Missing him triggers my childhood pain

This morning has been interesting for me, from a SLAA perspective. I mentioned before that my boyfriend is away for a few days, and although I was quite happy at first, I am now starting to become agitated as that all-too-familiar anguish over separation returns. 

I can see how it could be hard to understand why I am struggling - it must seem ridiculous.  He's only gone for a short period, and he has written to say he misses me. We are happy and will spend Christmas together. 

 

And yet, something as trivial as his absence for a few days is really painful for me. I have had some tough times in the last two years, so I find it astonishing that something like this can threaten to derail me in such a way. 

But I realise that this sits squarely at the centre of what SLAA has illuminated for me: this pain I am feeling comes from pre-existing wounds and goes very deep, back to my childhood and adolescence. I feel alone, helpless, abandoned, in danger and desperate. My unconscious quest to get rid of these feelings were what led me to my self-destructive and dysfunctional behaviour in the past. Often my actions created even more pain and chaos. 

I can feel the itch to act out, anything to make the discomfort go. I am nervous, obsessing. I keep checking my phone.

And I am still ashamed of myself and frustrated. Why am I so needy, so clingy, so insecure? I worry that if I don't keep myself in check he will no longer want to be in this relationship. And I don't really feel like this is me --- it's happening against my will, against my own values and aspirations of how I want to live and love. 

However, I have learnt some ways to cope. 

The old, pre-SLAA me would have kept contacting him, trying to extract some expression of his love or affection to prop me up and keep me going. I would have gone deeper and deeper into agonising and exaggerated emotional states and confuse these with being in love.

I would also be living a double life - one in the real world and one in my head, which would be consumed by my obsession with him. I would only be half-present in my own life. 

At worst, I would get so sad or distraught that I would become suicidal. 

The post-SLAA me tries to stay connected to myself and the present, to the people around me and whatever it is I am doing. I am more accepting of myself and compassionate. 

I also keep my goals in sight, and I accept that I have to work for them: 

- I want to be independent.

- I want to live my life and not get sucked into fantasy or into a parallel world of obsession.

- I don't want this relationship to dominate my life. I need to keep an identity. 

- Lastly, I want this relationship to thrive because it makes me really happy. 

I try to "sit" with the feelings, just let them flow freely rather than trying to block them. Sometimes they lose their intensity after a few seconds. 

Finally I have been telling myself that missing the man in my life is not exclusively a bad thing, and that it's normal. I suppose it's when I get desperate, sad, angry and suspicious that things are getting out of hand and that I need to pay attention to it. 

Have a nice day!