If we look again to fairy tales, we see many examples of kings and queens in haunted castles. ''The Fisherman and His Wife'' (The Brothers Grimm) is one example of a couple who seem well matched but miserable.
The fisherman, a seemingly "good-hearted man," appears incapable of standing up to his wife throughout the tale. He catches a fish who talks, who is actually a prince, and lets him go upon hearing his plea. The fisherman's wife thinks her husband foolish for letting the flounder go and even more so for not asking a reward from
this talking fish. She berates his capability as a provider and demands that he ask the flounder to provide them with a cottage to replace the "hovel" the fisherman has provided. The fisherman reluctantly, and apparently unhappily, returns to the sea to request this one favor. As the story unfolds, one favor turns into many as the
fisherman's wife nags and demands more. From hovel to cottage, from cottage to castle, she is still not satisfied. She wants to be King, then Emperor, then Pope all granted but never to her satisfaction. Finally she wishes to be Ruler of the Universe. The fisherman resists asking yet another favor, then complies until the flounder can take no more of her greed and turns her great church surrounded by palaces back to the hovel from which she came.
The tale, of course, is one that focuses on the liabilities of greed, but what of the relationship between the fisherman and his wife? It certainly isn't a marriage "made in heaven," or is it? Why is it so difficult for the fisherman to stand up to his wife and act on his own behalf? On the other hand, why is it that she can never get enough to satisfy her longings? Why would she commit to a partner for whom she apparently has so little respect? Why would he marry an individual who respected him so little? What was the original attraction, and what held their marriage together?
Cinderella
What of the prince in Cinderella? He proclaims that he will marry any woman whose foot fits the slipper. On Cinderella's part, however, we can clearly see that riding away with any prince who appears half decent, is certainly better than her home situation. Yet even this is suspect. There is no courtship, no getting to know each other, just "happily ever after." One might question, furthermore, why any father who apparently loves his daughter, as the story purports, would allow such treatment of his child by his mate. There is very little mention of his relationship with the wicked stepmother. It is highly unlikely, however, that they have much communication. Furthermore, it's amazing that so many children are given away in fairy tales for the misdeeds, desires or past lives of their parents, or is it?
If we search our memory, most of us can recall at least one acquaintance or
relationship that reminds us of Cinderella's relationship with the prince, her parents' relationship or that of the fisherman and his wife. Their partnerships certainly
weren't made in heaven. Their coupleships were instead the result of shame-based childhoods.
A part of each partner's self was sacrificed for their survival in a shaming family or community. Sadly the adults who shamed these children were themselves products of shaming environments. Like magnetic forces, these adult children are drawn to those who possess their disowned parts. They are equally repellent to individuals who do not possess, or are unwilling to act out, the parts of themselves they desperately want back, yet at the same time, need to control.
The fisherman appeared to be a selfless man, while his wife held his desires for unmet needs. She, on the other hand, gave him the dependency she was terrified of in herself. His wife held his unconscious anger and hostility, while he held her powerlessness and overt feelings of shame. As long as the fisherman's wife was willing to act out her mate's anger, he could experience himself as completely without anger. He could enjoy the products of her greed while remaining selfless. She could deny her dependency needs, while he acted them out for her. It is not difficult to imagine the adult world from which each sprang.
In partnerships we tend to fight in each other the very thing that attracted us with such force. We are attracted by the emotion, the trait, the characteristic that we then seek to control. We will even see an emotion, such as anger, in a partner that isn't there, if normal expression of anger was shamed in us as children. We will then seek to control the anger in the other as we have in ourselves for a lifetime. The cycle repeats itself in an endless repetition of blaming, controlling and defending. The argument frequently ends with one partner's guilty apology, rendered out of an anxious childhood need for survival, rather than sincere communication. Sometimes the interaction doesn't end. Stubbornly held walls finally crumble and the conflict is swept under the rug until the next time. It appears as if each partner is fighting for their lives because inside they are.