I read a lot about love, because I didn’t have warm, loving parents. I always get tripped up by my own confusion as to what intimacy and interdependence entails and I move between wanting intimacy and needing freedom.  I’ve been looking for guidance to help me out with that.

My mother was divorced my father by the time I was 2 and remarried by the time I was 5.  Both of her husbands were alcoholics.  My mother was narcissistic and very demanding and demeaning to those closest to her.  This made for some really tough early lessons. 

Despite my upbringing, I am a very loving, very caring person, but I carry scars from that early imprinting and that has interfered with the flow of that love. 

My husband, while very generous with his love and affection and kindness, and helped me trust and depend on him, also had a binge drinking problem as well. 

It is kind of true that adult children of alcoholics tend to become co-dependent with their spouses.  I was, a little, though I did a few things to try and separate from his issues.   I did what I could to protect myself from getting hurt.  Over the years…this grew into a gulf, at least emotionally.  We managed to maintain physical intimacy, but as far as emotional intimacy goes, I hardly knew my husband.  Many times, he shut down his communication, no matter how much I tried to get him to talk to me about what was going on in his mind and heart.

I have had a great deal of difficulty reconciling the different aspects of him. My husband was really loving when he was sober (which was most of the time) AND really hurtful when he was drunk (which was about 3-4 times a year in these binge drinking episodes).  It was like living with Dr.  Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.  Then again, I had my own version of Dr. Jekyll/Ms. Hyde too as I struggled to cope with my anger at the mistreatment.

I tried to turn to my mother and one of my close friends who had a bad drinking habit once upon a time.  Both sources were not very helpful.  They both found reasons to minimized the problem and they really had no idea how to help.

Eventually I came across Healing the Shame that Binds You that hit home for him.  And The Dark Side of Love has hit home for me.

One of the things I learned from the book that I didn’t realize about love is that it’s actually very mature to feel and express (in healthy ways) all the disappointments, hurts, anger, and jealousy that accompanies love.   Immature love only knows the positive feelings, so when the negative feelings arise, people think the love has died.  It hasn’t.  It just gets hidden.

Mature love accepts ALL the negative feelings too.  That book was one of the very first that taught me that  real love can’t exist without hate.  That to love a person in a wholly integrated way means you have to acknowledge and constructively address your feelings of hate for the person.  To be fully human means to have qualities we cherish and some really hurtful aspects.  Hating those hurtful aspects in another and conveying those human feelings of hate in a constructive manner is actually the first step in reducing the power of that hate.  Most people have been taught that feelings of hate are wrong and evil, so they end up stuffing them, but they have a way of interfering with love anyway.  Or making one ill either physically or mentally.

In order for a person to be fully capable of love, one must learn to manage our natural feelings of hate (not stuff them or disown them) and let them out in constructive ways.

Wow, what a liberating concept.  And it only took me 17 years of being in relationship to find this out.  My husband and I have had some really tough times over the years…and many times we were sorely lacking in faith that we could figure this out. 

We both needed lessons in expressing our negative feelings for each other in constructive ways and lessons in being able to actually HEAR those messages without defensiveness.  Both are very tough if you’d never been taught constructive communication skills to begin with.

It’s been some really, really phenomenal growth.  I know for sure I wish I could share what I’ve learned with my family.  But they aren’t receptive to hearing me just yet.  And that’s okay.  I’m a little sad, but I’m okay with it for the most part.

Have a great night,

Casey

When choosing a life partner, people make 2 common mistakes: they unwillingly sacrifice either attraction or fit. Attraction is about having feelings for your partner. It embodies physical chemistry, magnetism, enchantment. Fit is about realizing that …

I definitely agree that our ability to love (which means to loose our defences, to become vulnerable, to fully trust somebody) is formed during our childhood. In the same time, there is still a lot to learn in adulthood about love and relationships: is unfulfilled love can be really called love? How to reconcile our idealistic view of altruistic love with the more realistic picture of our and our partners’ needs?

But while we can’t change our past, we can change our future. So the question is, what it takes?

You are raising an important point – the question of how conscious can our choices be, when often there are unconscious forces in play, that are stronger then our own ability to understand ourselves. This is especially true in cases where, we didn’t have an example of a healthy relationship, when growing up.

I was fortunate enough to have loving parents, whose own relationship was (and is) filled with tenderness and care. So for me, it was always obvious that such relationship is the norm, and nothing something extraordinary.

That being said, self-understanding can improve our relationship choices, and it is attainable for most people, even without therapy. What might be more difficult to attain is the courage to act upon this understanding. So the question is, where do we muster the courage needed to leave a relationship that doesn’t work, or fix a relationship worth fixing?

http://www.systemsthinker.com/blog/2008/04/choosing-intimate-partners-repeat/

“View #1: The Repetition Compulsion in Intimate Relationships
as a Self-Destructive Mechanism to Avoid and Overcome by Choosing
Partners That Trigger Less Intense Chemistry”

In other words, be aware of red flags and RUN the other way, swiftly.  However, the problem with this is, wherever you go, there you are.  You still have unfinished business that needs to be resolved.

This concept is talked about this unfinished business in other places, one source is David Richo’s When the Past is Present.  We always subconsciously carry with us traces of the things we learned from our primary caretakers. 

The article I linked to talks about Imago Relationships, where we are compelled to find the partner who is most likely the biggest trigger for our unmet childhood needs and who often holds the key for resolving them.  The reason we choose mates much like our parents is because we have unfinished business to resolve.

“View #2: The Repetition Compulsion in Intimate Relationships
as a Purposeful and Required Catalyst for Full Healing Through
Mastering Resolution Skills with Partners That Initially Trigger Intense
Chemistry”

Provided you have an intimate partner willing to work through some issues, you can use the relationship to catalyze healing and growth.  However, high chemistry often involves those subconscious triggers to the original issues and there becomes a problem of what do you do if your partner isn’t interested in growing.

So, well, I say it’s not at all an easy choice.  And whatever conscious choices you make, there will always be some sort subconscious longings at play that might override rational decision-making.

I really think what is needed is a requirement for all couples headed for marriage (or any long term commitment) go through an intensive relationship building and communication skills course.  Long term commitment to someone requires flexibility, negotiation skills,empathetic listening and communication skills, and if they decide to have children, another course in attachment parenting.  For all the technological ways to communicate, we have grown less competent in making deep connections and transmitting this skill to our children.  I say this from experience.  I wish I knew BEFORE I had children.  It would have made my journey a lot easier.

Casey

Wishing you a great week, and  a joyful summer