The Dance of Intimacy

My wife Susan pulls out her old, weathered copy of the Study Guide for Marriage and Family Therapy, and opens it to a well turned-down page. Tears come to her eyes as she reads a quote by clinical psychologist David Schnarch:

“Intimacy is the process of knowing oneself in the presence of another person. It takes courage and faith in one’s self and the other. Only then can each person risk stripping away every mask, every façade . . . and exist for a while in that state of pure being where there is no expectation and no judgment.”

“You see, Peter?” she says, as she takes my hand, “It is possible for us to have deep intimacy together. That’s what I want for us.”

Being married to a therapist is not always easy. She has my number. I can’t hide.

For years I considered relationships as a spiritual path. I was married to my first wife Fran for twenty-five years. We lived in a yoga ashram and practiced a conscious relationship. We even taught a program together called “Deepening Your Love.” Although the work was transformational, it still did not go deeply into the unresolved emotional issues.

After Fran died of cancer, I met my second wife Linda. We were married for almost twenty years, and our life had an intense spiritual focus. We went to countless retreats and even started a retreat center together. Even though we had a loving relationship, Linda was emotionally distant. For the last ten years of her life she had a painful autoimmune illness and became addicted to pain pills, which affected our relationship. I was on anti-depressants, so we were both out of touch with our deeper emotions. Linda eventually died from an overdose.

Three months after her death I met Susan. We’ve been in relationship for ten years. Susan has a similar autoimmune illness, but courageously deals with her pain through natural methods.

That means I’ve chalked up over half a century of being in intimate relationships. I thought of myself as something of an expert on relationships and intimacy.

Now I’m not so sure.

I’m discovering that being in a spiritual relationship is a place where you can hide from intimacy, rather then going more deeply into it. It’s called spiritual bypassing, using spiritual ideals to sidestep unresolved emotional issues. Under the guise of being spiritual, I avoided strong emotions of anger, sadness, and rage, because I considered them to be “unspiritual.” Equanimity was my goal. But I’m now seeing that true spirituality contains all these emotions.

What is intimacy? David Schnarch describes it as “the ability to allow oneself to deeply know and to be deeply known by one’s partner.” On the surface that sounds simple, but what it means is being willing to experience both love and hatred; it means being willing to reveal the worst and best in ourselves; it means being willing to face the deep terror of abandonment.

I’ve always had a conflicting dance with intimacy, both wanting it, and running away from it at the same time. I know that one of the reasons why I run from it is because of childhood trauma. My mother died when I was twelve, and in my child’s mind, getting close to someone meant they die; it’s very dangerous to be intimate. Despite years of working on myself I never dealt with the dark side of myself.

With Susan I have little chance to run from it. Susan has spent years helping other people in their relationships. She received a Masters in Marriage and Family Therapy and a PhD in psychoanalysis, doing her own psychoanalysis for 20 years. She has been a practicing psychoanalyst for 40 years.

Before my relationship with Susan, I thought of myself as Mr. Nice Guy” who never got angry. I knew I had control issues and didn’t deal well with conflict, but I never realized that these were connected with intimacy issues that I had from times when I tune Susan out and unconsciously ignore her speaking to me. Numerous times, even daily, I ignore her. She reacts nicely at first and asks me not to ignore her. I become passive-aggressive when she brings this up as if I am the victim. I have learned through her that this is a way of not experiencing closeness or intimacy.

“Peter, you haven’t heard a word I’ve said. You’re tuning me out. How can we be close when you’re not there?”

“I’m sorry, I go into my bubble. It’s a place where I can avoid feelings.”

“Tell me what you’re feeling. I’m here for you.”

Sadness comes, and then tears. Susan holds and comforts me.

I look into Susan’s eyes and hold her hand

“We’ll get there together,” she says, as she leans over and gives me a kiss.