I was reading something today that really resonated with me. Here it is:
www.emergingfrombroken.com/how-i-believed-it-was-up-to-me-to-fix-problems-in-relationships/The title is "How I Believed It was up to me to fix problems in a relationship".
That really resonates with me as I can see it in so many areas of my life going back to childhood. One of the things that really stood out is this:
4) Since I had long ago given up hope that anyone else would change, (it is not safe for children to believe the parents will change or to try to change them so in childhood it is natural for the child to try harder to ‘be good enough’ or ‘not upset the adults for fear of what might happen; this is part of a child’s survival mode’ and a huge part of victim mentality that needs to be changed in adulthood.) I believed that I had to be the one to change and it was automatic for me to accept that. This childhood survival mode may have been necessary in childhood, but in adulthood it was a lie I had to break though before I could change that automatic response.
I can see where I did this in my relationship with ex. I accepted him for who he was and thought that I just had to figure out how to change so I could get his love. His rejection of me HAD to be because I wasn't doing something right and I just had to figure out what it was that I was doing wrong.
This is something else that really resonated with me:
5) I believed that if I stuck up for myself that I would be ‘just like the abusers and controllers” in my life who were “never wrong”. I related ‘arguing’ and defending myself with being ‘just like them’. It seemed more comfortable for me to accept that it ‘must be me’.
I spent a lot of time NOT arguing with ex. I spent a lot of time overcompensating and NOT sticking up for myself because I didn't want to be abusive. I didn't want to be mean. I know that I have a mean streak when pushed too far. I try not to let myself get into situations where I feel that I am pushed that far. With ex, because he was my husband and I loved him and wanted to make it work, I let myself get pushed farther than I have ever let anyone push me ever before. I did it because of my values around marriage and family. When I did stand up for myself in ways that weren't very pretty, I assumed that I must be the problem. If I could have just found a better way to communicate or be better. I was not seeing that it was okay to stand up for myself. It was okay to challenge him. That didn't make me an abuser or a controller. That made me human. It means that I value myself and can stand up for myself.
The last little bit of the article says:
I had to see where I was so stuck in trying harder and ‘proving my worth’ that I never considered that perhaps relationship should be a two way street. My mother was really good at communicating the rules of relationship when it came to what was expected of me, but the truth is that she didn’t live by them herself. I had to realize that not everything is up to me; the success or failure of relationship does not depend ONLY on one person and all healthy relationship, regardless of the title one person holds, (father, mother, teacher, police officer, lawyer, grandparent, doctor, judge etc.) is based on mutual respect and equal value.
This is what I need to work on most. I don't need to prove my worth to ex or anybody else. I can want a relationship that is a two way street and that doesn't mean that I am demanding or asking too much. When ex would accuse me of being demanding or wanting to much, I believed him because I falsely believed that it was my responsibility to figure out how to make the relationship work. The part about knowing what was expected of me while seeing the other person NOT live by those same expectations really spoke to me. I can see how that has played out in several of my relationships through out my life. It is this notion that I was supposed to do what was expected of me and then take whatever I could get and be happy with it. If I didn't take whatever was given to me and be happy with it, then I was ungrateful or demanding or something else. So, I learned to be happy with whatever I was given. If I felt myself NOT being happy with it, then I would talk myself into finding ways to be happy with it.
Even in the healing process, I find myself getting impatient and telling myself, I just need to try harder.
Has anybody else had similar thoughts or experiences? I would love to have a discussion about some of this stuff.
