Dear Acappella,
Yous sound quite low and despairing in this post, am I reading you right? If so, I'm so sorry. I'm guessing something bad has maybe happened?
I think you're asking whether it is possible for people to have an equal and mutually supportive relationship? Here's my experience -
My husband and I both come from N parents and have failed marriages behind us. We have been together 20-odd years. We continue to struggle with issues from the past that impact our relationship, but I like to think we are still making progress together. Although old stuff gets in the way, we really try to come from an I'm OK, You're OK perspective.
What we both have of course is echoes of what we learnt from our parents, and that REALLY gets in the way. He will at times be patronising, overbearing, dismissive, impatient etc, just like his dear old Dad. And I will be victimy, bitchy, despairing, moany, etc, like my mother. We are getting good at spotting this in each other and pointing it out nicely, and accepting that we do this.
I can only think of little things we do that seem to help. For instance, he insisted long ago that we start the day by being nice to each other, so we always say "Good morning" and kiss first thing. I can't tell you how strange this was to me at first, but it is a powerful way to behave. Similarly, we don't go to bed with bad feelings between us.
I never could understand why it was OK in my family for my parents to be incredibly rude to me, when they would never dream of being anything but ultra-polite to people outside the family. So we try to remain civil even when we are expressing anger. I am very influenced by the whole emotional literacy thing (Claud Steiner, Daniel Golem (sp?)) so we try to own any strong emotions we have and focus on each other's behaviour rather than attacking personally.
Of course all of this is a counsel of perfection and we fall off the wagon frequently. Sometimes I think I'm justifying repression, especially of my own anger. I never had a tantrum as a child (it was too dangerous, my mother would never have coped) so I have difficulty expressing anger appropriately. He on the other hand feels and expresses anger all too easily. There is so much damage done to children of N parents, especially in terms of the lack of unconditional love that all children need, that it is an ongoing struggle to maintain a 'normal' adult relationship.
I'm wondering if this is the sort of thing you wanted? I hope you might post again and say how you are at the moment.
nightsong
