You can't argue with crazy! Top 10 ways it gets easier to walk away from an unhealthy relationship
A personal share, for anyone who needs to hear it today:
"You can't argue with crazy."
But it does get easier to walk away with a clear conscience, as I get older and wiser!
Background:
I grew up with a completely unstable, mentally ill stepmother for a few years of my early childhood. It was deeply terrifying to me. I remember having nightmares every night, where I had to walk through a tunnel made up of woven together writhing snakes. You know those looping dreams where it seems like you're in it forever? It was that kind of nightmare. There was a light at the end of the tunnel I kept walking determinedly towards, but I never got there; it was just terror the whole time.
My strategy was to stay up late reading with a flashlight under my blanket as long as I could, to put off falling asleep. For instance, I read the entire Encyclopedia Brittanica before I was 9. (In trivia games, random general knowledge category, I'm you're gal!)
Thankfully I was able to exercise choice at the age of 9 and move in full time with my mom, and had limited interaction with the stepmother after that. The traumatic experience of living with a mentally ill, abusive, manipulative caretaker during those powerless formative years imprinted on me deeply, however. I'm sure it's part of the reason I have taken a path towards self-discovery, healing, and transformation.
Today:
Every now and then someone ends up in my personal life that vibrates those same sympathetic strings in me that my ex-stepmother did. I still sometimes don't catch it until I've already enmeshed in an enabling/caretaking/compensating cycle.
It has happened a few times in my adult life, including one recently.
What tends to happen is the person seem unstable, unwell (yet interesting, compelling, and full of potential) and step in to I help in seen and unseen ways. I cover for them. I make it work so they can be OK.
Or there’s a project of mutual benefit I get involved in and am already committed to before I realize how “off” the dynamic is.
(Yeah yeah… I know. My self-awareness is pretty sharp but this is a blind spot. The stepmother note is not one I tune into regularly - I’d rather do just about anything than remember what I endured! It’s a slippery, evasive undertone that I best identify as I’m extricating myself. Maybe that empowerment is what gives me the sense of safety to face it?)
Right now I celebrate these 10 ways it gets easier to walk away from abuse cycle:
- It gets easier to pause interaction and take time/space when it feels unsafe. (Yay to being an adult!)
- It gets easier to not take insults and rants personally. (When there's that much emotional content, it's rarely about me even if I'm the current target of it.)
- It gets easier to conserve my energy and focus on all the amazing positive things happening in my life instead of wondering/worrying how to resolve difficult things that are highly unlikely to change (unless I were to capitulate and continue the enabling cycle, digging myself in deeper, so that’s an obvious NO).
- It gets easier to have a clear boundary and end point with my time, conversation, involvement.
- It gets easier to not be frustrated when they insist on their delusional narratives unhinged from facts.
- It gets easier to know that while I'm definitely far from perfect, I do my best and my integrity is intact.
- It gets easier to accept that their version of me is based on their own story, and I’m unlikely to feel seen, heard, and understood by that person. (Luckily, other people meet those needs for me!)
- It gets easier to walk away with kindness, because their nightmare might be in their waking mind. (I’ll never truly know, but that doesn’t mean it’s my responsibility.)
- It gets easier to acknowledge that my response may be influenced by my own history (trigger), and perhaps an overreaction.
- It gets easier to be OK with walking away anyway (because that's still me taking care of myself, exercising agency and empowerment).
There you go... PSA complete. :)
I was journalling these thoughts today and felt to share, in case any of you out there are dealing with a situation and need:
- a reminder of your options
- encouragement to take care of yourself
- or celebration for being even 1% more skillful, sooner!
Oh, and I'll be doing some extra mantras for peace (of course!) also, as an offering into the space of harmony.
Lots of love!
