wrote:The second part was learning to pass $#%^ tests and properly enforce boundaries. Every time you fail a $#%^ test, she respects you less and she feels less secure in your ability to protect and support her (and she starts shit-testing more because she's insecure). Every time you pass a $#%^ test, she feels more secure. The way this term is used varies a lot, but to me, a $#%^ test is where she deliberately tries to cross one of your boundaries to see whether she can get away with it. What makes it hard is that during a $#%^ test, she will deny, blame, blameshift, guilt, project, misdirect... use every emotionally abusive and manipulative weapon in her arsenal against you to try and 'beat' you.
(Edit: This is just my clumsy description of it. I'm just reading the chapter named 'Stop Hoping For Your Woman To Get Easier', in The Way of the Superior Man by Deida, and he describes it better than I can.)
$#%^ test: She insults or emasculates you (bonus points if in front of friends).
To pass: Call her on it. "I'm not going to take that $#%^ from you."
To fail: Let it slide. Congratulations, she now knows it's OK to treat you like that.
$#%^ test: She starts an argument and tries to make it your fault.
To pass: You stand your ground, calmly explain it's not your fault, if necessary your 'I will not be abused by my partner' boundary kicks in and you leave the room until she runs out of steam.
To fail: You apologise and supplicate yourself.
$#%^ test: She starts spending one-on-one time with a guy who's attracted to her.
To pass: Tell her that you won't accept her having 'suitors' and that if she doesn't cut contact with him, she's out on her ass. You will not settle for half of a girlfriend/wife.
To fail: Accept her $#%^ about 'we're just friends', 'you have trust issues', 'you're controlling and possessive'. Let her guilt trip and #######4 you into letting it continue until it's eaten away at your relationship to the point where she's having an emotional affair with the guy.
(Yeah, I failed this one, badly, twice. So maybe I'm a slow learner... but she now knows damn well not to try it again.)
$#%^ test: She invites people over for the evening without telling you.
To pass: If you're OK with company, just say "next time, consult me first." If you're not, then make her cancel the invite.
To fail: Let it slide. Congratulations, you no longer have a say in the running of your own house.
The most important thing to remember about a $#%^ test is that while she's fighting tooth and nail to make you fail, she wants you to pass. During the $#%^ test she can be screaming 'I'll leave you!' but inside, she's crying "don't let me go."
Part three (and these come in no particular order) is de-enmeshment. You have to untie your emotional state from hers, and just like everything else, take control of and responsibility for it. If you can't be happy unless she's happy, then what happens when she gets depressed or starts brooding on something? You'll be stuck in a downward spiral with nothing fun or pretty at the bottom. If you let her drag you down, you'll never be able to lift her up.
The basic theme is that a $#%^ test is when she doesn't feel secure in your strength, so she tests you, hoping that you'll prove to her that you're strong by standing up to her. After all, if you're weaker than her, how can you protect her from the rest of the world? The only way for her to ever stop testing you is if she feels your strength. And if you are strong, but fair, and pass all her $#%^ tests, and she KEEPS testing you, then it's like one big meta-shit-test: How much of her crap will you put up with? If you feel that you're in this situation, just sit her down and say "you're being a heinous bitch, I need you to stop being a heinous bitch or you're going to be a lonely heinous bitch."
All – strikes me as TatteredKnight knows his limits of what he is willing to tolerate in terms of bonding with a HPD, and for him it works well! Looks like to maintain some sanity amidst the chaos some limits and a contract need to be established “up front” in dealing with a HPD. What are the limits? When you see HPD how do you strike “the contract” And when the terms are tested or crossed, do you have any other option than full exit with no looking back? Warnings, second chances? Is a best effort good enough? Tolerance? Fall back?
The word you're looking for is 'boundaries'. The 'contract' you're talking about is with yourself, not your partner. You have to communicate your boundaries to her clearly, explaining what it is you won't tolerate and what the consequences will be if she crosses that boundary. When she does cross a boundary, you enforce the consequence. In an extremely dysfunctional relationship, many of the consequences will be "if you do <X> then I will leave you." As the relationship becomes healthier then the transgressions will be smaller and the consequences likewise should be smaller - maybe if she yells abuse at you the consequence is you leave the room until she calms down, or if she puts you down in front of friends the consequence is that you call her on it then and there, "that was bitchy, apology now please".
Other therapists start out by being very direct with a patient, and HPDs might just love that! "I will be your knight in shining armor coming to your emotional rescue. You will be mine, you will be mine, all mine." – Rolling Stones). This would initially appear to be TatteredKnight’s approach. However later, once trust develops you might find that same therapist pulling back the emo support and doing everything humanly possible to rid the HPD of all dependent personality traits and force the HPD to stand up on her own two legs (albeit with some genuine empathy this time around…). Any thoughts on how that might work? Can you swoop in, do a rescue and then later (gradually, over time) wean the HPD over to more “mature” independence?
How do you think I got my username?
My armour had a lot of dents in it by the time I signed up on this forum. And yes, that's exactly how it worked for me, although quite by accident. I was far too much of a rescuer and a caretaker, and I had terrible boundaries. Our relationship started wonderfully, I rescued her from a nasty situation and gave her the life she'd dreamed of. The rot set in when I didn't have the maturity to enforce boundaries, pass $#%^ tests etc. and I had to learn how to have a real, adult relationship in order to save my marriage. Basically everything I've said in this post, I've figured out in the last year.Also very much on my mind - can a Non work collaboratively with a HPD effectively over time and effect real relief, or is a professional always required? Non’s have so much more contact time, and so much more live, real-time behavioral data to work from. (On the order of 100x or more!) Psychotherapists have great training, have studied disorder patterns, and have focused experience, but they are exceptionally expensive (many times not covered by insurance or subject to limits and high deductibles). Plus, a psychotherapist only has what the HPD voluntarily tells them, verbally (and what they can soak up nonverbally.) They also only operate off-line in non real-time, whereas a Non can catch things right in the moment.
Definitely. My wife never got anything helpful out of therapy. She's grown amazingly just since I started getting my own $#%^ in order. While I do believe that psychoanalysis can be very helpful in understanding yourself and others, it's pretty telling that Deida has an entire chapter in Way of the Superior Man entitled "Don't Analyse Your Woman". Following my psych's advice helped me somewhat, but the main benefit I got was learning, from his example, how to understand another's basic thought processes. On the other hand, following Deida's advice transformed my marriage. Your mileage may vary.
Thanks for the CBT info. Some solid stuff there - I'm going to try and find more to read up on.
lol. So every week I get a small "$#%^ test" to take. I am amused but I pass them easily. So here's an example with this new woman:
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