Out of the Negative Cycle
If you had a chance to take last week’s assessment to determine the level of connection and safety you are experiencing in your relationship, you might have discovered you and your partner have an area in your relationship that needs further developing.
Cultivating a safe environment for one another is of primary importance for a sustainable relationship and fruitful life for your family. For most couples, simply deciding to become a safe haven and a secure base won’t be enough to actually create that nurturing environment both of you are desiring. Believe it or not, a well-researched road map exists that guides couples back to places of safety, intimacy, and connection (even after affairs and other difficult betrayals).
The first step is to discern where the breakdown occurs in the negative cycles (downward spirals) we find ourselves in with our partners:
1. Understand the negative cycle: What are the repeating thoughts, feelings, and behaviors of negative patterns in your relationship? Partners react to one another’s reactions, almost automatically, and as partner reacts to partner, over and over, a never-ending negative cycle ensues.
2. Know your tendencies: What do you do when you are feeling disconnected and disoriented? When couples feel disconnected, they tend to move into three different places.
Blaming each other, where the negative cycle goes on and on with each partner accusing the other and causing even greater distancing and wounding. Ironically, the fear of disconnection drives this interaction and the end result is a greater loss of safety and an increased divide.
Protesting, where the desperation and fear of attachment distress feels like a threat to survival. This results in one partner tending to withdraw and shut down, while the other partner pursues with criticism and more hostile attempts to engage. Both reactions are common responses to attachment longings.
Freezing and fleeing, where partners stop seeking one another for emotional connection. Instead they create distance by either making it dangerous to come close or they simply sit out the relationship in its entirety.
3. Identify your raw spots by taking the time to uncover the underlying hurts that drive the feelings and behaviors of the cycles– and partners then taking the time to share them with one another. This defuses some of the pressure of the conflict. It’s a huge step in recovering connection.
Looking to past attachment injuries informs us of our deepest fears, providing clues to our triggers and land mines. As an example, here are two common attachment injuries I see in my practice and how they show up in relationship:
Inadequacy- For some, the deepest fear may be one of never being enough. So when a partner criticizes, even constructively, for those who in childhood/adolescence weren’t affirmed or told they have what it takes, the slightest criticism can throw them off course. Off course can look like defensiveness and escalating or extreme withdrawal and disengagement.
Abandonment- For individuals who went through childhood unseen and felt unimportant, a distracted partner can be the spark that sets the cycle into action. Working too much, getting sucked into screens, or even being consumed with the children’s needs can cause a panic for one’s partner. A pursuing partner will pick a fight to try to get the needed attention while a withdrawing partner will move farther into isolation and disconnection, making an attempt at self-soothing.
Since identifying raw spots heightens insight and clarity in understanding significant causes to the dissolving framework of connection, next week’s blog will help you and your partner to identify your vulnerabilities.
Until then, check out this video where a therapist shares her story of where a defining childhood moment created an emotional raw spot. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lV85-DryVZM
Dive Deeper…
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