Where Should We Begin? with Esther Perel - Couples Under Lockdown: Sicily, Italy

Episode Date: March 24, 2020

They left each other emotionally years ago, but with three kids they have been trying to keep it together. For the last two weeks they find themselves confined to a small apartment in Sicily, Italy ��� he bears the brunt of the domestic duties at home all day. She must report to the hospital every day to help usher in new life as a midwife. Esther helps them come to terms with what these next few months could look like if they learn to communicate with one another in ways that might save their relationship. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I am a midwife. And today was a very hard day because there was a suspected COVID woman, pregnant woman. So there was a lot of panic in the hospital. It's not easy. None of the couples you are about to hear are ongoing clients of Esther Perel. For the purposes of maintaining their confidentiality,

names and some identifiable characteristics have been removed. But their voices and their stories are real. It's been weeks that italy is in a lockdown so i decided to meet couples where they are and this is my first online where should we begin session this couple is in sicily they've been together for 10 years they have three children. One of them is in school, the other is not yet. For me, it's difficult just because the children are nervous to stay all the time inside. The kids have been at home for the last 10 days and they're starting to ask some questions. My oldest is turning eight and his birthday is coming up soon. So he's starting to ask,

like, am I going to have a birthday birthday will I be able to see people and as they are dealing with impending losses they are also revisiting the multiple losses that happened in their own relationship with each other I originally came to sicily for work where I met her we fell in love but at some point we just lost the ability to talk to each other. The biggest problem that we have is a communication problem. There was a miscarriage which was not mourned well by the two of them. She had this miscarriage. The miscarriage was a big deal for her and I didn't really know how to deal with it. I didn't know how to be close to her. It is in my heart what happened. It is in my heart what happened is in my heart. And there was a third child which was originally not wanted by him. I went on a business trip and I came home

and she's like you know congratulations you're going to be a dad again. I was like wait we spoke about this I didn't want another kid and then when she told me it felt like a big betrayal, you know. And there was the loss of her wanting him to be so happy for her and feeling that he wasn't there at that time. We stopped having sex. We stopped talking to each other. You know, in my mind, we'd kind of left each other already. From the day she felt abandoned by him, when she announced to him that she was going to have another child, she closed her heart. And it's as if she said, if you do not want my child, you will also not get my body.

And so they have been very far apart. At a time now when they actually need each other, probably more than ever. At the moment I start with them, they're like a broken glass. If you have a glass that fell down, it's broken. You can use the glue, but the glass is broken. You can see the cracks everywhere. One of the big things about this COVID-19 and staying home and being in quarantine is the disruption of the routine. How has that been for you, first of all?

Routine is extremely important to me. I've been in the house for the past 10 days or more, maybe just going out to throw away the rubbish or go to the supermarket. I mean, I'm the kind of person who I need the outdoors. I need to see the sea. I need to be outside a lot. I mean, I need to put my own needs on the back for a bit because the children need a lot more support than we do.

You know, trying to stick to some kind of new schedule, waking them up on time, giving them breakfast on time, making sure they go to bed on time, doing homework. Are they going to school? Do they go remote learning? The teacher for the oldest one, she gives the homework. The two youngest are too small, so there's no homework. So ironically, we have a lot more time to spend together and I'm answering questions which I have never contemplated in my life before today we

were talking about the definition of triangular numbers and you know today I wanted to give them something to do while you work I didn't know what to say to them so I remember it remember something from my university days about triangular numbers. So we started to talk for two hours about triangular numbers. This kid is eight. In normal times, they have a fairly traditional arrangement. He gets up, goes to work, and lives on the periphery of childbearing. In normal times, she goes to work, goes on the periphery of child rearing. In normal times, she goes to work,

goes to the hospital, works her shift, comes back and does her second shift and remains the primary parent. Since they've been in quarantine for almost two weeks, everything in the gender roles have reversed. He's home. He's taking care of three young children. She goes to the hospital. Her shifts have doubled in length. She comes home exhausted. And she is now commenting on the primary parent, whose style is very different from hers. So, you know, it's been exhausting for the both of us, every bit of energy that we have.

I mean, I'm quite adamant about rules and discipline and schedule. And I want life to have some kind of order, especially now. It's nice to have some order. You know, honestly, I think it's working out okay. Because I give her some authority over me. You know, I listen to you. I do. Don't look at me like that.

It's like when you have a disruption like this, often you will have one person who says, especially because things are up in the air, we need more structure now or we need to make sure to hold on to the structure. But you have another parent who says, because everything is up in the air, we need to cut some slack. We need to be more relaxed. We need to be less strict about the rules because these are not normal times. And so one parent says,

because these are not normal times, we have to continue as much as we can our routine. And the other parent says, because these are not normal times, we have to relax on the rules and on our routine and those differences are very common and as long as both parents can say i need her to help us relax and she says i need him to keep some structure, then you have complementarity. If one of them starts to fight the other and says,

you should be doing this, this is not right, then you get into more stress because now the two parents are fighting or disagreeing over how to handle stress, which by definition we all do in different ways. Capito? Yes, yes. When you say something like, don't do that, let them do this, then I back off.

And I hope that is enough. I hope that you understand. It goes even a step further. Are you both able to appreciate the other person's style? Yes. Well, speaking for myself, yes. Well, you don't... No, but I'm not... Ah, okay. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No.

No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No.

No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No.

No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No.

No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No.

No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No.

No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No.

No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No.

No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. No. I would you know it would be a different house I love having you in this house what do you mean what do you mean

I don't know really when to back off you know when I when there's a rule there's a rule

and that's it end of story is that the way you learned it that is the way I learned it yes definitely the hard way

yes I learned it well I mean I had some hard times when I was a kid and Yes, definitely. The hard way? Yes. I learned it well. I mean, I had some hard times when I was a kid. And, you know, that's how I learned it. I do pretend that it's the right way sometimes. I've been broken a little bit. And, you know, I don't pretend to be the expert on how to raise kids.

Definitely not. And, you know, I feel inadequate all of the time because I don't really have anything to go on. No, but why do you think she's the expert? She has better, she had a better experience? No, I don't think she's the expert. I think that neither of us is capable of handling the situation by ourselves. But that's not a problem.

No, no, it's not a problem. But, you know, what I was going to say was that we bring a lot of different things to this table and recently I mean recent very recently I've been able to get past my preconceptions of what should happen in the house and maybe look at the way that you do things in a slightly different way I don't know if you feel the same non so se ti senti lo stesso non credi? non credo cosa sta succedendo qui? se non ti mostro

devo provare un altro modo What's happening up here? If I don't show you, then I need to try some other way. I don't know. What's happening? Huh? No, no. I want to hear you talk to each other, too. It's fine. I think that he often says, I'm changing.

I'm trying to change that. I'm trying to do that in another way We use this kind of expression it's like a square for the speaker is blue and my heart square I have heart ages and He is in this way Because he grew up in this way It's very difficult to make me think, make me reason.

But, if I may, do you encourage him or do you criticize him you know the partner can say here are all the things that I don't like change or the partner can say I know you would like to do these things differently and I want that too. Here are certain things you can try or when they have tried, the partner says, that was really a good start. Keep up. Keep it going. together we're tracing their child wearing styles to their own childhoods what they knew and what they are repeating so she tells me about her draconian dad and how important it was for her not to repeat that. And so when he becomes very stern, the tension between the two of them rises. And we all know one of those sentences in a couple we really want to avoid at all costs is, you remind me of my mother or my father. Where is he in the story of the man of your life?

I asked that to myself a lot of times because I saw something in him similar to my father. What was that gesture? Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. That gesture was. Give me time to explain. Yes, okay. Sometimes when I punish the children, when I discipline the children, he is too strong, too hard. And he remembers me, my father.

He reminds you of your father. How he was with me. You have to do that. And I ask myself, if it's real, that sometimes we're looking for a model that we know or we knew in our past. It may not be that we are looking, but that that was what we have learned. Maybe. But before they began to accuse each other of being their respective parents, there once was a love story.

Where did you meet? I had a contract with the European Commission to work six months in South Africa, six months in Italy. And she was a friend of a friend. I had a party at my house and there she was. And she just got me. She was quiet and beautiful. That's a beautiful story. I think so. It was very hard. She made it very difficult.

Very difficult. You had to win her heart. Yes, and everything else. The heart I'm still, I haven't won yet. Were you surprised that you allowed him in? I was in a difficult period of my life. And this could be the story that just never went anywhere. The summer flame.

The story that has started. Yes. And so I decided to build a wall. Then I don't remember exactly what happened. I'll tell you what happened. I came back again and again. And did I leave you alone? Yes.

But the question that you're not answering is, did the wall come down? Sometimes, no. I know that. So talk to me about the wall. come down. Sometimes, no. I know them. Voilà. So talk to me about the wall because the wall was built in a way before he came into your life.

Yes, I know that. And he sometimes enters into despair because he keeps still wanting for this wall to go down. I'm saying it and I'm looking at his face saying yes. I have no idea if that's the case.

Yes, yes, yes, you are. It's not a secret between the two of us. So tell me about the wall, because this is a relationship with two adults, three children, two histories, and a wall.

A big wall. Have I forgotten any other piece of the architecture of this relationship? Let's say we have a very complicated mansion that we live in. It's not just a few walls. We have towers and big windows, but a lot of walls. Okay. So let me meet the first wall, and then I'll meet the first wall and then I'll meet the windows and then I'll meet the towers and then I'll meet the bridges or we

will build the bridges the first one I think I built a mistake I was a mistake my birth was a mistake because my father was a young Sicilian Italian, nice and fancy. My mother maybe was so young. She decided to don't interrupt the pregnancy. Not have an abortion. Yes. They had to get married my father was an optician but he

didn't work seriously he didn't work seriously but he seduced seriously yes yes yes and so much and this marriage

is durable lasted thank you And this marriage lasted for eight years. When my mother decided to leave him, I discovered that at the same time, my father had another relationship with another woman and she was pregnant too, the same time of my mother. She interrupted the pregnancy and he married my mother. And then when they divorced, he came back to the other day. They got married when I was 14. From when she arrived in my life, she starts to destroy everything.

And how would you name this first wall? My first wall I think is to be a not wanted child from him. From him, okay. And the second wall, I'll first meet the walls, then I'll connect it to your man here sitting next to you. The second one was her second husband. Her second husband. And the third wall? me I'm not satisfied when I was young 20 31 my dream was to be a dancer but Sicily is not the right place where we have this kind of dream? No. Sicily is the place

where, as a young girl, you can dream of being a ballerina. But Sicily may not be the place where one lets the young girl make her own decisions. And when you look at your partner, when you look at this man here next to you, is he part of the stories of the walls

or does he live outside of the fortress? Se sei parte della storia dei muri oppure io sono fuori? Penso che ho costruito la piazza perché sono scemo di soffrire. Di soffrire? Di soffrire. Di essere sbagliata, sì, sì, ovviamente. Ho provato a buttare le piazze. A buttare le piazze? Yes, of course. I tried to throw the walls down. But sometimes I don't know how I can do that. Okay. You know, I asked you all these questions, and I have many, many more,

but in part because I have a sense that just watching his face and listening to you talk not that you said things that he doesn't know maybe here and there something but primarily that he rarely gets to listen to you talk like this, period. I never had the chance to hear you talk like this. Because we talk. And that he enjoys, that he feels good to him to hear you talk in this way about you. To talk about the wall is a way of bringing him behind the wall.

Yes, but I try to speak with him about my world. But sometimes he told me, this is the past, you have to go ahead. Don't this is the past. You have to go ahead. Don't think about the past. Just right now, I saw how he enjoyed just simply hearing you talk. It doesn't even matter what you talk about, just that you're present, that you're talking, and that he's invited to listen.

I'm sure there are other times when you have said some of the same things, and he can't hear it. That happens also in a relationship. Did I see this, or did I imagine this? No, you didn't imagine it. There's no place where we talk about these things. And then all of the bad habits get in the way and I can't just let you talk. But yes, when you talk to somebody else, I feel your pain.

And what he's also asking her is that when she expects him to act differently, can she do it in such a way that promotes his success rather than bombard him with criticism? And this is especially so now that he has taken charge over the household and children. He may be a square, but you have the wall and the wall wants to make sure that you don't get hurt by nasty men. Then you don't come to him with the softness. He sees the softness because he probably sees you with the children.

The softness goes to the children and the criticism goes to him. So you end up being with him the way he is with the children. Translate that. This is my talk. This is not hidden. con i bambini, più duro, meno morbido, meno incoraggiante. Now I say something very stupid, just for example. Don't leave the shoes on the bedroom. Very stupid, very stupid thing. I try to ask in all the way I know to ask that Redondo love nothing Saying maybe if you don't

Put the shoes out you can sleep on the couch or Maybe sometimes I would love to sleep on the couch you make me go on the balcony angry angry I tried a lot of ways

and then I I gave up I gave up and this is a problem because I Ho perso la vita. E questo è un problema. Perché ho cercato di trovare la maniera giusta per parlare con lui. Sto cercando, ma non riesco. Ma hai appena detto che ti arrendi. and not she said she tries

and she searches for many ways and I said yes but then you give up

the shoes were a very stupid example no but it's not about the particular The shoes were a very stupid example. No, but it's not about the particular example. It's in the way that, I mean, I can completely imagine both sides, right? One person is like, how many times do I have to ask you about the shoes? I have tried in every way possible. This is impossible. I already have three children that I have to ask to put the shoes away, or even the children know to put the shoes away,

and what's the matter with you, et cetera. And that is a very important and valid experience. I have to do everything myself. And this, I have to do everything myself, is not a new idea for you. This is part of the wall. Yes. And then on his side, yes, so far so good? Hot? Okay.

And then, you know the game Hot and Cold? Caldo Freddo. Yes, yes, yes. Okay. So this one was? Caldo. Caldo Freddo. Yes, yes, yes. Okay, so this one was? Caldo. It was five. Five.

Five. But then him on his side, you know, it's probably true that he forgot the shoes again and whatever else, all these other things that he doesn't do and that he forgets. But he then thinks that's all she thinks about. It's not true true but that's what he then starts

to think she tells me the same thing she tells the children she doesn't talk to me

about the more important things and all I get is orders and all I get is

criticism and all I get is instructions and where is my woman where is

the woman that I want to have more than that with? And then when it becomes really bad, he says, I'm tired of talking about the shoes. And she says, I'm tired of talking about the shoes. Everybody's tired of talking about the shoes. The shoes, the this, the that, all of the list of all of these conversations.

And she says, how can I talk about anything else if I all the time have to think about the shoes? And he says, I don't want to think about the shoes because we never talk about anything else. Yeah, exactly. And if you're going to be together for a few more weeks in the house, as you are, it's going to be more of that. Because it will, like, these patterns, this, how do you say patterns in Italian? Comportamenti. Yes. Comportamenti. They become more rigid when there is disruption in the family life.

Yeah, we are both aware of that. And I think, at least speaking for myself, I mean, I know that it's a very difficult time now. Everybody is stressed and we are worried. But, I mean, what I try to do is to make sure that I don't let these small things that I know bother you, I don't let them happen or try not to let them happen. So I know that they will get to you. I know that every time the kids are shouting, you get upset.

Every time, you know, I try to get ahead of that, at least now, and be there, you know, in a different way. Because it's a special time. It's not a normal time. So, in a way, you know, this crisis is just making me pay a bit more attention. And I can see your worries. Which is why you need more of each other and not only as parents. Like what you are doing with me tonight, where you take two hours three hours whatever and you stay

here with me and you sit quiet and you talk and you chill if we were not having this conversation you would each be going off in your own direction yeah I mean and this is I'm not saying you need to have a therapy session

alone but checking in with each other in that more meaningful way. How are you? How was it today? What happened? You know, one thing is to describe what happened at the hospital and to say this woman came in and she had fever and we were worried. The other thing is to talk about how it all connects, right?

The fear at the hospital, coming home, not being able to, you know, being afraid for the children, needing his support. It's one set of interdependent needs. They all relate to each other. We never really are able to just relate to each other. We never really are able to just talk to each other because we always have this big mess of unresolved problems

that somehow get into the conversation, no matter what we're talking about. There's some way in which they get in. And now where there's a big issue, it's bigger than the both of us. I feel even better.

You know, you come home and I know that we can talk and I can, I mean, I just want to be with you 15 minutes, you know, before I'm very tired and I have to go to bed. But those 15 minutes are important for me. And we don't really do that

when there's no crisis. You know, all I ever really wanted was to get into you, to be a part of you. And I never really got there. Somehow I wasn't able to get there. And then each of you, you go back to your ancient stories. You think, I have to be careful, men can hurt me. And you feel lonely. And you feel, oh God, I've thought I had finally been allowed in,

but I still am not able to enter inside with this woman and experience connection, security, tenderness, love, and then you get depressed, and then you either get angry or you sulk. You feel sorry for yourself, or you get angry at her or at life. You have three little ones, and they're looking at you. They are learning from you the way you learned from the other adults.

They look if you ever touch each other. They look if you are tender. They look if you laugh. They look if you ever touch each other they look if you are tender they look if you laugh they look if you kiss they look if you resolve conflicts they look how to see how you repair they understand that people who love each other fight but they're learning the entire relational code through you like you learned it through the people that raised you. And now that everybody's home and is going to be home for a while to come, they will become master anthropologists.

And both of you who promised yourselves when you were young, I will never be like this. Each of you looking promised yourselves when you were young, I will never be like this. Each of you looking at things that you said, I would never do it like that. And we did it. Yeah. But you can't change what happened, but you can change from here on. When you get into a stupid argument, one of you needs to say,

we want to spend the rest of the evening like this. When you want to make a remark, you ask, if I say this now, what will this do to us? What will it do to our relationship if I make one more comment about the shoes? The classic repertoire. Every couple has a repertoire by the way every couple has a hit parade with the 10 top stories so this is not original you know but what helps is when one person can say, let's not do this. We are more important. Especially when we feel like we're not in normal times.

I know you did try to stop that kind of behavior. And I think things did change between us since January, since a few months. No? I feel that they have changed, but I'm not sure. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Ask her and get an answer. Do you feel that things have changed between us? That we have stopped falling into bad habits,

like fighting over nothing? Do you feel that? No? I feel that. And I'm trying to do that. But I just don't know what to replace it with. I don't know

how to talk to you. I'm not sure what to do anymore. What's the one thing that you've been wanting to say to her? The one thing that I want to say to you? I miss you. I miss you, I miss you. And I know I mean, I know I can't just say I miss you and then you come back suddenly. But I miss you. And I want you. I want to be with you.

Somewhere along the line, we were together. And then somewhere, something happened and we weren't together anymore. But I don't want to fight about the things that happened with us I don't want to go over all of the things that happened and all of the things that we did to each other because we know what that does so I want to try something else you know I want to be in this with you

can I ask you something? yes you may have done this before in this with you. Can I ask you something? Yes. You may have done this before because this is not the first time you have this conversation. But I have a feeling that there's something you may have done

that is not just about how you parent your children that reminded her that you were more similar to her dad than she wanted you to be or that you wanted to be yeah

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for for for for for for for che ti ha ricordato troppo fortemente che io sono come il tuo padre e gli altri uomini della tua vita. E' così che ti hai male?

Che io sono più simile di quanto tu volessi al tuo padre. Guarda, non so cosa significa per you, but when my mother was here, I remember in the road, I remember the fight. I'm not sure what to say, but I never thought I could react like that with you. And nothing I can do can take that back. But I'm sure that after that day, you changed in how you feel for me.

I know you did. And, yeah, I know you did. He's talking about his two-year-old son who ran away from him. And instead of running after him and protecting him, talking about his two-year-old son who ran away from him.

And instead of running after him and protecting him, he got involved in a brawl with another driver. And she picked up that his pride and his duel with another man was more important in that moment than protecting his boy. In addition, this boy carries tremendous meaning for both of them. He is the third child that she wanted and that he did not. He is the child who replaced the loss of another child,

which they have not mourned well together. And when she got upset with him and he pushed her, this type of intimate violence that ensued created links in her memory that were unmistakable. And this gesture was for me very very bad. It was like if you have a glass that fell fell down and it's broken, you can use the glue, but the glass is broken. So when he pushed her, for her, it was like a glass that broke,

that you can glue, but it will remain broken, especially because of the resonance of that behavior with her own history. This incident may have been a breach of trust, but I also know that you're trying to reach her and your anger about not reaching her and then your anger at her being critical of you and then you're becoming contemptuous. All of this goes together.

Yeah, I mean, I was angry, but I think I managed. That doesn't justify it. No, no, of course not. I just want to say that this latest, you know, the latest incident sits on top of many other situations. Yeah. For both of you. I mean, I never want to give the impression that I'm justifying that this thing happened and something broke in our relationship.

And, you know, now I don't want to stop there. I want to get past that. And if we have an opportunity, if something is broken, if I broke something, let's build something else. Let's do whatever comes next, but let's just not stay there. Do you think primarily about the broken glass between the two of you

or you're looking at the uncertainty between the two of you or you're also looking at the uncertainty in the two of you, or you're also looking at the uncertainty in the world around you? We have three kids, and I don't think they're going to have a great future. Not because of them, but so many things are falling apart. I mean, really falling apart. We are both very sensitive to the state of the world, you know, every time most of

the things that we tend not to argue about are in the background. I'm always thinking about what future are my children going to have? Are they going to have something like we had or are they going to starve or are they going to be able to work? What the hell is going to go on for them? That's always happening. And I mean, that's a bit more important than our relationship. I think. But there's nothing I can do about that now. You know,

okay, now we have the crisis and we can at least protect them. Don't send them to school, clean their hands. We can do something about that. But I can't do anything about the fact that there's going to be fires. I can't do anything about the fact that they're not going to have food to eat. You know, I don't know, but it made me feel the same way. But it's hard to go to sleep at night and tell them, you know, sweet dreams.

Why are we pretending that life will be good? It's not going to be good. You know, obviously we don't tell them these things. But, I mean but it's depressing. When you help babies come into the world, do you have that feeling or do you feel like you are screaming eros and going against death. It's so powerful. We put babies out every day into this world,

and he says, what world are we putting our babies in? And you're bringing them into the world. Do you share his experience, or does it give you actually the strength to affirm life? No, for me, it's a wonderful moment. I don't think about

climate changing or nothing like this. They are the life and I think that it's a miracle yes I every time I wish them a good life in Italian it's just good life more than it so I'm going to have to leave you, but I'm leaving you in the middle of a sentence because we could continue,

and I want you to continue even without me. I want you to continue first together because I do think the way you know to withstand despair, hopelessness, fear is through the deep connection that you have with the people around you and small circle, your partner, your children, your family, and then the community. It is through the connection and the despair, the facts don't change, but the experience of it does. And by the way, that is what people did during the war. If you go back to war and if you go back to the experience that both your partner

and I share of World War II, I would say that it probably was the most powerful curative self was to stay connected to the people that they loved and therefore find a reason to stay alive and to keep going. So I want to leave you with that. Buona vita. Gracias.

We are looking for more couples living in close quarters or captivity like the one you just heard. If you and your partner, romantic or your business partner, would like to do a session with Esther for the podcast, please apply at whereshouldwebegin.esterperel.com. Where Should We Begin with Esther Perel is produced by Magnificent Noise for Gimlet and Esther Perel Productions.