Breakup Advice

Today we have a reader question that touches on the issue of enmeshed relationships.

If you have a question too, feel free to contact us and, when you do, please let us know if we have permission to post your question – with any changes necessary if you wish to protect your anonymity – along with our response.

Today’s question, posted with the reader’s permission, arrived in an email entitled “Cheering each other up” and reads as follows:

I’ve recently just had a break up, it wasn’t too long a relationship, 11 months, but very intense, especially the beginning. Your page has some really useful information. The question/dilemma I have, that perhaps other people often come across is that, I love my girlfriend very much, and when she gets down I want to make her happy, but sometimes life might hit her hard and she will be down for some time, I will try to cheer her up but sometimes feels like a real struggle and this will make me sad that she is sad then we are both stuck in a rut. Have you got any advice to prevent this situation in the future?

And our response:

Well the first things that cross my mind when I consider enmeshed relationships, of which this may be an example, are identity and boundary issues. If her mood is affecting you too much and you are unable to separate your feelings from hers, you may be identifying too much with her and having unhealthy boundaries. Obviously it is perfectly reasonable and healthy to identify with and open your boundaries to someone you are in a relationship with to some extent. If they are down for an extended period, it’s certainly reasonable and even expected that you will feel somewhat down about this too at times. But ultimately it isn’t helpful to either person for you to identify or become enmeshed to the extent that your feelings blend with theirs. The fact that you say it is so intense from the very start is also a sign that identity and boundary issues may be involved.

The next thing to consider is who you are attracting. Are you attracting women repeatedly that have a pattern of being depressed for long periods? If so, you may want to think about why this pattern exists. Do you have a rescuer complex where you, consciously or unconsciously, hope to be a woman’s savior and have her eventually come to look up to you as the person who fixed her? If so, you may want to rethink this strategy. For one thing, many people who are constantly depressed have deeper issues than a relationship alone, especially without the help of therapy, can fix. In addition, this is really not fair to you since you also deserve someone to be there for you and pick you up at times and, if they are constantly in the dumps, you will always be giving more than you receive, which, over time, chips away at your own energy and self-esteem. Your email was titled “Cheering each other up” but the email itself only talks about you cheering her up.

Depending on what you discover when you think about these topics, you may want to look into the theme of codependence, which plays out in many enmeshed relationships. Or you may ask yourself sincerely if these issues apply and find that they don’t. Only you can answer that. If they do not, then there are some other things that could be considered. But this is a good starting point.