You know how in action movies, when there’s a bomb set to detonate any minute, and they call in the bomb squad, there’s always that tension-heavy scene with the guy defusing the bomb? You know the one I mean. He’s got all these wires, and he has to cut one to de-activate the explosive device, but there always seems to be some doubt as to which wire it is. He hovers his snippers over one, then the other, having a debate with himself: “Is it the red one? No, I think it’s the blue one. No, definitely red.” He looks like he’s on the edge of a heart-attack, and rightfully so, because if he snips the wrong wire, then KABLOOEY.

Well, I feel like a bomb squad guy sometimes. Only I seem to have MUCH less information about the construction of the bomb, and even if I do manage to snip the right wire, it may stop the immediate threat, while merely re-setting the bomb to go off at another time. And here’s the Big Stupid: Sometimes I see the right wire, know what I can do to at least make the clock stop ticking…and I don’t do it. Because it would hurt my pride, or my feelings, in some way. Most usually it would require me to, you know, SHUT UP. And I’m not such an expert at the shutting up.

We’ve recently had a bomb squad incident in our life. Everything’s OK now, crisis averted, no one went off the rails, nothing exploded (well, maybe some small explosions, but nothing nuclear). But while it was going on, it was miserable. We were both miserable. And I couldn’t help, which is frustrating. I could keep from making it worse, but that was about all that was in my power. Part of the reason that I couldn’t help is because I was faced with thought processes that, to me, just did not make any sense. There were questions I couldn’t answer, because I simply could not view them in a rational light. Most frustrating of all, things kept going in circles–there was no logic which could prevail that would lead, in a linear fashion, to a CONCLUSION. For someone like me, this is crazy-hard.

I like to think I learned a little from our recent difficulty, and I hope that I can utilize it in the future. But, MAN, is it ever not easy. I have long known that there are certain “symptoms” of what I think of as “bipolar logic,” and also that there is no use in trying to circumvent that thought process in my husband. It won’t last long, and if I can just SHUT UP and ride it out, and not feed into it or make it worse, it will be over even faster. Have I mentioned how difficult that last part is for me? The shutting up part? Because it is. Particularly suppressing the impulse to say, “You are acting like a CHILD,” which, as you can imagine, really helps things get resolved. /sarcasm.

For me, dealing with a problem goes something like this: See problem. Recognize source of problem. Evaluate whether anything can be done toward solving problem. Take what steps I can to actively accomplish those things, including engaging the assistance of others who might be able to help with problem. Move on. Admittedly, with me, there’s a lot of anxiety and stress wrapped up in this process, but I don’t waste a lot of energy on things I can’t control–I concentrate my anxiety on the things I can do something about.

This is not far from my bipolar husband’s approach to problem-solving, either…eventually. But first, for him, a stressor is a “trigger.” It puts his brain into a fight-or-flight mode that is counter-productive to the problem-solving process. He stalls after that first stage, and gets caught in a loop of arguing with the problem, usually about how unfair it is. He gets combative, first railing against the upsetting thing itself, then eventually at me, because, you know, I’m THERE. I’ve gotten better at not taking this personally, though I won’t lie and say it doesn’t hurt. In my mind, I’m his ally, his supporter, his #1 fan, me and him against the world, but for a little while in his mind, I am “other,” and I am, like everyone and everything, “against” him. I really hate that part.

After this last storm passed (and you know, I should mention here that TREMENDOUS progress has been made by my husband in the last few years, and that things that would have previously sent him into weeks-long tailspins now maybe just partially derail him for a day or two), and Alex was apologizing to me for his misplaced anger and hostility (he doesn’t call me names or abuse me in any way–he just directs some of his anger at the only other person around: me), I took the opportunity to ask him, “When this was going on, and you were going around and around in circles with your thinking, and lashing out about things–like the weather–that no one could control, what would have been a response from me that would have helped in any way?” He didn’t have an answer for me. I asked, because, when a storm in brewing in his brain, there really seems to be no “correct” response that I can make–no matter which wire I snip, something’s gonna get asploded.

I’d like to think that I’ve at least gotten better about not making the explosions BIGGER, which I used to do with no small frequency, pushing buttons that I should have been mature enough not to push, especially since I was supposed to be the “rational” one, whatever that means.

Support groups, online forums, and written resources everywhere are full of advice about how not to escalate irrational behavior, or at least how to remove yourself from the equation. I’m pretty much all set there. I know all the buzzwords and phrases: Detach, Do Not Engage, Take Care of Yourself. That’s all fine and good. But–and here is where I expose my inner co-dependent who never really goes away–when someone I love is in pain, and is suffering due to non-productive anger and frustration…isn’t there something, anything that I can do to alleviate that at the time, instead of just retreating to an emotional storm shelter and waiting it out?

Ironically, these questions have only just begun plaguing me since the “bad times” have become far less frequent, less lengthy, and with less lingering aftereffect. Maybe I’m fooling myself into thinking, since things are so much better, that if I just had a better bomb squad, we could avoid this kind of tension altogether.

Does any of this make any sense at all?