Home→Forums→Relationships→Taking a break
- This topic has 265 replies, 6 voices, and was last updated 1 month, 2 weeks ago by anita.
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June 26, 2024 at 11:09 pm #434300ChauParticipant
Hello Heclat
Thank you. Agree relationship is about two people and we both contribute to what it is today. I cannot think for her part as this is her growth journey, I can only think of my part as a person, on how to grow and how I can improve, so that I am better able to love someone in the future.
Thanks for sharing your story, it takes courage and determination to continue with a relationship which involves hurt indeed. I will work on myself and hopefully she does, we can see if we will both on the same page when we meet a few weeks later.
Have a great evening on your side.
Clara
June 27, 2024 at 1:31 am #434302HelcatParticipantHi Chau / Clara
I think that you have a really great perspective. It takes a lot of honesty and courage to work on oneself. I think it’s also important to treat yourself with love during that process. There are reasons why patterns exist. People learned it from somewhere.
I agree, it does take courage to give a relationship where there have been difficulties a chance because vulnerablity is hard. I think that has been a problem for me. Being vulnerable during disagreements. It is much easier to communicate with someone when they are being vulnerable and vice versa much easier to be defensive if someone else is already defensive.
I think this is also why forgiveness is important. It is hard not to be defensive when all of the past hurt is being carried into the present. Sometimes the past hurt isn’t even the person in front of you, but also memories of other difficult relationships.
I wish you both good luck with everything, I hope that you have a nice evening too!
Love and best wishes! ❤️😊
June 27, 2024 at 2:55 am #434304ChauParticipantthanks all
just now during work i missed her so much all of a sudden.
its such a roller coaster ride to have fear anger sad etcetc and the feeling the love for someone and missing that person dearly
I tried to catch myself, asking myself to calm down. distracted myself and tried to go back to work
I tried to treat this as my exercise, but the emotional ride is exhausting phew
Chau
June 27, 2024 at 6:27 am #434310anitaParticipantDear Clara:
“It’s such a roller coaster ride to have fear, anger, sad, etc… the emotional ride is exhausting phew.“- I wonder if there are Emotion Regulation exercises that you are not currently practicing that can help regulate the ups and downs today and every day, particularly in the next few weeks.
anita
June 27, 2024 at 6:36 am #434311ChauParticipantHi Anita,
I am not aware of what practice is available, if you can shed some light that would be awesome
Thank you
Chau
June 27, 2024 at 7:00 am #434312anitaParticipantDear Clara
(Do you prefer to be addressed as Chau or Clara?)
In my first quality psychotherapy, the therapist’s priority was to have me practice emotion regulation skills because intense emotions sort of hold a person hostage and prevent reasonable behavior, learning and making progress. He used to send me links to Mark William’s mindfulness meditations audios (he’s a mindfulness expert of sorts in Oxford University). There are mindfulness themed guided meditations available online, audios and videos. Listening/ watching a few you like (one at a time) during the day, and/ or at bedtime is one emotion regulation practice.
Another is daily exercise, particularly the aerobic kind (fast walking is what I do), another is yoga, and/ or Tai Chi (the latter, a slow-motion martial art form does wonders when it comes to slowing down the brain).
Another is the practice of CBT (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy): you identify the thought or thoughts behind an intense emotion that took over you, write it down, and examine it: is it true? is it untrue? After correcting an untrue/ distorted thought, the intense feeling calms down.
There are many books, handbooks and online resources on emotion regulation (and on CBT) with exercises and suggestions. Googling just now, Master Your Emotions: A Practical Guide To Overcome Negativity And Better Manage Your Feelings reads like a promising title.
anita
June 27, 2024 at 7:27 am #434316ChauParticipantHi Anita
Thanks for asking. Chau/ Clara are both fine, people address me both ways.
It happened I just registered a mediation app called ‘balance’. I will start small and may be have daily mediation session.
I used to run marathon and subsequently trail running a couple of years ago, those are one of my ‘lightest’ years, emotionally and physically . I stopped because of some injur,ies may be it is a good idea to resume
I do yoga regularly indeed. I actually am interested in Tai Chi. I always wanted to try but never had a chance, but may be I should
I have some basic idea about CBT. I was writing journal since day 1 of the break, instead of just scribbing may be involving CBT is a good idea.
It’s getting late on my side, have a goodnight/ morning to you.
Chau
June 27, 2024 at 7:38 am #434317anitaParticipantDear Clara:
You are welcome and thank you for wishing me good morning. Yes, I remember that you shared about running marathons and doing yoga. I prefer brisk walking (or swimming, if I had daily access to a pool) over running as a form of daily aerobic exercise because it’s way easier on the knees, particularly if a person carries excess weight (you wrote that you were lighter in earlier years).
The quality of the Tai Chi class experience is all about the quality of the Sifu (teacher- master).
Good night, Clara!
anita
June 27, 2024 at 7:36 pm #434338ChauParticipantHi Anita and all
I am browsing other topics and I saw other people suddenly fall out of love as well.
Reading them helped me recognize the suffering they are going through, which is probably the things my partner is going through now.
My conclusion so far, for this situation is:
I understand she is suffering and lost and frustrated, i know she sees me having quality as a life long partner but she needs time to think if we can adjusted to the ups and downs in the long term relationship. Falling out of love makes her very confused as on one hand she sees my qualities, on the other hand she is, falling out of love.
” I wish she could tell me earlier” , this popped up in my head. I think this is the exact same thing I said, when I shared about her almost 6 years ago, about her not telling me about her ex. This probably needs to be addressed if we stay together, even if we break up, she has to think about it on her own how this is affecting her relationship as well(not that I can control if this is the case). I think if she tells me on her own, rather than wait for me to ask whether she likes me and went silence, this could have made me feel way better.
Other than that, I sometime have some overreacting and made her scared, she takes my emotions as her responsibilities and it seems those are too heavy for her. But in fact, my emotions should be mainly my responsibilities, and I will take that as my duty instead.
I did sink in that you mentioned relationship can be an aim. If i aim for her as a life long partner, then we have to do something(compromise/ sacrifice / pay effort) to make this work. With no consistent work, things may fall apart again
Thanks all, good morning to me and goodnight to you all
Clara
June 27, 2024 at 9:03 pm #434340anitaParticipantDear Clara:
You are welcome. Whenever you feel judgmental of her, shift to empathy for her.
Whenever you feel judgmental of yourself, shift to empathy for yourself.
anita
June 27, 2024 at 10:18 pm #434348HelcatParticipantHi Chau / Clara
I think it’s really great that you are putting in the work on figuring things out during the break.
You have been feeling a lot recently, including anger. Anger is an emotion with a purpose. It lets you know when you have unmet needs or when boundaries have been crossed. When you understand the reason it is easier to let go because you can address it.
I would agree in some cases about people falling out of love when they are hurt. The days where I fell out of love, I felt deeply hurt by my partner. I was doubting the relationship.
Yes, it is not helpful for you to have to be the one to notice when something is wrong. She needs to communicate more openly and tell you.
Does your partner share her emotions with you? It is good for people to support each other, as well as taking responsibility for our own emotions.
Yes, relationships do take a lot of work and compromise. Even good relationships.
I hope it is okay if I share with you some things that my partner and I learned in couples counselling.
Check in with each other and ask how was your day every day, at a particular time can be helpful.
Keep difficult conversations to 30 minutes. Set a timer.
During difficult conversations take turns to talk for 5 minutes each, the other person is not allowed to speak during your time. A timer is helpful here too.
Taking a break when difficult converstions get too much can be helpful. Some people like to use a funny code word for that. Lollipop for example.
This is something that we noticed. When there relationship problems talking about it all of the time is stressful and wears on the relationship. Nothing ever cools down or feels normal. So we made a rule to only discuss relationship problems once a week for 30 minutes. After a meal. Judges often make better decisions sentencing after a meal.
This involved planning what to talk about and doing it piece by piece because there isn’t a huge amount of time for discussion. It gave us a sense of normalcy in the relationship back and taught us to defer talking about problems until we’d cooled down and given it some thought.
Love and best wishes! ❤️🙏
June 28, 2024 at 7:42 am #434360ChauParticipantHi all,
Just as i thought i was on the rise. I had another break down
I went home for dinner with my parents. My mom has dementia, and my greatest fear in recent years, was that she would no longer recognize me.
Today, as I was sitting on the same table with her, she mumbled ‘when is my daughter coming back for dinner’. I asked her to look at me and see who i was, and she laughed and realized she didn’t notice me. She did this twice. I held my tears until I went back to the hotel, where sadly this has become my temporarily home,and I had a massive outburst. I cried like a baby just now, even worse than the night when my on-a-break partner did not respond to my question of whether she still likes me or not.
i tried to ground myself after the cry. I so wanted to call her just now, she knows this is my greatest fear in the recent years, too bad I couldn’t
Clara
June 28, 2024 at 8:09 am #434363anitaParticipantDear Clara:
I am sorry that your mother suffers from dementia, and that you suffer too.
“she laughed and realized she didn’t notice me“- I wonder if she laughed because she was trying to make light of it, so that you will not be upset, or perhaps she was embarrassed (?)
Interesting, the title of your thread is “Taking a break“- in regard to the break from your girlfriend. Your mother had a break from registering that you were there at the dinner table (twice), and then you “had another break down” at the hotel.
We experience breaks from people while being physically close to them, like your mother not recognizing you while you were there at the dinner table with her, and you and your girlfriend experienced breaks in the relationship while still living together, before the current physical break.
It is important to be connected and remain connected to people we care about, as much as possible. What had caused me to have breaks with people, has been my judgmental, quick to anger attitude and tendency. This is why I practice what I suggested for you to do in my previous post: shift from judgment to empathy.
It’s late at night where you’re at. I hope that you are sleeping or are about to sleep restfully following crying like a baby. If not, and otherwise, please feel free to post anytime, to use your thread as a journal and a place to communicate with us here.
anita
June 28, 2024 at 8:37 am #434365HelcatParticipantHi Chau / Clara
That is awful that your worst fear happened while you are on a break with your partner. I bet you wanted nothing more than to talk to her.
I’m sure that it would be your mother’s worst fear too to not recognise her family. On the plus side she was asking for you. I think that shows how much she cares. She was waiting for you. ❤️ Her brain is misfiring. Even with that happening, she still cared. I hope that she recognises you again soon.
I’m so sorry. Please take extra special of yourself in these challenging times.
Love and best wishes! ❤️🙏
June 29, 2024 at 12:55 am #434375ChauParticipantHi all
Thanks
I am glad to make this a semi-private journal, I feel quite safe here, sharing with you while remain mostly anoynomous.
Last night I called my friend who learned somatic experiencing technique. She guided me a bit which helped me feel more grounded.
She said I actually had good inner intelligence, it suddenly occured to me that I have my own flow when it comes to healing myself. Knowing the first week is tough and I let my emotions out, let the physically part(crying, sighing) be in sync with my emotion(frustration/ disappointment/ scared). And I know i had to stop somewhere, to pull mself up and stand on my feet, that is when I looked for ways to help mself such as to meditate and do aerobic exercise as Anita suggested. I did manage to had a brisk walk in the gym and meditated even after my big cry, which in retrospect, I am proud of. Proud of myself for trying hard during the challenging time.
I will definitely remember to be kind and empathetic to myself and to my partner. In fact these days when I had negative thoughts, I remembered this and i tried to think of her good. this helps lift me up. But sometime I would be scared to not think of the worst, and I am not prepared for the bad things to happen(she breaks up with me/ she lied to me), then I would have not been prepared for this. It’s so hard to find the balance, to be positive yet expects the worst.
This morning I went volunteer, I learned some sign languages and I visisted people with deaf and hearing impaired. I occured to me that my problem could actually be very small, if I let it shrink and not keep feeding it. There is this woman who is only 2 years older than me, who is suffering from mental problem, jobless, and her mother is the only person who takes care of her 24/7, scared that if she didn’t keep an eye out for her she would go out and get lost(the woman did get lost one time and spent 3 days 2 nights unable to find her way back home). This is a single parent family and they are the only person for each other.
Today I also did some shopping, my other friend said maintaining a relationship includes taking care of yourself(mentally/ physically/ outlook), I went to buy some nice new clothes which I had been sooo lazy to do. I lost the motivation to make myself look better(outlook wise), in a way I feel this is true also, if you don’t think yourself is beautiful, how would anyone think this way?
Will post again, have a good morning on your side
Chau
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