Relationships: Your Ex, Who Abandoned You, Wants to "Start Over"

Being abandoned by someone you love deeply is one of the most painful experiences that anyone can go through.  It can be debilitating on every level--emotionally, physically, and spiritually.  It can cause you to feel you're "not good enough" and "not lovable."  Many people often feel ashamed about being left, especially because it can trigger earlier abandonment issues from childhood.

Your Ex Wants to Start Over

The Road to Emotional Recovery
When you've been abandoned by someone you loved and trusted, the road to recovery can be long and arduous, especially if you were in a long term relationship with this person.  As human beings, we're hard wired for emotional bonding and attachment, not for loss.

What often makes it worse is that well-meaning people might try to encourage you to "just get over it" and "move on," but it's just not possible to wave a magic wand to erase the emotional pain involved with this type of major loss.  You need time and space to grieve.  And, yet, life goes on.  You still need to get up every day, although it might take a lot of effort just to do that, and take care of your responsibilities.   You might wonder how you'll get through the day or even the next minute without falling apart.

Step by step, with the support of loved ones who understand you and your loss, you work to put the pieces of your shattered heart and your life back together again.  Gradually, the pain begins to lift until you begin to feel a sense of hope again.  You realize that you're now having moments when you feel lighter.  You're not completely recovered, but you're not where you were when your spouse or partner left.

What to Do If Your Ex Wants to "Start Over"?
Over time, you're starting to feel better about yourself and the world around you.  Then, suddenly, the unthinkable happens:  Your ex, who abandoned you, returns and he or she wants to "start over" again.  Once again, your world can get turned upside down.

If your second reaction, after the initial shock, is anger, you're in good company.  This is a common and understandable reaction in this situation.  But shock and anger can't be the basis for making a decision about whether to start over with your ex.  You need to stop, think and sort out your feelings before you make any hasty decisions.

No one can tell you what's right for you.  For many people, who were left by an ex, the answer to "starting over" would be a resounding "No!" and they would send their ex packing with Donna Summer's song, "I Will Survive" playing in the background.  But for many other people, including possibly you, the answer might not be so clear.   You might feel confused by a lot of mixed feelings.    This is also a common reaction.

But there are a few questions you can ask yourself that might help you to decide if you want to open your heart and allow your ex to return:

What has changed?

Your ex's apology and just saying you're going to "start over" doesn't automatically resolve whatever issues caused your ex to abandon the relationship or whatever problems you might have had before.  Be honest with yourself. What has changed?  Even if your ex had an epiphany about his or her behavior, will this realization alone be enough to prevent your ex from abandoning you again?  Wanting to change and actually being able to change are two different things.  And if not much has changed, can you endure going through the same kind of heartbreak again if your ex walks out of the relationship again?

How do you feel about yourself when you think about getting back into a relationship with your ex?

It's important to start with this question rather than how you feel about your ex.  Whether you're angry, sad, hurt, happy or glad that your ex wants to get back together again, pay attention to your gut feelings about this.  Aside from your initial feelings about making up, which can be exciting and sexy at first, what's your sense about what the relationship will be like for you after this initial stage?  

How do you feel about him or her?
During your healing process, your feelings might have changed about your ex and, possibly, about what you want from a romantic partner or relationship in general.  Aside from the anger and hurt, if you can look at your ex objectively, what are your feelings about being back in a relationship with your ex?  If you're still in love with your ex, put those emotions aside for the time being and assess what you think is best for you.

What was your part in the breakup?
This can be one of the hardest things to consider.  But whether you take your ex back or not, this is an important question to ask yourself because you don't want to repeat the same mistakes, whether it's with your ex or someone new.

Taking responsibility for your part in the breakup, even though it was your ex who walked out, is important for your own personal development.  This doesn't mean that you blame yourself for all of your ex's problems or all the problems in the relationship--just your part.  It also doesn't mean that you allow guilt to influence your decision.  Are there things you'd like to change about yourself?  If so, how do you plan to go about making these changes?

Take Your Time
If you have mixed feelings about getting back with your ex, take your time to consider your decision carefully.  Only you know how difficult it was to go through the breakup and what it took to get to the other side of this emotional crisis.  There are emotional risks in taking back your ex, especially if he or she has abandoned the relationship more than once.  Don't allow your ex's sense of urgency to cause you to make a hasty decision.

Also, be aware that loneliness and a fear that you might not meet anyone new could cloud your decision.  This isn't about settling out of fear.   It's about making the best possible decision for yourself based on what you know in your gut.

Getting Help in Therapy
Friends and family can be helpful in this process, but they might already have their own strong opinions about your ex and your former relationship.  You might find yourself either defending your ex if your loved ones try to convince you not to go back or defending your feelings about not going back if they're urging you to go back.

In this type of situation, there are usually few people who are close to you who can be truly objective.  So, it can be helpful to see a licensed mental health professional, who is objective and can help you sort through all of your feelings about whether or not to take your ex back without having to defend any particular feelings and without feeling ashamed of your feelings.  If you're unsure about what to do and you have mixed feelings about your ex, you owe this to yourself to put yourself first and get the help you need.

About Me

I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist.

To find out more about me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist

I work with individual adults and couples.

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Stop Keeping Score in Your Relationship

Over time, keeping score in your relationship can have disastrous consequences.  A "tit for tat" mentality or, worse still, "upping of the ante" can lead to anger, resentment and the end of the relationship.  And, yet, so many couples do it.  They find it hard to resist blaming, finger pointing and saying, "I told you so!"

Keeping Score as a Habitual Way of Relating to Each Other
Often, when keeping score is an ongoing pattern in a relationship, each person waits for the other person to make a mistake so s/he can point it out.  There is a fair amount of contempt involved with doing this. And if this is the couple's predominant way relating, the relationship can devolve quickly.

Stop Keeping Score in Your Relationship

Keeping score can become a habit and, like any habit, it can be hard to break.  Before you say something that both you and your partner are going to regret, it's important to be able to stop, step back and ask yourself, "What am I trying to accomplish?  Is this going to make the situation better?"

Of course, this requires a cool head and a mature personality.  If you're able to stop yourself and reflect on what you're about to do, you'll soon realize that, by keeping score, not only are you showing contempt for your partner, whether you realize it or not, you're also trying to shame him or her.  Then, at some point, if this is the dynamic in your relationship, your partner will look for a way to shame you as well.  When you engage in this behavior, it's never ending.

Unfortunately, there are lots of couples who, rather than being bound together with love, are bound together by hate and anger.  You might ask yourself why two people would stay together if this is their bond.  But, when people are bound together by hate and anger, they often don't realize it.  They're too busy looking for the next opportunity to blame their partner than to stop and think about what's going on in their relationship.

Keeping Score and Your Family of Origin
Like many relationship dynamics, both positive and negative, many people internalize the keeping score mentality from what they observed at home when they were growing up.  If this is the case, on the face of it, it might not seem so bad to you because it's familiar.  But, as I mentioned earlier, it can ruin a relationship.

Getting Help in Therapy
If you recognize that you and your partner have a dynamic where you're keeping score and you're unable to change this dynamic on your own, you could benefit from couples counseling with a skilled  clinician who can help you develop better relationship and communication skills.

Getting help can make the difference between saving or losing your relationship.  Many couples, have successfully changed this dynamic, and you and your partner can too.

About Me

I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist.  

I work with individual adults and couples.

To find out more about me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist.

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

The Heartbreak of the On-Again/Off-Again Relationship

Several years ago, a friend confided in me that, in the past (before I knew her), she had been in an on-again/off-again relationship for two years.  The usual pattern to her relationship was that whenever "the going got tough," her boyfriend was gone.

His Pattern Was to Flee the Relationship When He Felt Overwhelmed
Without saying a word, when he felt overwhelmed by their relationship, he would load up the car and drive off to stay with one of his many family members around the country, leaving my friend to wonder and worry about his whereabouts and the future of their relationship.

After a few days or so, he would call her to let know where he was and to say he needed "his space" for a while.  My friend never knew how long "a while" would be or if having "his space" was a euphemism for the relationship being over.  When she asked him, he refused to define how long or if he felt the relationship was really over.  But one thing was clear:  It was always on his terms.  He needed to be in control.

The Heartbreak of the On-Again/Off-Again Relationship

The first few times this happened, my friend was, understandably, upset.  This type of situation would be difficult for most people, but having lost both of her parents as a child, she was especially sensitive to her boyfriend abandoning her whenever he felt overwhelmed.  And he felt overwhelmed often, including when my friend wanted to talk about where their relationship was headed.

After a while, it became obvious to my friend that her boyfriend regulated the intensity and intimacy of their relationship by all of this coming and going.  He used his departures as an emotional pressure valve.  When enough time had passed so that he felt some of the intensity had subsided, he would return, sometimes contrite, sometimes not.  For a while, whenever he returned, my friend said she felt she had to "walk on eggshells" and tiptoe around him so he wouldn't leave again.  She tried to talk to him about therapy, but he wasn't open to going to individual therapy or couples counseling.  Needless to say, it was a very challenging situation.

To make matters worse, as I mentioned, all of her boyfriend's coming and going triggered earlier abandonment issues for my friend, which soon made the relationship feel emotionally intolerable for her.  Several months after she began therapy, she felt she deserved a lot better than this, and she ended the relationship.

Not surprisingly, once she withdrew from the relationship, her ex pursued her like he never pursued her before, promising her that he would never run off again.  But my friend understood that, even though her ex might have had the best of intentions, it was obvious that he couldn't tolerate the emotional intimacy that is a natural part of being in an intimate relationship. And, despite his promises, she knew he would leave again when he felt emotionally overwhelmed due to his own unresolved emotional issues.

Fortunately, my friend never went back to that relationship or ever entered into another relationship with that dynamic.  She's now in a committed relationship with someone who is comfortable with emotional intimacy and he can handle the inevitable ups and downs that are part of all relationships.  And, she gave me permission to use her story, without using her name or any identifying information, because she thought it might be helpful to others.

As a psychotherapist, I've seen many clients who are involved in these type of on-again/off-again relationships with similar dynamics to the ones I've just described.  When there are children involved, it's especially damaging to their emotional health and well-being. Children need stability and consistency.  Young children are naturally egocentric and believe that if one of their parents leaves, it must be their fault.  Over time, feeling abandoned by a parent can lead to poor grades in school, behavior problems and drug and alcohol problems.

Getting Help in Therapy

If you're in an on-again/off-again relationship, you probably realize how damaging this is to your sense of self.  

Even if you don't have a history of early abandonment issues, this type o relationship can create intense anxiety and depression as you ride your partner's unpredictable emotional roller coaster.

Being in an on-again/off-again relationship, where your spouse or partner is in control, can leave you feeling powerless.  But you're not alone.  

Many people, both men and women, have developed the emotional wherewithal in therapy to get off the emotional roller coaster so they can live more fulfilling lives

About Me
I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist.

I work with individual adults and couples.

To find out more about me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Love: Is It Really Better The Second Time Around?

Is love really better "the second time around," as Frank Sinatra says in his song.  

As a therapist, who has worked with individuals and couples who have rekindled relationships with exes, I've seen couples who were able to successfully reconnect and work out their differences.  I've also seen couples who got back together after a breakup and tried to work out their differences, but they continued to have the same problems.  So, it all depends on the two people.

Love: Is It Really Better the Second Time Around?

Going Back into the Relationship the Second Time Around with Your Eyes Wide Open
When you go back into a relationship that ended because the two of you couldn't or wouldn't work out the problems, you're going back in (unless you're in denial) with your eyes wide open.  You both know what the problems were, how you tried (or didn't try) to work things out and that it resulted in a breakup.  You know what you're up against and, for whatever reason, you and your partner or spouse feel you have the wherewithal to overcome the problems this time.

Reasons Not to Get Back Together
People often get back together again because they still love each other.  It might not be that heady "in love" feeling they had for each other when they first met, before the problems started.  Usually, it's a more mature love, and the feelings are strong enough that each person feels it's worth the emotional risk to try again.  But there are also reasons not to get back together:

• You're too afraid to move on and meet someone new.
• You feel "the devil you know" is better than "the devil you don't know."
• You're "use to" your ex and don't want to have to go out and meet someone new.
• You heard your ex started dating someone new and you couldn't stand the thought of it.
• You lack confidence to date again.
• You feel you don't deserve anyone else.
• You're afraid you'll never meet anyone else new.
• You feel you should get back together again "for the sake of the kids."

I'm sure there are lots of other reasons not to get back together again, but these are some of the reasons I've heard from clients who mistakenly return to their ex, only to discover that nothing has changed.

Simply Saying "We're starting over again" Doesn't Solve Your Problems
If you and your spouse or partner had serious problems that led to your breakup, just saying, "Let's start over again" doesn't automatically resolve all your problems.  I know this might sound very simplistic, but I've heard couples in couples therapy tell me that they think they can just "put everything behind" them and "start over" without doing any work on their relationship.  It's not surprising that I hear from these same couples a few months later that they're still having the same problems as they did before the breakup.

Being in a relationship is not like playing a game where people call out, "Do over" and everything is erased.  You might want to "put everything behind" you, but that doesn't change the fact that there's a history of problems, and hurt, resentment and anger that led to the breakup.  Avoidance, in terms of working out these problems, isn't going to magically make them go away.

Getting Help in Therapy
If you weren't able to work out your problems the first time without couples counseling and you want to give the relationship another chance, you owe it to yourself and your relationship to get professional help this time.  

A skilled couples counselor, who is objective, can help you navigate through the difficult emotional problems in a way that's often not possible to do on your own.  

By participating in couples counseling you both can also learn relationship skills that you might not have had before and that might make the difference between your relationship succeeding or not this time.

About Me
I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist.

I work with individuals and couples.

To find out more but me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Coping With Workplace Stress: 5 Things You Can Do to Reduce Your Stress at Work

I've been hearing more and more from clients and friends about how excessive work demands have been taking a toll on their stress levels.  With fewer employees, companies are expecting the remaining employees to pick up the slack and, often, ask them to take on  the duties of two or more former employees.  This often causes a lot of stress and fatigue, so that even when they're home with their loved ones, they're too tired and stressed out to spend quality time with them.

Coping With Workplace Stress

Consider the Consequences of Stress to Your Health and Personal Relationships
Before you sign on for extra work projects, it would be wise for you to consider the consequences of taking on this extra work and stress to your health and your personal relationships.  An optimal amount of stress (whatever is optimal for you personally) can help you to focus and accomplish tasks.  But when stress is excessive, as it usually is when you're taking on too many work tasks, it can compromise your immune system.

Over time, if you get little or no relief from the stress, it can cause you to develop stress-related illnesses like headaches, irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), high blood pressure, heart problems and other chronic illnesses.

5 Things You Can Do to Reduce Stress at Work

• Go out for a short walk: This sounds so simple, but it can really make a difference to go out for a short walk (longer, if you can) to get away, even for 10 or 15 minutes from work stress.  Rather than having lunch at your desk and trying to do work, take a break and go out.  When you come back, you'll feel refreshed.

• Take a nap at lunch time:If you have your own office where you can close the door, set an alarm for 20 minutes or half an hour at lunch time and take a nap.  Taking a nap in the middle of the day can do wonders to help you feel revived.  People who take a short nap during the day usually feel revived after their nap, and they can approach their work with more energy.

• Listen to a guided meditation recording: There are so many different guided meditation recordings that you can download from the Internet.  I usually recommend that you set an alarm before you listen to the recording to make sure that you don't snooze away the rest of the day.  Guided meditations can help you to feel that you've gotten away for a while from your work environment, at least, on an emotional level.

• Get up, stretch and breathe: Rather than sitting hunched over your desk the entire day, get up at least once every hour or so and stretch.  Even simple stretches can help to relax tense muscles so you feel less stressed out.  When we're very stressed out, we sometimes breathe in a very shallow way.  When  you get up to stretch, check out whether you're taking full, relaxing breaths when you breathe or if you're taking shallow breaths.  Make a conscious effort to take a few deep breaths to calm yourself and help you to relax.

• Learn to say "no" when you can: This can be a tough one.  You know your boss and your work environment.  If there are times when you feel you can say "no" without jeopardizing your job, learn to say "no" at those times.  If you always accept extra assignments, the expectation will be that your boss can continue to overload you with extra work all of the time.

About Me
I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist.

To find out more about me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Is It Love or an Infatuation?

Knowing the difference between love and infatuation can be tricky.  Often, love starts out with that same heady feeling you get when you're infatuated with someone.  

You might spend all day fantasizing obsessively about the other person, forget to eat, dream about him or her at night, and talk incessantly about this person to your friends.  

But, the main difference is that if it's really love and by this, I mean mature love, over time, it will develop into more than just an obsession and it will be reality based.

Is It Love or Infatuation?

What is Reality Based Love?
What do I mean by "reality based" love?  Well, when you're infatuated with someone, the other person might not even know that you exist.  If you're infatuated, the fact that he doesn't even know you, won't stop you from thinking about him all the time.  But when it's really love, it's based on mutual feelings that you've developed together for each other as you get to know each other.  That's what makes it reality based.

Why?  Because you can't really be in love with someone that you don't know, no matter how intensely you feel your feelings.  And it takes a mutual love relationship to get to really know someone--not just your fantasy of who you think this person is.  If your feelings are for someone relatively new to your life, it can't be one sided and still be considered mature love.  I know some people might disagree with me about this, but I think this is important when you're trying to figure if it's love or infatuation.

Spending time together is important so you get to know each other over time rather than getting carried away with who you each think the other person is in your fantasies.  An infatuation can fizzle out if the person that you fantasized about turns out to be a completely different person.  Then, you know your feelings were for the fantasy rather than the actual person.

Mature Love Grows Over Time as Compared to Infatuation
Mature love usually keeps growing over time, assuming it's nurtured.  Mature love is more stable usually and will be more likely to survive the test of time and life's challenges better than infatuation.

Whereas infatuation often has a painful emotional element to it, especially if the feelings are unrequited, mature love, where there is mutuality, makes you feel good about yourself most of the time.  That doesn't mean that you'll always be happy with this other person.  But, generally, speaking, when it's mutual love, rather than infatuation, its a more positive experience most of the time.

Does This Make Infatuation a Bad Experience?
No, not necessarily.  It depends.  If you can enjoy the feeling of being infatuated and it adds a certain passion and aliveness to your life, these feelings can have positive consequences, as long as you have realistic expectations and understand that it's not love.  Feeling alive and passionate might lead to your making positive changes in yourself and in your life.

If you have unrealistic expectations, as mentioned before, it can be a painful experience.  Obsessions can be hard to deal with over time. They can cause you to neglect important areas in your life as you spend most of your time and mental energy focusing on the object of your infatuation.

It all depends on your attitude.  If you can maintain a healthy attitude about your infatuation, it can be a fun time and you can open you up to new experiences, possibly, even to a mature love the next time around.

About Me

I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist.

I work with individual adults and couples.

To find out more about me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

All You Need is More Than Love

Often, when people fall in love, their attitude is that, like the Beatles song, all they need is love.  Being in love and passionate for each other can take you along for a while--maybe even the first two years of a relationship.  Then, it soon becomes obvious that you need more than just love to have a successful relationship.

All You Need is More Than Love

Here are a few other important factors, beyond love, that contribute to a happy relationship:

Respecting Each Other:  If you love each other, but there are times, let's say when you're angry, that you speak and act disrespectfully to each other, after a while, love alone isn't going to carry you through. Disrespect can take many forms:  a contemptuous look, name calling, cheating on your partner, lying, etc. It's important that when disagreements come up, as they inevitably do in serious relationships, you both remember to be mutually respectful to one another.

Learning to Compromise: Falling in love and feeling passionate for one another is great, but relationships also call for compromise at times.  If you and your partner haven't learned the give-and-take that is part of any long-term relationship, more than likely, you'll soon be embroiled in arguments and power struggles where each of you is trying to get your way.  Both people need to know how to compromise so it's not just a one-way street with one person doing all the compromising.

Having Similar Core Values and Outlook on Life: When you fall in love, it might be due, in part, to a sexual attraction or you enjoy similar activities, but it's also important for the health of a long-term relationship that you have similar core values.  You don't  need to agree about everything, but for the things that are most important to each of you, it's important to have similar values.

There Are Exceptions:
Now, I know there are couples who have long-term relationships where they don't have similar core values.  But they're the exception rather than the rule.  For instance, if your religious faith is important to you and you know you will only be happy with a partner who shares the same faith, don't think that overlooking this in a partner will work or, worse still, that you'll convert him or her to your faith.  It can happen, but more often than not, it doesn't.

If you know you won't be happy unless you have children and your partner doesn't want kids, don't overlook this.  You might feel resentful in the future.  There are so many other examples of this, whether it involves attitudes about money, politics, families, etc.  So, be honest with yourself and your partner at the beginning of the relationship.

All You Need is More Than Love
When you first fall in love, you might not want to think about respect, compromise or core values.  It's easy to get swept away on a tidal wave of love and think that "love will conquer all" and other cliches about love.

And maybe you and your partner will be one of the exceptions that I've discussed, but chances are you won't be.  So, don't ignore some of the red flags that might come up early on about these issues if you want a long-term relationship.

About Me
I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist.

I work with individuals and couples.

To find out more about me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during regular business hours or email me.