Breakup Advice

Today we have a question from a reader who had an affair for a year, which recently ended. She is having an extremely painful experience trying to get over this relationship and asks:

I am currently dating a man for 12 years and last January 2012, I met this man. We talked on the phone a lot, and since he was a carpenter, he said he could do some work for me. I knew that was just a way of getting to know me.

As time went on, he took me for drives and we had many fires in my firepit all summer long. Very romantic. I didn’t intend on cheating on my boyfriend, but I did. I feel like a very bad person because I have better morals than that.

Dec. 22 of 2012, I told this man that it had to be over. I was starting to get severe anxiety over it. I had a nervous breakdown and had to go to the hospital which my real boyfriend took me to. He has no clue that I had this affair and I can never tell him about it as he would be done with me and I don’t blame him for that.

I did fall truly in love with this other man and the breakup in Dec. has caused me severe anxiety with nausea. They first put me on tranquilizer and now I am on 20 mg of prozac. It has been 5 weeks today since the breakup with this man. I guess I have only been in the relationship for a year and really didn’t get intimate till this summer which I do mean we had sex. So it has been a year since I have known him.

How long do you think that I will get over this breakup? I am still with my boyfriend of 12 years but he doesn’t understand why I have severe anxiety. I told him it was over work and he seems to believe it. This has been really unbearable. And believe me I will never be unfaithful again.

Please give me some advice.

God Bless.

And our response:

There are a few pieces of advice/information I have to offer you.

Whenever the reaction to a relationship is so overwhelming and intense, you have to wonder what it’s dredging up from the past. Usually the type of symptoms you’re having where you are nauseous and so anxious you need hospitalization and medication as a result of a breakup have to do with some underlying attachment issues. That might go back to your family or other experiences in your younger years that left a wounding.

It may be that the reason this connection was so intense for you, even when you already have a longstanding boyfriend, is that this new person triggered to the surface wounds that your boyfriend does not. So there was a strong drive to explore and heal those together. When the relationship ended, it left those surfaced wounds raw and exposed along with the realization that they would not, at least at the moment, be healed in this relationship.

The best way to understand the symptoms you’re having may be to think of it in terms of withdrawal from an addiction, as we talked about in a previous piece on this site. I’m sure you can see how a lot of the cravings and feelings and other symptoms involved are analogous.

I highly recommend these books to help you understand that addictive nature of the situation.

	How to Break Your Addiction to a Person by Howard Halpern – This book will help you make sense of and get through the withdrawal pain you’re feeling right now shortly after the breakup.
	Facing Love Addiction: Giving Yourself the Power to Change the Way You Love by Pia Mellody – Will help you explore the roots and pattern of the addictiveness.

Luckily, as with other types of withdrawal, if you have the proper support you need (which it sounds like you’re getting, at least to an extent) you can get through it and come out on the other side. But withdrawal is always a very painful difficult process that you have to take one day at a time.

One thing you might consider doing is looking for online forums of people going through relationship withdrawals as that might offer you somewhere that you can – anonymously if need be – get some support from people who recognize how painful this process can be.

As far as exactly how long it will take to get through that phase, as we’ve said in our article on the topic, it really isn’t worth asking that as focusing on that question is like watching a boiling pot. It is understandable to want to ask and try to figure it out, but it only keeps you locked into the feeling. Focus on getting through each day and processing the withdrawal, finding the support you need to get through it intact and the passing of the pain will come upon you like a sudden surprise one of these days. And whatever you do, if you are determined to move on, don’t have any contact with this other person, not even indirect contact like checking their online pages and so on. Focus anywhere else, as difficult as that might be.

If my boyfriend is depressed, what should I do?

This is a question that many people in relationships ask. It is understandable because when you really care about someone and believe that you see them consistently feeling down, there can be mixed emotions.

On one hand, if you are a very compassionate person, you probably feel some motivation to help your partner.

On the other hand, even the most compassionate person can eventually reach their wit’s end and, if the person’s depression seems intractable, wonder if they should finally break up with them.

Let’s take a deeper look at this topic.

First of all, it is important to recognize that the word depressed is often used to describe a variety of different things. When you say my boyfriend is depressed, you may not be quite accurate.

If you perceive your boyfriend as regularly experiencing feelings of sadness or melancholy, it could indicate any of the following:

• Your boyfriend is grieving a loss of some kind
• Your boyfriend is using some substance or substances that are affecting his mood
• Your boyfriend has an undiagnosed medical condition with mood-related symptoms
• Your boyfriend has a history of abuse or neglect that is unresolved

It is also possible that your boyfriend has a chemical imbalance of the neurotransmitters in his brain, which is what many of us immediately think of when we believe a person is consistently depressed. But it is important not to just assume this is the case.

There are some people – and your boyfriend may be one of them – that are just temperamentally less excited and active and seem depressed to others when there is nothing actually unhealthy about them. So make sure to consider this possibility also.

And, finally, you may be misinterpreting the situation entirely and reading in depressed feelings where they really aren’t.

The lesson is not to jump to any conclusions. It can take time and a lot of communication to discover what is really going on.

Once you realize this, you can open up communication with your boyfriend. Let him know that you care about him and that, because of this, you want to understand better how he is feeling and let him understand better how you perceive the situation. Tools like Intentional Dialogue, as described in Getting the Love You Want, can be extremely helpful in facilitating such sensitive discussions.

If the depression you are perceiving is not actually there, if you have been misinterpreting it or if it stems from addressable issues in the relationship itself, this communication may go a long way in getting to the bottom of the problem.

But, if the depressed feelings are real and serious or if you cannot figure out what is going on, it may be best to support your partner in seeking professional help. Love alone does not qualify you to treat what may be a medical condition. So the most loving thing you can do in such a circumstance is stand behind him as he gets assistance from someone trained in these areas, just as you would if he had a broken leg.

The biggest challenge you will have is deciding what role you want to play – or is appropriate for you to play – in your partner’s attempts at recovery. A balanced approach is healthiest. It is perfectly reasonable for you to want to help and to offer support. At the same time, you must realize that you can only help so much. You must be watchful that you don’t use your boyfriend’s problems as an excuse to avoid dealing with your own issues and excessively indulge in feeling needed and wanted, which can signify codependence. And you must remember that you can only really be a healthy support if you are taking care of yourself, as well.

The hardest step may take place in relationships where the boyfriend’s feelings are causing difficulty for his partner, but he is unwilling to respond and make any changes. If this persists too long and you have given all the support you can, then you are well within your rights to consider breaking off the relationship. You don’t have to be stuck saying “My boyfriend is depressed” for the rest of your life. You deserve a healthy relationship or, at the very least, a partner who is willing to work to make it healthy.

Abandonment issues, symptoms of which can take a variety of forms, are probably one of the single most common causes of unhealthy relationships and breakups. On one hand, they can lead to jealousy, pushiness and verbal and physical abuse. On the other hand, they can lead to distancing and coldness.

What are the symptoms of abandonment issues and how can we recognize them?

It is helpful to divide abandonment issues symptoms into two categories. These categories are based on the two main categories of defensive styles identified by Harville Hendrix in his books Keeping the Love You Find and Getting the Love You Want.

The first category is called maximizing. Maximizing takes place when a person responds to a failure to get their needs met by becoming overly aggressive and reactive in coping with the resulting wound.

So, for example, if a person’s parents or other significant caregivers are not sufficiently present physically and/or emotionally for them at some formative stage in life, they may, later in life, act in an excessively forward manner trying to fill the void. They also may become very upset or angry at even the perception that someone they care about is not or may soon not be as close to them as they wish.

Abandonment issues symptoms that take this maximizing form can include:

• Frequent complaints about their partner’s distance

• Attempts to guilt their partner into being present more often

• Refusing to accept reasonable boundaries

• Hints and accusations that their partner has been unfaithful

• Insistence on being involved in every aspect of their partner’s life

The second category of abandonment issues symptoms is called minimizing. Minimizing takes place when a person responds to a failure to get their needs met by trying to simply cut off awareness of those needs in an attempt to numb the pain of the resulting wound.

So, for example, if a person’s parents or other significant caregivers are not sufficiently present physically and/or emotionally for them at some formative stage in life, they may, later in life, act very stoically and independently, refusing to fully admit their need for healthy attachments or to participate in relationships that could involve the risks associated with intimacy.

Abandonment issues symptoms that take this minimizing form can include:

• Frequent attempts to cut off emotional discussions, either by changing the subject or physically leaving the situation
• Refusal to actively show affection
• Putting down those that openly display vulnerability, painting them as weak
• Long periods of consistent behavior periodically interrupted by emotional explosions when tensions build to the boiling point.

In most relationships, each partner falls more or less into one of these categories. And understanding these dynamics is especially important since, typically, a maximizer and minimizer attract each other.

So look for these abandonment issues symptoms in your relationships and, when you recognize them, remember that these behaviors are rooted in deep pains from the past. Luckily, with the right techniques, such as those championed in Imago Relationship Therapy, abandonment issues can be resolved when partners work together to do so. And this can lead to a very powerful connection and lasting love.