This column appears weekly in the Style section of The Sunday Times, London. You can also view it on The Times online website
2008
November 9 - I'm afraid to leave the wife I don't love
November 2 - I can't move out and abandon my mother
October 26 - I feel like a loser when I see my ex
October 19 - Worrying for my alcoholic father has made me sick
October 12 - I've sorted myself out. Now I want my boyfriend back
October 5 - My boyfriend won't move in with me
September 28 - I need to tell her that I loved her
September 21 - I left my husband for an old flame
September 7 - I can't stand my mother
August 24 - I want to apologise to my boyfriend's ex for our affair
August 17 - My boyfriend and I are constantly breaking up
August 10 - My father's suicide still haunts me
August 3 - I am trapped in my marriage
July 27 - My wife's sexual past is destroying me
July 20 - I am 30 and in a relationship that fills me with pain
July 13 - Is this a mid life crisis or male depression?
July 06 - I haven't had sex with my husband for months
June 29 - He talks a lot about his ex
June 22 - I can't forgive my mother but the anger is eating away at me
June 15 - Should I stand up to my rude brother-in-law?
June 8 - My ex-husband is manipulating me
June 1 - I have a habit of kissing my friends' boyfriends
May 25 - My on-off boyfriend has finally decided it's over
May 18 - My father chose his lover over me
May 11 - My jealousy is ruining our friendship
May 04 - How do I forget my ex?
April 27 - I can't bear to live with my alcoholic mother
April 20 - Did I marry the wrong man?
April 13 - I can't stop falling for insecure men
April 06 - I fantasise about an old friend. What does this mean?
March 30 - I'm marrying my first boyfriend but I still want to explore
March 23 - How do I stop my volatile mother ruining my life?
March 16 - Being a virgin in my twenties makes me feel unmanly
March 9 - I cheated on my boyfriend - should I set him free?
February 24 - I don't love my husband, but I can't divorce him
February 17 - I'm addicted to porn - how do I stop?
February 10 - I divorced my husband because I couldn't deal with his alcoholism
February 03 - I can't love my five-year old daughter
January 13 - Is this depression or just teenage withdrawal?
January 06 - I'm addicted to emotionally unavailable m
2007
December 30 - Why can't my family treat me like an adult
December 23 - He's putting his kids before me
December 16 - I haven't had a relationship in 14 years
December 09 -
Our best friend is sleeping with her married boss
December 02 - My husband's anger is destroying our marriage
November 18 - How to be the life and soul of the party
November 11 - I think my wife had an affair before we go married
November 4 - I love him - but he's an alcoholic
October 28 - My fiancee is a control freak
October 21 - My boyfriend doesn't want us to have children
October 14 - I would rather stay alone than risk being hurt again
October 7 - I can't escape my needy ex-boyfriend
September 30 - My relationship is making me feel like a paranoid control freak
September 23 - Is being cool the best way to attract a guy?
September 09 - An affair that hurts
September 02 - Two men, one big mess
August 26 - Can I save my marriage?
August 19 - My wife is having sex with another man
August 12 - Can't get rid of the lump in my throat
August 5 - I can't get rid of this resentment
July 29 - My boyfriend won't marry me
July 22 - Teen love blues
July 8 - Desperately unhappy in my marriage
June 24 - Narcissist alert
June 17 - I can't bear to be away from my boyfriend
June 10 - I can't get over my boyfriend's ex
May 27 - She won't return my feelings
May 20 - How can I stop behaving so destructively?
May 13 - I'm a successful guy, but a doormat in relationships
May 6 - My boyfriend is in touch with his ex
April 29 - I'm in love with two men
April 22 - I'm worried about my mother who is bulimic
April 15 - My stepdaughter is choosing her wastrel father over me
April 08 - I despair of my controlling mother
April 01 - I left my wife and kids for another woman. Now I want to go back
March 25 - He broke it off but now he keeps texting me
March 11 - I left my boyfriend but went back. Now he treats me like dirt
March 4 - Why do I have difficulties finding the right person?
February 25 - My elderly parents recently announced they have disinherited me
February 18 - How do I find the courage to tell my ex-boyfriend how I feel about him?
February 11 - My boyfriend asked me to move out of our flat
February 4 - Why can't I stop being horrible to men who like me?
2006
December 24 - Does he want to marry me, and does he want kids?
December 17 - I'm 33, single, and I pine for a man I can't have.
December 10 - I'm 20 and he's 41. Is he too old for me?
December 3 - My partner left his wife and kids for me. Now he wants to go back.
November 12 - Should I marry my lovely but unexciting boyfriend or wait for true love to come along?
November 05 - My sixteen year old daughter has left home and blames me
October 29 - How do you leave somebody when you don't want to?
October 22 - My wife doesn't want sex
October 15 - I don't know how to be happy
October 8 - My mother is critical and overbearing
October 1 - I'm still in love with my ex-girlfriend
September 24 - Letting go of the ex
September 10 - I'm in love. Trouble is, I'm already married
September 3 - I don't like my sister in law
August 27 - I saw our son wearing women's underwear. Should I confront him?
August 20 - In love with emotional damage
August 13 - My boyfriend treats me like a flatmate
August 6 - I don't want children and don't know how to tell my husband
July 30 - I feel as if I've lost myself
July 23 - My grown-up children won't accept my new wife
July 16 - I love my boyfriend but I want to explore
July 9 - I can't forgive my mother for Staying with her abusive lover
July 2 - How can I become more confident and likeable?
June 25 - May I offer you a male perspective on separation?
June 18 - I want to stop my son getting a divorce
June 11 - What should we do about our sex pest neighbour?
June 4 - My boyfriend refuses to sell out for his art but makes me pay for everything
May 28 - I'm addicted to my ex
May 21 - How do I leave my husband?
May 7 - Do I have visitation rights to my step children?
I'm afraid to leave the wife I don't love
November 9 2008
I’m 33, have been married to my wife for two years — we’ve been together for 10 — but I feel I don’t love her any more. I told her I wanted to leave but couldn’t, partly for fear of being alone and also because it seems unspeakably cruel. She still loves me very much and wants children. If I go, I’ll be denying her that opportunity. It’s possible, but unlikely, that she’ll meet somebody while still young enough to start again. All our fights are symptoms of the same problem — she doesn’t feel loved because I don’t love her. I’m worried I’m naive and unrealistic about what love actually is. I realise the first heady rush fades, but we never had it in the first place. I married because I didn’t want to break up. Now I realise my reluctance about children isn’t about not wanting them but about not wanting them with her. She was horrified when she dragged it out of me. She’ll do anything to save the relationship. I’m reluctant because if we try, and fail, we could both miss out on children. I’m torn between upsetting her horribly or staying and having children, then realising my gut instinct was right all along.
Let’s get one thing straight. At 34, your wife has plenty of time to meet somebody and have children. Better still, she has time to meet somebody who loves her and who would love to have children with her. She has, in truth, time to find real happiness rather than what sounds like a desperate and unhappy compromise.
I’m sure she can’t see that at the moment. We all shrink from the pain that change may bring. It’s human nature. Better the devil we know, and all that. Then again, as far as she is concerned, it seems it’s so far, so good. You haven’t left. You’re still wavering on the children question. In other words, she’s convinced she can change your mind — just as, I suspect, she was able to change your mind about getting married in the first place. How did you put it in your longer letter? “It was a make-or-break situation and I didn’t really want to break up. I didn’t have huge enthusiasm for getting married, either.”
Inertia isn’t a great way to happiness for most people, so either your wife thinks your present outburst is just another of your little episodes, and it will pass, or she’s so desperate to keep you that she’s prepared to put up with any humiliation, including being told that she is unloved and you don’t want her children.
At the same time as seeming to be astonishingly passive, you’re starting to wake up and ask those age-old, but important, questions: “Who am I and what do I want?” It’s as if you’re leading two parallel lives; one as yourself and the other as a disembodied being who goes along with everybody else’s plans. On top of that, perhaps guilt about participating in a fairly high degree of emotional fraud (staying in a relationship because you don’t want to be alone; marriage as a strategy for maintaining the status quo rather than a deep emotional commitment) is driving you to make a difficult situation far worse. You are in danger of turning an everyday sadness into a catastrophe. Marriages break up. Bad things happen. Pain is part of the human condition. What matters is that we handle it with honesty and grace. It’s not simply telling the truth by our intentions that matters. It’s telling the truth by our actions.
You don’t love your wife. You don’t want her children. You’ve said you want to leave. So why are you still there? You say it would be unspeakably cruel to leave and, yes, it will hurt her a great deal — at least in the short term. But how unspeakably cruel is it to refuse another human being what they so obviously need (love, children) yet deny them the freedom and independence to go out and find those things?
You can try to take responsibility for another person’s happiness but, as you’ve discovered, it simply doesn’t work. All it does is provoke unintentional cruelty. You put it best when you said all your fights are symptoms of the same problem. Your wife doesn’t feel loved because you don’t love her.
Do you think she deserves to be loved? Obviously you do, or you wouldn’t be rending your emotional garments quite so savagely. Are you the person who can, and will (with total willingness), do that for her? Is your fear of being alone compromising another person’s happiness? Is your inertia just a lack of courage? I’m phrasing all these issues as questions because they’re the hard truths you need to confront.
If there is a shred of willingness in you to make the relationship succeed, it would be worth seeking out some counselling. That would allow you to explore some of your questions in a more objective way, as well as giving your wife a chance to voice her own issues and needs. Sometimes, we get locked into a particular course of action because we can see no other way. Counselling would not only give you some breathing space but, if it really is the end of the road, show you ways to make a less dramatic and painful exit.
relate.org.uk, 0300 100 1234
I can't move out and abandon my mother
November 2 2008
I am 17. I love my mother dearly, not just as my mum but as my best friend. However, lack of self-esteem and confidence dominates her life. She gets tearful about work because of the “bitchiness”. Her caring, eager-to-please nature means she is downtrodden and never gets the respect she needs and deserves. She doesn’t stand up for herself, blames herself for other people’s actions and constantly apologises. What frightens me is how similar we are. She says I’m the only person who understands her. I’m touched by this, but frightened, too, because I am going to university soon and feel I’ll have failed her if I leave. She took it badly when my older sister left, but I was here to help her through it. We share many problems, but if I haven’t resolved them myself, how can I help her? She is strong, having faced a traumatic childhood, an unhappy marriage and anorexia, but, at the same time, she is so fragile. I hope you can give me a fresh perspective on how to break this destructive behaviour pattern. I love her so much and it kills me that I’m not making a difference.
In your longer letter, you say that your mother wanted to write to me herself, but was frightened that “by some unknown law it will turn out everything is her fault alone”. You also say that she has no self-esteem or confidence. Isn’t it odd, then, that she thinks everything is about her?
That’s what happens when you have no self-worth. You become the most important person in your own life. You are so conscious of your own self (self-conscious) that the only person’s feelings that truly matter are your own. If you are also a mother, that self-pity can do your children real damage. Is your mum determined to help you set up an independent life and have a wonderful time at university? No. What she is truly concerned about is herself. “How will I cope? Poor me.” That may not be what she actually says, but it is the message you’ve picked up.
I know I sound cruel, and I am truly sorry, but I am trying to get your attention with some harsh reality. If her behaviour does not change, she will trap you into a life as narrow and fearful as her own. I know you love her very much, but you are not responsible for her life. I cannot stress that enough. She loves you dearly too, and in the name of that love, her duty is to set you free.
The two of you are trapped in a highly enmeshed relationship. This is also known as co-dependency. When we are co-dependent, we base our self-esteem on the way others see us. We don’t simply want them to like us; we demand unconditional approval. We might call it love (“I do everything for others”) but, in truth, it is ruthlessly manipulative.
That is why people respond so badly to your mother. Just as a vine clings to a tree to climb up to the sun, a co-dependent clings to another person’s strength to raise their self-esteem. She makes other people responsible for her feelings (“You made me feel sad/upset/ashamed”) rather than taking responsibility herself. Sadly, that sort of neediness makes people react with anger and contempt because they sense, at its heart, a profound dishonesty. What do I mean by dishonesty? I mean the inability to admit that it is not compassion for others that governs our actions, but desperate need. There is nothing loving about need. It takes. It does not give.
It’s a vicious circle. We try to get our self-esteem from others and, naturally, we fail. When we fail, we feel even less self-esteem. Usually, we learn this behaviour in childhood. If we are abused — or simply not loved — we learn that the best way to avoid abuse or to get attention is to placate the people around us. The co-dependent is like a whipped dog that fawns and cringes to get a scrap of affection.
It seems that may be the way your poor mum learnt to survive her traumatic childhood. Tragically, we teach our children what we ourselves have learnt. That’s why you feel so scarily similar to her. It’s also why you feel you will fail her if you leave home. She has made you responsible for her survival. If you leave, you fear she will collapse. You may even fear you will also collapse because you have never been taught it’s okay to be independent. By playing the victim, she enmeshes you (“Nobody understands me but you”) to keep you by her side.
Admitting you have a problem is the biggest step to healthy change, so well done, both of you. Read everything you can about co-dependency (the internet is a good source) and, if possible, attend Co-dependents Anonymous (Coda) meetings.
Codependent No More by Melody Beattie (£13.99 Hazelden); coda-uk.org
I feel like a loser when I see my ex
October 26 2008
For the past four years, on and off, I dated a guy who is a budding politician, so we seldom went out in public. He always had a steady girlfriend, but I hoped some day he would realise he wanted to be with me. It was more than “friends with benefits”. As well as great sex, we went on holiday, cooked together and did “couple” things. More than anything, we were friends, and he’s also a friend of the family. Last May, we went on holiday. I thought we had a lovely time, but he has rarely contacted me since. Out of pride, I didn’t contact him either. Now he’s engaged to be married. She’s very sweet and friendly, and we often meet at parties. I dread bumping into them. I don’t want to be with him, but I don’t want him to feel sorry for me either. How should I behave? Is it wrong to be friendly when she has no clue? Should I attend their wedding, as he’ll be obliged to invite me? I’m back with my old boyfriend, but he lives overseas. If he lived here, I wouldn’t feel like a loser every time I bump into the happy couple.
I am sorry to be cynical, but your on-off ex sounds as if he’s in the right job, getting an early start on devious, underhand behaviour. He had a steady girlfriend, but dated you on the sly. He was happy to get naked with you, but didn’t want to acknowledge you publicly. He enjoyed holidaying with you, but not so much that he bothered about your daily existence.
On top of all that, when he decided to get married (and why not — you asked for so little, he thought he was free to do exactly as he pleased), he didn’t even have the decency to tell you himself. This guy sounds like a complete prat — chinless, spineless and a moral coward to boot. The sadness is not that he has taken a hike into the sunset. The sadness is that you value yourself so little that you put up with him in the first place.
You can call it what you like — self-worth, self-love, self-confidence — but what it comes down to is that you think you deserve so very little that very little is what you get. That’s what happens when we undermine ourselves: other people follow our lead. You think you’re worth nothing? Okay, I’ll treat you according to the worth you place upon yourself. Horrible, but true.
I can’t say, either, that you’re entirely blameless. You knew he had a girlfriend. You accommodated him at every turn. I’m sure if I heard his side of the story, he would express shock and surprise, claiming he thought you were perfectly happy with the situation — that it suited you as well as it suited him. We all know that’s a convenient truth, otherwise he would have been relaxed and upfront about his forthcoming marriage. A shred of honesty and he would have admitted he knew exactly how you felt. And if you had a shred of self-love, you would have told him, but that might have meant the end to your arrangement, so you stayed quiet and kept up appearances.
You’re still keeping up appearances now. Your main impulses in handling the fallout seem to be to avoid any awkwardness and to not look like a loser. Fair enough. Nobody wants to look like a loser — we all have our pride. It’s just that yours seems sadly misplaced. It’s based on the way others see you, rather than on the way you see yourself. It’s as if pride is an afterthought, a sticking plaster to keep your image in place. It would be good if you could do some work around issues of self-worth, because when our inside doesn’t match our outside, eventually the cracks start to show. The insecurity and fear start leaking out, expressed as depression, anxiety, eating disorders or problems with alcohol or drugs. We can’t fake it for ever. The truth will always come out.
As to how you should behave now — do nothing. If you bump into them, be charming and noncommittal.
If you like her, why be anything else? It’s up to him to tell her what has been going on. It’s certainly not your problem. Of course he’s awkward when he sees you — guilt and shame make us clumsy and uncomfortable. No doubt he’s terrified you’re going to blow his cover, not to mention his budding career. Your silence will make him doubly uncomfortable, as he has no idea if or when you might choose to break it.
And if he takes your silence as indifference, well, as the saying goes, indifference is the sweetest revenge. It’s not the best way to live a life, but at least it may help you to move on. As for attending the wedding — why bother? The only reason, once again, would be to keep up appearances. Perhaps it’s time to stop worrying about what other people think and to start concentrating on what actually makes you happy. It must have really hurt to have been treated so shabbily. I’m sorry for that, but you could use it as a learning experience. If we behave as if we deserve nothing, we get nothing. In the future, expect more.
Worrying for my alcoholic father has made me sick
October 19 2008
I so desperately need help. I feel totally lost and unable to cope. My dad is an alcoholic and my mum, after years of unhappiness and trying to “fix things”, has left him. They have extreme financial difficulties. My dad seems unable to get himself together and, while I find it incredibly difficult to have contact with him, I worry constantly that he will kill himself through drink — or something else — and I’ll have to live with the thought that I didn’t do enough. My mum is terrified, but determined not to go back. I’ve struggled with eating disorders and depression. I want to travel as I’ve no idea what I want to do, but whenever I’m away I worry about my parents and crave the security of routine. My brothers have families and are able to distance themselves and enjoy life, but I feel unable to step back when the two people I love most are in such pain. My friends are moving on in their careers and relationships, while I continue to procrastinate and cry, and feel unable to talk to anyone who understands.
Let’s begin at the beginning. You cannot rescue people, however much you love them. You cannot solve their problems or live their lives for them. Sadly, understanding that intellectually doesn’t stop you wanting to go on trying.
Understanding it emotionally is a different matter. When we understand, emotionally (deep in our beings), that we cannot rescue other people, we begin to do what is called “detaching with love”. We continue to care, but stop attaching any expectations of our own happiness to their behaviour. We do not make judgments about what we think is right or wrong for them. We respect their individuality. We might offer help, but only when it is directly requested.
“Detaching with love” is a phrase pioneered by Al-Anon, which was originally set up to help those who are worried sick (literally) by the behaviour (alcoholism) of the people they love. It is a support group that outlines some straightforward principles, the most important being that we cannot change other people, we can only change ourselves.
Until your dad decides he wants or needs help, there is nothing you can do. Feeling responsible for his life (or death) will not help him and it most certainly will not help you. In fact, seeing you miserable may make him feel guilty and the more guilt he feels, the more he will drink in order to take away the bad feeling. That’s not to say you are in any way to blame, just that your inability to let go and allow the people you love to create their own lives (and live their own pain) is helping nobody.
Your mother has already discovered that she cannot change your father or his behaviour. All she can do is live her own life. And, no matter how terrified she feels, she is doing just that. Good for her. You should feel very proud of her. Your brothers have detached (rather than distanced) and are able to enjoy their own lives. I suspect that even the words “enjoy life” make you feel guilty. It’s part of a syndrome called co-dependency, which is often found among the children of alcoholics. Co-dependency is about getting our identity from “fixing” or trying to make other people feel better. It is about an overwhelming sense of responsibility for others and a lack of sympathy for ourselves. If the people we love are in pain, how can we dare to feel pleasure?
The most important person in this equation is you. By fixing on other people, you are ignoring your own pain. It refuses to be ignored, however, and is manifesting in an eating disorder and depression. I’m sure you know that an eating disorder can be regarded as an addiction. When we are disordered around food, we use it to change the way we feel, just as an alcoholic uses drink. As for not knowing what you want to do with your life, perhaps that’s because you’re so concerned about other people, you have no time to look at your own needs and wants.
So, what can you do? There is therapy, but there are also various self-help groups that may be just as helpful, if not more so, as they directly address the issues you are struggling with. You say you feel unable to talk to people who understand. The groups I am describing are filled with people who will understand immediately — sometimes so vividly it may feel almost scary. The first is Al-Anon, but there is also Adult Children of Alcoholics (ACA), and I would also suggest Overeaters Anonymous (OA), which addresses compulsive-eating patterns. It may sound odd to suggest different groups, but addiction is often mirrored in families. Many alcoholics, for example, attend Al-Anon to deal with a parent’s drinking and also attend AA in order to deal with their own addiction. You may also find people attending Al-Anon who attend OA, because addictions manifest themselves in many different ways. When you can learn to know and love yourself, you may (note the word, may) be able to help others. I really hope this helps you.
al-anonuk.org.uk; adultchildren.org; oagb.org.uk;
Adult Children of Alcoholics by Janet G Woititz (Health Communications)
I've sorted myself out. Now I want my boyfriend back
October 12 2008
I can’t get over my ex. We broke up five months ago, having been together for seven months. Two years before that, I was raped, and the memories of this returned when we first got together. I was also having trouble finding a job after graduating, so I felt very insecure. He reassured me, but was secretly uncomfortable, so he withdrew, making me feel even more insecure. Breaking up brought back the negative emotions from the rape, tangled up with bad feelings about the split. Finally, I sought counselling and am doing well. The rape no longer hangs over me, which is exhilarating. I’m in a new job and have new friends, so I should be happy. I am — but I’m still sad about him. I got in contact, and he explained that he had felt suffocated and more like my therapist. He said he sees no chance for us. I e-mailed to say I agreed, but I also see faults on his side (such as his not saying how difficult it was for him). I’ve tried to move on, but what I really want is to get him back.
First of all, I am so sorry about the rape and well done for seeking counselling. That takes great courage, and you should take heart from the way you have dealt so well with intensely difficult emotions. Now you’re faced with recovering from a love affair. I understand how much it hurts — broken hearts always do. But I wonder if you could try looking at things in a different way. It seems your ex-boyfriend (however inadvertently) was a stepping stone to emotional health, so maybe you should be grateful for what he could give you, rather than resentful for what he couldn’t.
In order to heal, you needed to engage with intimacy, but weren’t entirely ready for an equal relationship. You felt very insecure and needed constant reassurance. Sadly, your ex was unable to give you that, but it’s a tough call to mend another person. It’s hard enough to mend ourselves. When we’re in pain, we become intensely self-centred. That is not the same as being selfish, it simply means we become centred on self. We withdraw in order to recover, as an animal does when it goes off alone to lick its wounds. When we’re in that state, it’s hard to give anything. Instead, we take — be it comfort, reassurance or security. As a result, the relationship falls out of balance, with one person doing all the giving and the other all the taking. I imagine your ex-boyfriend ran out of things to give in the face of your constant insecurity. Your needs were so great that he felt suffocated, as people do when somebody else’s emotional demands are overwhelming.
You feel he should have told you how difficult it was for him. Honestly, would it have made any difference? In order to get well, you needed help from a counsellor or an expert, objective witness. We cannot expect the people we love to be our therapists. They have issues of their own without taking on the burden of ours. In order to have good, whole relationships, we need to be whole ourselves — or at least be working towards that end. We also need to be responsible for our own feelings, rather than expecting somebody else to fix us.
He gave you as much as he could and now he has moved on. And so must you. How? The first step is to make a conscious decision. You say that you don’t actually want to get over him, you just want him back. If that’s the message you’re giving yourself, you won’t get over him. If you convince yourself you can’t be happy without him, you won’t be happy.
Why not? Well, because we believe the stories we tell ourselves. Our minds are fabulously good at denying reality — either our own or somebody else’s. And the reality is that this is a man who cannot tolerate too many emotional demands. He has already shown you he can’t give you what you want, and no amount of scolding via e-mail is going to change that. In fact, it’s going to have (has had) the opposite effect, because you’re making yet another emotional demand. You’re asking him to do something he’s unable to do, which is to be honest with you about the way he feels.
Why do you think that’s going to change? I know you’re going to say he doesn’t need to change because you’ve changed — you were in a bad place when you were with him, but it’s different now. It may be so for you, but he has a different idea of you in his head and it is an idea that is going to be well-nigh impossible to change. And is it honestly true? We may be stronger at some times than at others, but it seems to me that our emotional centres stay pretty much the same.
You like to confront emotion. He likes to avoid it. How is that combination of emotional opposites going to make you happy? You have great courage. Use it to face the reality of your own emotional needs and move on to find somebody with whom you can have an equal and loving relationship.
My boyfriend won't move in with me
October 5 2008
I’ve been in a relationship for four years, but we don’t live together. My boyfriend, who has never been married, says he needs his independence, and I must not take it personally. The trouble is, I do — and he won’t even discuss it. I have been through an acrimonious divorce and have found it hard to adapt to life alone. He supports me by listening to my problems, but I can get incredibly insecure (usually after too much wine), saying I hate him and don’t want to be with him. The truth is that I love him so much. It happened again recently. I regretted it immediately, but he shut me out. I realise I’ve been pushing him into a corner, but I’ve been in the same position, with friends asking me why I don’t live with him. I listened to them too much and started questioning the relationship. I know he loves me and that we could have a wonderful relationship, even if we break convention and live apart. I’ve learnt now that I don’t want a husband or cohabiting partner; I just want my life back. I’m totally heartbroken, but he won’t respond to my e-mails or texts.
I am sorry. I can see from your long and distressed letter just how heartbroken you are, but perhaps you need to try to look at things from a different angle. The first question a therapist might ask is: why have you chosen a man who doesn’t want you?
I know that sounds harsh, but the point of therapy is to challenge our behaviour and what, deep down, we already know. If we are to be happy, we need to face both ourselves and the reality of the relationships we choose. We are all capable of denial, pushing aside even the most glaring wrongdoing and denying our own pain — until it bursts out of us in anger, frustration, depression, drinking too much or eating too little. In your case, you dismiss that pain as “incredible insecurity”, but what those outbursts of insecurity are trying to tell you is that this man does not give you what, emotionally, you need.
I know you say he loves you and that you have great chemistry and laugh a lot. Great. But the most important element is missing: he won’t share himself with you or allow true intimacy. There may be all sorts of reasons for that, and it’s pointless to blame or judge him (“he should commit”) because, as he has been telling you for four years, that’s the way he is.
Four years is a long time. Do you honestly think anything is going to change now? Not only does he refuse to live with you, but he refuses to discuss it — he won’t even share that much. When you try, out of frustration and too much alcohol, to goad him into changing his mind, he withdraws and shuts you out. This is called “stonewalling” and is cruel and highly defended behaviour. People use those walled defences to protect themselves from emotional pain (usually past), and it’s impossible to circumvent unless the person in question decides it’s something they want to address.
I’m sure you sense that, behind the defences and the coldness (he may often be warm and loving, but his actual behaviour is excessively cold), there is a highly emotional man — and that is what keeps you hooked. You believe that, one day, he will emerge into the light of your love. You believe it because it is what you so badly need and want.
You believe it so much that you’re now prepared to accept any crumb he drops from his table, even though you know, deep in your heart, how terribly unhappy it makes you. If it didn’t, you’d have spent the past four years happily accepting the rules that he has laid down. Instead, periodically, the pain of his behaviour drives you to anger and drink, which is when you tell him how you truly feel. And what happens then? He shuts you out.
I suspect you’re a highly emotional woman who needs a man who is going to love and support you. Instead, you’ve chosen somebody who will not (or, more likely, cannot) connect emotionally.
Which takes us back to the original question: why?
You don’t say what happened in your marriage, but I wonder if you can see a pattern to your relationships.
If you are constantly attracted to emotionally unavailable men, it is worth asking why that might be? We need to ask those questions of ourselves (What do I really want? What do I actually need?) if we are going to be happy in our future relationships. Otherwise we keep seeking out the same damaging and destructive patterns.
So do try to ask yourself those questions and then, with great honesty, ask if this man could ever fulfil those wants and needs. You may be able to persuade him to come back, but will those few crumbs he can offer make you happy? Or will you find yourself so starved of the affection and commitment you need that within a few months you’ll be acting out the same destructive patterns that are damaging and hurtful to you both? Not your fault, and not his either. You need different things. Sometimes it’s better to let go with love.
I need to tell her that I loved her
September 28 2008
Ten years ago, when I was at university, I fell in love with a girl. She was everything to me. I knew I wanted to spend the rest of my life with her. I was living in a house with five other blokes; she started seeing one of them. I was understandably gutted, but kept my feelings to myself. When their relationship fizzled out, I got the closest I ever came to saying how I felt, but again, I didn’t. She started seeing another former housemate. I hoped that would fizzle out, too, but they married and now have children. Out of all my old mates, he has always been there for me and I greatly value the relationship. I don’t have feelings for her any more, but I still feel there is unfinished business, so have decided to write them a letter explaining I am no threat to their marriage. I’m hoping this will give me closure. It is very important she knows how I used to feel. I would really value your advice — not on whether to send the letter, but about writing it. That said, if you think it’s an absolutely barmy idea, I don’t mind you saying that, either.
I think it’s an absolutely barmy idea. So barmy it’s hard to know if it’s based on foolish arrogance or emotional naivety. I’m going to assume the latter, in the hope that somebody telling you straight that what you’re suffering from is not unrequited love but baseless fantasy will free you to have a relationship with a real woman.
I honestly wouldn’t send the letter. I would bet a lot of money she knows perfectly well you have been mooning after her like a sick puppy for the past 10 years. She is just too kind to draw attention to it. Women have a weird sixth sense about men who like them. They are also fiercely pragmatic. They know the difference between projection and reality. If she had wanted to respond to your adoration, she would have done so, even without your say-so. Instead, she has been getting on with her life, as in had a couple of relationships, had her heart broken, had her heart moved, got married, had kids.
And what have you been doing? Indulging in a decade-long mind game with an imaginary “great love”, a love so great you didn't even have the courage to confront it. Why? Perhaps because the reality of a flesh-and-blood woman, with all her faults and fragilities, would have decked the dream with a swift left hook.
She’s not real, you see, except in your imagination. You didn’t love her. You never even came close. Love does not happen in splendid isolation. That’s the Disney version. Love is two people daring to share themselves. It is dark and glorious, painful and inspiring, heart-lifting and unpredictable. It’s really about courage and taking a chance on rejection, but on magnificence, too.
What it is not is a sterile fantasy of distant yearning. Writing a letter will simply embarrass her, not to mention your old mate, that bloke who has always been there for you and who you value so highly. So very highly that you are prepared to offend him by telling him something that he does not need to know — although I have a strong suspicion he already does. Why? So you can get “closure”. On what? On a relationship that never even happened.
I know how harsh I sound and I’m sorry for that, but I’m concerned that embarrassment might be the least of your problems. More likely, they’ll have a good laugh about it, in that annoying way that happily married people do, but they’ll never again be able to look you in the eye with any degree of sincerity. It’s one thing knowing something and quite another having it forced under your nose.
It seems to me you’re too emotionally fragile to risk humiliating yourself and sabotaging the good relationships you do already have.
A bit of self-awareness and truth-telling would help. Honestly, if you really don’t have any feelings for this woman, why are you thinking about her at all, let alone planning to letter-bomb her marriage? What is this really about? Is it an oblique (some might say sneaky) way of declaring yourself? Or is it a desire to be the centre of some sort of sabotaging attention? Or is it, actually, that you’re scared of having a real relationship, so you’ve projected all your energies into a fantasy?
Try a bit of self-analysis and examine your true motives. One might be to love and be loved. Trust that motive. Enjoy it, but use it well. Get out and about among people and, that way, you might hook up with a woman with whom you can have a real relationship and give some of that love you obviously feel so strongly and that you would like to share. Don’t, though, admire from afar. Take a risk. Have courage and make the connection. Engage your heart, and not just your head, with another human being and this woman will fade gracefully into the background. Try to see her and her husband as the friends they so obviously want to be. Allow them to get on with their marriage while you get on with your life.
I left my husband for an old flame
September 21 2008
I divorced my husband after meeting a man I had a relationship with 20 years previously. I tried so hard to make my marriage work, but grew fed up with my husband’s emotional bullying. This new man was in the early throes of a divorce, but meeting me again hastened it. When my husband found out about the affair, he told our teenage children in a brutally damaging way. It was agony, knowing I had caused them such pain and animosity. Two years later, my relationship with them is again loving and open, while I continue to have an intense physical and emotional relationship with the new man. He is now divorced, but suffering huge guilt about the pain he has caused his children, and he disappears for long periods. I know he is hurting, but I find his distancing hard to bear. All I want is to love him and make it right. I understand, because I also want to put my children first. He says he cannot be in a relationship at the moment, but continues to contact me. Is there any hope, or should I be brave enough to move on and try to forget him?
I think the first thing to consider is that while men suffer from the same emotions of pain and guilt, they often deal with them in a different way. One of those ways is to retreat. Women believe everything can be worked out by talking things through and by an outpouring of love and support. For many men, it is the opposite. They need time alone to absorb pain and process their feelings.
I understand how much it hurts when this man disappears into silence, and how sharply you feel that abandonment, but try not to see it as personal. Think of him as a wounded bear who has retreated into a cave to lick his wounds. Show your compassion by respecting his suffering and allow him to heal in his own way.
In other words, let him be. I know how hard that is when, as you say, all you want to do is love him and make it right.
That seems a natural and laudable impulse, but I wonder if you might be projecting your own needs onto him. You want him to love you and make it right, or in other words, you want his full attention, because that is what would heal you. I suspect that you are also, in a subtle way, resentful of being held to blame, perhaps feeling that he is pushing you away because you are the one who caused his children pain. Part of you is stung by the unfairness of that. Again, I think that may be projection. Just because he withdraws from you doesn’t mean he is blaming you. It may simply mean he is turning his full attention to his children in order to see them through the unhappiness he feels he has caused.
Women are multitaskers. They can hold more than one thought or emotion in their heads and deal with them simultaneously. Men tend to deal with one project at a time.
I suspect that once he feels his children are okay (job done), he will free up enough space in his head to turn his attention to you. As you say in your longer letter, after two years, your children are able to see both sides of the story and love and forgive. His children also need that time. Men panic at the sight of pain in their children (particularly if they feel guilty), whereas women are pragmatic and patient enough to allow them to process their feelings at their own pace.
Try to do the same for him. Allow him time and space, but in the meantime what is really important is that you attend to yourself. It strikes me that you have jumped from one relationship to another without drawing breath. Perhaps it might be good to enjoy some independence for a while and undergo a bit of self-examination. What is it that you need from a relationship? Why did your marriage fail?
I know you cite your husband’s emotional bullying, but it takes two to make or break a relationship. Why were you attracted to a bully in the first place? What are your expectations around intimacy? Is it your belief that you can only get happiness and self-respect from another person, or could it be that you need to look at providing some of that for yourself?
If you feel you are the one who is always doing the giving (and the waiting), perhaps it’s time you thought about what you should be asking for. That might be to say to this new man that his inconsistency is making you unhappy. One solution could be to take a year out while you sort out your own head and he sorts out his. This does not involve emotional threats, just a simple plan.
Right now, you’re stuck in all-or-nothing thinking, because every part of you is focused on his intentions and actions, rather than on your own. Should you wait in hope, or chuck it all in and move on? There is a middle way and that middle way is you.
I can't stand my mother
September 07 2008
I can’t stand my mother, yet she has a hold over me, even though I put as much distance between us as possible. She sees herself as a guru of free thought, but if she doesn’t get her own way, she makes problems or pretends she’s ill. She’s a terrific snob, and I was bullied at school because she would never let me fit in. I hardly know my father. For years, she told me men were useless, and I grew up believing it. I married because my mother said I should propose. We divorced and I fell in love with a wonderful girl, but my mother said we were wrong for each other because of our different backgrounds. Although I loved this girl very much, I was always wondering if my mother was right, and I broke her heart. I still don’t fully understand my actions. I like women, but find it hard to accept or give love. I have my idea of the “ideal” and can’t settle for less. I’m a complete mess. I take drugs to forget myself and I’m very depressed. I don’t know who I am. Please help.
The worry is not so much your mother, but how scarily resigned you are. If you can’t stand her, I wonder why you choose to allow her to inhabit you so completely. And it is a choice. Nobody holds more power over your life than you do. To some people that may seem obvious, but to you it isn’t. Even if you know it is true intellectually, emotionally your mother has all the power. The thing to remember is that you gave it to her. Nobody can take away our power unless we let them.
You have to take back your power (and by power, I mean your essential self). It can be done, but it is hard, slow work. You need constantly to challenge what, in cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), are called core beliefs. That means being less interested in what your mother did to you as a kid and more interested in the legacy — or your thinking in the here and now. As you begin to examine your thinking, you can start to own your own behaviour. As you do that, you will begin to see that you are responsible for your own actions, not your mother. She may be a snob and a bully, but she didn’t marry someone she didn’t love. You did. She didn’t break a wonderful girl’s heart. You did.
I know I sound like the bully now, but I’m simply trying to impress upon you that you can’t do anything about your depression and addiction until you face up to yourself. That’s where the power lies — not with your mother. Here’s a simple idea to try: wear an elastic band around your wrist and every time you have a negative thought, snap the band against your wrist. Immediately replace that voice with a positive response.
No doubt your immediate reaction is to think it’s impossible, because (as you say) you don’t know who you are. And if so, how do you know what you think? You only know what your mother thinks. I don’t believe that’s true. What I think may be true is that you’ve given up trying.
It is what Professor Martin Seligman of the University of Pennsylvania defined as learnt helplessness. Sufferers are markedly more likely also to suffer from depression and addiction. Learnt helplessness is essentially a response to frustration. We learn that, no matter how hard we try, our actions have no effect. We come to believe we are powerless or helpless, so we give up trying. There is a solution, also proposed by Seligman. It is to challenge or unlearn our responses, and put healthier ones in their place. He calls this learnt optimism.
In order to change behaviour, we need to change our thinking, but we can only do that if we face up to our essential self. You are powerful, important and capable of love. The only question is whether you’re willing to accept that power and the responsibilities that go with it. The spiritual thinker and author Marianne Williamson said: “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.”
Playing devil’s advocate, perhaps you load responsibility for your life onto your mother because if you took sole responsibility, you might have to face up to the mess it is in. And if you face up to it, you might have to do something about it. So, here’s how. It will be tough, but take one step at a time, using CBT (ask your GP) and a 12-step programme such as Narcotics Anonymous. As for your mother, leave her where she belongs — trapped in the prison of her own prejudices. It is an unpleasant place to be. You sound like a nice man. You don’t have to stay there.
I recommend you read The Mother Factor by Stephan B Poulter (Prometheus Books £12.99) and Learned Optimism: How to Change Your Mind and Your Life by Martin E Seligman (Vintage Books USA £14.99), and contact Narcotics Anonymous (ukna.org).
I want to apologise to my boyfriend's ex for our affair
August 24 2008
Two years ago, I had an affair, which resulted in us both leaving and being divorced by our respective spouses. We are still deeply in love, although not living together. My ex has a new relationship and we are now on good terms. My boyfriend’s ex also has a new relationship and says she is happy, but often flares up in anger, which fills my boyfriend with guilt. I try to stay out of it, but recently asked him how she feels about me and he says she is still very angry. We discussed if I should say sorry, but he doesn’t know how she will react. I have never expressed regret to her, although we haven’t been in contact for more than a year. The last time we spoke, I was defensive and probably aggressive because I was in the wrong and feeling guilty. Two years later, I don’t know what to do. I don’t regret what happened, but am sorry for causing her so much grief and heartache. Would it be insulting and pointless to apologise now? She might slam down the phone and be more upset, and my boyfriend would suffer.
I am a great believer in making amends, if at all possible. I also believe we should respect another person’s feelings. If somebody is angry as a direct consequence of our actions, then we should respect their right to be angry. We should also tolerate their need to dislike or even hate us. Of course, we hope that time will eventually temper those emotions and we can express regret.
However, as it is always uncomfortable to know somebody hates us, I wonder how much of your desire to apologise is about your own discomfort? Of course she’s angry. You scarcely needed to ask your boyfriend how she feels. The fact you did, particularly asking about her feelings towards you, seems to suggest that some of your concern might be self-interest. Is this really about making her feel better or is it about making yourself feel better because you find it difficult to tolerate the idea of somebody being angry with you?
I know that sounds harsh when you want only to apologise, but it’s terribly important to be honest about your motivation. An apology that lacks genuine regret can do more harm than good. People always sense insincerity, even when we are not conscious of it ourselves, so an apology made purely to keep the peace (or to make somebody like us) can generate more anger and resentment.
People fall in love without our permission. It happens and it hurts. It hurts like hell, and one of the ways we deal with extreme pain is through anger. It may be that your boyfriend’s ex needs to be angry to get through a difficult time. Anger helps us to move forward. Her anger may also be connected to grief and mourning the end of a marriage. It could also, possibly, be bound up with regret. She may feel she didn’t pay sufficient attention to her relationship, perhaps she let the physical side of things slide or allowed irritability to become a fixture in their emotional life. She may feel bad about that, and the point about bad feelings is that we want to be rid of them, so we displace them onto others in the form of blame or self-righteous anger — just as you did the last time you spoke to her.
Then again, she might simply be filled with rage at you for stealing her man. Who knows where her anger is really coming from? The point is, you’re unlikely to change her feelings with a phone call. In fact, it might simply be unkind. Phone calls are so intrusive. There we are, happily going about our business, when the phone rings and it’s the ex-husband’s girlfriend (unexpected and uninvited) wanting to be friends. We are unprepared, bereft of our usual emotional armour. Our response may not reveal the best of us, and the shame of being discovered to be emotional and vulnerable can make us angrier still.
It is always better to apologise face to face, but that’s not always possible. In this situation, a better way might be a letter. That would challenge you to really consider your intentions by setting them down in black and white. For her part, it would give her the space to read the letter, rip it up, burn it or even reply — whatever she feels like doing. The point is, she could do it in the privacy of her own home.
If it is a response you’re after, you quite possibly won’t get one. Or, if you do, it may not be the one you want. The point of expressing regret in this situation is not to attach any sort of expectation to the outcome — of forgiveness, improved relations or feeling better about your own behaviour. So, if what you want to do is simply apologise to another human being for causing them pain, a letter could be the way to go. It should be done with the utmost respect. She has a right to process her anger — in her own time and in her own way.
My boyfriend and I are constantly breaking up
August 17 2008
My boyfriend and I have become masters at breaking up and reconciling. The latter is largely down to me, and I wonder if I’m guilty of the unrealistic expectations our culture can engender. We both work overseas, which has caused an immense amount of pain and separation. Despite that, we’ve generally succeeded in overcoming those hurdles, and our friends often comment on our solidarity. However, I realise that my biggest concern is our lack of conversation. In all other aspects our relationship is fine and often very good, but I have a constant, nagging desire to have a nourishing conversation and share ideas and opinions, either seriously or with humour. The lack of it has been my biggest disappointment. I’m now in my thirties and would eventually like to get married, and wonder if I should compromise on this one issue or accept that its regular recurrence as a theme in our arguments is answer enough. Perhaps this is something over which compromise is not possible? Any guidance would be so very welcome to provide some peace and give us both a clear path, either together or apart.
I can’t help wondering if what you’re actually asking for is change. I know you feel you're prepared to compromise, but the constant break-ups tell a different story. So do the reconciliations.
It could be that frustration and rejection in the face of what seems like stubborn, contrary silence cause you to become critical and demanding. That provokes arguments and, after one too many, you split up. A little later, longing and regret kick in and you start to think it wasn’t so bad after all. You decide your boyfriend has other, wonderful virtues, and if you could only be gentler in your approach, it might encourage him to change. So you go back and it’s great for a while. You manage to keep a lid on your frustrations and he’s also trying hard to please, but, eventually, good behaviour turns into real behaviour. Reality bites and so do all those good intentions. That’s when the arguments start again and I’ll bet they always contain the same punch line: “Why can’t/don’t/ won’t you . . . ?”
We all know those arguments, and they always, but always, come from trying to make someone else into the person we would like them to be. “If only they were \ more communicative/ tidier/more romantic/didn’t work so hard, then our relationship would be fantastic.” It rarely seems to occur to us that the other person is not going to change, not because they don’t want to please us, but because, fundamentally, that’s the way they are.
Trying to change another person is a highway to hell — for both of you. Your introvert boyfriend is not, overnight, going to blossom into an extrovert. Some people just are reticent. It’s their character style — their hard-wiring, if you like — so even the most desperate desire to please the person they love is destined to fail. Worse, the constant (even if unspoken) pressure to change makes them feel unlovable. Why? Because the message is that they are unacceptable as they are. That, in turn, sets up resentment, which builds until they withdraw or lash out; the subtext being “If you don’t love me as I am, forget it”.
The only people we can change are ourselves. We could, for example, change our expectations. We could learn to be tolerant and compassionate. We can work hard around issues of acceptance. We can learn to love the foibles that irritate us. Now, all that works very well — but only if we feel that our basic emotional needs are being met. In other words, if we also feel loved and accepted for who we are. Somebody can be quiet and unforthcoming, but still inspire us with an unshakeable confidence that we are cherished and appreciated. However, if we feel a partner’s lack of communication is a rejection of our most tender feelings (in other words, our own hard-wiring), then it’s not going to work.
So, what we have to do is face up to our own needs. Fundamental emotional needs are difficult to compromise on — as you have already discovered. We all need certain (often quite different) things to be genuinely content. In order to discover what those might be, we have to ask ourselves some hard questions. What are the areas in a relationship where we simply cannot compromise? Twisting ourselves into a pretzel to suit another person or to hang onto a relationship is never going to work in the long term. Neither does asking another person to supply an emotional need that is actually our responsibility.
Then there is our belief system. We may believe our romantic partner should satisfy all our needs. Is that true, or could we accept what they are able to give us and find the rest elsewhere — from friends and family?
What’s required here is both rigorous honesty and unflinching self-examination. One of your basic needs may be communication — in any relationship, not just your present one. There is nothing wrong with that. If it really matters to you, it matters. As to how much, the only person who can answer that question is you.
My father's suicide still haunts me
August 10 2008
I'm 26 and struggling. Since my father's suicide last year, I can't find my stride and shake it off. I don't want this to be the defining moment any more. I was by no means perfect, but I was confident, worked hard, had many friends and opportunity was everywhere. My faith in almost everything is broken. I do my best to stay active and positive and to grow and learn to be a better person from losing my father in this way. It works at times, but then I'm back to square one. I feel like I am failing my family. I clash with my mother and brother and just want to walk away, but I love them too much. I fear I will lose everything. I can't describe how low I am. I miss my father beyond words and wish I could have said something to give his life enough meaning to stay. I've read about depression and grief, seen counsellors and done so many things to pull myself out. I think my brilliant girlfriend deserves better. To be blunt, I wouldn't want to be with me. Any advice would be met gratefully with an open mind and willing heart.
First, do please try to forgive yourself. There is no right or wrong way to feel; there is only the way you feel. You are doing your best in the face of unimaginable pain. I know you fear you will alienate everyone around you, but do you honestly think they can’t forgive you (as you, surely, forgive them), or is this more about finding some compassion for yourself? Let me put it another way. If a small child was in terrible emotional pain, hitting out and raging and crying, would you think any less of that child? Of course not — your only impulse would be to want to take that child’s pain away.
And that, no doubt, is how your family and girlfriend are feeling. They may react angrily because they are in pain, too, but nobody expects you to be as you were. Your faith in everything is, as you say, “broken”. The trouble, I think, is that you are expecting to be as you were. You are falling short of your own expectations, rather than falling short of anyone else’s.
You are also, of course, angry — one of the stages of grief. I’m sure you’ve discovered them in your reading, but, in case you haven’t, here they are, as described by Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, a Swiss psychiatrist at the forefront of work with the dying and bereaved. She outlined the grief cycle as: shock, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. The stages are not linear, so we may ricochet from one to another until we arrive at acceptance.
Acceptance is a difficult place to reach, so I’m going to suggest some actions that have helped (and continue to help) me. When we are struggling, it’s useful to have practical solutions. Taking action, however small, is helpful when we are paralysed by extreme emotion.
You write so beautifully that I wonder if it might be good to start a journal. Try to write every day — without censoring yourself at all. Allow any and every emotion. Your journal is your safe and private place. Write when you feel some sort of peace or happiness as well, so when you feel really bad, you might look back and see there are times when the pain lifts. It’s easy, when we’re trapped in despair, to believe we always feel that way. We need to be reminded that grief, like happiness, is infinitely fluid. Instinctively, we know that nothing stays the same, good or bad, but when we are trapped in pain, we need reminders.
Consider some form of meditation. In meditation, we learn to sit with an emotion without attaching words to it. Usually, when we feel an extreme emotion, we immediately try to nail it down with words (“I feel this way because . . .”), which then sets up obsessive thought patterns and associations. If we can separate the emotion from the words, we may feel the emotion as an energy that shifts and changes. If we can learn to see emotion as energy, we may begin to set it free.
Try prayer. In the Buddhist tradition, prayers are used to free us from suffering. I don’t know why it works (perhaps a shift of emphasis in the mind?), I just know that it does. A prayer could be a request to be free from pain, to have faith, to let go of anger. Be as creative and chatty as you like in your dealings with the universe, but do try to start the day with some prayers. If we set our intention, often our unconscious mind will follow.
Find somebody to talk to on a regular basis, whether that’s a counsellor or a wise older friend. It is important to establish a routine so that you know that, at a prearranged date and time, you have somewhere safe to unload your feelings. When we know, for example, that every Thursday at 6pm we will deal with a particularly difficult thought, it allows us to get on with the rest of our lives.
Finally, please accept some love and compassion from a stranger. You sound quite wonderful in your letter. And, no matter what you think, it sounds as if you are doing wonderfully too.
On Grief and Grieving: Finding the Meaning of Grief Through the Five Stages of Loss by Elisabeth Kübler-Ross and David Kessler (Scribner £10.99).
A Path with Heart by Jack Kornfield (Rider & Co £12.99).
The Royal College of Psychiatrists has a Bereavement Information Pack for those bereaved by suicide or other sudden death. Download it from rcpsych.ac.uk/ mentalhealthinformation.aspx.
I am trapped in my marriage
August 03 2008
My life is sheer hell. I have been married for 22 years. We were happy, but our sex life was never really exciting. Then I met someone; a guy younger than me at work who has thrilled me with stories of his conquests and success with girls. My wife says he has changed me into a “horrible, depraved individual”. I am obsessed by him. He means more to me than anything. I'm not gay but bisexual, and I love beautiful, young things. I think he worries that we're getting too close and wants to leave his job to escape from me, but
I can't live without him. My wife is standing by me. She thinks I am mentally ill. Understandably, I am being punished. We sleep in separate rooms, so I'm locked in a sexless but loving marriage, more like mother and son. I need love and to be held; I need a fulfilling sexual relationship; and I'm trapped. I don't want to throw away my family life, but I know our sex life is not going to improve. I either continue as a family man in the spare bedroom or find someone for fun and lead a double life. Please help.
I am not surprised your relationship with your wife is that of mother and son. You sound like a 16-year-old. Everything you've written is an echo of that “I want it and I want it now” stage of adolescence. Actually, strike that. My teenager is way more mature than you.
I am sorry to be unkind, but can you see how myopically self-centred you sound? It's all me, me, me: I don't get sex; I feel trapped; I need love; I want fun. Not a word of regret. No sense of sorrow for the pain you have caused. You have wounded your wife beyond belief. You are driving a young man out of his job. He doesn't sound depraved, he sounds like an idiot. Anybody who boasts of his conquests (the word says it all) and success with girls (women, surely, if they are over the age of consent?) hasn't made it past the nappy stage of emotional maturity. The question is why, at fortysomething, you find that even interesting, let alone exciting.
Your wife thinks you are mentally ill. That's a harsh way of saying you are completely unresolved, not simply about your sexuality, but also about your emotional needs. It sounds as though meeting this young man has precipitated some sort of psychic crisis, catapulting you back to a teenage self. People make jokes about the midlife crisis, but it is as painful as the turmoil of our adolescent years. These are the two most difficult periods of life.
If we did not resolve our emotional issues in our teens, as we struggled to make our way to maturity, it is likely that they will resurface in our forties, when we mourn the ending of youth. The midlife crisis is not a crisis of sex but of identity.
I'm not a psychologist, but it seems to me that you need serious help. If you have never resolved your issues around sexuality or emotional identity, it may be that you have been living a false life for the past 20 years. Living a lie is hard work. What we truly feel must eventually find expression. All those unfulfilled needs and desires are bursting out of you in a way that is both overwhelming and unmanageable.
Let's take your sexuality. You say you love beautiful, young things. Are you sure it's not simpler than that? You want to be a beautiful, young thing and cannot come to terms with the death of that possibility. Youth and beauty now belong to others, and no amount of sex or longing is going to change that. Usually, we grieve that loss and move on, but you can't move on. You have focused your intense need on a blameless stranger and now you're trapped in obsession. That's much more about you than it is about him. As for being bisexual, that seems to point to yet more confusion about identity. People may have both homosexual and heterosexual relationships as they search to discover their central beings, but most settle for one or the other. Many bisexual people struggle to make emotional commitments because they have no idea who they really are.
And that brings us back to the central issue, which is a crisis of identity. What should you do? You cannot possibly make decisions until you know who you are. Your wife is prepared to stand by you. Great. She is obviously a fantastic woman. If you really don't want to throw away your family life (and that involves what you both want, so your wife's needs are as important as yours), you need to decide what you truly want. To be a young boy who wants to be loved?
A teenager who wants to shag his brains out? Or a middle-aged man who wants to respect and honour his marriage? These are intensely difficult questions to solve on your own. Therapy will help. Do get some.
My wife's sexual past is destroying me
July 27 2008
I had been happily married for 14 years and thought my wife was the best thing that ever happened to me. However, about three years ago, (on my request, thinking there wasn’t much to be said) she told me about her previous sexual partners. It destroyed me and I don't know why. At the beginning, I thought it would go away but my sadness is stronger than ever. I get recurrent images of her with other men and feel as if she really did cheat on me. I knew I wasn’t the first man in her life but I never imagined there had been ten previously, one of whom was married. I’ve read a lot about relationships and psychology, but still don't have a clue about my reaction. I wish she hadn't been so candid and had done what I understand is common practice: lie. Unfortunately I know I sound chauvinistic and deeply machismo but I can honestly assure you I’m not. I really want to be married to this extraordinary woman and just want my feelings and intrusive thoughts to go away so we can carry on with our lives.
I’m sure you know I’m going to say that your feelings have nothing to do with your wife or her sexual past. Her past is just what that word implies – over and finished with. What is horribly present is your jealousy.
Jealousy is one of the most powerful emotions. It is also one of the most destructive both to our own happiness and that of those we love. And it is love (or perhaps an exaggerated notion of love) which seems to me to be the real issue here. It sounds from your letter as if you have built unreal expectations around your wife. She is the “best thing that ever happened to you.” She is an “extraordinary woman”. Those appear to be charmingly romantic sentiments but they carry a dangerous sting.
If she’s the best thing that ever happened to you, obviously the worst thing that could ever happen is that she would be taken away. So it’s hardly surprising you’re carrying those imaginary rivals in your head. You are obsessing over your worst fear. It is said that jealousy is a potent combination of fear and anger – fear that the thing we love will be taken away and anger that we might be powerless to stop it.
Those unreal expectations you have built around your wife might also mean you have put her up high on a pedestal. You have objectified her, made her into a valuable and beautiful object. She has become a thing that might be taken from you, rather than another human being (messy, insecure, flawed) who is in equal relationship with you. As well as that, if you have made her more important than you, you have made yourself less important than her. Stay with me. There’s a point to this.
According to evolutionary psychologists, there are good reasons for jealousy and the main one, evolutionary speaking, is to hang on to our mates for reasons of procreation. The selfish gene wants to survive. So, if you feel less than her, unconscious logic dictates you believe she has better mating options. Your unconscious is looking for rivals. They might be well in her past but your fear makes them all too present.
In other words, what this is really about is your feelings of inadequacy and low self worth. You need to get both yourself and your relationship right-sized. Let’s start with your relationship. Your wife chose you. It took her a while to find you but as the saying goes, we have to kiss a lot of frogs to find Prince Charming. Her past may have involved a few too many frogs for your liking, but that was her journey. She’s not hanging onto that journey. She’s hanging on to you, just as she has done for the past fourteen years.
Now for those feelings you have of inadequacy and self-worth. You may not even be aware of them and, because they are difficult and painful emotions to face up to, unconsciously you may have looked around for a place to park them. The mind is a wonderfully inventive thing and yours has found a string of ex-lovers who are no more important to your wife than the old coats or handbags she was once briefly attached to. To her, they are about as lifeless and uninteresting as that. To you, they are a threat. They are better than you, more powerful than you, more virile than you.
They are not. They are not even ex-lovers. They are emotions such as inadequacy, shame, fear, worthlessness, terror of abandonment (take your pick) given human form. If you want to change things, perhaps you might try making her a little less extraordinary and yourself a little more extraordinary. You need to bring things back into balance. The best way to do that would be through counselling. I know that to you this feels like a problem of overwhelming proportions, but, honestly it’s not. It’s the jealousy that feels overwhelming, not the situation. Do some work with a CBT counsellor around your core beliefs (the deep-seated, unconscious opinions we all hold) and get things in proportion. And remember, she chose you. You absolutely are good enough.
I am 30 and in a relationship that fills me with pain
July 20 2008
I am 30 and in a relationship that fills me with pain, anxiety and restlessness. When we met, it was glorious — I couldn’t believe how intelligent, funny and loving he was. Then we got to know each other. He became angry, distant and domineering, but I was so insanely in love, I accepted any humiliation. I forgot how to be myself - I was always alert to his moods, helpful and eager to change. Finally, I couldn’t take it any longer and moved out - for one day. The improvement was that he stopped the silent treatment, but I still crave affection and communication. I cannot stand the way he plays computer games nonstop, his lack of need to be with or talk to me, the lack of intimacy, my feelings of loneliness and sexual deprivation. I know I’m too dependent and I have only one desire - to feel relaxed, my thoughts focused on something different. I want to feel peace. The only solution I can think of is separation, but I cannot leave without his help. I choose to think it’s not his fault - I can’t handle my emotions. I'm controlling and hysterical, and I definitely wouldn’t stand for behaviour like mine.
Poor you. You do sound terribly trapped. I think of this kind of relationship as locked-in syndrome — an overpowering, toxic interplay of emotional neediness. It is also known as co-dependency or love addiction.
Let me explain about love addiction, a neat label for a dysfunctional approach to relationships. The love addict has overwhelming emotional needs. They have an empty space inside so they cannot soothe, calm, nurture or love themselves. Love addicts have no idea who they are, or so dislike the person they feel they are that they contort, pretzel-like, to whatever their lover wants them to be. Their self-esteem relies entirely on other people’s love and approval. They have a desperate need for attention and passion, usually mistaking passion for love. The more overstated or extreme (or even violent) the emotions, the more real and important they feel the relationship is. Like all addictions, it is exhausting, claustrophobic and deeply destructive for all concerned.
Love addiction can drive people to humiliate themselves, be chameleons to fit to whatever their lover admires and accept any kind of abuse. The flip side is that they abuse, control, demand and manipulate in a desperate plea for attention. The rejected love addict might constantly text and phone the object of their obsession, stalk them or sabotage new relationships. Love addiction drives people to medicate the pain by abusing alcohol or food, or by shopping. Some experts believe that love addiction is often the underlying emotional dysfunction behind alcoholism or an eating disorder.
You can be a love addict on your own, always yearning after the One (the perfect fit, the soul mate) who is going to make you whole, or pining for the one who got away, convinced that without them (however terrible the relationship really was) you can never be happy. You can also be a love addict in a relationship. A relationship doesn’t stop the behaviour. It often makes it worse because, unconsciously, a love addict looks for somebody who echoes their own dysfunction. A love addict most often ends up with a love avoidant. The love avoidant is the mirror image of the love addict. Love avoidants also have overwhelming emotional needs (and a similar terror of abandonment), but have no idea how to express them (as well as being terrified by them), so they use rejection, dominance, humiliation, silence, anger and distance to control their lover and to avoid being left. A dance goes on between addict and avoidant. The more the avoidant shuts down, the needier the addict becomes. The needier the addict becomes, the more the avoidant shuts down. Sound familiar?
So when you say you are hysterical and controlling, that is probably true, but the problem is that you have chosen somebody who perpetuates those behaviours. They call it an addiction because, just as the alcoholic does not know how to find peace without a drink but longs for freedom from that obsession, the love addict longs to be free of their compulsive behaviour but is terrified of being without their lover — or their fix. Alcoholics long for somebody or something to stop them drinking. Hard as they try to stop on their own, they can’t. You long for your boyfriend to help you to leave because you cannot do it on your own.
It is not your fault. You are suffering. You need help. The best place to find it is Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous. You need the support of others who understand, and a programme of recovery to help you find the peace you long for. Essentially, this has nothing to do with your boyfriend. For an alcoholic, a drink is the outward sign of an inner emotional disorder. It is not the fault of the drink. Your relationship is the symptom and not the cause of your unhappiness. To help you understand more clearly, try reading Is It Love or Is It Addiction? by Brenda Schaeffer (Hazelden £13.99).
Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous; slaauk.com
Is this a mid life crisis or male depression?
July 13 2008
I think it’s a midlife crisis, but it might be more than that. I’m a man in my mid-forties and, on the outside, appear to have a good, if not a great life. I have a nice house, a stable family and a job that pays me well and allows time for friends and exercise. Inside, though, I’m a mess. I’m in a relationship with someone that I know is wrong and need to break out of. What really worries me is I keep having two competing thoughts. The first is to walk away from the mess I’m in and go and do some good. The second, more worrying thought is to accept that we all die and it would be better for everyone if that happened to me sooner rather than later. I get angry inside and, at times, have an almost total disregard for my own life. I have really low self-esteem, yet if you saw me at work or with friends, you would never guess. Needless to say, my wife has no clue. What do I do? I need to act quickly.
While I hesitate to diagnose anybody, it does sound as if you are suffering from depression, so the first thing you should do is go and have a talk with your GP. Do, please, describe your state of mind exactly as you have outlined it in this letter. On no account minimise or make light of the way you feel. Simply telling another human being the truth will bring relief.
Tragically, male depression often goes undetected, because men are unwilling to admit to what is commonly, but wrongly, perceived as a weakness. Instead, they hide their pain behind a false front — just as you are doing. You say that if I saw you at work or with friends, I would never guess. Your wife doesn’t have a clue. That is so sad.
Our flaws and our frailties are what make us human. An act of love is the courage to share ourselves with others, to allow them to see us as we truly are. It is also an act of self-love or self-esteem. Telling the truth is about being authentic. It’s about inhabiting our own selves. When we fail to do that, or if we say one thing when we feel another, we live in a lie. That lie alienates us from others. It cuts us off from our fellow man and brings devastating loneliness. It causes us to feel hopeless and helpless, because we cannot admit who we truly are. And that is where the anger you describe comes from — the frustration of not being authentic.
These, of course, are also symptoms of depression. Which comes first, the act of being inauthentic, which ignites and then perpetuates depression, or the depression that causes us to be inauthentic, because we are ashamed of our own feelings? Nobody knows. What the experts can tell us is that ignoring depression will not make it better. It will only make it worse.
How? By trapping us in such a vicious cycle of helplessness, hopelessness and loneliness that we come to believe the only way out is either to walk away or to take our own lives.
These are not solutions. Trust me, I know, having recovered from a long episode of debilitating depression. We can walk as far away as we like but, wherever we go, there we are. We can take our own life — or wish for it to be taken — but that’s not an answer to the question of how to live our lives happily; it’s merely avoiding the question.
So, how do we answer that question? Or rather, how do you pull out of the mess you feel you’re in? As I say, the first step is to admit how you feel. Your GP should be your first port of call. He or she may suggest a course of antidepressants. They are worth a try, in as much as they can lift the most debilitating symptoms and allow you to face the underlying causes with greater optimism and clarity. They do not work for everyone. They are not magic pills, so if they have no effect, do not despair. The second and, from the tone of your letter, most important step is to get some good counselling — a safe place where you can express your true feelings and challenge your emotions of anger and low self-esteem.
As to the affair, it is another way of running away — hoping that somebody else will change the way you feel. The guilt and shame, both of betraying your wife and of using another human being as an emotional Band-Aid, will make you feel much worse. Taking action, such as stopping this relationship, getting help and being authentic with those around you, is your road to emotional health and happiness. As the saying goes, we are only as sick as our secrets.
Finally, if there is one thing I know about challenging depression, it is this. It is okay to feel angry. It is okay to feel less than worthy. It is okay to be vulnerable. It is okay to mess up. The only true act of courage is to love and forgive ourselves.
Shoot the Damn Dog: A Memoir of Depression by Sally Brampton (Bloomsbury £15.99; shootthedamndog.com )
I haven’t had sex with my husband for months
July 06 2008
I haven’t had sex with my husband for months. I’ve finally admitted it — okay, to a complete stranger — but it feels good. We’re happily married, work hard and have hectic social lives, but we don’t find time for each other where it really matters: in bed. The first couple of years were great, but, as with many parents of young children, life runs away, then, suddenly, it’s been months. My problem is, I’m scared because it has been so long. I do fancy him, and we cuddle and kiss, but I usually go to bed first. If we go to bed together, I wait for him to make the first move, and he waits for me, and soon we’re arguing about the fact that both of us want to make love, but neither will make the first move. I sometimes imagine him telling me he has had an affair — and who could blame him? Friends don’t talk about their sex lives, but I’m sure they do it morethan us. I worry we’ll end up in a sexless marriage, but I don’t know how to get back into the swing without feeling it’s me who does all the work.
I honestly don’t think everyone is having more sex than you, particularly if they have young children: we all know they’re the greatest passion-killers in the known universe. So I’d stop worrying about that. All that matters is what’s right for the two of you. Obviously, a sexless marriage isn’t right, and that’s the perfect place to start: on a note of optimism. You both want sex. Great. You’re not having it. Not so great.
Think of it this way. Sex is a habit. It’s a good habit, but it’s a habit nonetheless — and, once you get out of the habit, it’s hard to get going again. Talking to each other about the things that matter (fears, worries, feelings) is another good habit. Once you get out of that habit, it’s equally hard to get going again.
That’s because both habits are about intimacy. Generally, it’s not so much a lack of sex as the inability to discuss it that ends up being the problem. For once, however, I don’t recommend talking it through — at least, not immediately. The trouble with talking about why you’re not having sex is that you rarely end up talking about why you’re not having sex. Instead, the discussion about who doesn’t make the first move turns into an argument about who always picks up little Johnny from the playschool and ends up in a row. The great thing about sex is that, afterwards, you feel so close, you couldn’t care less who picked up little Johnny from the playschool. In fact, sod little Johnny. Post-sex, closeness and intimacy allow you to talk sensibly and kindly about the resentments that led you to not have sex in the first place.
The problem with resentments is that they build in our mind until they’re as real as any physical obstacle. And the tragedy is that, for the most part, they are built on some careless infraction (which the other party may not even be aware of) or some belief about a right or wrong way of doing things (which the other person doesn’t even know about).
Here’s one, from your letter: “It’s me who does all the work.”
Buried in those words are volumes of resentment. They seem to imply that you feel you do all the work in the relationship. Or perhaps you unconsciously feel that men should always be the sexual initiators and your husband is not doing his “work”. He, on the other hand, may feel resentful that it’s always up to him to initiate sex, or he may have felt sexually rejected in the past, when the children were babies. I’m wondering, too, why you say you wouldn’t blame him if he had an affair. Surely, if the sexual impasse were coming from both sides, he would be totally blameworthy? That makes me wonder if you feel guilty in some way, or feel it’s you who has been withholding?
Honestly, I don’t know. I’m just trying to read between the lines — which, I suspect, is what the two of you are also doing, and coming up with the wrong conclusions. It seems the best thing you can do is break through the barrier, have sex and, in that lovely postcoital glow, gently put right any misunderstandings.
Okay, so that does mean you have to make the first move, and I know it feels really difficult. Look at it this way: you say you don’t want a sexless marriage, but you don’t want to be the one who makes the first move.
Well, somebody has to. It seems to me that, in order not to have the first, you have to do the second.
As for being scared, there’s only one way of getting past that. Be brave and be bold. Just say: “I love you. You’re gorgeous. I really want to shag your brains out.”
A good result is almost certainly guaranteed.
He Talks A lot About His Ex
June 29 2008
I’m in my late thirties and have been dating someone a few years older for a few months. He is divorced (he says he was never happily married), and has two teenage sons. He is great fun, intelligent, witty and can be very loving, but I’m confused about boundaries. He talks a lot about his ex, still feels guilty and seems reluctant to let go of other past relationships. He sometimes comments on other women’s attractiveness, usually celebrities. I find this hard and don’t always feel particularly special. I’ve suggested counselling about his past guilt, but he won’t hear of it. On the other hand, he’s very full-on, wanting my undivided attention and time. He’d like me to go on holiday with him and his children, but I’m not sure how “safe” I feel with him. He tells me he loves me, but my guard is up. Just because he had an affair once doesn’t mean he would do it again. I do want to give this a fair shot as I’d like a committed relationship and a family, but am worried that his past is clouding both of us. What should I do?
The message that seems to be coming through is that you don’t trust this man. I wonder why not. Trust involves more than ticking the right boxes, such as fun, intelligent, witty and loving. It is an instinct or intuition, and yours seem to be telling you that things are not as they seem. Now, you could listen to your intuition and decide this is not a goer, but before you do, it might be helpful to ask yourself a few questions.
Is it possible you are throwing obstacles in the way of this relationship because of your own deep-seated feelings of insecurity, rather than any sinister behaviour on his part? Asking somebody you have been intimate with for only a few months to go and see a counsellor does seem a rather overanxious response.
I am also puzzled why you don’t feel safe enough to go on a family holiday. It’s your use of the word “safe” that’s puzzling. Again, this seems like such an overreaction to the suggestion of a couple of weeks in the sun that it makes me wonder whether this is more about your feelings of insecurity than his actual behaviour. He’s very attentive, tells you he loves you and has asked you to go on holiday with his children. Now, if ever there were a sign of commitment, it is allowing you to become involved with his children. The only black mark against him seems to be an attachment to women from his past. Are you sure he is excessively guilty about his ex-wife and reluctant to let go of past relationships, or is it more that you wish they didn’t exist because any reminder of them makes you feel insecure? Be really honest.
I wonder if it’s the latter, simply because of your use of the word “special”. He doesn’t make you feel particularly special. Now, I wonder what it would take to make you feel special. Would it be a man who behaved as if his past lovers didn’t exist and refused to have any contact with them, a man withoutthe ability to feel sadness or regret? Or would it be a man with no attachments or emotional history? In other words, what you seem to be looking for is a man untouched by human hand. Nobody turns up without baggage — particularly by the time we get to our thirties — but some people are able to put it safely into storage while others carry it into the next relationship, leaving little space for anything else. It may be that he is one of those carriers. It could be that his baggage is too big to get around. Or it could be that the baggage is actually your own.
You give no clues as to what has happened to you in the past. I wonder if you have been badly betrayed, or whether suspicion and jealousy have always dogged your relationships. Those seem to be your dominant emotions, which is why it’s important to get really honest and work out if these are feelings you are projecting onto him, or whether they are real concerns.
You know I can’t possibly tell you what you should do other than suggest that there are two sides to every story, and that, sometimes, the story is based on a script we have written ourselves. I do, however, think it would be both sensible and instructive to go on the promised holiday. It is always revealing to see how people interact with their children, and teenage boys are famously bad at dissembling.
If your fears about his feelings towards his ex-wife have any basis (and you seem to be implying an unresolved attachment), then her sons will soon reveal what it is. Living in such close proximity — even for a couple of weeks — will give you a fair idea of his true nature. Being open to love and making a commitment involve taking a risk. Here’s your final question: are you fearful about him? Or is it more that you are fearful of loving somebody? You’re the only one who knows the answer.
I can't forgive my mother but the anger is eating away at me
June 22 2008
I was wondering about your thoughts on anger and forgiveness. I am terribly angry with my mother. I don’t want to forgive her, as I don’t feel she deserves it, but I know hanging on to these kinds of emotion isn’t good. My mother was cold and hypercritical, making me a shy and unsure child. When I developed bulimia, she was unsympathetic. She insisted I leave school at 16 to bring money into the house, although we were quite affluent. All my contemporaries went to university and did well, whereas I have always been skint, going from one rubbish job to the next. My lack of self-esteem and my self-hatred meant I never allowed anybody to get close to me, so I am rather lonely. I have finally stopped hating myself, although I wouldn’t say I like myself. I can live with myself, but I don’t know what to do with this anger. I see how much people who believe in themselves can achieve and what a nice life they have, which makes me angry for not trying harder and terribly sad for a life that could have been. I’m in my forties, single and childless, and see a lonely future ahead.
"Forgiveness” is such a big word. I prefer “acceptance”. If we accept that somebody is the way they are, and they are behaving in that way not to offend us, but simply because that is the way they feel and think, then we may find space for forgiveness. In other words, we forgive them for being who they are. We may as well, because if there is one single truth, it is that we cannot make other people behave in ways we would like. The only person we have the power to change is ourselves.
So, if we accept that people are themselves, what is there to forgive? Their bad behaviour, perhaps? That takes us back to a point of nonacceptance. If we don’t accept them as they are, we believe they should behave in a certain way, according to our criteria of what we believe is correct. In other words, I’m right and you’re wrong. Sure, we could go down that road, but really, there is no point. Trying to make somebody agree that they are wrong and you are right is like banging your head against a brick wall. If you keep it up, the only person you hurt is yourself.
So, give it up. Let it go. Accept that your mother is not the person you wanted her to be. She is the person, for whatever reason, she wanted to be or thought it was right to be or did not know there was any other way to be. Letting her live rent-free in your head is not going to change that. There is a saying about parents: “Shame on them for what they did to me as a child. Shame on me for what I am doing to myself now.” Yes, it was bad. No, it shouldn’t have happened. But it did, and now it’s over and you’re an adult in control of your own life. Or you would be, if only you would stop handing the responsibility for it over to everyone else. Just like your mother, the rest of the world is not responsible for the way you feel, and making them responsible (they went to university, they believe in themselves, they had mothers who loved them) is not going to change anything.
Nor is anger, which could be seen as an aggressive form of self-pity. Life is not fair, but why we believe that something as abstract and impersonal as life should be fair, I have never understood. It’s like ascribing human emotions to a tree and saying a tree should be fair. A tree is a tree. It is what it is.
You could go on hating your mother (and yourself) or you could try to make friends with yourself. Yes, I know being kind to yourself is a novel idea, but if you could find some compassion for your own difficult emotions, you might understand that everyone suffers from them, too — including your mother.
Here are three practical suggestions you might like to try. The first is to count your blessings. Write them down, every night. And please don’t say you have nothing to be grateful for. You have a roof over your head. You are able to work. It doesn’t matter how rubbish you think that work is: the truth is, you have choices. You are healthy, which is not to be underestimated. Challenge yourself to see the good in your life and, eventually, you will come to believe it.
The second suggestion is to help others. It will stop you concentrating so exclusively on yourself. You are not the only person in this world who feels bad. Reach out to others and you will feel less alone.
Third, pray for five minutes every morning. Set your intention for the day. I don’t mean that in the sense of organised religion — although it may be that you embrace it. Simply pray to your higher self. Pray for the willingness to let go of anger, to enjoy your life, for self-hatred to leave you. Pray for compassion for yourself and others.
Finally, remember this: living well is the best revenge.
Should I Stand Up to My Rude Brother-in-Law?
June 15 2008
I struggle with my relationship with my brother-in-law. He is sarcastic, critical and aggressive towards me, my mum and, at times, my sister. Most of my family see it as an inferiority complex and ignore his behaviour, but I struggle to accept it. I don’t want to upset my sister, and I know she’s in a difficult position and feeling vulnerable after the birth of their first child, but I’m disappointed she doesn’t stand up to him, or for me or our mum. He doesn’t behave like that in front of his family or our father. My sister says he’s stressed, but I feel that’s no excuse. My sister and I are both “people-pleasers” who don’t like conflict (our parents are divorced and they used to argue a lot). I feel that I should stand up for myself and take a stance, but I could damage my relationship with my sister. I don’t know if I should just accept that my sister has chosen her husband and put up with and accept him.
I suspect that, at heart, this is not a problem about your brother-in-law. It seems more likely it is a question about your struggle with confidence and assertion. You say your family dismiss your brother-in-law’s behaviour as an inferiority complex and simply ignore it. The question is, why can’t you? What is it about his attitude that makes you so angry when the people around you hardly notice? Or, if they do notice, are not bothered by it?
In therapy, when somebody triggers us (provokes us to overreact), it is often because something in that person’s behaviour mirrors a quality in ourselves that we don’t like or are afraid of. It may also provoke envy because, secretly, we would like to behave in the same way, but are frightened of the consequences.
I am not for a moment suggesting that you are sarcastic, critical and aggressive, although I wonder if you would like to be free to express a bit more anger but feel you must keep that urge hidden because you are (as you say yourself) a people-pleaser? There is a part of you that would like to get away with the kind of behaviour your brother-in-law manifests. You would like, occasionally, to be stroppy and shout and put yourself first, but you don’t dare because you believe that if you did, people wouldn’t like you.
This is sometimes called “good girl” syndrome. On the surface, we behave as if we are sweet, kind and considerate. We don’t like to rock the boat or ask for what we want or need because we can’t bear conflict, particularly if we have grown up seeing rather too much of it. So we learn to keep the peace, or become the peacemaker, by putting our own wants and needs aside (including the need to express anger). We sit on our most difficult and hostile emotions and bottle them up behind a compliant exterior until something triggers us.
As we have never learnt how to show anger or be assertive, we don’t know how to express our needs in a healthy, moderate way. Rather than simply asking somebody to stop doing something upsetting, or explaining that their behaviour is unacceptable, we either explode — or fear that we will — or we clamp down on our rage. That part of ourselves is so contrary to the image we would like to present to the world, it makes us feel ashamed and guilty, which creates yet more unexpressed resentment. This is the passive-aggressive model.
I wonder if you are the peacemaker in your family, and grew up trying to protect your sister and mother, so the sight of your brother-in-law being rude triggers your feelings of protectiveness. You take so much responsibility for their feelings that you don’t believe they are capable of standing up for themselves. If you are hyper-alert to the idea they might be hurt, you may find it impossible to understand why they don’t even notice what you see as offensive behaviour.
It’s all very good to understand your impulses, but how do you deal with them? First, you might consider an anger-management course. They are not just for people who are obviously hostile, but teach us how to express anger in a healthy way. You might also consider the Buddhist ideals that teach us, first and foremost, compassion for ourselves. Once we have mastered that difficult art, we begin to understand that everyone is suffering equally behind a facade (your brother-in-law’s facade is anger, yours is compliance and people-pleasing) and that we can have compassion for them, too. It certainly takes the sting out of other people’s behaviour to realise that we all struggle with emotions that overwhelm us. In that spirit, I am going to recommend two books. I do hope they help.
The Wisdom of No Escape: How to Love Yourself and Your World by Pema Chodron (Element, £8.99).
Beating Anger: The Eight Point Plan for Coping with Rage by Mike Fisher (Rider, £7.99)
My ex-husband is manipulating me
June 8 2008
I was married for 15 years and I believed we had a great relationship, though, when I look back, it was less than perfect. My husband had an affair and left me and our teenage daughter. The separation was protracted and painful. I clung to the hope that he would return, but I knew our marriage was over. I learnt a lot about myself in the process – how needy I can be and how I lose all sense of boundaries. I am now in a cautious, affectionate relationship with a kind man. The problem is my ex, who remains in close contact through our daughter. He is friendly and he never refers to his girlfriend, but I feel he is trying to create an unreal “friendship” that is toxic and damaging to me, as well as unhealthy for our daughter. He buys me presents for birthdays and Christmas, and brings back gifts whenever he travels abroad. I find it difficult to push him away, but have told him his behaviour makes me uncomfortable. He says he will be more distant, as he doesn’t want to upset me, but I am angry that he is so manipulative.
First, I must congratulate you on establishing a relationship with your exhusband that allows happy and frequent contact with your daughter. After the pain and betrayal of an affair, it must have taken a great deal of courage and selflessness.
The usual responses of blame and punishment are both unimaginative and damaging, in the broadest sense. They are not singular exercises in sniper fire but cluster bombs that burn and scar all those in the vicinity - particularly children, who suffer, for the most part, in terrible silence.
Well done for that and for learning about yourself in the process - understanding that you can be needy and lose all sense of boundaries. In that spirit, I wonder if your