Is Fear Keeping You From Setting Boundaries?

“I remember the day as if it was yesterday,” she told me. 

As a client, she often shared stories of her life and former self with me. She and her husband were on their way home from visiting her father in the hospital when her older sister called. Hello was the only thing she could say before the yelling started. Waiting for it to stop, she moved the phone away from her ear and listened for a break in the action.  

“Is she yelling at you? Hang up on her,” her husband said.

He looked at her with wide-eyed astonishment, “Don’t let her talk to you like that. Just hang up.”

“I can’t hang up on her. It’ll make her mad,” she said.

Her husband rolled his eyes and returned his gaze to the road. The yelling continued with no end in sight. After several minutes, despite the knot in her stomach, she hung up.  

Her sister called her back immediately. Reluctantly, she answered the phone,

“Please stop yelling. I won’t talk to you if you continue to yell at me.”  

“Don’t you ever hang up on me!” her sister yelled, picking up right where she had left off.. 

Without so much as a glance in her direction, her husband urged her to hang up again. “Hang. Up. On. Her.”  

The knot in her stomach still there, she hung up, again. Her sister called back, again.  

“I told you I wasn’t going to talk to you if you continued to yell at me,” she said firmly.

Her sister yelled even more loudly, “I’ll yell at you if I want to!”

She hung up, this time without needing any encouragement or permission. Once again, her sister called back immediately.  This time, she didn’t answer.

Previously she would have tolerated the yelling and the accusations, judgment, and criticism that came with it.  Looking back on it she could see, ironically, that her fear of others’ criticism, accusations, and judgment kept her from setting boundaries in the first place.

Not this time. This time, she set a boundary and communicated it.  Although she couldn’t force anyone else to respect it, she could choose to respect it herself.  

Boundaries are a game-changer and often a life-long pursuit.

They define what we consider to be acceptable behavior and set the tone for how we want to be treated. They protect us from harm such as manipulation, codependency, and self-neglect and prevent us from harming ourselves and others because of unstable relationships, lack of mutual trust and respect, and poor communication.