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Post by seeking on Dec 28, 2023 15:39:05 GMT
When you guys talk about "fixing", I'm not sure exactly what that looks like vs. just talking with someone about their lives. Do you feel a need to accomplish some kind of outcome, give directives, etc? Manipulate? Curious what it looks like when you catch yourself in fixing mode, and how that differs from support and concern. So if someone mentions they are having some kind of struggle, what are your healthy lines and where do you get into trouble? What are the distinguishing characteristics for you between support and fixing, encouragement and control, helpful suggestions vs unsolicited advice? My girlfriend and I offer suggestions to each other when in some kind of pickle, and we've discussed it, it's welcome on both ends. I guess it has not only to do with certain ways of aproaching the conversation, but also with the temperaments of the individuals and their dynamic? Lots of people will accept a suggestion or advice without feeling put off, understanding there is no agenda or control,and even appreciate it (me included). But I've seen some things on the net that seem to pretty much equate suggestions or advice as control and some kind of offense. Of course a good approach is to ask the speaker what kind of support they need. Just curious about what you all think about these things. These are good questions - based on the last post I wrote before this one, I'm realizing it's very different in different situations. And not all across the board. It makes me wonder why with the two particular friends I named, my FIXER/RESCUE part wants to jump in. The only thing I've come up with to date is that they may have filled in as MOM or reminded me of her and rescuing my mom would have been critical in my childhood (she was physically abused in my childhood and I witnessed it). When my ex friend was in a similar situation I stepped in - esp with regard to her kids and overstepped boundaries. I got LOUD. And she told me I was intense and gave her a panic attack. When I defended myself she exited the relationship. The other friend - the one who prompted this post - she is always a victim, stays stuck, and ends up with tons of people enabling her. And this triggers me. It does with my ex and sister too. So there is something about that. Everything else is really - what I do for a living, supporting and caring for friends, when people ask me I will admit I do go "above and beyond" - being an empath and not liking seeing people suffer (esp if there's something I can do to ease it). But lots of variations - I think the two that are unhealthy, though, are the ones in the two scenarios above. |
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Post by seeking on Dec 28, 2023 15:45:46 GMT
I think it is the degree of attention towards the other person. Supporting someone does not take your eye off of your own balls….trying to fix issues for other people is when you go deep into the other person’s problems that you lose sight of your own. And as has been stated above, there can be a reward…a feeling of being needed, a feeling of helping, a feeling of accomplishment that perhaps is missing when looking at your own issues. It can become very enmeshing, it can also become tit for tat….”i am very much in tuned to your needs…why are you not in tune to mine”. It can be a coping mechinism…”at least this small area of my life I have control over.” Yes, this is it. I think with my ex friend and her abusive spouse, for me it was like getting control over how bad it feels to witness my mom still in an abusive relationship and my own history with abusive relationships and literally being on the phone with her that day she was making really poor decisions and dissociating and wanted me to go along for the ride (with her dissociation), I refused. But I think the overall nature of my helping her in that crises was like, "Hey, I just lived through this - if I can spare you and your kids some agony, here's what I would do." She didn't even have a lawyer at one point, and that was obvious advice: Get a lawyer, my friend. With the other friend who prompted this post - I do think it's enmeshment - and maybe it's my dad. Why would you stay stuck and victimy when you can do a, b, c and then be a witness to me and a friend to me (dad to me). I'm guessing - but I don't really know. But I do think that's why it's not this way across the board with me. My best friend is periodically in crises b/c of his divorce and I don't have this with him. I just listen and sometimes I barely get to call him. My dearest friend who was suicidal probably did kill himself (I don't have it in me to find out right now). And I would tell him I loved him and he was trying to get help, but maybe it was just in his energy I just didn't fix or offer more except love. He was more a giver to me. So it really is in the dynamics. And certain people just trigger certain dynamics for me to activate that strategy. |
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Post by seeking on Dec 28, 2023 15:50:55 GMT
Fixing for me is anything that crosses into someone's agency as an adult. Or acting like they can't solve problems on their own. While you are right that there is a healthy level of advice / back and forth in adult relating it can easily cross a line. For example, my best friend when I have a problem will often excessively offer me solutions, like 3-4 of them, and often really This is interesting because in the examples I just gave in the previous post - my two male friends seemed to be giving off more adult energy - one when he would talk about his suicidality so matter of factly "I don't want to be here," he owned it. There wasn't a lot to say to convince him otherwlse. And same with my friend going through the divorce. But the other two were seemingly helpless. Like my one friend would be drowning in fear with her life falling apart. And the other had a man threatening her life and she wasn't taking a single action. I think I jump in when I see no one in the room is taking care of things, and I think this was a compulsion from childhood to keep me safe. Who is the adult here? OMG there are none. I will be. |
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Post by seeking on Dec 28, 2023 15:55:14 GMT
It's also spending far more of my time / energy on someone else than for myself. Some people are very rooted in their victim mentality and I found them wanting a mother more than a partner. They would word things in a way that next thing I knew I was spending hours doing a task for them that they should be doing on their own. Not because I wanted to, but because I felt like I had to because look at me being the happy healthy adult in the relationship. It's also routinely bailing someone out because they fail to plan and just expect everyone around them to pick up the pieces. I often check in with myself now and ask "If I get nothing back at all from doing this thing, how am I going to feel?" and let that guide me. If I drive you to the airport because you failed to leave enough time to get there on your own, am I going to resent you because I really don't have the time to do this? (actual example) So what would your answer be? Mine would be anger, frustration, anxiety (what I would feel if I get nothing back). Also, curious about this: "felt like I had to because look at me being the happy healthy adult in the relationship." |
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Post by seeking on Dec 28, 2023 16:01:30 GMT
This is so helpful. So there's more to it than I realized, it seems to go deep for the person doing the fixing, with an urgency behind it. Also, it seems like it's often from a dynamic... one person doesn't take responsibility for themselves and the other steps in to take on the fixer role, and off to the races? I'm sure that's not always the case, someone may be a fixer and go over the line with anyone whether they are "attracting" that or not. There seems to be an active energy to it, a drive to focus on the fixer-upper, as a way to turn away from oneself? So it would make sense that anxious is more prone to this behavior than avoidant, we with the dependent vs. Self sufficient approaches to relationship. But not just that, the self-focus of the avoidant would deter this kind of deep involvement in someone else's affairs, because of natural tendency to self-absorption, not a pretty trait but also not prone to taking on other people's problems . It seems like there is a real permeability in the boundaries in that dynamic, I imagine a mesh screen and the fixer smooshes through it like a play dough extruder. Do some people welcome this kind of caretaking? Am I reading that right, some people look for someone to kind of mother them? Do you find that jn friendships, where one person willingly becomes the child to the other's parental type energy? Yes, I think this is the compulsive nature of it that I've been writing about in all my responses from today. There was no thought with my friend and her abusive ex. It was automatic. Off to the races. Like I was born to do this (in that moment). Later, the damage to our friendship was already done. So, yes, an "active energy." It would leave me with ENORMOUS anxiety. Massive. So that's been an interesting discovery today and making me flip my understanding to what I always thought about myself that I have more of an anxious attachment style. |
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Post by seeking on Dec 28, 2023 16:06:25 GMT
It seems like there is a real permeability in the boundaries in that dynamic, I imagine a mesh screen and the fixer smooshes through it like a play dough extruder. Do some people welcome this kind of caretaking? Am I reading that right, some people look for someone to kind of mother them? Do you find that jn friendships, where one person willingly becomes the child to the other's parental type energy? I do not welcome or seek this - at least not anymore. But I do think my friend who prompted this post is absolutely avoidant and I think my anxiety kicks in with her. It's familiar and has that potency to it. I'm guessing somehow unconsciously, I'm going, Oh, this time I can make it right. Fix her right up so we can finally connect. (Mom, dad, etc). And why I get soooooo utterly irritated by these types enablers. "You jerks are keeping them from doing their work so that then the can finally connect with me, see me, see what I've been through now that they've had to go through it themselves - love me, appreciate me, care for me back). My ex has enablers all around him, so does my dad, my sister, and this friend. As long as there is the victim, there is the enabler. I refuse to be one. So interesting. I think I'm getting at something here. So much to respond to. I just wrote like 600 posts. Gonna take a break and reflect and try to summarize some of what I'm learning here in all this in a bit. |
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Post by seeking on Dec 28, 2023 22:44:15 GMT
So it seems that for the anxious anxious fixer, the survival need to be connected drives the behavior, because the enmeshment avoids abandonment. But for the avoidant, the need to survive by securing basic stability drives the behavior, separate from connection. For me, its been "Red Alert! The tide of emotion coming at me is destabilizing, how to stabilize? How to stop this intensity?" For me, solving every problem that CAN be solved through action is critical to coping with deep survival fears. My sense of security hasn't come from belonging, it's come from practical survival and maintaining a basic sense of things being manageable and under control, crisis destabilizes that. That's why avoidants get wrapped up in things other than relationship and connection, because our sense of self and security doesn't come from there. In fact, our sense of self is protected by remaining apart, and tending to that deep sense of being the one who has to make sure we are OK, no matter what happens, we just need to be ok and make sure our boat doesn't sink. For the anxious, the fixing provides ongoing contact and a platform to engage. I definitely do both of these things. Generally the more avoidant strategy ... But I think I switched when I became a single mom. Relying on relationships felt too risky. I had bills to pay, food to buy, and a child to raise. I tried to meet other men back then but my issues were still strong and it didn't work (prob a good thing). But I've carried that on now. With friends, it's a mixed back. I like to feel seen, heard, validated, but I don't want people to help me. I would like someone to be *in it* with me - us doing it together, but no one to help me, dig me out kind of a thing. But I seem willing to help dig someone out. Perhaps in return for them staying connected/not leaving - giving me some crumbs of feeling seen and heard. |
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Post by cherrycola on Dec 28, 2023 23:13:54 GMT
It's also spending far more of my time / energy on someone else than for myself. Some people are very rooted in their victim mentality and I found them wanting a mother more than a partner. They would word things in a way that next thing I knew I was spending hours doing a task for them that they should be doing on their own. Not because I wanted to, but because I felt like I had to because look at me being the happy healthy adult in the relationship. It's also routinely bailing someone out because they fail to plan and just expect everyone around them to pick up the pieces. I often check in with myself now and ask "If I get nothing back at all from doing this thing, how am I going to feel?" and let that guide me. If I drive you to the airport because you failed to leave enough time to get there on your own, am I going to resent you because I really don't have the time to do this? (actual example) So what would your answer be? Mine would be anger, frustration, anxiety (what I would feel if I get nothing back). Also, curious about this: "felt like I had to because look at me being the happy healthy adult in the relationship." I realized I would feel a lot of resentment. That the piece that was missing was appreciation of my time being just as important as theirs. That it felt very one sided to drive them all the way out there and they don't say thank you or acknowledge the effort. Then I had to examine why do I feel responsible to fix this problem. Etc etc. and it's that I'm an adult piece. Somehow my approach is the right approach. My mom parentified us a lot so it's just the role I'm used to. Being the responsible one in the room. At the same time I watched her clean up my dad's messes. This friendship has been very challenging in terms of how much in their victimhood this person is and how when I set boundaries around my time and energy it's like a child rebelling against a parent. He's gone thru life learning if he whines enough, people will give in but then the flip side is eventually everyone gets tired of him and distances and he can't see how A causes B. |
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Post by sunrisequest on Dec 29, 2023 11:38:49 GMT
I have a few friends who I see as co-dependent 'givers' and it can be very uncomfortable for me, because while I do need and want support from friends, if I sense I'm being 'fixed' or 'rescued', it feels very oppressive and disempowering and I feel like shutting down and becoming less available to those people - luckily I have the language to tell those people what I need instead of being 'fixed', and in fact had a conversation last night with one of my friends around that, and explained what it felt like to be told what I needed to do, when I more just need a witness while I go through my own process of healing. I've also been on the receiving end of this-- with one friend in particular. She was the one who years ago begged me to go to her former therapist who specialized in codependency - I did for years, but that therapist also told me to consider this person (my friend) not a friend. It was weird. I guess she knew something I didn't know. She did help me grow over the years. I remember one time I was greatly in need of support and the friend told me "You need to learn how to self-soothe," which felt really painful at the time, but she was of course right. But as I got healthier I noticed she only came around when I was in some kind of dilemma. Or she'd write me to try to gauge where I was at - if I mentioned a problem, she would send me long emails and offer unwanted advice, but if I was like "Hey, just doing great over here," I'd hear nothing from her. I mentioned my driving anxiety to her in one email without asking for help, and she wrote back all this stuff about God and not doing it alone, etc, etc, and I was like Woah, where'd that come from and she was like, "Well you mentioned the driving anxiety." Like she didn't know how to just witness that and say something like "Sorry you're struggling with it. That's gotta be hard." Which I realize I don't always do - it's like if I have the "answer" or know something that can help, I jump in. But I can see where a simple "If you want me to share some thoughts or things that might help, let me know" would be crucial for both me and the other party. I'll come back to your other questions in a minute, but I had an experience this last week with a friend that really relates to what you're saying here, and this conversation has really stirred some stuff for me and given me food for thought as well.. it's made me look at the co-dependent balance in some of my friendships. I have a friend who obviously sees me as a project as well, or potentially sees herself as my mentor, seeing as that is what she does for work. We have always shared stories about our lives and relationships, but recently she was giving me advice in a way that crossed the line for me - it was forceful, rejecting any sense that I had myself of the situation I was talking about... and it felt as though she was using me as a case study in front of the other person who was there - to show how she 'helps' people like me in her work. I was instantly triggered and shut down. It also made me reflect on the friendship as a whole, and I noted that she is extremely supportive when I call and need something, but although I often call to try and arrange a neutral hang-out, I don't feel she's as enthusiastic about that kind of connection... I suspect she's set our friendship up in her own mind as her being a mentor and me being the mentee... It's interesting how that dynamic triggers such strong feelings for me, but it has made me consider how much and the way I'm sharing to certain friends in order to set the dynamic up the way it currently is... I do have a lot going on, always tbh... but I have been potentially oversharing about all of my life challenges in the last year. I don't want to be a victim, I want an equal footing with my friends, so this has made me feel that the place to dig deep into relationship and family issues isn't always friendships - sometimes, sure, but by leaning on these supports too much rather than taking it to a therapist, I am participating in a setting up a co-dependent dynamic where one person sees themselves as the saviour/helper/fixer, and me as the person who is helpless and needs to be fixed. I don't need or want to be fixed, I just want friends to be in it with me, similar to what you expressed. I just want to be witnessed and supported in a reciprocal way, so I've had to make some boundaries with myself about what I am going to share in the future and with who. It's interesting that you're feeling into the idea of keeping more of your energy for yourself, even from that very energetic perspective that you were talking about, which does actually count for a lot. Even the thoughts we put into others can drain us and can potentially be sensed in others... I wonder what it would be like if you pushed further in this direction, and really committed to only witnessing and validating rather than giving advice to anyone outside of your work (which as you say is a nourishing and appropriate place for you to indulge this skill and gift you have for helping others). But even if you find it easy and natural, I wonder what it would feel like if you only helped friends if they asked for it specifically, and only again if you had space and energy for it? |
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Post by seeking on Dec 29, 2023 12:51:19 GMT
But it leads to enmeshment in the same way. As someone who has been anxiously attached I have done this in many relationships/friendships and it usually does look like "helping" or over giving. My anxiously attached mom overprotected me through helping and I learned it from her. Can you give an example of what it looks like for you? My mom is also this way - I don't know if I "learned" it from her as much as it's my own trauma response -- but I can relate to this. |
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Post by sunrisequest on Dec 29, 2023 14:42:58 GMT
sunrisequest Avatar Dec 12, 2023 17:33:42 GMT -5 sunrisequest said: So, yes, like you, I was also avoiding getting what I needed... but I do not have avoidant or fearful avoidant attachment, but I do have co-dependent traits.Can you say more about what you mean here? I think I just meant that I have some avoidant strategies that I use sometimes, but I don't have an avoidant or fearful avoidant attachment style. I can't actually remember but I think I was referring to the fact that I often feel the overwhelm as a single parent etc etc, and I have needed a certain type of support, but I have avoided truly taking the steps that would get me this support. And that's me dialling into an idea that I'm the one who holds people up, not visa versa (in a co-dependent way). I would complain about it, and feel hard done to, but I wasn't really allowing the support I really needed to come in... With anxious attachment, you can imagine yourself as being someone who is regularly leaving their own energy and their own body in order to reach someone else, to establish connection and keep it, manage the connection, make sure it doesn't leave you... but the problem with that is that if you're reaching so far to other people that you're out of your own body, it's harder to self-soothe, regulate and receive bids for connection... there's nobody home to receive those things. So we sabotage what could be support and connection because we're so busy obsessing on what everyone else is doing or not doing for us. I know you've had many question marks over your attachment style, and I don't want to confuse things, but having a mix of anxious and avoidant strategies does not automatically mean you have a fearful avoidant attachment style. It's more complex than that. |
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Post by cherrycola on Dec 30, 2023 3:27:02 GMT
sunrisequest I just wanted to say your post about how you inadvertently show up as a victim sometimes really spoke to me. I've struggle with this for years. I've attracted a lot of rescuer men and when I try to show up in my adult space I tipped so far over into self reliant, I turned off even the healthier ones. Its such a hard balancing act and I struggle with it everyday. Showing up as an adult and being vulnerable but in a boundaried way. I wish I knew the answer to this.
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Post by iz42 on Dec 30, 2023 5:10:33 GMT
But it leads to enmeshment in the same way. As someone who has been anxiously attached I have done this in many relationships/friendships and it usually does look like "helping" or over giving. My anxiously attached mom overprotected me through helping and I learned it from her. Can you give an example of what it looks like for you? My mom is also this way - I don't know if I "learned" it from her as much as it's my own trauma response -- but I can relate to this. Growing up, my mom was constantly trying to help me by micromanaging me. She really was trying to help - the intention was good - but she would question small decisions that I made and try to convince me to do things her way instead. I ended up not trusting myself well partly because of this. She would offer me lots of advice even after I had refused her help. I remember her offering all of these things for breakfast in the morning even after I said I wasn't hungry. In relationships sometimes I find myself offering help even after my partner has refused it. It's completely unconscious. One example was that my partner had to work overnight for several nights in a row and was worried that he wouldn't be safe to drive home. I offered to pick him up and he refused. It was incredibly hard to to let that one go because I knew he might have been putting himself in danger. But even then, he had to make his own decisions. |
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Post by seeking on Dec 30, 2023 12:24:45 GMT
With anxious attachment, you can imagine yourself as being someone who is regularly leaving their own energy and their own body in order to reach someone else, to establish connection and keep it, manage the connection, make sure it doesn't leave you... but the problem with that is that if you're reaching so far to other people that you're out of your own body, it's harder to self-soothe, regulate and receive bids for connection... there's nobody home to receive those things. So we sabotage what could be support and connection because we're so busy obsessing on what everyone else is doing or not doing for us. I know you've had many question marks over your attachment style, and I don't want to confuse things, but having a mix of anxious and avoidant strategies does not automatically mean you have a fearful avoidant attachment style. It's more complex than that. Just going to write about what came up for me as I was reading this -- that loneliness again, which I'm beginning to think is at the very heart of a lot of this. I'll write a post about it. But I'm reading what you wrote about the anxious and thought, "Oh, if I don't do that, no one will come." That's actually not been my experience for years - I had a lot of bids for connection. I just couldn't meet them. They would overwhelm me, and I'd shut down/avoid. But now things are so quiet, it's my worst fear. So many people are caught up in their own stuff. But I think these things go in cycles. Just that right now, my loneliness is pretty strong. I have two friends I owe calls to but one who I had no words for even. I'm not even sure where I am right now to be able to talk or catch up with someone ... I have always thought I was anxious, but I'm again about to write a post or two - and my friend inventory list shows me that I'm different depending on the context/relationship. |
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Post by seeking on Dec 30, 2023 12:25:43 GMT
sunrisequest - you don't have to share here but I would love to know more about the support you got once you broke through. I literally can't think of what that would look like for me; I've been stuck on it for YEARS.
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