When Loving Him Becomes an Addiction

I had something to say this week to a woman who keeps letting someone back in who is verbally and emotionally abusive and I realize some of you may need this, too.

Of all the things we deal with, of all the men we chase and the ways we love and the ways we try to let go, there is nothing as damaging to our self-esteem, the very core of our being, than being with someone whose words and actions keep us staying small, forgetting our worth, putting all our hopes of ever feeling loved on the very ones who ironically are the very ones so incapable of showing us love, of giving us that love.

Being with someone like this feels so incredible at times. The highest of highs, followed at some point by the lowest of lows because it can't be sustainable when someone isn't capable of loving like this.

If this is where you are, if this is what you're going through, I offer you the solace of knowing you're not alone, that someone has your back, someone still sees you in the midst of this. One day soon, when you're free, you'll see this so much more clearly.

You'll see what you were giving up in order to be with someone like this. And you'll see him for who he really is.

This isn't love, it's something else.

And what that is, isn't something we like to talk about. Ever.

You need to understand that this an addiction.

It's going to be so difficult for you to say no to him, to refuse to let him back in, to block him and not go back.

It's going to be uncomfortable, painful, depressing, and everything else experienced as part of that addiction, to hold your ground and stand up for yourself and refuse to be with anyone who would treat you this way.

It's one of the most difficult things you'll ever do.

You'll try to convince yourself why it'll be different this time.

You'll try to tell yourself it's really not that bad.

You'll try to downplay just how bad it is.

You'll accuse yourself of making a mountain out of a molehill or being dramatic again, because this is what you've been told so many times before. Their words will have become your own.

It's one of the most difficult things you'll ever do.

But this is what it will take to start to break this cycle in the men you're letting in.

If he says the demeaning, abusive things he does to you, it's because he can, because you allow him to and because you positively reinforce this abusive behavior in him by that allowance. They become the words you hear in your head, and the self-talk that you'll find yourself most gravitating to because they're the most familiar ones that reinforce more of his kind, more of the ones who've spoken to you like this before, often enough that you've made them your own.

That's why you don't have same reaction to them as people you repeat these words to do.

We, too. who've gone through this have learned we have the right to demand, and then expect, these words and these behaviors never to be used anywhere near us but only because we've learned or are learning to say "no."

There is nothing someone can offer you that would make him worth having these words and the ensuing behaviors that stem from these words anywhere around you. Nothing.

Only when you recognize your own behavior as an addiction, can you treat it with the same seriousness you would with another kind of addiction. This is on that scale because of the harm it's doing to you.

It doesn't have to be this way.

All it takes is one word from you, "no" and then block him and get a restraining order or call the police if you need to. But you have to be the one to say that "no".

We can't do this for you. This part has to come from you.

Love,

Jane

If this resonated with you today, I'd love to hear from you in the comments below. You're not alone in what you're going through.