Can’t Let Go of a Bad Relationship?

Old 06-19-2007, 12:50 PM
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Can’t Let Go of a Bad Relationship?

Can’t Let Go of a Bad Relationship?
by Susan Anderson

Do you know someone who stays in a bad relationship? What hooks them? The standard answer is that they don’t feel good enough about themselves. They don’t feel they deserve better. Their have a low sense of entitlement.

While self esteem is certainly a factor, many of these people started out feeling much better about themselves than they do now.

Being constantly criticized, rejected, neglected, or abused eventually pays its toll. The low self-worth you see is not always the CAUSE of their being unable to leave, but the RESULT of having been treated this way. Once they feel low about themselves, they lose the strength to get out.

But there is more to it. They have become traumatically bonded.

A traumatic bond is created when pain is inflicted into the attachment. This bond is stronger (just like epoxy glue is stronger than rubber cement) than a non-traumatic bond. The more traumatic the bond, the harder to get out.

There are examples of this everywhere in nature and science. Researches found that when training a duck to “imprint” them, when they accidentally “stepped on the duck’s toe,” the duck imprinted them more than before. Science has conducted myriad experiments that demonstrate the power of “pain” to strengthen the bond. It’s the principle fraternities use in hazing where they humiliate or hurt their pledges to instill greater loyalty in them.

But there is still another factor which really cements people to the abuser. They get hooked by the “intermittent reinforcement.” The abuser, every once in a while, will give them what they need, i.e. “a pat on the arm” or saying “love you” or “bringing home a paycheck.” It’s intermittent.

If you ever studied classical conditioning (Pavlov’s dog and all of that), you may remember that if you want to “train” a rat to respond a certain way, rather than giving a steady reward (i.e. sugar pellet), give it only intermittently. Intermittent reinforcement is more powerful than steady reinforcement.

This explains the paradox of relationships. If your partner mistreats you in all kinds of emotional or physical ways, you run the risk of getting deeply hooked in.

You’d think it would work the other way – that if your partner made you feel secure, safe, and comfortable, you’d have a hard time leaving. But the irony is that many people feel freer to leave someone who has made them feel secure. Ever hear “nice guys finish last?”

But if they are made to feel chronically insecure, heart-sick, anxious, or hurt, they can get caught up in the drama of the abuse and locked into the dynamics of the relationship– especially if every once in a while, their partner gives them a little crumb of love – intermittent reinforcement.

If you are in a traumatic bond, you not only suffer from your partner’s criticism, blame, betrayal, unreliability, or neglect, but you suffer from beating yourself up for allowing it to happen.

You feel guilty for not being able to leave. Your friends may get fed up with you for being so stuck. Even your therapist loses patience. You feel judged. You feel weak. You feel ashamed of yourself.

"Why did you STAY?" comes the invariable question.

"Because I loved him," comes the equally invariable response.

Abuser tells Abused, "I love you," and these women continue to sell themselves out to hear the occasional utterance of three hollow words, meaning nothing to the abuser.

The more infrequently the “crumbs of love” are offered, the more hooked you are. You become conditioned, like a rat in the cage.
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Old 06-19-2007, 12:51 PM
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The Case for Traumatic Bonding: The Betrayal Bond
by Dr. Patrick Carnes

About Trauma Bonding:

These people are all struggling with traumatic bonds. Those standing outside see the obvious. All these relationships are about some insane loyalty or attachment. They share exploitation, fear, and danger. They also have elements of kindness, nobility and righteousness. These are all people who stay involved or wish to stay involved with people who betray them. Emotional pain, severe consequences and even the prospect of death do not stop their caring or commitment. Clinicians call this “traumatic bonding.” This means that the victims have a certain dysfunctional attachment that occurs in the presence of danger, shame, or exploitation. There often is seduction, deception or betrayal. There is always some form of danger or risk.

Some relationships are traumatic. Take, for example, the conflictual ties in movies like The War of the Roses orFatal Attraction. What Lucy does to Charlie Brown (in the comic strip, Peanuts) every year when she holds the football for him to kick is a betrayal we have grown to expect. Abuse cycles such as those found in domestic violence are built around trauma bonds. So are the misplaced loyalties found in exploitive cults, incest families, or hostage and kidnapping situations. Codependents who live with alcoholics, compulsive gamblers, or sex addicts, and who will not leave no matter what their partners do, may have suffered enough to have a traumatic bond.

Here are the signs that trauma bonds exist in your life:

When you obsess about people who have hurt you though they are long gone from your life (To obsess means to be preoccupied, fantasize about, and wonder about something/someone even though you do not want to.)

When you continue to seek contact with people whom you know will cause you further pain.

When you go “overboard” to help people who have been destructive to you.

When you continue to be a “team” member when obviously things are becoming destructive.

When you continue attempts to get people who are clearly using you to like you.

When you again and again trust people who have proved to be unreliable.

When you are unable to distance yourself from unhealthy relationships.

When you want to be understood by those who clearly do not care.

When you choose to stay in conflict with others when it would cost you nothing to walk away.

When you persist in trying to convince people that there is a problem and they are not willing to listen.

When you are loyal to people who have betrayed you.

When you are attached to untrustworthy people.

When you keep damaging secrets about exploitation or abuse.

When you continue contact with an abuser who acknowledges no responsibility.

About co-dependency:

“Parallels do exist between trauma bonding and codependency because to live with an active addict is often traumatic. For the most part, the addiction field has not incorporated all the trauma research that documents how people grow closer to their abusers in the face of trauma. Yet it is clear that many codependents are also trauma-bonded. The converse is also true. The trauma field has not really addressed issues surrounding addiction, let alone codependency. Yet addiction in its many forms is one of the principal solutions used by survivors to cope with their lives. And most trauma-bonded persons, whether as children or adults, are involved with an abuser who has one or more addictions.”

About shame:

An injury to one’s sense of self forges some bonds. The self-injury becomes part of the fabric of the relationship and further disrupts the natural unfolding of the self. When this involves terror of any sort, an emptiness forms at the core of the person and the self becomes inconsolable. No addiction can fill in. No denial of self will restore it. No single gesture will be believable. Only a profound sense of the human community caring for the self can seal up this hole. We call this wound shame.
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Old 06-22-2007, 12:50 AM
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Thumbs up

I think this is so TRUE i want to move it back to the top!!!
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Old 06-22-2007, 01:55 AM
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..but what happens when you are in that type of relationship.. but you know that you deserve better? and you dont have low-self esteem or any of that... you just happen to fall in love with them before the addictions?

I like that "crumbs of love" metaphor because it is soooo so true.
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Old 06-22-2007, 07:44 AM
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I know "I" have some major issues stemming from my husband's addiction but 'codependent' info didn't quite hit home...this nailed it right on the head for me.

I see that your two articles came from different sources so I'm guessing this wasn't from a book?????? I will do some research because I want to learn more.
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Old 09-22-2013, 10:00 AM
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Bump.
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