The Benefits for an Introvert to be with an Extrovert

So my previous article, where I wrote about what I learned as an introvert being married to an extrovert didn’t go down very well with my wife. While she laughed out loud when reading it, she also felt that it was one-sided and didn’t represent her very well.
Yes, she is my only regular reader on Medium at present… Oops, I didn’t think about that when I hit publish…

So to give the other side of the story and stop the imminent divorce proceedings, please allow me to elaborate and fill in the many details that I left out of the previous article.

So what are the Benefits of an Introvert to be with an Extrovert?

She is always checking in with me to find out how I am

I have a tendency to suffer in silence, bottling everything up and holding it all down. No, I’m not British but I lived in England for around 20 years, so some of that stoicism rubbed off on me. And of course, I learnt from my Kiwi mum that you just get on with things and don’t complain. so, as a result, I’m keeping it all inside and trying to deal with it on the quiet…

But, because my wife is also a highly-sensitive extrovert, feels that there is something going on and she ever so gently enquires. And then when I say ‘I’m fine’ she enquires slightly less gently and is again met with ‘I’m ok’ so she gets more insistent and a little less gentle…

This continues until I finally crack and spill the beans… Usually, I’m worried about money or work or something like that, and not as her imagination has conjured up that I am secretly packing my bags and planning to leave her imminently.

Sometimes, I’m lost in the dark like a jellyfish

She is the one who insisted that I take on a Life Coach

My wife likes Life Coaching and gets a lot out of the engagement, but when she suggested that I get a coach too I wasn’t particularly keen.
A few years ago I had a very good business coach, and a few years before that I had a very bad business coach. But they were Business coaches, not life coaches, and since my business was in a holding pattern while I was focusing on online English teaching, I didn’t need a Business coach.