Forum "Links Cache" [Archive] - 2-in-2-1 Discussion Forums

Mike56

13th April 2007, 10:53 PM

I thought it might be a good idea to hold a cache of useful links here on the forum - these are the links I garnered from David's posts on co-dependency, narcissism and detachment.

Co-dependency (http://www.50connect.co.uk/index.asp?main=http%3A//www.50connect.co.uk/50c/articlepages/relationships_index.asp%3Fsc%3Dromancestories%26aI D%3D12527) - insight into the traits assocaited with "takers" and "caretakers" in co-dependent relationships.

Dr Harley's Basic Concepts (http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi3550_summary.html) for falling in love, and staying in love.

Tools for developing detachment (http://www.coping.org/control/detach.htm)

More on co-dependency (http://karenscoda.blogspot.com/2007/03/more-characteristics.html) from a blog titled "Living Free & Alive".

Love Busters (http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi3400_lovebust.html) - a specific page from Dr Harley on causes of falling out of love.

Narcissism (http://wiki.answers.com/Q/FAQ/1804) - a Wikki Answers insight into narcissism - lots of personal views.

More FAQ's on narcissism (http://www.healthyplace.com/communities/personality_disorders/narcissism/faq_index.html)

The "180" Concept (http://survivinginfidelity.com/faq_bs.asp#FAQ11) - the no-contact strategy.

Surviving an Affair (http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi8113_ab.html) - more from Dr Harley - "Plan A and Plan B"

Co-dependency / co-dependence (http://joy2meu.com/codependency1.html)

This is the "Giraffe cartoon" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dGvw6WpHSF4) which deals nicely with the 5 Stages of Grieving - applicable either to bereavement or to loss through someone leaving. (Needs b/band and sound)

Mike.

David H

22nd April 2007, 10:37 PM

More from David - this is a link to an article on Affairs.

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1175/is_n3_v26/ai_13700396

That is a very illuminating article -- I thought you'd like it!

Below is my most up-to-date list...

Other interesting new ones are under "Choosing your relationship partner" & "Establishing Healthy Boundaries.."

David

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Start here for more insight:

Codependency:
http://www.50connect.co.uk/50c/romancestories.asp?article=12527

"Relationships heal when individuals heal. When each partner does their Inner Bonding work, their relationship system heals. When each person learns to take full personal responsibility for his or her own feelings of pain and joy, they stop pulling on each other and blaming each other. When each person learns to fill themselves with love and share that love with each other, instead of always trying to get love, the relationship heals."

Learn to love yourself:

"Real love is based in a universal truth that NO ONE can love you, respect you, cherish, or adore you at a level greater than you do these things for yourself. That the amount that you do love, respect, cherish and adore yourself is exactly the level that another will love, respect, cherish and adore you."

http://www.loveshack.org/forums/t113131/
http://www.4therapy.com/consumer/life_topics/article/6713/489/Learning+To+Love+Yourself

"The best relationships are made of wanting to be with the other person, but not needing to be. I think that goes for married relationships, too."

http://joy2meu.com/codependency1.html
http://joy2meu.com/codependent3.htm
http://karenscoda.blogspot.com/2007/03/more-characteristics.html

Do you recognise this ("Blowing hot and cold") in your relationship? (Mine was like this!)

"The way the dynamic in a dysfunctional relationship works is in a "come here" - "go away" cycle. When one person is available the other tends to pull away. If the first person becomes unavailable the other comes back and pleads to be let back in. When the first becomes available again then the other eventually starts pulling away again. It happens because our relationship with self is not healed. As long as I do not love myself then there must be something wrong with someone who loves me - and if someone doesn't love me than I have to prove I am worthy by winning that person back."
http://joy2meu.com/codependent4.htm

Choosing your relationship partner:

Emotional Unavailability, by Bryn C Collins, McGraw Hill, Page 7:
"... people choose to be with partners who remind them of the parent with whom they had the most unresolved issues ... it leads the person to choose essentially the same type of relationship time and time again ... the partner might come in different packages but the contents are emotionally similar..."

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Another possibility is that your H is having a male midlife crisis:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mid-life_crisis
http://midlifecrisisforum.com/6/ubb.x?s=3106003104
http://www.pathpartners.com
http://fortysixty.invisionzone.com/index.php?act=idx
http://www.divorcebusting.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=postlist&Board=28&page=1
http://lifetwo.com/production/node/20060824-types-of-midlife-crisis

Not everybody has a Mid Life Crisis -- most people go through a Mid Life Transition. About one third cannot cope with the MLT and it becomes a crisis.

"MLT becomes a MLC when it takes on the "self-medication" of affairs, rampant spending, and other such unwise and hurtful behaviour."

MLTs/MLCs are triggered by some life-altering event such as the death of a parent, loss of an important job, onset of menopause, etc; even your children growing up and leaving home... "Empty Nest Syndrome"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empty_nest_syndrome
http://www.netdoctor.co.uk/womenshealth/features/ens.htm

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You may eventually have to do "a 180" for your own sanity (to allow yourself to heal):

http://survivinginfidelity.com/healing_library/divorce/no_contact.asp
http://survivinginfidelity.com/faq_bs.asp#FAQ11
http://www.divorcerecovery101.com/addiction.htm

You may also need to detach emotionally:

This is a good place to start understanding detachment:
http://www.coping.org/control/detach.htm

Establishing Healthy Boundaries in Relationships:
http://www.coping.org/relations/boundar/intro.htm

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Many codependents are mutually attracted to narcissists...

More on Narcissists:
http://www.healthyplace.com/communities/personality_disorders/narcissism/faq6.html
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/FAQ/1804
http://www.healthyplace.com/communities/personality_disorders/narcissism/faq_index.html

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http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1175/is_n3_v26/ai_13700396

Psychology Today, May-June, 1993 by Frank Pittman, III

Romantic Infidelity

Surely the craziest and most destructive form of infidelity is the temporary insanity of failing in love. You do this, not when you meet somebody wonderful (wonderful people don't screw around with married people) but when you are going through a crisis in your own life, can't continue living your life, and aren't quite ready for suicide yet.

An affair with someone grossly inappropriate - someone decades younger or older, someone dependent or dominating, someone with problems even bigger than your own - is so crazily stimulating that it's like a drug that can lift you out of your depression and enable you to feel things again. Of course, between moments of ecstasy, you are more depressed, increasingly alone and alienated in your life, and increasingly hooked on the affair partner.

Ideal romance partners are damsels or "dumsels" in distress, people without a life but with a lot of problems, people with bad reality testing and little concern with understanding reality better.

Romantic affairs lead to a great many divorces, suicides, homicides, heart attacks, and strokes, but not to very many successful remarriages. No matter how many sacrifices you make to keep the love alive, no matter how many sacrifices your family and children make for this crazy relationship, it will gradually burn itself out when there is nothing more to sacrifice to it. Then you must face not only the wreckage of several lives, but the original depression from which the affair was an insane flight into escape.

People are most likely to get into these romantic affairs at the turning points of life: when their parents die or their children grow up; when they suffer health crises or are under pressure to give up an addiction; when they achieve an unexpected level of job success or job failure; or when their first child is born - any situation in which they must face a lot of reality and grow up.

The better the marriage, the saner and more sensible the spouse, the more alienated the romantic is likely to feel. Romantic affairs happen in good marriages even more often than in bad ones.

Both genders seem equally capable of falling into the temporary insanity of romantic affairs, though women are more likely to reframe anything they do as having been done for love. Women in love are far more aware of what they are doing and what the dangers might be. Men in love can be extraordinarily incautious and willing to give up everything. Men in love lose their heads - at least for a while.