How to STOP Obsessing On Someone You Can't Have.

people traumatized as kids are known to have difficulty weighing the potential consequences of trauma-driven behaviors that they allow to continue in themselves and so you might jump into an impossible relationship or stay in a bad relationship or cling to an ex who has told you clearly that they'll never feel that way that you feel even though they're happy enough to have you on the periphery of their lives and this is who traumatized people can so easily end up attached to in life like they're not quite alone but they're unable to build the friendships or care for themselves financially or liberate that tremendous talent and ability that's inside because obsessive clinging infatuated love for someone who is not able or willing to be your partner and the word for that is limerence that kind of obsessive love consumes everything you've got it's got your joy it consumes your security and your future and when you're doing this it's likely you'll come up with a dozen rationalizations why it's just for now and you know it's not really going anywhere and you'll tell yourself and everyone that you're actually happy with that tiny little corner of a relationship that you actually secretly want all of you love them you want them to give you everything but you can taint yourself with just a little bit you can't build a real life when your heart is pouring energy into a fantasy of what you wish would happen a life can only be built on what is happening that has to be taken into account and you build on that and as hard as it can be to do when you have childhood PTSD everything depends on facing the truth that limerence is a parasite it's sucking the life out of you so my letter today is from a woman I'll call Jane and she writes dear Anna like so many with cptsd I haven't had any friendships strong enough to call me out or to even understand really and I've lost so many friendships because of my cptsd so many lately you've been speaking about limerence and I can see how my situation was exactly that at one time but I think things have evolved however I know to question my judgment that my discernment might be off a little bit so I'm writing to ask a question about my current living situation here's the background nearly five years ago and only a couple years after separating from my ex I met a man and we began dating looking back it was The Firestorm that finally woke me up to the work I needed to do to heal we triggered each other so hard it was tragic he's avoidant I'm anxious avoidant and while we really hit it off fast and hard of course right I'm circling it with my fairy pencil because I'm going to read through and then I'll come back to the things I circled so we can talk a little bit more and I'll see if I can help you Jane okay we really hit it off fast and hard of course right we also kept breaking up this on-again off-again thing that probably traumatized me further when I was already a cptsd mess about a year into this my only child attempted suicide less than two weeks later my boyfriend dumped me saying we needed space I know I was trigger a triggered toxic mess and I owned that now and I know that a lot of his behavior wasn't cool either that he abandoned me in my greatest time of need I was at the beginning stages of calling people out who were hurting me I likely wasn't doing a great job of it we did mend things again a few weeks later and he apologized admitting he couldn't handle the huge emotional toll it took but that he shouldn't have left me hanging like that we kept doing this growing learning triggering breaking it off long story short two years ago he said I don't like how this relationship feels a few months later he told me just friends forever but continued to keep in touch to check up on me I was living alone in a tiny Cottage on a farm in the woods he was living alone without much contact at all in the city all this during the pandemic we chatted regularly like friends do but I know I was in limerence then based on everything you've described I was sure he kept in touch because he still wanted me I was a total mess over the loss of our love relationship always looking for hope that we would mend it always daydreaming of us getting back together crying all the time and so on I realize now I placed a lot of self-worth on being wanted by someone else months later I discovered the place I was at the farm Cottage had an addicted man living there in an RV and there was an incident that triggered some old stuff and this was just as I was learning what triggered meant what it meant to have my new diagnosis of PTSD but the power of it terrified me it shook me to the core I called my dad in a complete disregulated mess and he was busy easy so I called the boyfriend my closest friend and regular confidant my boyfriend wanted me safe out of there and offered his spare room just a note my stuff is all in storage I've been going around trying out neat places to live like the farm or traveling in my camper trying to decide where to settle and some of my things are still at his place like my bed and dining room table chairs his spare room for example the one he offered me had my bed set up in it already because I didn't want it in the garage storage all the rest of my household stuff is in it was fall winter weather was coming already and my camper isn't winterized I accepted his kind offer at that time hoping we would grow close mend our relationship and the rest would be history by February five months later I was finally waking up to the fact that he really meant it just friends forever although I was still lost in limerence despite these facts in my face I found a job and returned to the farm the drug addict had moved on and by the end of that summer last year our friendship was still strong long distance my limerence was healing along with all the therapy work I was doing and continue to do but the job was seasonal and I hadn't been able to find a permanent place to live he welcomed me back for the winter once again should I mention I had a kitten the first winter that he accepted no problem and he fell in love with it because by that second winter when I returned to the rent the spare room again he had his own kitten and now we were a household of four yes I'm still here in that spare room paying a very manageable rent my kitten grown into a cat and the two of them might be a bonded pair now meanwhile there's a housing crisis and War and Rising prices and I haven't been able to secure my own place not sure I want to to be honest living alone again with suck but am I fooling myself am I still in limerence staying on here like this I mean it's not forever he has plans to retire soon and buy an acreage I have plans to go traveling again this summer and look for a new place to live I'm not expecting our relationship to change I love him deeply still but as a friend only I swear is it bad for me to stay in contact with him having that history I can't imagine not talking to him not calling him with news of my life not camping out on his property to help him build his Homestead not asking his advice when I found some place I'd like to acquire have we managed to create a valuable friendship or am I still fooling myself I recognize our friendship has held us both back from seeking new love relationships best wishes Jane all right Jane I think I can help you here we go life is complicated isn't it okay all right you had a relationship that was limerent and now you swear you're just friends so first of all I'm going to be the friend who does call you out and say if you didn't have limerence about this guy you wouldn't have to write about it that's so mean right but I think that's the case I think you do have limerence for him I think you're using self-denial as a way to tolerate that you can't have somebody who you love very much and yes I believe you have a good friendship being limerent doesn't always exclude the truth of having a good friendship I'll tell you what I think let's go through some of this so you guys had a terrible trauma Bond relationship and that's not uncommon for people who are traumatized as kids and it's interesting to avoidant people going into trauma Bond trauma bond is when two people break up get back together break up get back together or one person you know messes with the other person's mind is like I love you I hate you I love you I hate you it sounds like it was kind of a mutual thing so that will actually even to somebody who didn't have trauma that will addict someone's brain to the high of getting back together after a breakup so you have the pain of the breakup and the abandonment and then and the high of getting back together and sometimes it gets to be so like entrenched that you can't even feel feelings for each other without doing that but it sounds like you guys are middle aged and so you know better than to you know keep it at this high fever pitch of drama and so you're finding this kind of happy medium of being roommates Together part of the Year even though it's blocking you both from having another relationship this thing where he couldn't deal with first of all I'm so sorry that your only child attempted suicide it sounds like they survived thank goodness and this whole the years of the pandemic have been terrible for young people and I'm so sad for anybody who starts to feel that badly and so glad they survived and so of course you were very upset and um I think it is fair if you're sleeping with somebody and you living with them and you're with them long term it is fair that they should be there for you when your life has a big big bad thing happen in it like that and if they can't be there for you it's just a matter of deciding like are you okay with that so you say he's like a avoidant and that's what avoidance do right they don't like intense emotion they hit the high road when they do that although a lot of them they know that they're not supposed to do that and so they go through the motions of sticking around but being with an avoidant person can be a very hard and disappointing thing now you say you're avoidant too so what's interesting about that is in a way it's a perfect relationship for two avoidance you know if you got to a point where you were just to say no I'm really clear I I can't actually deal with a real relationship and I don't want to pursue it anymore I just want to have this roommate who I kind of adore and we have our cats and I go away every summer so it's not too much you know that could in a way be the perfect Arrangement but here's the thing you're not building up a financially secure situation that from middle age into old age is going to be so important and so I think that's the thing about limerent relationships is they keep you off in Dreamland and you're not dealing with important practical questions like that like married people can help each other do that doesn't mean it's always going to happen but you know it's a real Advantage for you know saving and growing old together single people who just are consciously single can focus on saving money for that and not you said this was a seasonal job a seasonal job is not a good job for somebody who's headed for retirement I mean unless there's some wealth coming your way in the future but right now with like um you can't afford to even have your own place and you're living in a camper it sounds like you're right on the edge and I would say for a person with trauma to keep themselves on the edge like that you're always going to be terribly dependent on relationships whether they're miserable or not and there's the possibility he's going to meet somebody and then it will become necessary for you to go so I'm just you know I'm not really telling you what you have to do about this like you guys could agree to accept this but if I were your friend I would just be very worried about your financial security and want you to deal with that and also that you had a support system outside of him so that you didn't rely on somebody who's avoidant and can't deal with your feelings and if anything bad ever happens in your life is going to just like run out the door on you and possibly get into a new relationship so that is a strong suggestion I have for you support system Financial Security what's going on here what I notice is it's um and I talk about this sometimes when the child in you is controlling the adult in you it sounds like the child in you needs to be taken care of right now but it's not proper to have an X do that for you it's fraught with difficulties it's going to activate your trauma and it's got the limerence going and once limerent you know it's always like right under the surface you might think it's not there but it is it's there I think very few people ever recover from limerence what I've heard is the one thing that can do it sometimes is actually getting together with somebody and then you're like dealing with the real thing of being with them and all the disappointments that being with a real person also contain it's very hard to stay in this like fantasy of them of how great it would be because you're actually in whatever it is and something to remember like the relationship that you have with him that is your relationship with him so there's it's very easy to get attached to like a hypothetical relationship but what is the relationship is playing out always in real time in front of us in all the relationships we're in you get to see this is what it looks like a friend of mine used to say if you want to know about a relationship take a trip just because when you take a trip it starts to you know pop the bubbles of Illusion about what might be and you're thrown together maybe in a car you know for several days and you get to experience what's that like what what is so annoying about them so now you've lived with him you guys are good friends it just sounds like either it's that he's not in love with you or he's so avoidant that he cannot be in that kind of relationship but the fact that he calls and stays in touch yeah it seems like he's happy enough to have you be on the periphery of his life and um that's often the case so if you're okay with that forever with a lot of risks that you're going to get thrown out one day go for it I'm being mean I'm not trying I'm not trying to be mean I'm just trying to like trying to show you the dark side of this um but also to let you know there's total acceptance of this like it's an okay life Arrangement many many people don't end up in couples many many people have dear friends who they really kind of stay tied to and that becomes their sort of chosen family just that the limerence the limerence could lead to a great Soul emptiness for you and I would hate for you at the end of your life you know when you're reviewing everything just go God I wish I had actually found myself a real partner so that you could have all the joys that come with a real partner and instead of a roommate where you have all the downsides but not the choice right I think about that winter where you had to go live with him because the winter was coming in your van you know and you live in a snowy area Far North I don't want that to happen to you there needs to be another alternative for that so maybe what you're doing is rationalizing going to him as if there's no other place in the world but actually you could go to a city or you could you know rent a room or if you really had to go to a shelter there would always be an option for that but just please stay in touch with your options on this if the relationship isn't what you want it to be if it's not something that you're free to commit your whole life to which is not right now certainly and it doesn't seem like it's going to turn to that you say I realize now I placed a lot of worth on being wanted by someone else you know what I don't I don't hear you doing that to a fault everybody wants to be loved by somebody else I don't think you're doing it to a fault I think limerence crops up when real life is just not very good and especially when childhood wasn't very good and real life is sort of like you know sad and there's there's not enough friends there's not enough money there's not enough love we want to escape into the fantasy of what might be that's all it is it's an Escape into fantasy but like all addictions it keeps you from doing active things that make your life good you know developing your skills learning to play the guitar having a better job making sure you have something safe for retirement having a warm place to go in the winter just in case you know things don't go very well here you talk about being a disregulated mess you were very hard on yourself about how upset you were and about when you went back and lived in the RV thing with the addict guy and you were triggered and you learned about it and you called your dad and he wasn't there and that's when you called your ex I totally get it you were in a vulnerable place and he was just like the only person who represents security to you who represents like a shoulder a hand I get it this is why it's sort of an unstable Arrangement but many of us have such people in our lives that's how we get through he offered you a spare room all your stuff is in storage the fact that your stuff was still in his house you guys have been entangled this whole time right so that thing where you break up all the time and get back together I don't know it just seems like if you could find a way to make it stable and commit to it and like see each other through to the end of life it could work and if you were okay that it's not sex and you know all that it could work I see that there's a lot here and now the cats and now you say the cats have a pair bond and so that's where it's like the cat thing yeah but that's where I knew you had limerence going on it's like the cats are pair bonded we have to be together that sounds like a limerence thought I know cats Bond but that doesn't mean you can't take your cat and go yeah and the world is pretty scary right now and who doesn't want to have a secure home where they can stay and know that they're going to be okay and somebody will help them and what if you break your leg and you know you want all that of course you want that and you can't imagine life without him and not talking to him and talking about news and staying on his property and helping him build his Homestead so yeah not ask you want to be able to ask his advice when you make big things so I don't know maybe you're making it work you didn't tell me have you completely laid your cards on the table and just say look I love you and I can't imagine life without you and is there some way we can make this work because I would like to be together with you for real has that conversation happened I'm guessing it has but if it hasn't please lay all your cards on the table go ahead and get the honest answer from him and you know maybe I don't want to give you false hope it's just that I don't know but if there's hope here about how you can keep this relationship okay I think it needs to include monogamy that's just what I think I think you're not going to be okay if he sees somebody else and his new person isn't going to be okay with you there I don't know but people who love you and who are your friend like that they're hard to find I don't I see what you mean you don't want to just throw out throw out the baby with the bath water sometimes it's a sign sometimes it's a sign that it really is a partnership when you can't imagine life without them and some of us you know I've answered letters recently from people who are in relationships that there was the young lady who was with a guy who didn't do housework and so many people are like oh that's terrible you know dump him and I'm like you know from where I sit when you have severe PTSD and in that letter you know she had been in an orphanage till eight months and it had affected her ability to attach and so it was difficult to attach and show love to me when love shows up when love shows up and people really love and care for each other it's a wonderful thing and sometimes it's worth being somewhat flexible to preserve it so if you can do that Jane if you can find a way to take care of yourself and find a way to make this tenuous push me pull you relationship kind of hold on and be okay the trick with avoidance is you can't come rushing at them with a lot of emotion there there you sometimes they can process information more slowly and you put a little distance with them and so it's possible that with some healing your cptsd you could be able to be a little bit more self-contained we use the daily practice around here that's how I stay self-contained because I'm I'm married to somebody who's a lot more avoidant than I am and that's how that's how we do it he has to work overtime to try to make sure he doesn't like walk out the door when I'm emoting I have to make sure I don't emote like crazy I have to kind of limit it for him I can communicate but that's how it works for us you meet in the middle you said though you told me that you were real you were waking up to the fact like he means it friends forever so you know what I'd like you to do Jane get back to us in six months at the end of the summer let us know what happens I want to know what happens with you I feel like there's too much going on to say oh run get out of there there's too much going on here and and I fear that I'm giving you false hope in the whole thing but you asked so as your far away friend on the internet that's what I want to say it's like um I feel like I feel like this could be a very special thing and especially because I know your kid is going through a hard time I want you to be safe I want you to be supported and you know they have a lot of online 12-step meetings now so that you can have a place to heal that's free you can have because if you're going to go live in the country here you're going to need online meetings right but it's free you'll have friends there you could maybe have a sponsor and somebody to call when your emotions are strong so that what you end up communicating is a little bit filtered down if it doesn't work out with him then the 12-step program is still your support and your foundation so that you always have a community everywhere you go and people to help and advise you with all those things you were hoping to have from him it's so hard to leave a relationship with someone who is making an effort to make you happy and to convince you to stay and if you're someone with abandonment wounds from your childhood leaving feels even harder it's hard to think it's hard to see straight it's hard to trust your judgment but when you know there are deal breaker problems or when there are important things missing from the relationship that you know in your heart that you need and deserve then it could be time to break up properly my letter today is from a woman I'll call Charlotte and she's in the middle of realizing her relationship needs to end but she doesn't know how to actually pull the trigger and she writes hi Anna I'm 36 years old and I have a wonderful child from a previous marriage my childhood was riddled with multiple abandonments losses neglect and poverty as an adult I spent four years in therapy New Age woo-woo and all of the above without much relief so I'm grateful to finally know recovery as possible since I've been watching your videos and doing the daily practice techniques that you teach my relationship with my partner which was previously on the Rocks started to improve I can't tell if the partnership has become unhealthy because my cptsd has me so triggered and emotionally out of control around some of his behavior or if his behavior was simply toxic we have a long history we've been good friends for almost 20 years since I was in high school he was also my limerent lover I always irrationally dreamed of being with him we were never really together as a couple until I divorced my ex-husband my ex turned out to have a sex addiction and was emotionally and financially abusive so there was a lot of pain and suffering during our eight-year marriage he didn't want to let me go and made various threats about killing himself taking away our son and making sure I would have nothing if I left the marriage it took two separate tries and six months of serving papers restraining orders and a lot of drama to finally escape this was when my old limerent friend appeared like a knight in shining armor helping me to leave the marriage let's call him mark we have experienced a lot of good things together these past four years but we've also had some problems in particular his secretive Behavior surrounding communication with girls on social media and dating apps I even found out he cheated early on in our relationship he's in the military and was unexpectedly deployed about the time my divorce became official I think he was unsure that I would be able to follow through on the divorce I kept him in my Gray Zone because it was a very scary and unstable time this is when he was with other women and unfortunately was not forthcoming about it I had been told that we were exclusive and he was very clear that he wanted a marriage life and future together when he came back from the deployment we started over he would often claim he couldn't love me or anyone though he also said he wanted to be together exclusively he said he didn't want a marriage anymore but seems to still want all the benefits of a marriage which was confusing to me we have shared a life as partners who share household chores and responsibilities we help each other with family friends work and dreams I should also add that he's extremely generous with me and my child I Now understand I ran from one relationship to another without fixing my deep childhood trauma wounds I also realized I was convincing myself that I didn't need marriage or a formal commitment partly because Mark didn't want those things and partly because my first marriage didn't work out since I started becoming healthy and establishing boundaries he suddenly announced he quit social media which had been a huge source of a lot of our drama he's suddenly been stepping up in how he shows up and he said he would put me on the title of his house that we now live in in lieu of marriage after my recent work on my own cptsd through your channel I've discovered that I do indeed crave a committed stable healthy and loving marriage that would benefit my son too there is still a part of me that wants another child too Mark has been on the fence about this until recently but has since clearly stated he doesn't want any children of his own I made a bold move a few months ago and moved out to my own place with my son still it's been very hard to actually break up the more I get well and distance the more Mark appears to get well and come closer his offer to put me on the House's title in lieu of marriage was shocking it was something that I had asked for a while ago which he refused then he has showed more effort in connecting with my son the last few months too it's very confusing he still refuses to go to therapy together still I can't come to trust him for doing what he did I've asked for a break and it's been at least three weeks but he keeps weaving himself back into our lives and saying he loves us but the fact is he hasn't put much effort into spending time with my son in the past they in general like each other they're respectful with each other but Mark is afraid of getting attached to my son he says he won't even play ball with him for a few minutes at first he had asked that I don't pressure him and allow a relationship to develop naturally but four years have gone by and clearly Mark avoids my son I have seen the sadness in my son hoping to connect with Mark and eventually my son just stopped trying I'm a devoted mom I have an interesting career and lots of loving friends around me they're all saying not to give this guy another chance I don't know how to say these words to break up there is a part of me that fears I'm giving up my best friend and my one true love you've given me hope that perhaps one day I can be mostly healed and have a partner who would love to be a good role model to my child if you could help me put together some of those words so I can hear them and practice them it would be so helpful I keep finding myself explaining why I'm not happy and he then jumps in to fix it how do you break up with a best friend of 20 years who is a limerent lover who became a pretty good partner how do you know if enough is enough how would the fairy break up what does it look like in action thank you so much I look forward to continuing my work here under your guidance all right Charlotte I got your back here I see that this is a tough tough one you know he's not terrible he's not abusive but this thing where he said he really wanted a marriage and then he came back from his deployment and he said he didn't want that you know being on the title of the house that's nice and everything but it's not marriage it's not the same thing saying he doesn't want to bond with your son having four years to do it and not doing it the writing's on the wall and you know what kind of the Clincher for me was um that your friends all see it your friends are like don't give him another chance this thing about the online girls I suppose maybe it ended and maybe that was a gray Zone period I don't know he lied to you about it and he doesn't want to go to therapy I'm just hearing from you like whatever he's done it wasn't enough to satisfy you that something was different and in fact since then like I don't know things got a little worse so it's not uncommon that when you pull apart from somebody and take some distance they would try to come back and and and draw you back in he's a he's a person he's attached to you he doesn't want you to leave that's understandable so he's trying to get you back but he's not doing what needs to be done and in fact if if you were to leave him and he took that as a sign like okay now he's got to change his tune he's got to ask you to marry him and all that you wouldn't really want him to do that out of fear you know you would want I agree with you I think that you are someone totally capable and deserving of being with somebody who's really excited to have a marriage with you to have a family with you maybe another kid to be a stepdad to your son those are really important goals and the way your son feels sad and let down that's your kind of litmus test you know what's what's good for the kids is good for us and when you see your kids sad about their the way they're treated by your partner how are you going to possibly feel better than that right so I think you're you're making a good call it's a sad one you know this guy's not like the devil or anything it's just not what you need so here are my tips for a clean minimally painful breakup you know as not painful as it can be with someone who's not abusive and of course that would be different with somebody who was but this is how to how to break up with somebody when it's someone you care about but they're just not the one for you okay so first tell them that you have something important to talk about and ask him to meet you you've been with him long enough that this should definitely be an in-person conversation and the best place to meet is in a public place where no one can make a scene not so public that there's no privacy but public so that you know you can safely exit the conversation after a fairly short period of time so a coffee shop would be good a park is good a restaurant is too long you have to wait for a lot of stuff to come to the table and pay for it and you may want to make your exit before then so you could even meet at a bus stop but I don't know that's a bit sad you want to be somewhere where other people are around but they can't hear you unless you raise your voice so the other person in this case Mark will probably have an idea where the conversation's going if you're like you know meet me in a coffee shop I need to talk to you and you when you do sit down and talk to them you can let them know right away in the conversation that you're breaking up with them that's the first thing to say don't you know drag the conversation out or mislead them you do need to give them a reason but I recommend only giving the minimal amount of information so that they can understand why now in the long run it will help them to know why and people deserve to know why but it doesn't need to be every painful detail of how little we think of them right so in every way possible this is assuming the person has acted in good faith just avoid criticizing blaming or shaming the other person for example if the problem were that you're physically repulsed by a person that's not what you said but I'm just saying something that's so hurtful you just you don't have to say that you in that in something like that you can say that you know the match just doesn't feel right you're looking for a relationship where that rightness is very clear you should be kind but be clear so Charlotte you asked me for the words that you could use to break up with Mark so I'll tell you how you might Express the reasons um in the way that you told me yes okay so it goes like this Mark I've decided I need to end our relationship and I know that's hard and I know you've done a lot to try to make me happy and I really appreciate that I've realized though that I never really recovered trustwise from what happened early in our relationship with the other women online and what I know about myself is if I'm ever going to be in a relationship it has to have a full commitment a marriage not just because of that commitment to me but a commitment to my son and I may want to have another kid someday in the future and I know that's not what you want so you've been so generous with us and you've been my best friend for 20 years but I know in my heart that being a couple is not right for us so Charlotte then when it comes to seeing each other in the future I'd suggest that you don't leave it open-ended even if it seems like this will make it easier when you say goodbye it's okay to give him a hug but make it just a quick and cool hug you know don't send mixed signals with the way that you show concern for his feelings you care about him but you're no longer going to be taking care of him so don't let this conversation last more than say 20 or 30 minutes and after the information is out there you know let them say a thing or two but lingering on this is only going to open the door for the hurt feelings to start welling up and coming out and it could get yucky so you've said your piece he's had a chance to say something trust that he's going to be able to handle the experience and take care of himself after you've parted now you could offer to have a phone conversation with him in a week or two and set a time to do it when you have that call have a friend at your house with you to help you keep the call boundaried and under 20 minutes long and not have it Veer into how you're going to be friends now or work it out if you want to break up you need to let this be the real thing so don't agree to get together in person don't get sucked into taking care of him or negotiating some kind of friendship and don't tell him flat out that you don't intend to be friends you can say something like for now I need time apart so that I can heal from this too and that's true you know who knows maybe in the future you could have contact again don't give in and offer him hope don't make plans for the future over time this clean ending will help both of you to move on now if he has stuff at your house or vice versa I suggest you make a time and and ask him to have your things ready for you and then go with a friend and be quick and polite don't engage with him about anything other than getting your stuff a clean ending means you do not ghost them you communicate directly you give them your reasons you express your concern but when it's done you don't call them you don't text them you don't invite them to Gatherings and if you know they're going to be at a gathering don't go not for a while anyway not until you're really really not connected to them anymore don't email them don't stay in touch with their family it takes self-discipline but if this person is not your true love then getting out is a big step toward true love for you Charlotte not away from true love you're going toward true love now you are available and you being out of that unhappy and unfulfilling relationship is going to start to feel really really good soon even if it means being single for a while and when one day you find yourself happy in love the way you want to be loved you're going to only wish that you got out of that old relationship even sooner few things in relationships can drain your energy and your personal power like narcissistic abuse by definition when a cult leader controls and brainwashes people who fall under their spell it's called narcissistic abuse and so many good intelligent people are vulnerable to that to someone taking charge of their life in a way that it feels great at first like it solves all your problems but then it turns into a soul-sucking nightmare and the same thing can happen in relationships the luring in this is going to be great then the deprivation the mind [ __ ] the introduction of greater and greater emotional abuse at that point a vital sense of self-interest your instinct for self-preservation can be so damaged you can't imagine leaving my letter today is from a woman I'll call Freya and she writes hey Anna I would like to ask for your help because this situation has been dragging on for so long I'm 23 years old and just enrolled in University I have cptsd from an emotionally unavailable strict mother and an alcoholic father who cheated on my mother I met a guy almost two years ago when I was in a very vulnerable period in my life I was having frequent panic attacks I was jobless because of that and was living with a friend at that time the guy came as a quote savior it felt like he dragged me out of the mud we started dating only after two months he encouraged me to apply for University get better habits see a therapist stop smoking and even have a better relationship with God as we're both Christian it was all good until about six months into the relationship I started feeling overpowered like what I said did not matter my needs getting frequently dismissed such as asking for more affection validation I played the cool girl but got tired of it very quickly my partner wouldn't kiss me he would reject hugs even saying it was for my own benefit he felt like my need for affection was unhealthy I felt like a parent and a child simultaneously being guilt-tripped into doing chores for him such as cleaning or washing the dishes because he had eczema but being treated as a child always told what to do I felt like my voice my opinions did not matter he said it was unhealthy for me to wear makeup or drink coffee and he would pick fights over those things after a year into the relationship he ended up breaking up with me saying I was too obsessed with the idea of the relationship and I'm too immature to be in one I asked for no contact but he wanted me to stay close and I submitted hoping we might be together one day he said he would not want the advances of other girls and only did this to help me and better our friendship but I found out he messaged a girl some sexual things after a friend of his warned me about some strange messages he and the girl exchanged on social media he tried to deny it but after I talked to the girl myself it was very clear to me he pretended to be someone he wasn't they did exchange sexual messages and that moment I was done I blocked him everywhere and avoided physical contact as well since then he tried reaching out for multiple numbers apologizing saying he has found new faith it was the first time he said I was beautiful he said he loved me wants me and only me and that he was not connected to his heart after not talking for weeks he showed up in my hometown Uninvited he brought me a cake he made for me and brought me other very personal gifts I caught feelings again I caught feelings ah like catching an STG oh but later on he told me he doesn't want a relationship for now after he told me that I cut contact again he reached out from a new number trying to tell me I'm wrong for damaging my heart like this that I can't forgive and that I will cause myself hurt in the future I just want this to end I cannot seem to let him go a hundred percent even though I feel this is not real love how do I know I'm making the right decision I feel like I'm in his grip or under a spell thank you in advance Freya okay Freya I had my fairy pencil I was circling things I wanted to come back to as I read through I'm so glad you wrote and um there it is you want to know did you make the right decision yes and I'll tell you why it's been dragging on you're 23 years old you just enrolled in University you have cptsd emotionally unavailable strict mother alcoholic father cheated on your mother sounds like just lies and no no mirroring of presence of like helping you understand what feelings and perceptions mean they damaged your perception they primed you they made you vulnerable for exactly what has happened okay so you were having frequent panic attacks you had no job because of that you were living with a friend so very vulnerable now I wrote down a list of vulnerable characteristics this is a good time to read them so I I've been thinking a lot about cult leaders and spiritual abuse and I know like this guy I think it is spiritual abuse he was using the sort of Christianity thing but whatever it is whatever you call it he tried to hang it on 20 different hooks very interesting um but not cool I don't diagnose anybody but he just seems like bullet point textbook Wikipedia narcissist was who's a who's a psychopath everything seems manipulation so that's I can't diagnose but those of you who comment you can say anything you want so you go for it you please please help Freya know what this is so she knows what to do some research on okay so I got this list from spiritual abuse resources and they're an organization you can find them online these are the vulnerable characteristics that make somebody an easy target for narcissistic abuse and or spiritual abuse okay so it's someone who is under stress which you were you were having panic attacks in transition you were jobless you didn't have a direction in your life yet as a tend toward dependency you were living towards friends and so you were very young and you hadn't really gotten to that point where you were independent yet tend toward dependency unassertive gullible want simple answers to complex questions a lot of these are characteristics of Youth are attracted to trance-like states of mind are unaware of how groups can manipulate people have recently had a traumatic experience are unaware of how the mind and body can affect each other lack skills in critical thinking and logic and lack knowledge about methods of deception so I just thought I'd share that with you because I was thinking a lot about that list I've been planning to make the video about it but I'm you know doing my research but I thought I'd just pull out that list because Freya I just hear it in your story that you are vulnerable it's not your fault You're vulnerable I mean the minute people don't get taken care of properly as children it sets you up for this kind of thing so the the really positive thing is you're out right now you're asking for input you're asking for advice this is all really positive things yes you can heal it takes vigilance it takes persistence but you can do it he came along this guy as a savior classic okay classic narcissist move and it felt like he dragged you out of the mud and you know when you you were in the mud so any kind of love and attention would have felt that way right and of course when we look at somebody we're newly dating as a savior and it's going to solve all of our problems it does set us up for grave disappointment because nobody can really do that a relationship can be a positive thing and it can introduce a whole new set of friends and a purpose in life and totally good things I don't deny that but when you were in the mud and suddenly everything's been solved vulnerable okay okay healthy people will not try to convince you that they're the solution to all your problems either so you got into a relationship you were dating within two months and he encouraged you to do these positive things apply to University you get better habits see a therapist stop smoking have a better relationship with God it was all good until about six months into the relationship so whatever you know I I couldn't you guys who are out there in the comments section you can tell me the significance of six months but I just think it's when sexual interest wears off and the really nasty side you know there's there's no holds barred anymore there's nothing for them to get from you um just the control the need to control somebody else and to feed off that energy all right so you started feeling overpowered and I get it from what you said what you said didn't matter your needs were frequently dismissed if you asked for more affection or validation no you played the cool girl and I love that term we're gonna have shirts here one day that say x cool girl acting like oh that's fine I don't need a fiction and validation yeah that's needy that's pathetic or whatever he was telling you he said he wouldn't give that to you no hugs no kisses it was for your own benefit because your need for affection was unhealthy oh my gosh that's where I say mind [ __ ] what does that even mean it was unhealthy to need that I think it was inconvenient because uh well I'm I'm just I'm gonna just spoiler alert like what's with all the phone numbers okay something very nefarious is going on here felt like a child and a parent simultaneously guilt-tripped into doing all his chores that's a very cult cult leader thing that's how you show your loyalty and then treat it as a child where he told you what to do you felt like your voice and your opinions didn't matter well he tried to make them that way but they do matter so you were made to feel that way and because you were vulnerable and he was manipulative and that's where it goes but it's not true so I just want to say that you know for any any Credence that you give me your voice and your opinions totally matter and I'm so glad you're getting them back enough to say what happened here he said it was unhealthy to wear makeup or drink coffee what the right and he would pick fights over those things okay that's like crazy controlling after a year in the relationship he and he broke up saying you were too obsessed with the idea of a relationship oh my gosh that's like classic sleeping with other people and lying that it's somehow good rhetoric um he said you were too immature to be in one um yeah blame you you're young so in a way you know I give him no he's not right about this but just that you know none of us are perfectly formed for relationships and so especially in early 20s you know weird stuff happens when we were grew up with trauma you know we we often don't have the boundaries or the discernment and can't see the red flags and get very confused when people are abusive to us like did I cause that that's what we do but that's why we're here because we're healing from that okay so you asked for no contact but he wanted me to stay close and you submitted that word submit ouch hoping we might be together one day okay so yeah you were in a deep trauma Bond I just I hope he comes around and loves me I know and he said he would not want the advances of other girls and oh yeah I don't want that with other girls he just does that with other girls and you found out he messaged he has sexual stuff some friend warned you and you saw it and when you heard it was other girls like for whatever reason you couldn't have a boundary and and and and the self-esteem to realize that everything that had happened up to that point was terrible but the fact that he lied to you about another girl that was finally what snapped you out of it so good thank you other girl thank you thank you for existing and for making it clear to our friend Freya here that this was not good yeah that was the thing that was clear to you and it's interesting because there was that like your dad cheated on your mom thing and it's just weird how sometimes the karma of the stuff we witnessed and suffered from as a child comes back and repeats and that's what we're doing in recovery is you know we're just sort of breaking the repetition not by just going I'm so bad I repeat it I'm going to decide not to repeat it it's so subtle the way it creeps in and it creeps in I found through the very minute little fearful and resentful thoughts that become beliefs that start driving the trauma-driven decisions and behavior that carries us down the road of Ruin frankly I don't mean to be Victorian about it but my cptsd symptoms ruined my life until I began to use these techniques to really get to those those those very subtle little thoughts and just keep moving them out keep moving them out that those techniques I call the daily practice it's a free course that's always down below in the description section also on the free tools page of my website crappychildhoodferry.com if you want to take that very 500 people sign up for it a day it's really popular come join us it's let's see if it works okay so you blocked him everywhere and avoided physical contact I laughed a little bit it's not funny but if you block somebody on social media I hope you avoided physical contact so you were trying to have no contact and I know how hard that is for somebody who's been trauma bonded and who's been neglected in childhood that kind of a boundary and the loneliness that's coming up even when you're blocking somebody who abuses you it can be so compelling that you just break your own boundaries you know because you can't bear it but you're doing it okay and then once you blocked him he tried reaching out from multiple numbers I just circled that a bunch of times it's like multiple numbers what's going on he has burner phones for something for shady business or for having different relationships with different people I mean that would explain why your emotional feelings for him were a problem you know a problem for him and he apologized saying he found new faith I'm just guessing like that's what you were hoping to hear of course he clocked what it is that you wanted to hear and he said those things and it was the first time he said you were beautiful oh God trauma bonding to you were with a guy a year and he never said that and then he says it and you're like wait maybe it's love now I totally get it of course when we read it out loud you can see of course not it's manipulation and this is called hoovering by the way when a narcissist just you know they just like everything that you ever wanted to hear and suck you back into their orbit right and it worked a little bit and he said he loved you and you're the only one for him and at the time all that bad stuff happened because he wasn't connected to his heart I just would lay money that those are the words that you used when you were saying what hurt you about it so he parroted it back to you I suspect he has no idea what those feelings are or what it means he's just saying what you're supposed to say to get Freya to put down her boundaries then you didn't talk to him you still had a boundary then he comes to your town with a cake a man who made a cake how irresistible is that I totally get it he's wearing you down right and personal gifts so that phrase I chuckled the first time I caught feelings again and I think that maybe where you live that's just a way it said like I would say like I started having feelings again but I caught feelings it just sounds like a disease and it is in this case it's like a virus that just got in there and made you think thoughts like this is a good idea I've had that virus but later then he said guess what he doesn't want a relationship so he did all that you sort of opened up to him no he doesn't want one for now for now bookmark placed there and then he told you that so you cut contact again then he used a new telephone number this guy just cracks me up what's with all the numbers somebody in the audience is going to tell us here in the comments like what's with all the numbers what's he actually doing um and he's trying to tell you that you're wrong for damaging your own heart like this what by cutting them off that you can't forgive that's your problem right and that you'll cause yourself hurt in the future and I just want he's just boy he's grasping at straws to find a way to like try to get you to let him in again and saying basically anything no matter how hurtful and you just want it to end okay we're going to help you do that you haven't let him go 100 and that's what we do we cannot let go of the Hope especially when it's just been all like like it's just been so worked up in us like I want that love I want that love and you don't get it and you don't get it and then you're giving a little crumb and you're like yes I'm getting a crumb I think the whole cake is coming again but it's not coming the cake is taken away and every time you're given this tiny little thing it's taken away and it wears down your will your spirit your confidence your self-esteem your boundaries and that is the goal that's what he wants he wants somebody just who's all left up and so he can just like this is a figure of speech but he's drinking your blood he's an emotional vampire all right so you say I can't let go even though I feel this is not real love and I'm just going to say understatement of the year it's not even fake love this is like some sort of terrible terrible uh exploitation of a person and only because you were neglected and abused as a kid only because of that could you possibly crap fit this into thinking well it's something like love it's nothing like love love by definition is somebody who cares about the best for you I wanted to share with you a resource here if you're wondering if you made the right decision um Richard granan who is on YouTube who talks about cptsd a lot his thing is narcissistic abuse I really encourage you go check out his channel I'll put a link Down Below in the description section he has a new book out called a cult of one and I heard that title and I bought it immediately and it's on its way it just makes so much sense and that's what it sounds like you were in a cult of one this dude is you know it's it's it's brainwashing it's mind control it's exploitation it's everything like being in a cult and Richard grannon says he he had to choose a word for who if the other person isn't is a narcissistic abuser what am I and I just wanted to quote from his book here he says I chose the term codependent in using this term I'm going a little beyond the boundaries of the way it's typically used when I use the term codependent I mean a person who is traumatized and brainwashed into needing to be a slave to abusive Psychopathic narcissistic tyrannical types of people and systems in order to feel in any way meaningful visible or alive and then you had a couple of half relationships with guys who didn't treat you right and you got sick of it and you took space for six months and went to counseling for a couple years and then you stopped feeling guilt for the sexual abuse high five you that's good that's very good and then your dad died of alcoholism eight years ago and you had an aunt die of it and you met your now husband after the last counseling appointment and I circled that because I'm like if there was ever a time when you should stay in counseling it's when you get into a relationship okay so I've just also had a question for you did you leave counseling when you met him because a you were worried the counselor would disapprove or your cptsd thought oh everything's great now and I'm not making fun because I've totally been that person where you know like I I work on myself and then somebody new comes along and instantly I would drop it you know and just be like my problem is solved right now so I could just be projecting on you so then you got into yoga you were clean you were doing yoga it was the best you ever felt yay and you got into the spiritual stuff as you call it and you met him on a dating app and it was really great at first and after you say you slept together too fast okay A lot of people do and then you got married after a year and that was three years ago so then you keep having these huge arguments you think he has cptsd and he was taught to stuff his feelings and act like everything's fine yet some people have that that style and it's okay it's okay to be that way that's his style not yours okay his mom has some mental disorder he can't think of the name he still feels responsible for her and sends her money and um and you're really annoyed about that because she wastes the money and ends up with no food I I know what that's like when a relative is I've had it with a relative not a spouse but they're they're spending money on somebody I don't know anytime you're trying to help somebody who I guess she has a mental disorder I understand though that he wants to help her he wants her to have adequate money and he wants her to have food and yet she doesn't pull it together so I'm just sort of saying I I sympathize with you but I also sympathize with him on that and then you have this premenstrual dysphoria disorder and it's really bad you can't get support for it it's holding you back and you don't want to take medication because you took antidepressants before and I really don't know about that I can't give you any advice about that I know that yeah a lot of people have a negative reaction to drugs and they don't want to do it that way but if it's holding down your life that much you've got to do something and I'm not I'm not an expert on this pmdd but I have a feeling that right now you're not really pursuing solutions for that as fully as you might as fully as would be in your best interest okay and then you guys started a business and that is a really hard thing for a couple to do let alone a couple who's newly sober who does not appear to you didn't say anything about either one of you being in any kind of program of recovery so that to me is like double red flag I've had a lot of Alcoholics and addicts in my life and if they're not in a program recovery even if they're in a program of recovery they're vulnerable they're volatile they have a lot of healing to do it can be hard to be in a relationship with them there's a lot of ground to cover before somebody who's had an alcohol or drug problem including you is really capable of like a steady mature relationship that is mostly What I Hear going on here your husband sounds depressed rest it sounds like he you know the ADHD and growing up what you think is cptsd he's sleeping a lot I don't know what that is that drugs is it depression I don't know but you're not happy you married somebody optimistically who's turned out not to be somebody you respect or like that's what's basically going on here I just encourage you not to fault him like whatever is going on with him he only got sober right before he met you and now he's in a really difficult relationship and I just urge you to go to Al-Anon for his sake first of all to understand that what's going on with him related to his disease of alcoholism and or addiction is something he doesn't have total power over he can't fix it so that you will be happy in fact the more that you're unhappy and you're hard on him it's probably making it even harder for him and I urge you not to be that person who makes it harder with your expectations this is what's so hard about being with an alcoholic or an addict it just seems like if they loved you they would get it together and they would just do the proper you know tidy up after themselves wake up at a normal time celebrate an anniversary but there are real problems here and so people can't be forced to go through the motions of like being normal and happy when they're not feeling normal and happy so the job in this situation is to face and accept what is about this relationship you know I don't doubt that you have some love for him but but you're holding him to a standard that was once in your mind that was once in the past this business sounds like a real bummer and I have no idea what the details are and there are people who you can confide in who can maybe help with that there is also a 12-step program called Debtors Anonymous and I would really encourage you to check that out if you know you sound like you qualify for like all the 12-step programs for at least three and I would prioritize the substance abuse I feel worried about the amount of stress you're in and how unhappy you are given that you have a history of addiction that's a really slippery slope to be on and I just want you to be completely held in a group of people and or with professional help who understand that this is what you're going through and can support you to stay the path of sobriety this is kind of where people go down don't let that happen to you you know maybe the marriage is going to go to the side the business will one day be gone sooner or later and you will have your life ahead of you but for that to go well you're going to need your sobriety so put that first Debtors Anonymous Al-Anon those programs those are places where for free I know see because I'm hearing money is the problem here there's no money and that's okay you don't need money to get help you you need willingness and you need like I mean real real willingness not just like I went for a while you know and then I tried this and then I called for a couple weeks it has been hard for people to get therapy lately um there's a bit of a shortage I think it's slightly getting better there's online therapy but there's free 12-step groups and that just whatever it takes so that each day you have support be willing to do that that is what it takes to get out of a pickle like you describe I've been in some very bad circumstances before and I'm telling you nothing less than what I did for myself and I'm so glad I did it and my only regret is that I waited so long to get serious about it to give it my all I suppose it's worth a try sometimes you just think well maybe if I just do this much because it's inconvenient right to have to like get into recovery and work on yourself you just kind of want to carry on but it's time to give it your all to put your heart into it to make it the first priority in your life uh I think when you're doing that more clarity about your relationship will come and more support to decide what to do about the business it just sounds like you really you really you want to be out of that marriage you want to be out of that situation and so in addition to addressing your sobriety I encourage you to make the transition whatever that looks like so that you have a job and you are earning your own income once again because that's what a person needs if they're going to leave a relationship is they need money they need money all right that's just a practical thing so if you're avoiding that transition of making money it's just it's like a very big thing holding you down in your current situation so be brave about that be brave get the support you need to take positive steps to move in that direction the sending articles um feeling angry yeah you can let that go you don't need to send any more articles right now I would say as you work on figuring yourself what your next moves are and preparing yourself to make them that you be as kind as possible you stay safe like he rages at things you didn't say anything where he rages at you I hope I hope he doesn't it's time for one foot in front of the other self-care for you Cassie self-care be as pleasant as you can he's fragile too I'm sure you care about his his long-term well-being and I don't you I hear you you cry for hours sometimes and you're tired of all the pain you've carried yes so one thing that you can do on top of all of the things I've suggested with the therapy and the 12-step programs come be in our membership program it's a beautiful community of people many of whom are in transition with their relationships and work and who support each other through the ups and the downs and the symptoms and the bad days and the good days through our cptsd that's what everybody has so you'd be most welcome to come join the membership you get access to all the classes hi Anna what do you do when you close the door on someone but they keep pursuing you I'm trying to close the door on a toxic hot and cold relationship that's been ongoing for 10 months now all right I've got my fairy pencil I'm going to be circling things I want to come back to but right now I'm just going to read through Lauren's letter so I can see if I can help all right she says you've heard it all before I'm sure I have cptsd from my childhood my father was pretty normal and kind but my mother is severely autistic and suffered abuse as a child she was an authoritarian parent one who criticized heavily lashed out emotionally and was unable to regulate her own emotions much less anyone else's she also suffered from chronic migraines that made her bedridden for days on end leaving us children to fend for ourselves while our dad was at work yet at times my mother could also be incredibly warm and loving and present the entire household operated depending on her health and her moods and so we vacillated between the two extremes of hot and cold trauma Bond says Lauren this gave me an anxious preoccupied attachment style she says and that's someone who is fearful of Abandonment basically which shows up in my romantic relationships again and again three years ago I joined a soccer team and I met a guy I'll call Charlie and immediately fell into limerence okay we were both dating other people at the time uh-oh but I fantasized about us being together a huge Factor at play was how physically attractive I found him many of my female friends commented on how good looking he was my brain thought he was out of my league far too good looking for me finally after some years I was able to detangle myself from the super codependent relationship I'd been in Charlie got dumped by the girl he was seeing as soon as we were both single he started pursuing me and we hooked up I had never had a casual hookup before so I assumed that this was the start of us dating it wasn't we hooked up a few times after that but his behavior was avoidant and unclear I felt like I was chasing and he was running away finally I asked him point blank what he was looking for and he said he wasn't looking for a relationship at that time mm-hmm so I told him we should go back to being friends and he agreed and then I suffered that's right 10 months of hot and cold Behavior I've read enough about dismissive avoidant attachment to think that we were absolutely in an anxious preoccupied meets dismissive avoidant relationship okay so she's framing that as attachment Styles it went like this I would settle into us being just friends but he would never leave it at just that always flirting with me and pursuing me many times through the summer we would sit on my front step and talk and drink until 3am I was so attracted to him I told myself I would be fine just being friends with benefits so sometimes I would try to initiate a physical relationship once at 3am I asked him point blank to kiss me and he told me Point Blank that is a bad idea okay So Not only would he not date me he would also not sleep with me and he wouldn't leave me alone as soon as I would get sick of it and start to pull away he would actively pull me back in I thought him pulling me in was a green light so I would start to lean in and then he would pull away so then I would pull away and the cycle continued ad nauseum for months I think we were both at fault for the dynamic it takes two to tango I have a deep abandonment wound so whenever he would pull away or take extra long to reply to a text or flake on plans I would go into that abandonment melange that's the super intense abandonment depression that we go into those of us who were abandoned as kids and feel like my entire world was ending being rejected felt so shameful and made me attack myself the couple of times he left me on red or didn't show up for plans it consumed my thoughts on my energy and I obsessed about it and really tore myself apart for being clingy and embarrassing myself she puts those in quotes my response to perceived rejection him taking too long to text back or not showing up for coffee was to hit the eject button like the time that I dramatically returned all his stuff to his house in the middle of the night or engaged in emotional abuse by threatening to break it off over and over again I must have had the breakup conversation with him about six or seven times giving him countless ultimatums and pressuring him to either commit or quit sometimes I would go out with other people and watch as it made Charlie jealous that was when he pursued me the hardest and drunken oh interesting sued me the hardest and drunkenly told me he loved me and had sex with me it was because he had seen me out on a date with another man I knew at this time that I'd earned his love in the shittiest way possible but it still felt good his dismissive avoidant Tendencies meant he rarely gave me compliments didn't treat me or buy me anything and wouldn't verbalize how he felt about me but when he was jealous he did in December things changed he started acting like my boyfriend buying me food taking me out on dates texting me every day being sweet verbally spending more nights together I was scared to ask him what we were in case he rejected me again and so I decided to just accept the change in his behavior and see where it went then he got wasted on New Year's Eve and slept with a stranger I didn't know about it over the next month he consumed himself with guilt and shame and pulled away from me we started our toxic cycle of me threatening to leave and him winning me back all over again things were bad again but I didn't know why in February I really started to pull away he started getting blackout drunk every single weekend and sleeping with his ex which I was also in the dark about as far as I knew we were still dating sort of he never once gave our relationship a label no matter how I pressured him so I wasn't even sure if dating was the word he told me he wanted desperately to meet and talk about our relationship and I agreed he stood me up apparently he was too afraid to face me and admit that he'd been sleeping around it felt like a slap in my face I blocked him on everything it this tore him apart and my friends told me about him showing up to soccer blackout drunk and doing other dramatic attention-grabbing behaviors after a week of me avoiding him I ran into him on the street he looked so shattered that my wall broke down and I immediately fell into his arms he was shaking and very emotional we talked everything out and it was the greatest conversation ever he came clean about everything and was so deeply ashamed of himself and his substance abuse and was talking about going to therapy and doing being better I didn't forgive him but I didn't attack him either I listened and told him that I cared about him but for my own protection I would need us to be just friends again and that I would never ever let him hurt me like that again I have never felt so close to anyone in my whole life interesting we cried and told each other I love you for the first time I know Charlie loves me deeply we hadn't meant to hurt each other it was just our Dynamic but I can also see outside the limerence and know that love isn't ever going to change anything our wounds and Trauma rub up against each other in exactly the wrong way and send us both spiraling down toxic Pathways I'm currently doing the work on myself to change but I don't believe Charlie is ready to do the work friends orbit and I feel like my vision flickers between reality and fantasy sometimes I'm crystal clear about the reality of the situation and know he's a dead end and I don't obsess about him or engage with him but anytime I'm in a vulnerable place I want to dip back into that fantasy and despite my putting up a boundary he's still pursuing and flirting with me just like he always has trying to get my attention and sometimes it works sometimes we all go out for drinks and I avoid Charlie for the first hour but he knows exactly what to say and what to do to pull me back in and suddenly I'm flirting with him at a party and I feel the Cycles starting all over again I'm not sure whether I need to strengthen myself internally or try to willpower myself to a place of distance and safety or whether I need to put up practical boundaries like quitting the soccer team or not going out for drinks if he's if he'll be there or blocking his number I don't want to do any of those things because I love soccer and all of our mutual friends and I don't want to pull away from any of that I also heard from a friend that Charlie is in agony trying to read my mixed signals right now now I'm doing to him what he always did to me playing hot and cold I can't imagine what it feels like for him living in limbo not knowing whether he has a chance with me or whether that door is closed actually I can imagine she says I lived that reality for 10 months please help me close the door thank you so much for reading best Lauren okay Lauren I can definitely help on this one here we go all right so you say what do you do when you close the door on someone but they keep pursuing you so Lauren you don't you've never tried that yet you have never closed the door on this guy I'm just going to bust you right here that door remains open with this pretense that you can just be friends all right this is going to be a little bit of tough love because I know it's making you miserable I know what it's like to be in this type of relationship and I know it's not going to turn out well all right so the longer you keep telling yourself that you have actually set up some kind of meaningful boundary but he just keeps doing this thing the longer you're going to be unhappy and unavailable for an actual relationship so let's go through I'll show you what I saw here so in your childhood um your mother was severely autistic and suffered abuse as a child and she was authoritarian and she was she had chronic migraines bedridden you've had to fend for yourself she'd be loving and present and then her mood would get terrible and uh there it is there's where you got stamped with your trauma Bond flavor and that you know the worst thing our trauma as kids can turn into something that draws Us in as adults to the point that I would say that the game of cat and mouse is actually erotic for you all right this thing where somebody draws you in rejects you draws you in gives you a heightened emotional experience every time they take you back that it's addictive it's just addictive and I know and so many people who write to me have this it's not your fault it's not your fault you have this but it's a terrible way to live your life it's just as miserable as if you had a problem with alcohol or drugs all right so let's go through here so it was three years ago you joined a team you met the guy and immediately fell into limerence so you had a fantasy you were both dating other people at the time so I guess you didn't you weren't that into the guy you were in you were with but you fantasized about being together and it's a lot because he was good looking okay this is this is a lot where my theory that it's an eroticization is you know he just looks really good he's really mean he gives you that feeling that he doesn't want you and then he takes you back in and you know this is what your mom did this is what your mom did to you and I know what it's like I had an alcoholic mom and so she would be just like totally unavailable and then on some days she'd feel guilty or she was temporarily sober or whatever and she would just like give it all and it was like so delicious you know to be taken back in like that I know I know and I've had my experience with relationships like this where it is just so exciting when they take you back and there's a little bit of Hope It's Never full hope it's never just like flat out actual hope it's like a little bit of Hope and they take it away and a little bit of Hope and they take it away okay and then you did something interesting and turned the tables later but I'll get to that so you've you got out of the super codependent relationship you'd been in okay so you've self-diagnosed as codependent in the past at least and he got dumped well that's for you know interesting I mean somebody's got to get dumped in a relationship that ends right but now we know now we have an inkling of why right as soon as we were both single he started pursuing me and we hooked up all right so this is I'm just going to sort of keep focusing on language where you keep sort of putting the ball in he pursued you he pursued you so you hooked up so you never had a casual hookup before so you assumed that it was the start of dating and it wasn't you hooked up a few more times after that but his behavior was avoidant and unclear all right let's talk about that and you said I felt like I was chasing and he was running away finally I asked him point blank what he was looking for and he said he wasn't looking for a relationship at that time so I told him we should go back to being friends and he agreed all right so just like crappy child and fairy rule number one for people with attachment wounds like you I'm sorry to tell you this you can't go back to just being friends when you have a torrid limerent trauma bond with somebody there is no friendship there all right A friend is not somebody who treats you like that who leaves you confused feeling jerked around neglected abandoned that's not what a friend is it's a construct that that you're making I'm just kind of going to name it here you're making this pretense that by not sleeping with him you can have a relationship but be honest you know you're hoping he's going to come around and that's just not a friendship and so any relationship between X's where there's any kind of energy on either side that hoping for sex hoping it's gonna they're gonna come around hoping it's really going to work out because it's true love that is going to Doom your emotional availability and because he's demonstrated such a lack of consistency and sincerity towards you already as much as you kind of like lift him you know Elevate what he's doing into something a little better than I see it yeah he he doesn't treat you well he's not your friend and he's not your boyfriend so what is he here so you had hot and cold Behavior you said you've read enough about dismissive avoidant attachment that you think you were in an anxious preoccupied that would be you fearful of Abandonment chasing meets dismissive avoidance yeah that might be true but it's you say relationship but if that's you guys have a small R relationship so it's not uncommon that somebody who's anxiously anxious you know anxious and clingy is chasing after somebody who's just you know very aloof and cold that's not uncommon but it's not happy um and what I've what I understand about it is unless two people are going to meet in the middle on it where the avoidant person has some latitude but the fearful anxious person has some commitment they can count on no it's just miserable it's just miserable and I know it's you know you are so you wouldn't be writing okay so you said it goes like this I would settle into us just being friends but he would never leave it at just that so if you would be friends he would start to flirt again so a little bit Lauren didn't you notice how you actually had a lever in this whole thing that if you said I'm not going to sleep with you anymore I just want to be friends he would start to flirt with you he would get jealous about everything else you did he would start to move toward you which is what you always wanted but here's the thing if you have to jerk somebody around and hurt them to make them want you it's never going to be it's just not love it's not love it's a it's a trauma thing it's a form of Kink really you know there's I I get letters about this not not infrequently where one person is you know in love with the other one and the other one is only there if they're pulling away and then they're gone and comes back if they're pulling away that's the feeling the other person likes is like the little cat toy is getting pulled away getting pulled away and so they run and they grab it but they don't actually want it they don't actually want the toy they don't actually want a relationship they like the feeling of pursuit they like the feeling of ah I'm gonna get abandoned and then pursuing so a little bit you know when you start talking well okay I'm going to talk about this because I see that you kind of learned how this goes on your side and you can assess for yourself okay so many times through the summer you'd sit on the front step and talk and drink until 3am I was so attracted to him I told myself I'd be fine just being friends with benefits did you tell yourself that well when you're in love with somebody just you're not going to be fine with being friends with benefits I think you got that you were friends with benefits what sort of kept messing up the relationship is it wouldn't turn into more than that right so sometimes you would try to initiate something you asked him to kiss you and he said it's a bad idea so there's one moment where he was showing some better judgment it was a bad idea do you know why this is the painful part because he wasn't into you in that way so some people are perfectly happy to have friends with benefit sex but they're not into you and he had known you well enough at that point that I know it's painful right but I know you know this is what it is but you're just trying to like the anxious avoidant thing you're like maybe there's a psychological explanation maybe it's just a trauma injury but He's Just Not That Into You and he also sounds like a whole basket of problems as you sort of get into what ended up happening so even if you were into you not a great not a great match here so not only would he not date you but he also wouldn't sleep with you and he wouldn't leave you alone uh-huh so yeah it won't date won't sleep with he actually didn't want to be romantic with you so he did you know he was willing to do that to stay friends but you couldn't you know that we can't help who we fall in love with we can't help who we're attracted to so at least you were honest you were just coming from where you were but the part where you got dishonest is where you promised that you guys could just be friends or just friends with benefits or that you would stay friends and you were really firm about that that was an experiment I would say you were experimenting to see how that felt for you and how he reacted to it but there's only ever been one thing you wanted out of this you wanted to be with him for real there's no shame in that but it's not to be okay so you say you're both at fault for the dynamic for sure you have a deep abandonment wound uh-huh and so every time he would take a long time to reply to a text or flake or you know you would go into abandonment melange is horrible isn't it and I know what that's like because so abandonment melange it's this phenomenon Pete Walker named it for somebody who was abandoned as a kid when there's a something that triggers that old wound this intense toxic cocktail of grief rage Panic comes up and it feels like the end of the world and that's literally the the words used the world was ending those are the words you used um and then being rejected feels shameful uh-huh and made you attack yourself I totally understand so he would do that he'd leave you on red and it would consume your thoughts so that is that's what obsession is like that's what relationship addiction is like it it just absolutely consumes you it stops you in your tracks and you know just gently I want to invite you when we finish this letter to just do some reflection on like what has it cost you to have all that life force of yours go into something that just is a drain it never pans out into the relationship you want you've tried every permutation of how you can accept how it is make do with it date somebody else but it's not flying is it that's the nature of love and it's sad but real that you know there comes a time when you actually do have to close the door and you said you wanted to do that oh yeah you tore yourself apart for being clingy you felt that you embarrassed yourself so a lot of shame in being neglected totally normal it's actually not shameful it's okay you say you engaged in emotional abuse by threatening to break it off over and over again and you know I do call call people out on that sometimes if you're actually in a committed relationship and you keep threatening them that you're going to leave but you don't mean it that is emotional abuse but I think when somebody's just having hookups with you and sleeping with other people and lying that you threatening to leave I wouldn't call it emotional abuse I just call it like an attempt to set a boundary that you had that you weren't totally able to hold okay you weren't able to honor it because your love for him was so great your need for him was so great you would abandon yourself that's what it is I I'm not getting the feeling that that was emotional abuse so you had that breakup conversation with them six or seven times you gave him ultimatums pressuring him to commit or quit um and you and then you loved watching him get jealous and that's when he would pursue you the hardest and then he drunkenly told you he loved you and had sex with you and yeah because he saw you out on a date I think he's a very hurt and messed up person very wounded and a lot of this stuff is just coming out of pure unhealed wounds and then it goes on all this blackout drinking and drunken behavior and just total abandonment of you and lying and I I think maybe when you hear me read this out loud you're just going to go oh wow he's like not actually what I thought you know he is I think using you for friendship and security um in the measure that he wants in the given moment considering what else is going on in his life but a little bit like we do you're psychologizing it and you say his dismissive avoidant Tendencies meant he rarely gave me compliments didn't treat me or buy me anything and wouldn't verbalize how he felt about me but he was jealous when he was jealous he did okay so you say dismissive avoidance I say dishonest um if he loved you he would verbalize his feelings he would buy you things he would just do the normal couple things if he loved you and was worried that you were going to leave I don't think he was that worried I think the jealousy activates a reflex in him that you know it's very convenient for him that you're emotionally and sexually available if he just pursues you right I know it's hard to hear sometimes people go gosh Anna you don't have to be so mean but I don't want to be mean it's out of like I know I've been through this and I'm just I just want to tell you the truth so that you can you can really shut the door so that you can abandon hope because it's the false hope that you know he's going to change so this is where your childhood trauma really kicks in when it got dire so you start when you started to really pull away he started getting black out drunk every single weekend he started sleeping with his ex didn't tell you and you thought you were still sort of dating you know if you're still sort of dating somebody and I don't know don't sort of date anybody date them date them and see if they're the one for you I know you don't want to be in this sort of entanglement he never once gave the relationship a label no matter how you pressured him so I wasn't even sure if you were dating I don't think so if someone's dating you they can call it dating if there's resistance to labeling it they are not it's just not that it's I don't know you could you could interpret the word dating any way you want but the way that you're talking about no he's not doing that he told me he wanted desperately to meet and talk about the relationship you agreed and he stood you up so there you have it you say apparently he was too afraid to face you and admit that he'd been sleeping around you say apparently I'm not sure that's what it was I just think it was just purely shitty treatment of somebody who doesn't really care about your feelings and is sleeping around and maybe thought for a minute they should talk to you or maybe I'm just challenging you Lauren why on Earth would you want to have another day of this you deserve so much better all right so you blocked him you tore them apart and friends told you that he would show up at soccer black out drunk and do dramatic things but see this is weird this is where the little cat who chases the toy got activated in you it's like really he got that sad about me I know I know so it was like okay something real happened something emotional happened and registered that you weren't just completely nothing to him and I I get it all right so after a week of you avoiding him you ran into him on the street and you say he looks so shattered that my wall broke down and I immediately fell into his arms okay there's your old codependent thing the guy looks shattered and so oh I love him a guy who's cheated and Abandoned and lied and all that stuff just because he's shattered and gets blackout drunk all the time that the codependent thing in you that got formed when you were a little kid with your mom's like off-on Behavior it's that magical thinking that it's like he shattered because his heart has finally cracked open and he I totally see why you thought that because he came clean about all his terrible behavior and cheating and substance abuse and you say I didn't forgive him but I didn't attack him either okay and I listened and told him I cared about him but for my own protection I need us to just be friends again okay there's your fatal mistake you he's not your friend and he's not capable of being your friend he is a he's a person who hurts you every time you get involved with him and your life force drains out a friend is somebody who builds you up a friend is somebody where when you because of as a result of spending time with them you become a better person they get you they care about things that are hurtful to you they've got your back so this is not your friend so really like sometimes when we say that we're going to have to just be friends we're hoping we could turn the dial down on the intensity but still keep the Romantic possibilities intact like a bookmark right and it totally makes sense and there are cases in human history where it's worked but even if he were madly in love with you the stuff going on in his life right here even if you're begging you to be with him and it was all he ever wanted what's going on in his life right here means he really can't do it certainly not now and if somebody has problems of this magnitude I would say wait 10 years to even entertain the possibility you know to see if they've had a huge change it's these are serious problems and he's not working on them and so you said you would never ever let him hurt you like that again so that sounds really good right you don't have the power when it gets this bad we become powerless to not get hurt again to not get entangled again so big steps are met are required you say you know he loves you deeply and in in his weird mean way yes maybe um he had what you hadn't meant to hurt each other no he was just kind of selfishly pursuing what he wanted it was just our Dynamic yeah you can see that love that that love isn't ever going to change anything and your wounds and Trauma rub up against each other in exactly the wrong way and send you both spiraling down toxic Pathways you know I'm not aware there's nothing in your letter that tells me that you're the one sending him on a toxic pathway he's on a toxic pathway and you're codependently yoked to him kind of you've hitched Your Wagon to his star and his star is just going into the black hole so what can you do my metaphor sort of leads you there it's time to unhitch you say I'm currently doing the work on myself to change I I challenge you I don't think you are yet I think you're looking for the easier softer way as they say in 12-step literature but you don't believe he's ready to do the work no when you when you'll know that he's ready to do the work when he's done the work and he comes to you and he's like all he ever does is the work and he's like sober he is single he is honest he's full of um you know structured positive contrite conversations to have with you um but I don't think that's going to happen and I wouldn't settle for anything less and even then even then a lot of times somebody will get sober and want to make some changes and then in the first few months six months one year they want to get together again with somebody who they had that connection with and the connection itself because it's inherently Rocky because of all you've been through will be very destabilizing for them and actually dangerous for them and honestly if you love this guy set him free to go work on himself if he does I mean he's either going to self-destruct or he's going to work on himself but the last thing he needs is any codependent energy about you know if he would just get his life together the thing between you would be happy like I really having been through this before having my brother and two partners die of drugs and the partners while they were my partner I'm just speaking from experience you know the right thing to do is to detach and let them let them do their best being in a dramatic relationship is the worst thing for them okay it's dangerous now time to focus on you because you have been in danger yourself your life your future all your happiness you're in danger I don't think it's immediately life-threatening to you but it's bad and so detachment's going to get you back out of that you say that you're always in each other's orbit because of the soccer and sometimes you're clear about the reality and sometimes you flicker back into fantasy it works that way and it'll work that way so long as you have contact with them honey you know it's uh it's it's a tough road so breaking contact getting support from women who understand or maybe are walking the same path with you you could go to sex and love addicts anonymous you could go to Aca adult children of Alcoholics and other dysfunctional families this type of relationship thing you could come into my dating program or dating coaching with me or my team this is what we work on we help people come back to reality and we do that with practical tools that help keep taking you out of the fantasy and back into the delicious truth of reality it's actually quite good and comforting you know do you ever get that where you're just like oh yeah I'm just pursuing a ghost here that feels good it's a good feeling and to be surrounded by people who support you and they're like Yay good job good job Lauren you you did it you stand up for yourself and you go guess what I bought myself a new dresser today and I put it together myself and everybody's like yay yay and you help each other put your furniture together and you go out to outings on the weekend together and you start to have a life that's only based on friendship and positive growth and none of this destructive emotional vampirism that's been going on with you in the sky you say that sometimes you go out for drinks he's got this blackout drink thing and he says he loves you and sometimes you go out for drinks and then you um ignore him for an hour now you're playing with him all right you know that that's what sets them off and then uh he's you'd go back and you get sucked back together through drinks and ignoring each other and I just want to say I suggest to you even if you don't have a problem with alcohol while you're healing this problem I would suggest don't drink alcohol don't do mind altering stuff it's you know this somebody said this to me when I was struggling and they just said you have no business drinking alcohol and I was like what but I'm not an alcoholic but it's true it's really hard to stay with your better judgment it's hard to eat the food that you know is good for you it's hard to keep the Bedtime you know is good for you it's hard to keep the boundaries you know are good for you and it's hard to stay out of beds where you don't belong when there's alcohol involved and since he you know I don't know if you know this but alcoholism which she appears to have and it's taking him down a mental health Bad Rabbit Hole um can be fatal and so having I don't know you know I just urge you don't participate in that with him anyway I'm really sorry about the soccer team but yes I would leave the soccer team and I know that's not fair but you recovering and getting your life together is more important than this group of friends and this thing you enjoy and I just know you can find another team another activity another group of friends if that's necessary be willing to go to any lengths because I'm telling you what you have now is a full-fledged addiction that's taking you down so take it seriously okay that's my suggestion to you Lauren the last thing you told me is that your friends say he's in agony trying to read your mixed signals stop playing the game don't give him signals don't just no contact yes block no contact and you're going to still think about them stuff is going to remind you of him and you put it out of your mind there's there's a lot of tools like I teach my daily practice and that's one way you can be practical just you know processing these feelings maybe you're in therapy or you're thinking of doing that everything you can do to stay on the path don't go down your Bad Rabbit Hole of like maybe if I I could just have contact with them the way an addict just thinks just this one time I want to do the drug again that's my suggestion to you and you said please help me close the door and that's what I'm saying actually do it no more contact no more contact with this source of toxic miserableness for you Miss Lauren you're going on to good places all right hi Anna I am currently in a relationship with a man slash Man Child I've got my pencil here I'm going to circle things I want to come back to let's read this all the way through and I'll see if I can help you Rebecca all right he's 23 and I'm 29 she says he's had a really rough past and got through his addiction to drugs and such he's been sober but I feel like he isn't doing the work to heal or isn't seeking counseling to help our relationship was intense from the start we talked and cuddled for hours for like the first week I was excited but there were so many red flags that I let slide I honestly feel like this whole relationship I have just been passive because it's hard to do what I know is best if there's emotions involved I loved the feeling of somebody being so into me and the potential of our relationship fast forward a month besides the physical we had nothing in common he didn't ask me about myself really he didn't like to go out didn't want to take a walk or spend time in nature things that I loved and when we hung out it was mostly in silence he would smoke and be on the phone I felt invisible and frustrated but he he would hold my hand and give me affection so I clung to that as proof of his love he also had a dark sense of humor and made threatening jokes but told me I was being too sensitive and I needed to toughen up I've tried telling him how I felt because I've spent a lot of time trying to heal and I value emotional connection he didn't relate he always made my feelings mean something about him and got really defensive and then shut down my dilemma is I know he's immature but he's got good intentions and is trying to change and grow he wants to support me and I'm attracted to that provider characteristic but I'm not getting what I need now and I'm not sure if I can be in this relationship and continue to forego my needs with just faith that things will work out in the future am I accepting crumbs punishing myself I feel like this relationship isn't right but I don't want to let go of the potential okay Rebecca gotcha I think I can help this is going to be a tough love fairy video okay it may not be what you wanted to hear I guess you could say that you're accepting crumbs on this one but what I'm hearing is that you are using somebody you are using somebody on a fantasy about what you would like in a relationship that he cannot give you and has given no sign that he would and I'm going to be very Stern with you about this because of something you told me at the beginning which is he got through his addiction to drugs and such he's sober but I feel like he isn't doing the work to heal or isn't seeking counseling or help all right as somebody who's had experience with addicts in my life in the most tragic way I just want to say if somebody is newly sober you have no business having any kind of a relationship with them that is not in their best interest it's one thing if people have been together a long time and one partner gets sober and the longtime partner supports them and is in their life that is one thing and it's not even then it's not always good for both people but you've been seeing him a month and you're putting all this energy and demand on him that he should turn around and meet your needs he's a 23 year old addict who's barely sober what you describe is a sexual relationship there's hot sex that's what's going on here there's no other sign of a relationship he holds your hand a little bit and you're connecting that in a crap fit fashion to a fantasy of having somebody be in a provider role of looking out for you that is not what's going on a 23 year old freshly sober person who's not doing the work on himself is honestly not in a position to give you that or make your life stable or make you feel loved they need to put first things first they need to deal with their sobriety and he may or he may not be doing that right now but I'm telling you honey you do not want to be the one who pressured him into a bad place with the demand that he turned into some kind of boyfriend for you that's not what's going on and and so what you don't tell me but I can read between the lines is you had your own trauma I can tell right now you were seriously neglected that you even have the capacity to think of yourself as like oh this is such a great potential relationship it's not a potential relationship even if somebody were the right age and in a stable place I would always caution people don't fall in love with the potential of somebody the potential of somebody is your fantasy of how they should be and there is nothing worse for another human being than coming in and posing a picture on them of how you think they should be he is where he is he's on his path of where this is taking him I hope he survives you know addiction is an extremely serious problem this part where you say you're worried that he isn't doing the work to heal or seeking counseling to help that is your inner cry for help that you need to be doing your work you need to be getting the counseling you need to be focusing on what's going on in your life that at the age of 29 you're getting together with a 23 year old who has nothing to give emotionally who you have nothing in common with all right that is where your pain is coming from so it's totally natural I've been there I know what it's like to just kind of you know you just end up in some sexual relationship and then you're just like oh no this is really anything that I wanted so then you try to make the other person change it's a losing strategy it's not love and I told you this would be tough love but when we try to change other people like that to fit some need that we have um it's not love it's selfishness and it's not good for them and this is not yeah you the you know you're saying like the first week it was so intense but all relationships where there's a sexual attraction are intense in the first week if the lights have gone out in a month you know sweetie there's nothing going on here I think the Integrity path is to very lovingly step out of this relationship and go support yourself in healing from whatever happened to you that you would be in this sort of like it is a breadcrumb situation but it's also a vampire situation where you're you know trying to feed a fantasy you have about somebody really loving you and caring about you from somebody who's extremely vulnerable and could be in great Danger from his addiction so that's my tough love for you Rebecca I hope you do that we have a lot of resources here at crappy childhood fairy for people who are trying to do that brave step of stepping out of the unhealthy thing and to create a safe and nutritious pause where you can work on your stuff it could start with the free core course the daily practice I hope you'll take it anybody watching it's always down in the description section you'll find it on the free tools page of my website and you can learn the techniques that I use to start healing and you know start feeling better today start filling in that pain and angst that makes it necessary to keep pursuing it from somebody else sometimes healing these things it takes some time but the first thing you need is a way to feel better right away all right so I wish you well I hope that goes well and I hope he stays safe and if you're interested in learning about what are the signs that somebody is a good partner I'm not advocating Rebecca that you go out and look for a good partner I'm advocating that you become a good partner to start with all right and then start looking for somebody who matches you hello Anna I've been dating my boyfriend for a year now we're both 62 years old previously married and neither of us have children we met online through match and then in person we had a very romantic first meeting under a giant Christmas tree it was fun and exciting he kept using the word magical which I now cringe at he told me he loved me within 24 hours of meeting he purchased personalized license plates that said his name and my name forever within six weeks of meeting I told him he was moving way too fast and I was a little freaked out but I was really enjoying our time together so I ignored the obvious red flags I hoped he'd lighten up in his intensity as we got to know each other I believed him to be genuinely kind loyal and funny which I feel are hard qualities to find in a man these days I'm going to circle that with the fairy pencil and come back to that I'll read Sherry's letter all the way through I'm going to circle things that I want to make sure that I discuss in particular when I respond to this letter all right let's read it all the way through so she says I continue to see him we both have a history of getting in relationships too fast I did not have a crappy childhood but he did his mother was cruel and both emotionally and physically abusive my family has some emotional dysfunction but overall I had a happy childhood it's very obvious that he has cptsd though which I learned of when I went searching for help two months into our relationship but I knew it wasn't my job to fix him two months into dating I came down with covid and wound up in the Intensive Care Unit in critical condition for 11 days he also became ill but refused to go to the doctor so he stayed at my condo to care for my cats while I was in the hospital I was very grateful for that but at the same time concerned that he didn't seem to care for himself he's very comfortable in victim or martyr roles when I got out of the hospital I wasn't the feisty woman he met under the tree and he accused me of talking to somebody else while in ICU because he felt I wasn't the same I sent him home I was still very ill and my focus was on getting better he actually said he thought we would have this magical moment when they wheeled me out of the hospital what she says I barely knew my name after being in the Intensive Care Unit and near death it was an extremely traumatic experience for me and all he wanted was magic I was appalled yeah after that I told him I couldn't continue to see him unless he got help I connected him with a local therapist and he did go consistently for a couple of months but like you speak of in your videos it made him worse he found himself sobbing and completely disregulated after a session and with no tools to deal with the emotions that were coming up that's when I introduced him to your videos later we purchased your dating and relationship course I was impressed by his desire to be healthier even though traditional therapy wasn't for him I really felt compassion for him and was sad he had been through so much I had hoped he'd become more aware of why he had such negative behaviors and address them I listened to your video for those of us who are in relationships with cptsd Partners I gave him more patience and time than I normally would because of it I have belonged to Al-Anon for over 16 years worked the steps and have a sponsor who feels he isn't good for me I've also gone to traditional therapy as needed since my 30s I have my own share of complex PTSD from being married 22 years to a diagnosed narcissist I know I'm slipping back into my codependency which I've worked so hard to be better at my boyfriend feels my boundaries like don't yell are mean he doesn't have any friends that he does things with he'll speak of close friends but I've never met one in an entire year he focuses on me all day long consistently tells me he misses me and gets upset if I don't say it back to him I've listened to hours upon hours of your videos My Hope was to help guide him to resources so we could have a less drama-filled relationship that's all I want I don't expect to be perfect I don't expect him to be perfect I have my issues too but he is wearing me out I'm finding I resent him I'm feeling I don't want to tell him I love him or miss him because he constantly wants it he can be very passive aggressive and guilts me for not feeling like him and that makes me angry now I don't want to feel like him I don't feel he's healthy yet here I am still hoping who's the unhealthy one lol I do have to say he has gained more awareness of his behavior through your videos and course just since the summer I have seen changes in him he's doing daily writing but he still hangs on to the magical thinking and is obsessed with me if things don't feel magical every day he wants to know what's wrong I spend four out of seven days with him and he still pouts when I want time for the things in my life outside of him he doesn't do anything outside of us which I know is so unhealthy he calls this love of I'm also dealing with my mom who was just put into memory care with Alzheimer's even when he knows I'm sitting with her he wants to hear from me and that feels controlling although he loves me like no other in so many ways which is nice the downside of of his personality is just draining and disturbing sometimes I'm growing to resent him and have lost respect if I even mention us breaking up or that I need time away from him he starts crying I've never seen a man cry so much in my entire life is this normal for a man with cptsd I don't mind him sharing his emotions and I don't mind him crying but a man who sobs every week is too much I really do love the kind regulated boyfriend I met I'm sad to think of him not being in my life but his neediness is so unattractive and exhausting when it's good it's amazing but when it's bad well you know it's awful I fear he'll harm himself if I break up there it is he's threatened this before I feel ridiculous now for asking this but could there be any hope for him at this stage of his life with his severity please help thank you for all that you do all right Sherry I think I can help this is a tough case and I'm really glad you wrote this is uh gosh I I think I've been in both sides of this relationship before luckily I'm on the other side to tell you how you get out of each side of it all right so you've been dating for a year now you're 62 years old uh previously married no kids um big romantic meetings after connecting online for the first time and he said it was magical he changed his license plates so this yeah that is way too fast he said he loved you within 24 hours of meeting and you told him he was moving way too fast and you were freaked out but you were really enjoying the time together so you ignored the obvious red flags okay and you hoped he'd lighten up and you believed him to be genuinely kind loyal and funny which I feel are hard qualities to find in a man these days I'm just gonna I just flagged that one because you know it's just so hard to find decent men or decent women out there these days that is a trauma-driven belief that will keep you single it may have been hard for you but one of the reasons your relationships have been really unhealthy is because you're not healed yet Sherry when you're healed you would never get together you would never have had a second date with somebody who said he loved you on in the first 24 hours right so you've actually been going into relationships with your own half of the you know unhealthy dynamic and that's what's making giving you the impression that there are no great men out there because it's really easy to think like I'm fine I'm fine if I would just meet the right guy if he were just healthy everything would be great there must be no guys like that they are out there but they're not dating people with that energy and they're not dating people who have been in a relationship for the past year because you're already taken all right so I want you to put that idea out of your mind that there's no no men who are kind and loyal and funny not so and then you both have a relationship with a history of getting into relationships too fast you didn't have a crappy childhood but he did his mother was cruel and both emotionally and physically abusive okay that's a recipe for his behavior so it's very obvious to you that he has complex PTSD which you learned when you went searching for help two months into the relationship okay big red flag is when you or anybody is searching for help for your partner within two months of dating them the red flag is you and yes it's a red flag that that they're so screwed up that you feel that this is necessary but the red flag is that rather than going okay dating is to find out if this is person is appropriate for me to date and then to act as if you're their spouse and you've been with them for years and suddenly they're acting strange it's not like that you're seeing how it is the act of searching for somebody else online for how to help them is inherently codependent except if you're married to somebody basically I I I I know there are exceptions and everybody will go wait wait but but you get my idea here searching for help giving them books courses any of that stuff is codependently trying to make them be an idea of them that you would like to have that you originally had because I don't think there's any other reason why we do that because we're scared to leave because we can't deal with our own feelings about leaving so you're scared of hurting him but I'm going to wager you're also scared of how you will feel out of a relationship you know when you've wanted one for a long time and you meet somebody and you think I think this could be it oh it's devastating when you're just realizing oh it's not it I have to go back to square one I gotta try again and it's such a loss right and that loss can feel so big that you'll talk yourself into staying in a completely screwed up situation just so you don't have to deal with it and I think sometimes we fix people as a coping mechanism we just need to feel some kind of control over a situation that is totally out of control and unworkable two months into dating you got coveted so bad you were near death you were in critical critical condition in the hospital and when you got out he imagined there would be this magical meeting and he was disappointed that you were too tired and still unwell to you know deliver this magical experience okay this is where it starts getting pretty sick all right this is where this is like 0.2 when I just feel like ah you should not be here this is not good I couldn't continue to see him unless he got help and then you connected him with a local therapist so I just want to put out there to everybody if anybody ever makes an ultimatum to somebody that they need to get help or you won't see them anymore let them get help not you will make them get help and they'll show up you will not be satisfied with your results with that now again I make a distinction if somebody's in your family if you have like a lifelong commitment to them then sometimes there is a such thing as intervening and pushing and doing you know trying to save somebody's life but when you've been dating for two months you don't go try to rescue somebody and make them go to therapy and go call around for them and do that okay so Sherry this is where I think you're just kind of ruining your chances of happiness is instead of seeing a reality for what it is you're trying to go in and fix it and make it into what you want and from the outside it's just it's just like really evident like no that's not going to work okay he did go consistently for a couple months but it didn't help him and he was just crying yeah take it from someone who has tried to make somebody go get help and as many people who watch no you know I've back in uh oh gosh like 16 17 years ago I was it was a relationship after my divorce that turned out to be somebody with a drug addiction and I didn't know about it for a few months and when I did find out about it I was like you I just couldn't really face what that meant which was the end you know kind of it wasn't just any drugs it was heroin okay it was I needed to go I had children like no way could I do this but I was trying to like bargain with reality and go but I tell you what if you go to this kind of treatment an inpatient this and go to this many meetings and get a sponsor then maybe we can make it work like I wanted it to work so bad he didn't want to lose me so he pretended he was doing all that stuff and then I turned into that girl who goes around like following him around to see if his car was in the parking lot at the meeting and it wasn't and then I'd be all angry and I never again want to be in that kind of like drama because what I was trying to do was control him so that I could be okay and that's what codependence is your guy is perfectly capable of seeking help he can find a therapist if he wants a therapist if you were serious with your you have to get help or I'm not going to see you and I think you're done with him I hear that but I'm just saying you know for perspective if you that wasn't a real ultimatum when you went in and tried to do it for him okay so if you had said that and then you had stepped out of the relationship he could decide if he wanted to do it now I think that people who are as fragile as him and I think yeah he may have cptsd but I think he may have something more than that and I would leave that diagnosis to a there I'm not a therapist so those of you who are therapists or doctors out there please weigh in on what you think that this guy is dealing with um but what I do know is it's not workable for a relationship no way this is not workable you've just been dating okay and you've stayed with him for 10 months after this meltdown and that's really rough okay so then you introduced him to my videos which you know he could go online and find them um sometimes I say to people like go ahead and show them a video let them figure it out once they know there's a video by me and if they like it they will watch more videos they can take courses if they want the dating course is not intended to be taken as a couple I'm just saying the dating courses for people who are single who would like to get into a committed relationship so I appreciate that you bought the course and that's nice and I think that you taking the course is going to prepare you for what's next but I think that somehow you didn't like the the lesson of the course could not penetrate your mind because you were already in a relationship that you needed to justify and what what my course tells you is you write down what you actually need and I know you don't need somebody who can't even be present for you when you're sick because they're trying to get magic love from you that is not on your list I've already seen it no I haven't seen your list but I want you to write that down that you need somebody capable of being present who can actually care for you when you're sick I want you to write down somebody who actually is capable of going slow enough to get to know you so that you can mutually find out if you should take little baby steps towards intimacy because for people with cptsd and for what you have you may not have cptsd I don't know but you have this thing of rushing in and trying to you know crap fit to a relationship and in your and through trying to control the person and retrofit them and make them into you know like Pygmalion I'm going to make you into the sort of person I could feel proud of and feel good with and I'm not judging you I've done it I've done it more than once but I'm just telling you like it's a it's a terrible road to go down like go back stop now come back so then you said I'm impressed by his desire to be healthier even though traditional therapy wasn't for him I'm you know I don't know nothing in your story sounds like he wanted to be healthier he just wanted you to not leave but I won't speak for him he didn't write um and you felt compassion and you were sad he'd been through so much yeah it is sad um you had hoped that he could be more aware of why he had such negative behaviors and address them but I'll tell you what even if somebody who's suffering symptoms like him like it is so much an inside job and I'm going to be making a video very soon about that Moment of clarity when you realize oh my gosh everything I've ever done on my own and even with professional help like I haven't been able to break through my symptoms and if I can't change I I'm never going to be okay like if I had to get to that point where I would go to any length to recover and admit that I just you know nothing I had ever tried had worked and that it was going to somehow have to be bigger even if I couldn't even conceive of what that was that if that's what I needed I think it's true for many I think I would venture it's true for him so you do people a disservice when you get in there and try to make their recovery go forward it's true that by leaving somebody or suggesting something sometimes that influences them sometimes leaving them especially when they have that Terror of Abandonment that he's got um leaving them can sort of yank their chain and they will move around like a puppet you know and do the thing that you're saying they have to do but they can't sustain it and that's what you're seeing he doesn't actually want what you want for him that's not where he is right now and I you know I can't really speak for who's capable of these things or why the miracle happens sometimes some people get lucky but most of us you know we really have to do the footwork to show up for the miracle and other people trying to make it happen only slows that down you say I belong to Al-Anon for over 16 years so I think you know that logic about alcoholism like meddling in people's alcoholism trying to make them get into recovery not letting them hit their natural bottom and have the Dignity of problems and then deciding for themselves what they want to do about those problems like that is the way that is the way you can assist somebody you can drive them but you cannot make them do something and the only situation where our culture permits us to make people do something is if they are like clearly a danger to themselves or others and beyond that people have a certain amount of choice and there's a reason for that it's important for people to choose that recovery is what they want right now all right so you've gone for 16 years work the steps and you have a sponsor who feels he isn't good for you okay so I'm just going to say it either you need stronger meetings or you need a stronger sponsor because the way you're talking I'm not hearing a consciousness of what is taught and Al-Anon is not specifically about codependence but it certainly helps you know there's a 12-step program specifically for that Al-Anon is incredibly powerful if you're with people who are completely in the solution and so if you are going to the trouble of working the steps and having a sponsor you know sponsors are not they're not your boss they can't control you or anything but obviously he's not good for you and I would say if you really feel that you're an Al-Anon and that you have the disease of al-anonism um then you're in a relapse right now that's what's going on so what does a person do about a relapse they double down on the process of recovery you go back and you read the literature you go back and you call the sponsor every day you go through the steps again or if you know depending on how you do the steps but you give it your all just like you're wishing he would isn't that interesting like everything you want him to do I think it's a cry for help from within yourself that you need to do that I think you're in a position to possibly get faster happier results because you want to get better but it's but the toxic belief you have is that if he would change you would be okay if you would change you will stop having relationships like this okay yes you might be alone for a while but better alone than in this kind of like soul-sucking relationship that's just maddening I like the feistiness you have that it's making you resentful I know what you mean about losing respect I've had that happen and I think when that happens the relationship is over and so I don't think you've done anything wrong by losing respect but I just ask you to honor that feeling like stay with yourself here this is not somebody that you have the respect for and respect is critical to a good relationship people must respect each other it's totally important all right this guy thinks your boundaries like don't yell are mean so you're even that you're trying to like tell me about how unfair it is it's like if somebody yells it or if they're yelling at you and you're just like don't yell and they can't stop you have to decide if you're willing to put up with that anymore boundaries are are that your willingness to act not what you say it's what you do so if you say don't yell and they continue to yell and won't stop it's just not a boundary it's a request and requests are legitimate but if you actually want to not be yelled at you would have to leave somebody who can't stop and I know it's hard I know with alanonism and codependency and everything everything feels like a puzzle and a you know you keep thinking well maybe if I say this he'll do that and then I can do this and you know I just from the outside I would just say wash your hands wash your hands to say I'm going to relapse right now I got to get out of this drug I gotta get out okay he doesn't have any friends he speaks of close friends but you've never met one in a year focuses on you all day long gets upset so I I think there's something more than cptsd going on here I do I don't know what you do about it and I'm like I said I'm going to leave that to the professionals but you don't know what to do about it either and so this fantasy that you kind of have the solution if he will just follow it Let It Go girl Let It Go you're also dealing with your mom who was just put into memory care for Alzheimer's and when he knows you're sitting there he's trying to demand attention okay I'm so sorry that's happening with your mom and I think sometimes when something very scary and stressful and demanding is happening it the idea of leaving a relationship feels hard but that's actually a very easy time to do it because you're needed right now you're needed to help this transition of your mom she is luckily in care and then you can step out of that and you can get on with your life your healing your recovery and your relationships and your ability to have joy so you say something here that is the same as what I hear again and again from many people who are in abusive relationships and it's that when it's good it's amazing but when it's bad well you know it's awful there's some version of that that almost everybody in an abusive relationship says because you know there's a reason why we got together with these people who turn out to have this very bad side all right so yes don't be fooled because it's good sometimes the proof is is in the pudding of how do you feel you feel miserable you feel drained exhausted disrespectful uh you know just completely harried by this guy and afraid he'll harm himself if you leave so that's called being a hostage I do think what he's doing is abusive it's emotional abuse to make threats to harm oneself if somebody leaves I think sometimes people do that they don't have their full faculties they're not mentally well enough to take responsibility for what they're doing but it is abuse so I hope that helps you realize that you are being abused and you need to go even if he can't help how he's behaving one thing that you can do because there is a concern that he would harm himself and sometimes that is legitimate is you can call a crisis line and ask them to guide you on the best way to do this they will have experience they will have professionals you can alert them to who he is and what's going on you can leave him with the phone number if you want you can do the best a person who is not him can do and go save yourself foreign [Music]

Channel: Crappy Childhood Fairy

Views: 130,776

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Id: a3FdYKDkguY

Length: 132min 11sec (7931 seconds)

Published: Sun Jan 22 2023