If it’s easy getting into a relationship with an exploiter, getting out isn’t always so simple. What makes the getting out so difficult?
In retrospect (if we’re lucky enough to say “in retrospect”) it seems like it should have been a no-brainer. In truth there are many reasons it can be hard to leave a destructive relationship and destructive person. I’ve addressed several of them in previous posts, and the LoveFraud community in general has addressed this theme comprehensively.
But here I’d like to consider a less-appreciated factor.
I regard it as the factor of habituation. Optimally the best time to end a relationship with an exploiter is the very first signal you get that something is amiss. The next best time to leave the relationship would the second signal that something is amiss.
When we don’t act on these early signals, increasingly we are less likely to act on subsequent ones. One of many reasons for this is the process of habituation.
Habituation is basically how, through repeated exposure to something initially uncomfortable, even highly disturbing, we adjust to it. We are built, it seems, to habituate to unsettling situations and experiences.
And the key to successful habituation is exposure. Sustained exposure to almost anything increases our tolerance of, and comfort with, it.
Consider what happens when we’re willing to endure the initial shock of cold water in a lake, or pool. Our sustained exposure (non-flight) gradually results in our bodies’ adjusting, or habituating, to the cold water, which begins to feel less cold, maybe even warm.
This is great news for someone with a social phobia. We just have to be willing to intentionally expose ourselves, repeatedly and sustainedly, to disturbing social situations, and quite likely we’ll experience a gradual reduction of anxiety.
Unfortunately the same thing can be said of abusive, exploitative relationships. The longer you expose yourself to, and repeatedly tolerate, the abuse, the more habituated you become to it.
Alarming behaviors that initially signaled our self-protective response (like flight) gradually lose their activating properties as we habituate to them. The avoidance-flight signal particularly—in the face of repeated, sustained exposure—dulls and/or we become less responsive to it.
Heeding the avoidant-flight response, in other words, can be critical to our safety and self-interest. It is great to confront and conquer avoidance when the avoidance hinders our personal growth; but it is dangerous to do so in the face of real, violating circumstances.
When I work with partners of sociopaths and other abusers, I find that habituation to the exploiter’s abuse often has occurred over time and contributes to the inertia that keeps the exploited partner in the relationship.
Of course there are often many other (and sometimes more compelling) reasons that one stays in a relationship with an exploitative partner.
But habituation to the abuse, I believe, is not only real, but sometimes helps explain why an otherwise dignified individual would tolerate behaviors that, from the outside—that is, from the unhabituated’s perspective—should be (or should have been) no-brainer deal-breakers.
When relevant I encourage clients to examine this factor in their analysis of the indignities they’ve sustained sometimes for years in relationships with disturbed, violating partners.
Paradoxically (and precisely to my point) their suffering was often highest early in the relationship before, through habituation, they grew slowly more numb and inured to—more tolerant of—the abuse, and thereby less motivated to do what was advisable at the outset—flee.
(This article is copyrighted (c) 2008 by Steve Becker, LCSW.)
LIG- I am so sorry you are suffering so much right now. I have a lot of pain. too. I am going to go to the library, & try to find that book to read. Not understanding why so much pain was inflicted upon us is really hard. Maybe if we just find out some of the answers, we can regain some of ourselves that was so savagely taken away.
sstiles:
i’m doing okay.
my anger and disbelief doesn’t last too long these days. i rage or cry for an hour or so, then i’m okay again. much better than 4 months ago … i was a total mess ALL the time.
i find the best thing is to come here to LF and rage away, listen to the loving advice, punch a pillow, cry and then get up and do something nice for yourself or someone else.
thanks for your kindness.
Dear LIG,
I too am sorry that you are suffering. I sort of felt the same way “WHY?” “Why so much suffering in this world?”
I read a wonderful book “Man’s search for Meaning” written by Dr. Viktor Frankl. Dr. Frankl was in the Nazi prison camps during WWII and lost everything but his life. His wife, his family, his home, the manuscript of the book he had written.
He too searched for “meaning” in all the suffering that he had seen and experienced. He saw the different ways that people responded to the suffering. Some of them became mean themselves and would destroy things “just because I have suffered” they wanted to make other things and other people suffer too, others would withdraw totally from everyone, and some people became BETTER because of the sufferings that they experienced. He wanted to know why different people responded in different ways.
His spirituality and his LOVE for his wife (at the time he didn’t know she was dead) kept him going, made him want to live, to find meaning in what horrors he had experienced, to become a better person because of them.
His book was written from the emotional aspects of the suffering he experienced, and how many of those that died just “gave up” and died. It was an eye opener for me, and I determined that I would root out the hate in my heart, the bitterness against those people who have devalued and discarded me, those people who have tried to kill me, and I would become a BETTER person, not a bitter and angry shell. I will not let the deprive me of JOY, and PEACE and happiness.
If I let that bitterness carrode my soul, fill me with ugly thoughts and emotions, then they have WON. Their total goals in life are to WIN and to make everyone else LOSE. I refuse to lose to these EVIL beings. I don’t know the mind of God, (whatever form He takes, or by whatever name) but I do know that people are more than just animals, and more than just robots, we have spirits and souls and minds. We have choices to make ourselves into something and someone GOOD. I started trying to forgive the psychopaths, to get the bitterness out of my heart toward them. Not for them, but for ME.
Then, I realized that I still had bitterness and anger against myself for “being so stupid” for letting the deprive me of so many decades of goodness. I realized that I had to forgive myself for doing that, and for being less than I wanted to be because I was in pain and in my pain I would strike out at others who truly did love me.
I am far from Perfect, but I am a better person today than I was before I encountered the TRUE EVIL in these people. I can’t change them, but I can change my REACTION to them.
An animal that has been mistreated doesn’t understand the reason and in general they can’t determine WHY they were mistreated. They grow to distrust all people because they can’t distinguish which one hurt them or why. We, because of a higher intellect and a spiritual aspect that animals don’t have, so we can rise above this FEAR of abuse, and we can decide not to let ourselves be abused again, and we can heal from this abuse and find MEANING FROM LIFE. Even from abuse, and use this to make ourselves better, stronger, wiser and more caring people, not filled with hate or bitterness or FEAR, but JOY, AND PEACE AND HAPPINESS.
Whether or not this is accomplished through a belief in a God or a “higher power” or just your own spiritual aspect of yourself, doesn’t matter. The poiint of LF and of our sharing of how we are moving on, finding out about Psychopaths, and about OURSELVES, is the key to it all. Peace, Joy and Happiness to you, my dear! ((((hugs))))
Boy am I ever a hypocrite, telling people to let go of anger. I have been angry all week over stupid insults and injuries from co-workers and internet site members. I forget sometimes how deep betrayal can run with people we felt we could trust. Please forgive me if I sound smug sometimes. I just have a run of good days and forget about the bad ones. I think blogging about it when you angry is so therapeutic. You can get to the bottom of what you feel angry about and then learn what you need to learn from your feelings. Maybe then you can start to reach for the rainbow on the other side.
I don’t know if other Libras (or libra rising people) can relate to this. I’m really quick when I am insulted to see the other person’s point of view and try to be kind. Sometimes I gloss over my own feelings. I’m trying so hard to work on this.
StarG
ox: that book you speak of reminds me of ‘night’ by elie wiesel. it’s amazing how people endure such horror and mistreatment and come out of it with a will to do nothing but heal themselves, others, and the world. they are truly my inspiration, because i’m one who tends to withdraw and become reclusive in my pain.
if i didn’t have a job, i’d never go outside. but slowly, i’m realizing (esp. with the election and a new president i can be proud of (hopefully forever)), there is so much to be done and i must be a part of the solution.
i’ve always been a very good person; compassionate, caring, etc. but i’ve often done good in fits and starts because my pain has been so great that i too sometimes have a big ol’ angry chip on my nyc italian shoulder!
but, as i start to emerge from the fog of this experience of finally understanding my penchant for these s/p/n demons, and knowing who and what they are, it’s starting to motivate me to think like my idealistic 20’s self. i can do more, be more, act more to help those who need help. those who truly APPRECIATE help and can FEEL the love and healing i project.
please watch CNN tonite at 8 p.m. wanna get inspired!?! wow!
star:
that doesn’t make you a hypocrite, it makes you HUMAN.
letting go of the level of anger we feel is much MUCH easier said than done. we have every right to be angry. we are responding NORMALLY to an incredibly aggregious ABNORMAL experience.
one thing that has helped me deal with my anger is something my loving minister (unityofnewyork.org) said to me in the depth of my anguish: ”remember, you are a spiritual being simply having a human experience.” something about that statement helps me every time i’m furiously raging against my ex (my other ex’s, the pain my father caused me, etc) and what they did. my minister says i (and others who are tested on this level) are getting our ”spiritual doctorate”!!
there is a rainbow, but it’s not on the other side, it’s inside. we simply must ‘choose’ it over the dismal rain that falls in our hearts.
lol … now i sound like a hypocrite! but the point is, we KNOW what we must do for our healing. doing it is just a process a bit more difficult than our objective knowledge of the pain of others.
love to all.
TOWANDA!!!
Dear LIG,
Your comment to me and to Star are so very right on. It is easier in the saying than the DOING! LOL
And you are so right, we ARE human no matter how we set our selves up to be “perfect” and then fail at that and then BOINK ourselves with our own “iron skillets” for not being perfect.
We have to set reasonable and rational goals for what kind of people we want to be and then strive for those goals, but give ourselves some “slack” when we don’t achieve those goals 110%. LOL
I know that the “perfection” that my mother expected of me, and I never acheived (therefore was a “failure”) were not reasonable goals, but something she could use to feel superior to me, and I accepted the inferior status. I didn’t have to, but I did, because I sought her approval for my self esteem, rather than seeking my own approval. Then after I was grown, I still couldn’t find her or my own approval because I still accepted her standards.
Now, I am setting new standards, and being good to myself, being reasonable with myself—though I too backslide from time to time—but, guess what I DON’T HAVE TO BE PERFECT ANY MORE TO BE GOOD! I can forgive myself for being human and imperfect. I like your minister’s comments, and I think I have a POST DOCTORAL DEGREE IN PSYCHOPATHIC STUDIES, FROM THE UNIVERSITY OF HARD KNOCKS (Uof HK) LOL (((HUGS))))
ox: LOL…
my dad was the s/p and i always felt not good enough. every time i did what he wanted, the rules changed (sound familiar?) and i was at the bottom of the totem pole again. not pretty enough (why can’t you look like your friend samantha?!); not smart enough (a B+! where’s the A’s??); not feminine enough (why don’t you wear a DRESS once in a while). etc etc. what an a-hole.
so here i am, at 50, still trying to be everything to everyone so i’ll be accepted. and yet, there’s this other side that knows how smart and competent and loving and etc i am! those two sides of me have warred for years.
no more. i’m really trying to be whole and to allow those two sides to call a truce. i’m good enough as i am. know why? because i’m a perfect child of god.
and so are you … and you … and you!
towanda!!!
“I forget sometimes how deep betrayal can run with people we felt we could trust. ”
Dupes are depressing. On one hand, we’d like to kick their assets up between their ears for the stoopid stuff they say and do. On the other hand, we know they’re acting out of ignorance, not malice. It really ties our hands, and causes a toxic sludge of fight/fight hormones to build up in our bodies. This makes us stressed, and stress can make us sick.
Try to exercise. This is a great way to deal with the flight/fight cocktail that’s flowing through your veins. That’s because these chemicals were designed to make you very effective in dealing with a physical threat. Dealing with a psycho-social threat – not so much. Get physical, and your body’s chemistry will work for you instead of against you. After that, I like to watch goofy comedies and read trashy romance novels. I call it watching/reading for chemical effect. The chemical effect is remarkably positive. (Go to the little girl’s room BEFORE watching Madagascar II! I nearly lost all dignity laughing over that movie.)
When you are not able to completely neutralize the constant adrenaline dump you’re experiencing, give up caffeine. I guarantee you’ll feel absolutely no withdrawal symptoms, but it may help you refrain from throttling an innocent bystander.
Eureka!!!
Dear friends,
Since I’ve recognized that I tend to be targeted by Ss, Ps, & Ns, I’ve searched to find ways to keep my bacon out of the fire.
“What am I doing that makes me vulnerable?” I’ve asked myself. Every once in a while, I find a useful tool or two. Yesterday I had one of those Eureka moments. I was digging about looking for solutions, (which are pretty thin on the ground if you ask me), and I found this.
http://www.mental-health-today.com/articles/drama.htm
Oh yeah. Dummy here is definately a “rescuer”. “Alrighty then, now what?” I’m suposed to shift to “clear nurturing, but that concept has not been clearly defined. I dig some more. (Picture enthusiastic golden retriever making random holes in your pristine backyard.”
Ah Hah. Suweet! Stuff I can use. Maybe you can too.
http://www.parenteducationsask.ca/pdf/drama_triangle.pdf
Hope it helps someone. Blessings all! I’m going out to goof off.
Elizabeth