Learning to Self-Soothe in the Face of Conflicts in Your Relationship

We blame our partners when we feel discomfort, and this tends to create distance within an emotionally committed relationship. The distance, then, creates a feeling of further discomfort. The clue to dealing with this dilemma is to learn how to soothe your own emotional pain. This can open the way to more passion and closeness in your relationship. Schnarch offers several suggestions for helping people learn the art of self-soothing.

Read more...

Marriage, Couples & Relationship Counseling

The most exciting way to live is in true connection with your partner.

 If you're in need of relationship, marriage or couples counseling, we can help.  Please visit our site at www.DrQuintal.com or call us at 941-907-0525 for a free phone consultation.

Healthy and Unhealthy Boundaries in Relationships – Some Examples

Are you able to establish healthy boundaries in relationships?  Here are some examples of healthy and unhealthy boundaries in relationships:

Healthy

• Feeling like your own person
• Feeling responsible for your own happiness
• Togetherness and separateness are balanced
• Friendships exist outside of the relationship
• Focuses on the best qualities of both people
• Achieving intimacy without chemicals
• Open, honest and assertive communication
• Commitment to the partner
• Respecting the differences in the partner
• Accepting changes in the relationship
• Asking honestly for what is wanted
• Accepting endings

Unhealthy

• Feeling incomplete without your partner
• Relying on your partner for your happiness
• Too much or too little togetherness
• Inability to establish and maintain friendships with others
• Focuses on the worst qualities of the partners
• Using alcohol/drugs to reduce inhibitions and achieve a false sense of intimacy
• Game-playing, unwillingness to listen, manipulation
• Jealousy, relationship addiction or lack of commitment
• Blaming the partner for his or her own unique qualities
• Feeling that the relationship should always be the same
• Feeling unable to express what is wanted
• Unable to let go

A most exciting way to live is in true connection with your partner, family, friends and business associates.

Are you in a rut, feeling stuck?  Perhaps experiencing ongoing conflicts?  Wish you felt closer and more connected?  Have you been hurt, finding it hard to trust again?  These are just a few of the feelings that may be present in a relationship.  Most create undue tension, sadness, worry, fear, stress and more.

Dr. Quintal & Associates look at a variety of therapeutic approaches and tailor those best suited to you and your partner’s needs.

Learn to communicate more effectively and remove the blocks that keep you from connecting.  Get the tools you need and build the relationship you’ve always wanted.  Resolve conflicts and create a close loving relationship that can last a lifetime.

Dr. Quintal & Associates highly trained and skilled therapists are ready to help.  Make an appointment or schedule a free phone consultation today:  (941) 907-0525

Relationship Boundaries - Building Fences and Opening Gates

Unhealthy boundaries often emerge from dysfunctional family backgrounds. The needs of parents
or other adults in a family are sometimes so overwhelming that the task of raising children is demoted to a secondary role, and dysfunction is the likely result. Consider the role of the father who screams at his children or becomes physically abusive with them as a way of dealing in a self-centered way with his own anger. His needs come first, and the needs of the children for safety, security, respect, and comfort come second. What the children are likely to learn in this situation is that boundaries don’t matter. As they grow up, they lack the support they need to form a healthy sense of their own identities. In fact, they may learn that if they want to get their way with others, they need to intrude on the boundaries of other people – just as their father did. They would likely grow up with fluid boundaries, which may lead to dysfunctional relationships later on in life. They would have a hazy sense of their own personal boundaries. Conversely, they may learn that rigid and inflexible boundaries might be the way to handle their relationships with other people. They
wall themselves off in their relationships as a way of protecting themselves, and, as a consequence, may find it difficult to form close interpersonal bonds with others in adulthood.

Here are a couple ways in which unhealthy boundaries may show themselves in our relationships, along with some remedies:

Lack of a Sense of Identity

When we lack a sense of our own identity and the boundaries that protect us, we tend to draw our identities from our partner. We can’t imagine who we would be without our relationship. We become willing to do anything it takes to make the relationship work, even if it means giving up our emotional security, friends, integrity, sense of self-respect, independence, or job. We may endure physical, emotional or sexual abuse just to save the relationship.

The more rational alternative is to find out who we are and what makes us unique, and to rejoice in this discovery. Realize that your value and worth as a person are not necessarily dependent on having a significant other in your life, that you can function well as an independent person in your own right. When you move into accepting yourself, your relationships will actually have a chance to grow and flourish. This journey
of self-discovery can be challenging – but highly rewarding. Working with a trained therapist can provide the structure and support we needed to take on this task.

The Difference Between Love and Rescue

People who grow up in a dysfunctional family may fail to learn the difference between love and sympathy. Children growing up in these conditions may learn to have sympathy for the emotional crippling in their parents’ lives and feel that the only time they get attention is when they show compassion for the parent. They feel that when they forgive, they are showing love. Actually, they are rescuing the parent and enabling abusive behavior to continue. They learn to give up their own protective boundaries in order to take care of the dysfunctioning parent. In adulthood, they carry these learned behaviors into their relationships. If they can rescue their partner, they feel that they are showing love. They get a warm, caring, sharing feeling from helping their partner – a feeling they call love. But this may actually encourage their partner to become needy and helpless. An imbalance can then occur in the relationship in which one partner becomes the rescuer and the other plays the role of the helpless victim. In this case, healthy boundaries which allow both partners to live complete lives are absent. Mature love requires the presence of healthy and flexible boundaries.

Sympathy and compassion are worthy qualities, but they are not to be confused with love, especially when boundaries have become distorted. Healthy boundaries lead to respect for the other and equality in a relationship, an appreciation for the aliveness and strength of the other person, and a mutual flow of feelings between the two partners – all features of mature love. When one partner is in control and the other is needy and helpless, there is no room for the normal give-and-take of a healthy relationship.

For help in establishing healthy boundaries within your relationships contact Dr. Quintal and Associates at 941-907-0525. We will provide a free phone consultation.

The Ability To Trust

It is difficult to achieve intimacy in a relationship unless we have the ability to trust. We tend to focus on other people when we think about trust – that is, we might ask, who out there can be trusted and who cannot? But it may be more helpful to look inside and to think about trust also as something that we do well, or not. Some people grow up with a good ability to trust appropriately, and others, because of their needs and life experiences, have more difficulty with this issue.

Having a good eye for trust involves having a healthy sense of our own identities – and this means having a positive self-image, the ability to value ourselves and our decisions, and a good sense for protecting our own boundaries. We need to know what we stand for and what is best for us. Trust also involves acquiring a knack for making good judgments. When we have the self-confidence that comes with knowing and liking ourselves, as well as the ability to make life-enhancing decisions, we should be able to decide fairly easily about whom to trust.

Trust between two people emerges from a process of mutual self-disclosure – we gradually reveal more and more about ourselves to the other person until the relationship achieves a sense of intimacy. The first person self-discloses only to the degree that the other person has, in a series of steps.  A good balance is maintained between both people. If this balance is disrupted, it is difficult to maintain trust. For example, if one person reveals everything all at once and the other person reveals nothing at all, the balance is broken – and neither party will be able to trust the other. The building of trust is a mutual process that takes time. We feel comfortable revealing things about ourselves when the other person has shown that he or she is willing to take the same risk.

Some people trust blindly. They reveal everything all at once, expecting that the other person will be able to reciprocate immediately. What is more likely is that the other person will feel overwhelmed and may back off from closeness. People who trust blindly may want to look into issues like boundaries, self image, and why they need to be so close so quickly.

Other people find it difficult to trust at all. They may feel protected, but the walls are so high that they may never find an intimate relationship – and what a price to pay for protection! People who have difficulty with  opening themselves to trust may want to look into the pain that may have closed them off– and they may want to look into ways of improving their communication skills. The rewards of intimacy are well worth it.

A most exciting way to live is in true connection with your partner, family, friends and business associates. Dr. Quintal and Associates can help you find the path to living a fulfilled life and allowing trust to be a integral part of your relationships. Please contact us if you would like a free phone consultation at 941-907-0524. You can also follow us on Twitter and Facebook and Google+.

The Benefits of Intimacy

Once two people have entered into a deep level of sharing, they usually want to stay there. If there is true equality between the two, they achieve a balance that feels right and they don’t want to lose. If, however, one of the partners feels the need to lessen the level of intimacy, the probability of conflict increases. You can avoid misunderstandings by maintaining your commitment and trust during these natural cycles that occur within any relationship. Intimacy takes work and a sense of maturity. To shirk the responsibility of keeping an intimate relationship alive invites a return to isolation.

 The intimate relationship is healthy. Intimacy allows us to end loneliness and to share the deepest and most personal parts of ourselves with a trusted partner. As social beings, we respond physically to the experience of intimacy. People who have intimate relationships live longer and healthier lives and they report more personal happiness and satisfaction with the way they live. Intimacy gives us a feeling of comfort, security, and a sense of being loved and accepted. It gives us the freedom and support to stay true to the special qualities that define each one of us as a unique person.

A number of research studies have shown persuasively that people in intimate relationships live longer and happier lives than those who are not.

 

Study Results of the Healthy Benefits of Intimacy

• For example, we know that people in marriages or other committed relationships live longer than
people who are single.

• In one classic study researchers found that 95 percent of people who described their parents as uncaring had diseases by mid-life, while only 29 percent of those who described their parents as caring had mid-life diseases. Having supportive and close relationships with parents in our child- hoods leads to healthier relationships in general when we grow up, and it is these healthier adult relationships that are linked to a lower prevalence of heart disease and cancer in mid-life. In other words, one can compensate for a deprived childhood by learning later in life how to sustain supportive relationships.

• In another series of studies, researchers found that people who are socially isolated are two to five times more likely to die prematurely than those who have a sense of connection and community.

• A study at the University of Texas looked at patients who had undergone open-heart surgery. Those who had neither ongoing group participation nor were able to derive strength from their religion were more than seven times more likely to have died six months after their surgery.

• Women with metastatic breast cancer were assigned to support groups which met once a week for a year. The women in the support groups lived twice as long as those who were not in these groups.

• One study has even found that people with fewer relationships of any kind (e.g., friendship, a partner, family, work, social groups, religious affiliations) were four times as likely to develop a common cold as those who had more relationships.

• Interestingly, research showed that people with pets are healthier than people without them and
have to make fewer visits to doctors.

Psychotherapy can allow us to explore our own deepest and most intimate feelings in a safe and accepting setting with a professional trained to understand these inner processes. The psychotherapeutic relationship allows us to learn to stay true to our uniqueness and feel comfortable in sharing our authenticity with another person. We can explore who can be trusted, and who can’t, as well as the features of our lives that may have led us to hide ourselves from others. Psychotherapy has the potential to teach us how to break out of isolation and loneliness into a world of love and acceptance. It prepares us to explore an intimate relationship outside of the therapy setting.

At Dr.Quintal and Associates we provide a variety of counseling services including relationship counseling. Please call us at 941-907-0525 for a free phone consultation. You can also visit our website at dr.quintal.com for more information on services, and follow us on Twitter and Facebook.

Freedom From Verbal Abuse

A home should be a happy place, or at least a safe place. Dealing daily with the outside world, with its tensions, pressures, and surprises, can be difficult. The home is a place to come back to, a place to feel free, relaxed, and comfortable. The home should be the place where we feel loved and accepted just for being ourselves. This is, of course, an ideal description of what a home can be.

In truth, home is also the place where our personal conflicts are worked out, sometimes in destructive ways. Our internal conflicts may involve issues of anger, power, and control – all of which can lead to verbal abuse. The verbally abusive household is usually not a happy place, and, in extreme conditions, it might not be a safe place. It is important to recognize verbal abuse when it occurs – and then do something about it. Fortunately, there are effective ways of dealing with such situations and making the home a safe haven.

Verbal abuse leaves no physical scars, but the emotional wounds can be just as deep and recovery can be prolonged. On the surface, others may see both the verbal abuser and the victim of the abuse as a happy couple, the nicest of people. But behind the scenes there exists a subtle pattern of manipulation and intimidation, unreasonable demands, sarcasm, and angry outbursts. At the onset of these relationships, everything may seem wonderful. The person who later becomes verbally abusive may shower the eventual victim with gifts and compliments and make that person feel like the most important person in the world. Gradually, however, the relationship deteriorates.  The abuser’s anger and need for control are projected onto the victim. The victim is blamed for not being “good enough,” and the relationship gradually turns into an emotional roller coaster. When things seem to be going well, a fight emerges unexpectedly.

The victim may adjust to this situation over time, so that he or she is unaware of the extent of the abuse. Victims may come to see themselves as not “good enough.” They may feel that they are truly at fault, and if only they could change their behavior, the abuser’s anger would stop. The abuser usually fails to take responsibility for creating the problem and it is the partner who takes the blame. These relationships, then, are characterized by denial, poor interpersonal boundaries, control and power issues, trust issues, and unresolved anger.

Codependence and Verbal Abuse
The partners in a verbally abusive situation are usually involved in a codependent relationship, and neither partner may realize that verbal abuse exists. But they do know that something is wrong. Codependence exists when the partners in a relationship have grown up in dysfunctional families. In these families, the needs of the parents are usually put before those of the children, there is great instability, and interpersonal boundaries are poor. The children may be verbally battered so that they grow up with unresolved anger and a negative image of themselves. People who grow up in this sort of household may find themselves in a verbally abusive relationship in adulthood. The abuser is charming at first and the victim is eager to please. Neither party is clear about his or her own boundaries, so the abuser feels justified in imposing anger on the victim while the victim in turn tries to win love and approval – often by accepting blame and adjusting his or her reality to conform to what the abuser demands. The agenda for the victim is to be loved by taking care of the abuser. The agenda for the abuser is to control the victim into taking care of him or her. And both parties want to end the pain associated with negative self-esteem. The victim seeks to win approval, which provides some semblance of self-esteem. The abuser, who also suffers from damaged self-esteem, sees him or herself as the victim and uses power and control over others as a way to survive in what he or she sees as a threatening world.

Recognizing Verbal Abuse
Verbal abuse can almost always be seen as a control issue. Ironically, it is the abuser who sees him or herself as the victim. Thus, the abuser feels the need to control the partner in order to allay his or her own insecurities. The victim, hoping for closeness and approval, goes along with the control and may accept blame for causing the problems. In a sense, then, roles become confused – the abuser is the victim and the victim is the abuser. The situation becomes murky and perpetuates the conditions which breed abuse. To confront verbal abuse we need to become aware of the conditions which lead to abuse. Consider the following examples.

Blaming: The verbal abuser will accuse the partner of inciting trouble. “Dear, let’s talk about who will drive the kids to practice tomorrow.” “You’re always planning out my life! Can’t you just give me a break once in a while?” (Notice here how the abuser feels like the victim.)

Denial: The abuser claims that the reality of the partner is invalid. “Hon, remember when we were talking about taking a weekend just for ourselves?” “We never talked about that. You’re making it up.”

Discounting: Similar to denial, discounting trivializes the feelings of the partner. “Larry, I don’t like it when we fight like this.” “You’re just too sensitive, always making problems when you could just leave well enough alone.” (Notice that the abuser retains the control, especially if the partner then goes along with his suggestions.)

Blocking Discussion: The abuser refuses to respond to a communication, thereby blocking resolution of a problem. “Joyce, let’s go through the bills tonight and see how much we can put into savings this month.” “Who asked for your opinion? Get off my back, buster!”

Countering: The abuser sees the partner as the enemy and immediately counters anything the partner has to say without thinking it through. “Look at that lovely vase of zinnias.” “They’re dahlias, dummy.” (Notice here that Name Calling is also an especially destructive, and obvious, form of verbal abuse.)

Withholding: Refusing to communicate and share thoughts and feelings can also be seen as a category of verbal abuse, especially because it damages the chances of achieving intimacy and empathy. Withholding occurs when the abuser distances him or herself and reveals as little as possible to the partner. This is a way of keeping control and leaving the partner feeling frustrated and lonely. The partner may excuse this behavior by believing that the abuser is just a quiet person.
(This is also known as passive-aggressive behavior.)

Joking and Verbal Abuse: The abuser claims that he or she was only joking and then blames the partner for not being able to take a joke. “Did you really mean it when you said my mother couldn’t come here for the holidays?” “You just don’t have a sense of humor. Like, duh....”

Dominating: Commanding the partner to do something undermines the equality of a relationship and puts the abuser in the dominant position. “You get dinner on the table right now,” or “You are going to my office party and I want you dressed in ten minutes.”

Changing the Verbally Abusive Relationship
Because the partners in a verbally abusive relationship have usually adapted to their situations, as painful as this may be, it might require the intervention of a trained therapist to interpret the communication patterns objectively and empathically. In therapy the partners in the relationship may learn how dysfunctional families breed codependence, as well as how negative self-esteem and lack of adaptive interpersonal boundaries can lead to a verbally abusive relationship. New and healthier ways of communicating can be learned, along with the issues of control, the need for equality in a relationship, and how to trust and respect one’s partner. Learning assertiveness and refusing to participate in the cycle of abuse are crucial steps in coming to terms with the destructiveness of the verbally abusive relationship. Our homes can, and should, be happy, loving and safe. We owe it to ourselves, and to our partners, to confront the issues which prevent us from making trust and love essential ingredients in the recipes of our lives. The rewards of doing so are immeasurable.

The Cycle of Abuse
The typical abusive relationship falls into a three stage cycle, and the participants may not be aware of the cycle. One of the main ways of coming to terms with verbal abuse in a relationship is to increase your awareness of this cycle so that you can respond more appropriately.

1. The Buildup of Tension.
   The verbal abuser during this stage becomes increasingly critical, detached, preoccupied and contemptuous. The abuser becomes jealous and controlling. They may try to make the victim account for his or her actions and criticize how the victim dresses, talks, or cleans house. The abuser usually places limits on the actions of the victim in an attempt to assuage his or her own insecurities. It is during this stage also that the victim tries to accommodate the abuser by going overboard to please him or her in an attempt to keep the peace. The tension increases until the next stage of the cycle, the abuse stage, erupts.
2. The Abuse Stage.
   A major fight erupts and it is usually over a trivial incident, an incident so minor that the participants may not recall later what the fight was all about. There may be a great deal of yelling and threats, and sometimes the abuse can turn physical. One characteristic of growing up in a dysfunctional household is that people never learn to process their anger adaptively as a problem-solving tool, and in the verbally abusive household this anger may erupt as uncontrolled rage. Words which are very damaging, but which usually have no basis in reality, are hurled at the victim. The victim is left confused, hurt, and in need of retreat from the painful interaction.
3. The Regret Stage.
   Once things calm down, the victim feels distanced from the abuser and the abuser feels remorseful. The abuser may promise never to lose control again and then makes an extraordinary effort to win back the approval of the victim. The more distant and self-protective the victim is from the abuser, the more the abuser becomes conciliatory. The abuser uses all of his or her charm to make things right again, and because he or she is in the controlling role, is usually successful. This honeymoon stage lasts until tension begins to build up again – and the cycle is repeated. Unfortunately, over time the cycle can repeat itself more rapidly and usually with greater intensity – with the abuser taking less and less, or no, responsibility for the pattern.

At Dr. Quintal & Associates, we specialize in relationship and marriage counseling.  If you think you are in a relationship that involves abuse or verbal abuse, please contact us for a free consultation.

http://www.drquintal.com

Assess Your Relationship

Understanding the sources of conflict in your relationship is one step toward resolving the differences between you. When we can get the problems out in the open and talk about them objectively, we can often find the solutions. Use the list below as a starting point for shedding some light on your relationship conflicts, which may now be hidden but which, with some thought, can become known and talked about constructively.

• Look for themes in your relationship conflicts, problems that keep reappearing time and time again. Focus on identifying the underlying theme in most of your arguments. Arguments usually focus on the surface aspects of the underlying conflict. Your goal here is to define the underlying conflict.
  
  
• Have these themes appeared in your other relationships with other people – both with friends and perhaps with other partners in the past?
  
  
• Can you identify your part in contributing to these themes? Every relationship takes two people and both contribute to the difficulties. What is your part? (This may be a hard question to answer since we tend to see the problems as lying within our partner rather than within ourselves.)
  
  
• What are the positive qualities in your partner that you may have forgotten about as time has gone by? Can you begin to define your partner in those terms again?
  
  
• What are the negative qualities in your partner that cause conflicts between you? Does your partner agree that these qualities are true? Has your partner changed over time, gradually starting to agree that the negative qualities may be true? Or, conversely, does your partner insist that these negative qualities are not true?
  
  
• Do you focus mostly on these negative qualities when you think about your partner?
  
  
• Is there anything from your past – from childhood on through adulthood – which reminds you of the conflicts between you and your partner? (This may be a clue regarding your unresolved conflicts which are the source of projections.)
  
  
• Does your partner project unresolved conflicts onto you? (These are probably easier to see than your projections onto your partner.)

Dr. Quintal & Associates
5460 Lena Road, Suite 103
Bradenton, FL 34211
941-907-0525
Visit our website for information about relationship and marriage counseling : www.drquintal.com

Relationship Conflicts : Where Did the Love Go??

Relationships are seldom as simple as we would like. They bring out our needs, anxieties, and conflicts with people from our past – parents, friends, and former partners.

When we enter into a relationship we expect to be loved just for being who we are. A relationship should provide a safe zone where our partner values us for expressing our own uniqueness. This is a simple expectation. Indeed, this is the way most relationships start out. Why, then, does it seem so hard to maintain this ideal, blissful state of unconditional love over time?

Our relationships with our partners are colored by our own personal legacies. We often react to our partners as if they were someone else – and this will likely cause conflict in the relationship.

How we perceive our partners is influenced by how we learned to deal with other people in the past. This process can go back into early childhood, even to infancy. Indeed, our earliest primary attachment to a caretaker – a mother, a father, perhaps another adult – can have an effect on how we deal with other people for the rest of our lives. For example, if our earliest experiences taught us to trust in the world, then we are likely to take a trusting attitude toward people throughout our lives. Conversely, if a child is never shown love during the earliest stages of life, it may be a challenge during adulthood to learn how to experience and express love. Early experiences from childhood can have a powerful effect later on. (This is a strong argument for treating children well.)

Children experience both good and bad in the world. Plenty of good experiences, like love and trust, feel comfortable and produce a positive self-image in children – a positive way of defining themselves. Bad experiences, though, create feelings of conflict and frustration. These negative experiences also go into the self-definition that the child eventually develops. But they don’t feel compatible with the more positive feelings, so, according to one theory, the child projects them onto somebody else. (Projection means finding in someone else the qualities that you don’t want to accept within yourself – like blaming your partner for being controlling when you are the one who has the tendency to want to control.)

Projections

It is not only early childhood experiences that cause us to project our unacceptable feelings onto someone else. Friends can have the same effect, as can partners from our previous relationships. This is a process that happens throughout our lives. How many times have we heard someone say, “Treat me for who I am – I am not your former partner”?

The major point to keep in mind is that we project our own problematic feelings onto another person. For example, if we have an issue with jealousy, we will project our own jealousy onto someone else – perceiving that person as the jealous one. This is because we can’t tolerate seeing ourselves as having a problem with jealousy – and it’s easier to attribute it to someone else. In other words, we feel unable to correct the problem in ourselves, so we focus on this issue in the other person. And this happens with a number of problems – anger, dependence, distrust, laziness, and the list goes on. The way out of this, of course, is to become aware of our projections and understand how they affect our relationships.

When couples experience conflict in their relationship, projections are often at the root of the problem. If we are living with our own conflicts and are unable to make any headway in understanding them, it’s as if we look for the problem in the other person. In fact, at a certain level, we may actually seek out partners who have the qualities that we find problematic within ourselves. If we have difficulty with our own controlling behavior, we may seek out partners who do just that to us – people who dominate us. Our partner may not see him or herself as domineering, but because we need to work out our own problems with the issue of dominance, we search for these qualities in the other person. We take any cue we can from our partner and magnify it. Then we’re able to project our own problem onto the other person, saying it is
their fault. By blaming the other person, we protect ourselves from having to come to terms with our own issues. We can safely continue our controlling pattern and blame the other person for having the problem. And the price we pay for this? Relationship conflict.

The healthier option, when projections are causing relationship conflicts, is to increase our awareness of our own internal conflicts and understand how we project these conflicts onto our partner. We can look for examples of our projections in other life situations until we see a pattern. When we have awareness of the problem, we can understand the many ways it influences our behavior – and this can give us some control over the problem. We can then try out new ways of dealing with people. For example, when a person experiences frustration
time and again from feeling dominated by others, learning some healthy assertiveness techniques can alleviate the problem.

It is important to understand...
...that projections are not at the root of every problem that couples experience. Sometimes one of the partners does indeed have a real behavioral problem.
In this case, it is not advisable to try to understand it as a projection, but to see it for what it truly is and to take appropriate measures to change the situation. Working with a professional therapist is a good strategy for addressing relationship conflicts.

The Other Partner Colludes

An interesting phenomenon happens when a partner is the recipient of a projection – the one being projected upon. Because this person is trying to smooth out the conflicts, he or she may identify with the projection. So, the couple now begins to define their problem in this way. The person receiving the projection starts to say, “Yes, I have a problem with being too dominant, and I need to work on it.” In fact, this person may start to behave in a way that confirms the projection. It may never have occurred to this person that dominance was a personal issue in the past, but because it is brought up frequently through the first partner’s projections, the second person may create a self-definition that conforms to the projection. The recipient of the projection can either take in the projection – believing that it is true and behaving accordingly – or, in the more mature case, can modify it, insisting that the projection is not a true representation. In this case, the recipient can actually help the partner come to terms with his or her own issues and restore some health to the relationship.

The person doing the projecting may define the whole of the other partner as having the problem, and the recipient of the projection may do the same – to define the problem not just as a part of the self, but the whole self. When this happens, the couple may forget about the positive parts of each of the partners and concentrate instead on only the problematic areas. The mistake here is this – when we work on our relationship conflicts, we need to draw on the positive parts of the relationship rather than focusing entirely on the problems.

When a couple first gets together, they focus on their similarities – those parts of themselves that are compatible. This is when the intimacy and trust of the relationship are formed. It isn’t until the relationship has matured that the negative projections begin to take shape. This helps to explain why some couples who were so perfect for each other in the beginning start to have conflicts as time goes by. When the negative projections begin, the partner doing the projecting tends to withdraw from the intimacy of the relationship and to focus more on seeking some independence. And the second partner may then withdraw as well. This is when the couple may start to experience serious relationship difficulties.

It Takes Two

The process of projection in a relationship is not always one-sided. Things can get complicated when both partners are mutually engaged in this process – and this is a common occurrence. It becomes difficult for the partners to see where the problem lies. Take a look at the following example.

An Example – Chris and Pat

Chris grew up in a household where the parents were emotionally withholding. Affection was seldom expressed toward Chris and the other siblings, although material needs were always provided. Chris always searched for nurturance, love and support, the things that were never provided in the household – and harbored some anger that the kids were never given these things. Of course, this anger was never expressed, for fear that it would lead toward even more emotional deprivation.

Pat, on the other hand, had two very controlling parents. It was hard to experience independence during childhood, adolescence and early adulthood, and this led to hidden resentment that could never be expressed.

When Pat and Chris first got together, they both felt liberated, as if all of their dreams and hopes for a relationship could be met in the other person. Chris saw in Pat a person who appreciated freedom and was genuine, affectionate, and willing to give love and emotional support. Similarly, Pat saw in Chris someone who valued love, trust, and respect for personal integrity. Their first year or two together were the happy times.

Over time, however, Chris’s resentment, harbored since childhood and never resolved, became attached to Pat. Rather than seeing all the positive qualities in Pat that formed the basis of the initial attraction, Chris focused negatively on Pat’s need for independence and not being at home enough. Pat is accused of always being out with friends and finding the job more important than the relationship.

Pat, on the other hand, sees Chris’s demands to be at home more often as control, the same thing that caused such resentment during Pat’s childhood. Rather than focus on Chris’s more positive qualities of love and trust, Pat accuses Chris of acting like a parent who would not allow independence.

The couple is at an impasse. Chris accuses Pat of emotional withdrawal. Pat blames Chris for being controlling. They aren’t able to see their way out of their dilemma until they start to work with a therapist who is able to clarify the patterns. And for this couple – with some exploration, courage, and insight, there is hope.

Dr. Quintal & Associates
5460 Lena Road, Suite 103
Bradenton, FL 34211
941-907-0525
Visit our website for information about Rapid Resolution Therapy, Sarasota counseling services and treatment for depression, anxiety and PTSD: www.drquintal.com

Relationship Addiction

The experience of finding the right partner and falling “in love” is one of life’s true joys. It brings a feeling of euphoria, passion, connection, and hope for a happy future. It can lead to a lifetime of loving contentment. Of course, sometimes it lapses and becomes one of our memories, sometimes pleasant and sometimes not. The “high” that comes from this feeling of loving passion, at least for some people, is so compelling that they use it to fill gaps in their lives, much as they might use a drug. Being in love, for them, can resemble an addiction.

The source of an addiction is found within the person, not in the substance itself. Some people can use a drug, including alcohol, and not become addicted. Similarly, some people can enjoy the high of being in love as a positive life experience without any indication of addiction. Other people, depending on their needs, their abilities, or their backgrounds, use the euphoric feelings that come from an outside source of gratification (drugs, relationships ... or gambling, videogames – the list is endless) to create a false sense of fulfillment in their lives. They have difficulty looking within to find a way to achieve contentment, so they look outside of themselves for a way to soothe their internal feelings. Everyone does this to a degree. But when it takes on a compulsive quality that inhibits more positive life experiences and leads to negative consequences, it can be called an addiction.

People who use relationships addictively usually harbor a sense of incompleteness in their lives – emptiness, despair, feeling lost, or sadness. They may lack a feeling of attachment to love that has roots in early childhood. They believe their feelings can be remedied through finding that comforting feeling of euphoria that comes through a love relationship. An addictive relationship has a compulsive quality about it. While a healthy love relationship implies that both partners freely choose each other, in an addictive relationship there is a compulsive drive that limits this freedom (“I must stay in this relationship even if it’s bad for me.”) There is also an overwhelming feeling of panic over the thought of losing the relationship, even if there are arguments between the two partners and both know the relationship should end. If the relationship actually ends, there are pronounced withdrawal symptoms, much like drug, nicotine, or alcohol addicts experience when they go “cold turkey.” They may experience weeping, physical pain, sleep disturbance, depression, irritability, and the feeling that they have no place to turn to now. These feelings are so intense that they might drive the person into another addictive relationship immediately. After this period of turmoil ends, however, the addicted person senses a period of triumph or liberation and they don’t typically go through the long, slow experience of acceptance and healing that characterizes the ending of a healthier relationship.

The Relationship Addiction Process
Addictive relationships typically go through a process that usually starts with an innocent attraction to someone – and this quickly turns into an infatuation. The relationship addict, who is hungry for love, feels exhilarated and blinded by “love at first sight.” This turns into an excessive preoccupation with the loved one involving hours of fantasy about how the relationship might turn out. (Of course, this happens in normal love relationships also – but the degree to which this happens in an addicted relationship is enormous. This a case in which feelings control one’s life while rational thought is abandoned – and this is not a healthy style of living.) Love addicts then project all of their dreams for eternal happiness onto the loved one (most healthy people, of course, realize that they are ultimately responsible for their own happiness).

These fantasies trigger the dependency phase of the relationship. The love addict then develops the fear that the relationship could come to an end, and with it, the end of hope for a happy life. These fears lead to an obsessive quest to hold on to this relationship at any cost – even if it means control and manipulation.

This is when the relationship typically begins to deteriorate. The relationship addict puts so much energy into molding the relationship into what he or she needs that the other person begins to feel smothered, intimidated, and ungrateful. The loved one resents having to live to meet the needs of another person, especially when there is a feeling of control (people typically want to maximize their own life experience rather than using a great deal of their energy to make another person feel comfortable). The loved one may even express resentment in the form of lying, cheating, taking for granted, or abusing the love addict. This puts a severe strain on the relationship and it makes the relationship addict try even harder. A vicious cycle begins.

Love addicts keep on trying, however, attempting at all cost to keep alive the dream of experiencing happiness through the other person. The pain of going through this can be immense. They go into denial, acting as if everything is going well. They are not able to see where the true problem lies, which is in their own unmet needs and their addictive resolution. They idealize the relationship, even though it is barely viable and not meeting the needs of either partner. A relationship addict who is at this stage of a deteriorating relationship might consider a good, healthy intervention with a professional therapist. Failing to find help can have severe mental, emotional, and physical consequences. There comes a time to make a major life change and to learn how to deal with the pain in a different and more productive way.

Symptoms of Relationship Addiction

Premature Bonding
Relationship addicts have an overwhelming need to bond with someone. This goes beyond a healthy need to connect with others. Unfortunately, this need to form an instant attachment tends to overwhelm other people and pushes them away. And it leads to poor decisions about whom to let into one’s life.

Excessive Fantasies
Throughout the course of the relationship, the addict spends a great deal of time thinking about the other person and how perfect things will be. Even after the relationship has ended, the fantasies about getting together again may continue. Of course, a healthy love relationship also involves fantasies, but addictive fantasies have an obsessive quality about them. These fantasies tend to take over one’s day. The need to fantasize takes precedence over socializing with others, work, taking care of normal daily routines – and they tend to become dreams or expectations that must come true.

The Need for Excitement
Addicts in general crave getting “high.” Relationship addicts base their ideas about a relationship on romance, and this involves creating drama. They might pick fights just to experience a rush of excitement. An ordinary argument becomes a war. They see reality in terms of their own needs, so they easily read between the lines (“No matter what she says, I know she really loves me”). A love addict fails to understand that a normal relationship involves a series of highs and lows – in real life, lows do not mean that the love has ended. They see an ordinary relationship as boring because it lacks a sense of constant excitement.

Exaggerated Anxiety and Jealousy about the Relationship
Relationship addicts typically have fears left over from earlier experiences in their lives when they had been neglected, rejected, or abandoned. Their greatest fear in adulthood is feeling lonely because this reminds them of their earlier negative experiences – and they never want to endure that again. They need to feel attached and find it difficult to live independently. So, in their relationships they tend to look constantly for signs that things are not going well. They become possessive of their partner, experiencing anxiety when the partner is not present, and frequently accuse or nag the partner.

Ineffective Expression of Emotions
The relationship addict, because of difficult earlier life experiences, is confused and overwhelmed by emotions. For example, she might feel that anger leads to rejection or abandonment, so she doesn’t express anger and instead holds in all emotional expression – and when someone expresses anger to the relationship addict, she is unable to tolerate it. She might harbor painful feelings that seem unrelated to present circumstances. She may become stoic (relationship addicts have a great tolerance for suffering and endure substantial pain rather than face the prospect of a breakup of the relationship). Because she suppresses her normal, flexible emotional expression, she may revert to polarized expression of feelings (“all or nothing”) – for example, love or hate (but nothing in between), vigilance or complacency, fear or courage.

Loose Personal Boundaries
Because many relationship addicts have issues with self-esteem, they have weak personal boundaries. They lose their sense of individuality and become enmeshed with their partner. They don’t know where their needs and emotions begin and where their partner’s end. If their partner feels happy, they feel happy. If their partner feels sad, they feel sad. If they sense that their partner wants them to be a certain way, that is what they become. They have difficulty saying “no.” Unfortunately, this sets the stage for being treated with disrespect. Addictive relationships show a lack of equality between the two partners.

The healthy love relationship can be viewed in terms of two independent people who come together and make a commitment to each other. They each have the freedom to live as they choose within the boundaries of the commitment, and they are loved by their partner for showing integrity in how they live. Their partner encourages them to follow the beat of their own drum. The commitment enhances each partner’s ability to experience a full life – with love, security, and support.

Dr. Quintal & Associates
5460 Lena Road, Suite 103
Bradenton, FL 34211
941-907-0525
Visit our website for information about Rapid Resolution Therapy, Sarasota counseling services and treatment for depression, anxiety and PTSD: www.drquintal.com