"I miss him like that!" Why do we want to return the ex who does us no good?
I. Julia misses Max
Anton is great, Julia thinks. They went for a walk, cooked, then had sex. Now they are sitting in the cinema. Strange, she thinks, the distance with which she perceives him. She could howl: There's someone on the side who's undoubtedly great, but her heart stays numb. She longs for Max, type "catastrophe".
Julia ponders. How, damn, can that be? At the end of the relationship with Max she was a bundle of nerves, almost thrown out of her job because of him. But the guy will not let her go. She is ashamed of Anton. She is ashamed of those who know her story and wonder: why is this woman still hanging on to this man who did not do her any good?
Four years ago, she met Maxwhile jogging in the woods. Julia, 38, just back from London, stretched the muscles, he spoke to her. She is Event Manager, her life is a constant rush. Max works in a sports shop. Regulated working hours, everything easy. Traveling in the world, that would not be for him. Jazz? Help! He likes country. He kills her with his offensive charm, with his masculine appeal. Julia ignores the internal alarm that sparks: He does not suit you! Soon she finds herself on a roller coaster that catapults her to ecstatic heights and then tears into despair until she finally gets out after three years. And hit hard: far away from yourself.
For the Hamburg psychologist Dr. Angelika Faas is clear which principle worked here: The dangerous principle "dream man", which holds our subconscious like a safety net. Maybe the man who casts a spell on us has the same Anpacker charisma we loved so much about our father? Or does he resemble the one boy for whom all girlfriends swarmed and did not have the spark of a chance? As one emerges and embodies the promise that finally a deep yearning will come true.
Julia is like this: finally someone who knows what he wants. Your phone number. Then she. So far, she has lived with the feeling of having to be active in relationships. Max says at the second meeting, "I want you, whole. Forever." Big, strong, unique.
A childish longing, analyzed the couple therapist and ChroniquesDuVasteMonde psychologist Oskar Holzberg: To be loved unconditionally, one can expect from his parents, disappointment mostly included. In a relationship among adults, this expectation is inappropriate, one should distrust the corresponding bait. The one who ejects them expresses above all his own childish wishes - and woe, they are not fulfilled.
The film is blurring on the screen, Julia thinks of the first ugly scene with Max: They were a week on a Greek island, lots of sex, have fun. At the airport she met a colleague. He told me about a project in California: Would she like to come in? Max did not speak to her on the return flight. He just scolded that he did not like her upset nature.
That was the prelude. Then it happened in quick succession. He grew more grumpy, making derogatory remarks when she told others about her job. When she left for work, he did not answer her text message. There was no way to talk about it. Julia was suffering. She canceled orders, she defended herself when she went to the pub with colleagues. "When I was on the road, I was always peering at my watch," she says.
Then the end. In a final pronunciation, Julia tries to explain that she needs her job. He gets angry, pops the key on the table, just drives away. Julia yells afterwards: "You ass! It's enough!" She had expected this end. Not that he would fill her heart even after the breakup - until now, a year later. She wishes him back and knows that she needs to be small in a relationship with him. She meets other men, but they seem boring. It hangs as tied to the promise of the beginning: I love you unconditionally.
The only way out of the yearning spiral
If you hang on someone, which harms you, it is wise to do research in the past. One can assume that when feeling and understanding diverge, we face a conflict much older than the relationship. "We focus on it because we find ourselves in an old story and scent the chance to finally rewrite it," says Oskar Holzberg.A woman like Julia may have grown up with this model: As long as I'm weak, weaker than mother or father, I can count on a secure relationship. As soon as I go my own way, the ground under my feet is pulled away. Julia reacts to Max, as she has reacted before. Instead of drawing boundaries, she defends herself. She wishes his approval, believes: Without his goodwill I can not develop with a clear conscience.
"To become free, it is important to understand the pattern and take responsibility for the solution"says psychologist Angelika Faas. To make it clear that it is not really about this one person: A man who treated us unkindly and does not bother to think about himself, is not a dream man - he wears at most the appropriate costume.
II. Natalie misses Gregory
It was one of those nights, in which Natalie waited and waited, she wrote in her book: "You pierce my heart with a dagger, spiked with thorns, blood flows from my wounds, no, it's roses, I lay it at your feet, and me and you and me, that's a terrible thing, and it's all: everything. "
When Natalie was with Gregor, She wrote lyrics like these, poems that were almost always about hurt, fear, longing and love. Five months ago she separated from Gregor. "The breakup was like jumping off an airplane before it crashes and goes up in flames - I just barely survived, but seriously injured," says Natalie. And now this dichotomy: She misses Gregory and at the same time knows that living with him is hell.
Before Gregor showed up, Natalie lived in a relationship with which she was satisfied, very much: she and her husband, both teachers, both in their early 30s, they wish children, are interested in architecture. The first thing Natalie noticed about her later lover: those eyes. Natalie feels attracted and repelled at the same time. He smokes strongly. He acts like the actor Mickey Rourke in "9 1/2 weeks". Predator look. He is outrageous. At the third meeting, he starts playing under the table with her foot, as Natalie sits next to her husband.
After three months she leaves her husband, moves to Gregor. A relationship begins in which the brave Natalie gets to know completely new sides in oneself. It's like a rush. He sets her poems to music on the piano. She develops from the lady to the femme fatale: painted the nails dark red, wearing high shoes, short skirts. Sex rarely takes place in the bedroom. She thinks: I have found the love of my life.
But her old, orderly life escapes her more and more. In the morning she comes to school late, and above all, she does not feel up to this man. He is often out on weekends. At first she feels at his side as the most desirable woman in the world. "We were standing at a hotel reception somewhere, and I thought: Every woman around me envies me," says Natalie. But after a few weeks, Gregor turns away from her, flirts with other women in front of her. To be desired by him is meanwhile her life content, Natalie feels more and more clearly the imbalance, their dependency. When he has disappeared for two nights, she has to get a sick leave because she has not slept for a second. When he comes back and admits he has spent time with another woman, she packs her things and moves back to her husband. He wants to save the marriage, but calls for a couple therapy. Natalie agrees.
Five months has passed since Gregor left, but the pain still overpowering. She misses the man from whom she felt lifted and humiliated, sometimes sending a text message, he is like a drug. She knows: your only chance is consistent withdrawal.
Sex and eroticism can then, when a relationship is unstable and scary, you dive life into wonderful colors and chain us to a human being. Especially when the tension is great, the sex is often very intense. However, psychologist Oskar Holzberg warns against confusing things here: "Just because you're in the mood for a cigarette does not make it smart to smoke one if you've decided to become a non-smoker."
Much better than jumping up on the same torpedo is to make it clear: This human being, after whom we so much devour, has revived a side in us that led a long shadowy existence. One page, and that is the good news that is part of us! A woman like Natalie should therefore try to live her wild, erotic side without Gregor. Maybe her husband has this side too. It is quite possible that both were hindered to show each other.
To break away from a human, which at least for a moment gave you the feeling that you are so vital, so beautiful, so loved, to realize that life is development and that the most important impulses come from relationships that touch us particularly deeply.In a duel, we have to show contours, we can consolidate our ideas. "It's not so much about whether our opponent is objectively doing something wrong, but about what it does with our identity," says Oskar Holzberg. Recognizing, shaping and protecting one's identity is something that can be learned from love relationships that ended sadly.
The beauty is: So completely banished to the desert, we do not have the story, the us so intoxicating and our lives has turned upside down. We should hang them over the bed in a golden frame - but the guy himself, if he does not make a quantum leap in his development, radically banish him into the memory gallery of the exiles.
