Hi Brooke. My husband has a trigger word that makes him get extremely mad, threatening and acting out revenge. My neighbor said that word and a bunch of other words to express his displeasure with my husband. My husband has been continuely yelling in the face of my neighbor and his wife for 10 days now over the use of the trigger word.
I want peace. At least peace for me. My husband has tried to drag me into the altercations to defend him. I just observe. The word is applicable to my husband word for word, but his interpretation of it is causing him this pain. He is mad at me for not defending him to the neighbors. The neighbor applogized for the use of the word 9 days ago. My husband won’t let it go. Now he is doing things for revenge…blowing leaves into their yard. Now the neighbors are dragging me into it to make my husband clean up what he did. I tried to stay out of it by having them speak to him directly. It escalated to the point where I thought he was going to hurt them. That is when I stepped between to try to prevent anyone from getting hurt.

At home he continued to focus on the use of the trigger word. I asked him to explain what it meant to me. He wouldn’t. He just continued on a negative spiral of negative hate language towards himself that he says I must be thinking. I wasn’t thinking anything he was accusing me of and I told him that. It didn’t work. It continues off and on for two days now.

My thought is that he is too hung up on this word, due to bullying when he was younger (he told me that), and it is causing him rage that he cannot control.

I’m feeling scared he is going to hurt someone.

My action is to try to help him overcome the thoughts around that word.

Result: Disaster. Still stuck in negative spin cycle.

Please help me. I want to feel peace.