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Post by Deleted on Oct 30, 2019 13:56:28 GMT
Can we define what ghosting means? Does it mean not making consistent contact, or not contacting forever? I'd like to know. Because when an FA is deactivating, I find that very different from say a DA who really just can't deal at all and ghosts forever. FAs in my experience circle back around eventually. I'm not saying it's a good thing, but I am saying it speaks a lot to how their minds think, as many articles I have read talk about it. Also, some people take ghosting harder than others for whatever reasons. When the DA in my life ghosted me, I was bummed but it wasn't too long that I realized it was a gigantic blessing in disguise. He was a lonely loser who didn't deserve anyone good in his life anyway and I'm glad he did me the favor of shutting me out. NO love lost. Another FA checked out on me, but would cycle back in and out, until I finally shut it down for good. So what does ghosting mean to people here? To the title of this thread, some would see cyclical disappearance / reappearance as a form of intermittent reinforcement. Intermittently available. Intermittently not. This conversation has gone entirely full circle. Circular conversations are another form of madness that one can choose to participate in or not. I will not. We all fight our own battles, and have to determine which battles to pick. Best to all struggling with intermittent reinforcement in their relationships. |
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Post by nyc718 on Oct 30, 2019 14:04:21 GMT
Can we define what ghosting means? Does it mean not making consistent contact, or not contacting forever? I'd like to know. Because when an FA is deactivating, I find that very different from say a DA who really just can't deal at all and ghosts forever. FAs in my experience circle back around eventually. I'm not saying it's a good thing, but I am saying it speaks a lot to how their minds think, as many articles I have read talk about it. Also, some people take ghosting harder than others for whatever reasons. When the DA in my life ghosted me, I was bummed but it wasn't too long that I realized it was a gigantic blessing in disguise. He was a lonely loser who didn't deserve anyone good in his life anyway and I'm glad he did me the favor of shutting me out. NO love lost. Another FA checked out on me, but would cycle back in and out, until I finally shut it down for good. So what does ghosting mean to people here? To the title of this thread, some would see cyclical disappearance / reappearance as a form of intermittent reinforcement. Intermittently available. Intermittently not. As with many things, it's not black and white for everyone. I know why my FA needs to break away so I gave him his space to gather himself, but I completely understand how it could cause great distress to someone else whose significant other is deactivated. Everyone has their own limits, capacities and boundaries, and relationship nuances are different. And breakups, though usually sad, are not always heartbreaking, especially if you're prepared and or otherwise know that it's for the best to move on. I didn't read every response to this post so apologies if I am misunderstanding it. |
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Post by nyc718 on Oct 30, 2019 14:07:12 GMT
To the title of this thread, some would see cyclical disappearance / reappearance as a form of intermittent reinforcement. Intermittently available. Intermittently not. This conversation has gone entirely full circle. Circular conversations are another form of madness that one can choose to participate in or not. I will not. We all fight our own battles, and have to determine which battles to pick. Best to all struggling with intermittent reinforcement in their relationships. Um,lol, ok? |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 30, 2019 15:15:48 GMT
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Post by alexandra on Oct 30, 2019 17:52:53 GMT
This is a good article. My only criticism is this conclusion: "Consistent reinforcement will rarely get you a reward in the form of a thank-you from the personality-disordered individual in your life. However, the reward will come in the long run in the form of consistent behavior of their part - if only to avoid bad consequences of bad behavior." It's far more likely the reward will be you minimize the presence of unhealthy bonds in your life because you make decisions not to tolerate the negative energy. Hoping/expecting a deeply unhealthy and inconsistent person with a PD will change and become more consistent because of nothing more than your improved boundaries is wishful thinking. |
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Post by Deleted on Oct 30, 2019 18:03:12 GMT
This is a good article. My only criticism is this conclusion: "Consistent reinforcement will rarely get you a reward in the form of a thank-you from the personality-disordered individual in your life. However, the reward will come in the long run in the form of consistent behavior of their part - if only to avoid bad consequences of bad behavior." It's far more likely the reward will be you minimize the presence of unhealthy bonds in your life because you make decisions not to tolerate the negative energy. Hoping/expecting a deeply unhealthy and inconsistent person with a PD will change and become more consistent because of nothing more than your improved boundaries is wishful thinking. Right! The valuable information is in the importance of developing boundaries. What another person does is beyond our control but often how we respond is how we keep ourselves well. Also, The article refers to PD and I'm not conflating FA style with PD, nor am I posting this with the idea that the harm caused is intentional, or all the points debated in the thread. It's just a good article on how to take care of oneself in such a situation. |
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Post by serenity on Oct 30, 2019 21:59:55 GMT
This is a good article. My only criticism is this conclusion: "Consistent reinforcement will rarely get you a reward in the form of a thank-you from the personality-disordered individual in your life. However, the reward will come in the long run in the form of consistent behavior of their part - if only to avoid bad consequences of bad behavior." It's far more likely the reward will be you minimize the presence of unhealthy bonds in your life because you make decisions not to tolerate the negative energy. Hoping/expecting a deeply unhealthy and inconsistent person with a PD will change and become more consistent because of nothing more than your improved boundaries is wishful thinking. I agree. these articles explain how to leave a relationship with someone who deactivates, but not how to break the cycle and make the relationship work. FA's need to deactivate... you either accept it or not. I think its reasonable to ask them to explain longer deactivations instead of leaving the partner in the lurch for weeks or months. My ex did respond to that favourably when I asked. |
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Post by alexandra on Oct 30, 2019 22:03:45 GMT
Breaking the cycle and making the relationship work don't necessarily go together. The relationship can only possibly work if both are really committed to breaking the cycle and self growth. The best only one person can do is break the cycle to re-balance themselves.
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Post by serenity on Oct 30, 2019 22:57:34 GMT
Breaking the cycle and making the relationship work don't necessarily go together. The relationship can only possibly work if both are really committed to breaking the cycle and self growth. The best only one person can do is break the cycle to re-balance themselves. What I get from these forums, is the relationships `work' for sometimes years if the partner accepts the cycles of deactivation and distancing strategies, or transform things into friendship only. I haven't come across a middle ground that is workable for someone with FA attachment style personally. Boundaries don't change the FA's need for distance and deactivation. |
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Post by alexandra on Oct 30, 2019 23:13:44 GMT
Because ultimately the reasons the relationships don't work for FAs aren't related to the partner. Not meaning that no one is triggering or butting heads with FAs and a non-FA partner is always perfect, not by any means. But meaning that eventually, the FA is going to face life stress or something jostling and is going to project that onto the relationship no matter how "perfect" the partner is. Insecurely attachment styled people generally don't have good coping mechanisms and skills to deal with and release stress in a healthy way, no matter which insecure type. When the FA gets overwhelmed, they often push away what's close. You can have a relationship work for a while if it's a decent relationship and other stress in the FA partner's life is manageable. But at some point, someone's going to get sick or have money issues or worry about job security or have children or even just doubt themselves, and that fine balance will snap for the person who doesn't have an organized way of dealing with challenges and who has a nervous system that oscillates between being hyperactive overwhelmed and shutting down. If a relationship is mostly stable and going well but the FA still freezes and runs for a reason like that, they may try to come back when the stressors have diminished, but what's happened to trust during that episode? If the partner who was left is healthy, it diminishes as well.
If an FA wants to jump in because I'm over-generalizing, please do. But I think what's missing here is the FA is often fighting a war with themselves, especially if they are aware, and without a lot of healing that's going to make a longer term relationship difficult. It's not an issue of finding middle ground, because middle ground doesn't repair what's actually wrong.
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Post by nyc718 on Oct 30, 2019 23:18:35 GMT
Breaking the cycle and making the relationship work don't necessarily go together. The relationship can only possibly work if both are really committed to breaking the cycle and self growth. The best only one person can do is break the cycle to re-balance themselves. What I get from these forums, is the relationships `work' for sometimes years if the partner accepts the cycles of deactivation and distancing strategies, or transform things into friendship only. I haven't come across a middle ground that is workable for someone with FA attachment style personally. Boundaries don't change the FA's need for distance and deactivation. I've also read articles that say this kind of relationship can last years, if the person who is with the FA can handle the periods of deactivation. Now, whether they are happy or not, it didn't talk about that! But the articles did say this can go on for many, many years. I think knowledge is definitely power, and if you are a person who has a certain resilience, you can handle things that someone else might not able to. For example, my niece and nephew both have special needs, and one is on one end of the spectrum, the other on the other end of the spectrum. My sister is a VERY strong person, because she can handle it. Myself, I could never do as good a job as she does handling that every day, all day. HOWEVER, me knowing that my niece and nephew have these needs allows me to understand that they need to be spoken to and handled a certain way. That's how I think of my current FA. He needs to be handled a bit differently, and I (currently) have the capacity to deal with it. Someone else might not feel their FA and their ways is something they want to accommodate. |
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Post by stu on Oct 30, 2019 23:36:20 GMT
What I get from these forums, is the relationships `work' for sometimes years if the partner accepts the cycles of deactivation and distancing strategies, or transform things into friendship only. I haven't come across a middle ground that is workable for someone with FA attachment style personally. Boundaries don't change the FA's need for distance and deactivation. I've also read articles that say this kind of relationship can last years, if the person who is with the FA can handle the periods of deactivation. Now, whether they are happy or not, it didn't talk about that! But the articles did say this can go on for many, many years. I think knowledge is definitely power, and if you are a person who has a certain resilience, you can handle things that someone else might not able to. For example, my niece and nephew both have special needs, and one is on one end of the spectrum, the other on the other end of the spectrum. My sister is a VERY strong person, because she can handle it. Myself, I could never do as good a job as she does handling that every day, all day. HOWEVER, me knowing that my niece and nephew have these needs allows me to understand that they need to be spoken to and handled a certain way. That's how I think of my current FA. He needs to be handled a bit differently, and I (currently) have the capacity to deal with it. Someone else might not feel their FA and their ways is something they want to accommodate. These are great points and you guys are making a lot of sense with everything here. But I just wonder why someone would want to deal with this ? I mean in the case I dealt with recently distancing strategies meant bringing other males into the picture and having one foot out of the relationship in that kind of way. Without ever being upfront about it, and then de activation meant being ghosted and then no idea what's going on to them dating someone new. While I sat there feeling like shell come back around soon and we can talk when she's ready. Wasting even more time of my life with that. Maybe it's different in that not all Fas will introduce other people into the picture to get needs met when they are distancing or de activated from you. But how are you supposed to have a serious committed monogomous relationship with someone who is simply incapable of doing it? Unless someone is extremely self aware and already having done a lot of self work. But even with a degree of awareness and some work. These patterns can be so strong and so ingrained that they might just fall back into it unconsciously again. Maybe i just had my trust broken too hard and dealt with a particularly bad at experience with it. But it seems my experience has also been the norm for many others as well. It's fine if you stay detached and never get too close maybe as a casual thing. With periods of time acting more like a couple too but at the same time attachments grow, expectations and needs change, and your ability to be available for other people that might be a healthier fit also goes out the window when you develop that stronger pair bonding with an FA too. I just don't see any case of how it can really work in a serious context unless the other person is extremely self aware and already in some kind of therapy and consistently working on their challenges. |
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Post by serenity on Oct 30, 2019 23:55:10 GMT
I've also read articles that say this kind of relationship can last years, if the person who is with the FA can handle the periods of deactivation. Now, whether they are happy or not, it didn't talk about that! But the articles did say this can go on for many, many years. I think knowledge is definitely power, and if you are a person who has a certain resilience, you can handle things that someone else might not able to. For example, my niece and nephew both have special needs, and one is on one end of the spectrum, the other on the other end of the spectrum. My sister is a VERY strong person, because she can handle it. Myself, I could never do as good a job as she does handling that every day, all day. HOWEVER, me knowing that my niece and nephew have these needs allows me to understand that they need to be spoken to and handled a certain way. That's how I think of my current FA. He needs to be handled a bit differently, and I (currently) have the capacity to deal with it. Someone else might not feel their FA and their ways is something they want to accommodate. These are great points and you guys are making a lot of sense with everything here. But I just wonder why someone would want to deal with this ? I mean in the case I dealt with recently distancing strategies meant bringing other males into the picture and having one foot out of the relationship in that kind of way. Without ever being upfront about it, and then de activation meant being ghosted and then no idea what's going on to them dating someone new. While I sat there feeling like shell come back around soon and we can talk when she's ready. Wasting even more time of my life with that. Maybe it's different in that not all Fas will introduce other people into the picture to get needs met when they are distancing or de activated from you. But how are you supposed to have a serious committed monogomous relationship with someone who is simply incapable of doing it? Unless someone is extremely self aware and already having done a lot of self work. But even with a degree of awareness and some work. These patterns can be so strong and so ingrained that they might just fall back into it unconsciously again. Maybe i just had my trust broken too hard and dealt with a particularly bad at experience with it. But it seems my experience has also been the norm for many others as well. It's fine if you stay detached and never get too close maybe as a casual thing. With periods of time acting more like a couple too but at the same time attachments grow, expectations and needs change, and your ability to be available for other people that might be a healthier fit also goes out the window when you develop that stronger pair bonding with an FA too. I just don't see any case of how it can really work in a serious context unless the other person is extremely self aware and already in some kind of therapy and consistently working on their challenges. I couldn't see how it would work for a committed long term monogamous couple...like you said, the trust surrounding fidelity would be too damaged during long deactivations. I've only seen a long lasting relationship with someone FA where non-monogamy was part of the relationship. (between my FA mother and step Dad, 40 year relationship so far). They have been monogamous for 20 years, but for the first 20 they were a swinger couple. My Dad got over his jealousy issues back then. Whether this is healthy or not has been a lifelong conflict between my Dad and I. Honestly, the guy loves her, is happy, extremely positive, clean living, physically healthy and has tons of hobbies and great social and family life. We don't get on when he feels judged by me, and i've accused him of everything from co dependence, enabling child abuse, and stockholm syndrome. At a certain point, I decided to accept his choices, because I would lose him otherwise. My step Dad is the favourite child from a huge wealthy greek family. His mother and sisters are dominant women, and he and his brothers are chilled out submissive dudes, and very emotionally expressive. Me personally, I've experienced faithful, high quality long term relationships and don't wish to settle. |
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Post by nyc718 on Oct 31, 2019 0:07:21 GMT
I've also read articles that say this kind of relationship can last years, if the person who is with the FA can handle the periods of deactivation. Now, whether they are happy or not, it didn't talk about that! But the articles did say this can go on for many, many years. I think knowledge is definitely power, and if you are a person who has a certain resilience, you can handle things that someone else might not able to. For example, my niece and nephew both have special needs, and one is on one end of the spectrum, the other on the other end of the spectrum. My sister is a VERY strong person, because she can handle it. Myself, I could never do as good a job as she does handling that every day, all day. HOWEVER, me knowing that my niece and nephew have these needs allows me to understand that they need to be spoken to and handled a certain way. That's how I think of my current FA. He needs to be handled a bit differently, and I (currently) have the capacity to deal with it. Someone else might not feel their FA and their ways is something they want to accommodate. These are great points and you guys are making a lot of sense with everything here. But I just wonder why someone would want to deal with this ? I mean in the case I dealt with recently distancing strategies meant bringing other males into the picture and having one foot out of the relationship in that kind of way. Without ever being upfront about it, and then de activation meant being ghosted and then no idea what's going on to them dating someone new. While I sat there feeling like shell come back around soon and we can talk when she's ready. Wasting even more time of my life with that. Maybe it's different in that not all Fas will introduce other people into the picture to get needs met when they are distancing or de activated from you. But how are you supposed to have a serious committed monogomous relationship with someone who is simply incapable of doing it? Unless someone is extremely self aware and already having done a lot of self work. But even with a degree of awareness and some work. These patterns can be so strong and so ingrained that they might just fall back into it unconsciously again. Maybe i just had my trust broken too hard and dealt with a particularly bad at experience with it. But it seems my experience has also been the norm for many others as well. It's fine if you stay detached and never get too close maybe as a casual thing. With periods of time acting more like a couple too but at the same time attachments grow, expectations and needs change, and your ability to be available for other people that might be a healthier fit also goes out the window when you develop that stronger pair bonding with an FA too. I just don't see any case of how it can really work in a serious context unless the other person is extremely self aware and already in some kind of therapy and consistently working on their challenges. That's a good question stu Not all FAs are exactly the same. My current FA is different from my ex FA in that my ex FA was far more along the end of the spectrum that would self sabotage a relationship. My current FA will deactivate, but he doesn't do behaviors that make me otherwise insecure, like imply there are other women, or get drunk (he's not a drinker) or anything else. He just withdraws. I can handle that if he actually needs the space and then comes back, which he currently is now. (I have not fully embraced him back yet, as I feel like he needs to definitely feel some of the consequences of shutting down, but I am not going to shame him or otherwise punish him. That's not a healthy way to approach it that will be received well.) My current FA has been able to open up and allow me in way more than my ex FA. So it really depends on where the FA in your life is. Also, maturity as a person seems to weigh a lot. From what I understand, your ex is still kind of young. When I was that age, I was so not self aware of much. I know you're not much older than her, but you are more mature and more developed than she is (and a lot more than a lot of much older men than you, I know this!) |
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Post by serenity on Oct 31, 2019 0:13:58 GMT
I agree FA attachment can be a result of very different mental health issues, from trauma early in life, to later in life , to a range Personality disorders full blown or just on the spectrum a little.
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