What’s the “benefit” of repeatedly re-enacting challenging relationship dynamics?

[barefoot]

Thanks @PreciousChild - encouraging to hear that this helped you.

I did start reading The Body Keeps the Score quite a while back but found it hard to get into and had to keep re-reading bits to try to make them stick. I don’t think I got as far as the section you mention. I think I am perhaps a bit more ready in many ways to give the book another try. I will definitely take another look. Thanks.

 

[The ANP]

Sometimes the way we frame the question sets the limit on the answer. I am late to the conversation and I have read enough to get the gist of the conversation. Here is my take: it is not always that we get a benefit per se. Sometimes it is that being exposed to repeat boundary violations can cause us to normalize and accept that behavior in other relationships. As you have said, you verbalized what is wrong but found yourself apologizing to someone because you were afraid the relationship would end. I spent many years accepting abuse at the hands of many relationships because I had learned this was to be expected and the way I deserved to be treated. My biggest fear was being alone. It took a long time to learn that setting boundaries often meant respecting myself enough to walk away from others who could not for whatever reason meet my boundary expectations. I think the idea of "the Imago" AKA we seek out relationships like the ones of our early caregivers and or abusers is outdated and not based on best evidence. I have benefited from approaching my past actions with compassion. That has helped me with my healing process.

 

[barefoot]

Sometimes the way we frame the question sets the limit on the answer.

Yeah...the question in the title was basically a question put to me by my T last week and I said I’d think about it because I struggled to see a real benefit...hence I thought I’d throw it out to the floor here.

Sometimes it is that being exposed to repeat boundary violations can cause us to normalize and accept that behavior in other relationships.

Yes, I think there’s truth in this that resonates with me.

you verbalized what is wrong but found yourself apologizing to someone because you were afraid the relationship would end.

I wasn’t conscious of fearing the relationship to end...more conscious of not wanting them to be upset or angry with me and it turning into a heavy, messy conflict.

But maybe there is something about endings for me to think about.

setting boundaries often meant respecting myself enough to walk away from others who could not for whatever reason meet my boundary expectations.

Yes. And I did do that with each of these...I guess I just wonder (aka feel like an idiot and feel annoyed with myself) why I didn’t do it sooner.

I have benefited from approaching my past actions with compassion.

Ha! See my previous comment!
Yes...don’t think I’m very good at self-compassion at the moment. I’m trying to get better at it.

I think the idea of "the Imago" AKA we seek out relationships like the ones of our early caregivers and or abusers is outdated and not based on best evidence

I don’t know any research on this, so don’t have a view either way.
I don’t feel that I sought out these three people because they in some way and to some level perhaps represented/mirrored some historical, abusive dynamics. I wonder though if then getting caught in the tricky dynamic later on in these relationships made it difficult for me to leave/made me keep going back. Partly because of your point about what we learn about boundaries. And partly because my boundaries were wobbly (so I kept trying to make good the relationship instead of leaving) And partly because I wanted reparation/resolution - in those relationships and possibly in the past abusive ones if there was some re-enactment going on for me with these three people.

Lots to think about - thanks.

 

[The ANP]

I say trust your instincts, if it feels true to you, probably is. Everybody has opinions, including therapists. Some of my most productive therapy sessions have started with, this part is off base, but here is where I am at with it...

Sounds to me you believe your prior relationships with teachers were not grooming? If so, it is ok and appropriate to explore that dynamic in therapy.

 

[barefoot]

@The ANP - Sure, I don’t have an issue with saying in therapy that something doesn’t resonate or that. “I don’t think it’s that...I think it’s this...”
And my therapist’s fine with that too - she’s not one to push her view. She just throws something out there sometimes and it takes us wherever it takes us.

It’s not actually that I don’t believe the teacher stuff was grooming. It’s been something that has been bothering me for a while but it’s only just now that I’m starting to share it and explore it in therapy. And me bringing it up in therapy - it came up because of the other relationship dynamic stuff, which kind of segued into me bringing the teachers up.

I’m not really bothered about the grooming label per se...I’m not very clear whether it was technically grooming or not and I’m not really hung up on that. As an ex-teacher, I know that some of the things they said and did were very inappropriate. They were things that, now, if a pupil reported these same things, the teachers involved would be formally investigated and disciplined - the headteacher and one other, at least, would have lost their jobs. This was happening with me over 20 years ago. Things were different then. I don’t know what - if anything - would have happened if I’d have reported them. But I didn’t, so...

At the time, I was sometimes embarrassed, sometimes felt awkward, was sometimes confused...but I didn’t ultimately see that they were doing anything “wrong”. And I wanted to spend time with them. I liked them. I preferred to hang out with adults than with my peers. Despite the embarrassment, awkwardness and confusion that I sometimes felt with them.

Now, I can see that they absolutely shouldn’t have been the way that they were with me. That is actually quite a painful realisation. And, as I was a teenager and they were in a position of trust and authority, I think it’s probably understanding that I found it confusing. I still find it confusing and troubling and I feel uncomfortable thinking back on some of it.

The dynamics that showed up in these teacher dynamics are definitely something that I want to keep exploring in therapy, having only just introduced them last session.

I suspect that, ultimately, doing so will also lead back to touching on some of the doctor stuff too, which I tend to be quite avoidant about discussing. I know I need to do it...I think it just feels frightening and shameful and that’s why I find it hard to go there.