Breaking Our Borders Episode 24- Romantic and Friendship Relationships

Hi and welcome back! I’m Dr. Michelle Border and in today’s episode I am going to discuss healthy and unhealthy romantic and friends relationships. Survivors of childhood trauma often carry personality adaptations and disorders into adulthood that are used to cope with their abuse, as well as borders created in their minds from the abusive treatment. These are not always positive traits, and can impact decisions and behaviors in adulthood in negative ways, including with forming relationships. Let’s get started talking about all of this, and how we can have healthier choices in our relationships, right now.

Transcript

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Hi and welcome back. I'm Dr. Michelle Border, and in today's episode I'm going to discuss healthy and unhealthy romantic and friends' relationships. Survivors of childhood trauma often carry personality adaptations and disorders into adulthood that are used to cope with their abuse, as well as borders created in their minds from the abusive treatment. These are not always positive traits and can impact decisions and behaviors in adulthood in negative ways, including with forming relationships. Let's get started talking about all of this and how we can have healthier choices in our relationships right now. Childhood trauma survivors don't often experience healthy relationships. They learn relationship traits from their parents and carry that into adulthood. If they experience an unhealthy relationship with their parents, they will likely choose the same type of relationships in adulthood due to the lack of knowledge of what consists of a healthy relationship. I'll start with the parent and child relationship. In a healthy parent and child relationship, parents provide emotional safety and trust for the child. The child feels secure expressing their emotions, such as anger or sadness, without fearing harsh judgment, and they come to the parent when hurt or facing problems. The child doesn't have fear of sharing their feelings due to possible abuse. In a healthy relationship, parents also provide open, respectful communication with their child. The parent models respect of the child's thoughts rather than just demanding it for themselves, using calm language and validating the child's feelings. Communication is open and reciprocated between the parent and the child without criticism, judgment, or harsh behaviors. The parent provides unconditional love and acceptance of the child in healthy relationships. The child knows they are loved for who they are, not for their achievements. The child feels supported to be who they genuinely are and are given the freedom to become the person they are meant to be. This builds self-worth and resilience in the child. In healthy relationships, parents also provide quality time and connection with their child. Meaningful connection occurs through shared, often simple experiences like reading together, eating together, or playing. This fosters a strong bond without immense pressure. The parent puts forth effort into building a relationship with the child by sharing experiences, discussing thoughts and feelings, and acceptance of their differences. Constructive boundaries and structure also happen in a healthy relationship. Parents provide consistent limits that keep children safe, which helps them feel secure and valued, rather than restricted. Rules and consequences are provided that are fair and developmentally appropriate for the child, providing boundaries and self-control. In a healthy relationship, parents also provide positive reinforcement for their child's behaviors, abilities, and choices. Focus is placed on encouraging effort and acknowledging positive behavior rather than solely criticizing negative actions. This provides the child with confidence that they are a good person who makes good choices. If the parent makes a mistake with the child, they will take responsibility for their own mistakes, like losing their temper, apologize, and make amends, teaching their child how to handle conflict constructively. No one is perfect, and it's good for a child to see that we all make mistakes, but we need to recognize those mistakes and take accountability for them. In a healthy relationship, the parent encourages the child to pursue their own interests and talents, offering choices to promote independence. The child learns who they are, who they want to be, and how they feel about the world without influence by the parent to be the way the parent wants them to be. These elements foster a secure attachment that helps children become confident, resilient adults. They are able to develop their personalities in healthy ways while feeling confident and safe in the world. Now I don't know about you, but after talking about what traits there are in a healthy parent and child relationship, I'm pretty much thinking that none of those things happened for me as a child. This is detrimental to a child's future because we repeat what we know. From my parents, I did not learn what a healthy relationship was like. So I carried that unhealthy knowledge into my adult relationships. Because my parents were narcissistic and emotionally absent, I was drawn to people like that. With the traits I had developed to cope with my trauma, and the only knowledge I had of relationships being unhealthy, I experienced many unhealthy relationships in adulthood. Growing up in an abusive home caused me to be unable to develop into my true self. I was not allowed to express choices or opinions, and was forced to comply to be what my parents wanted me to be in an attempt to avoid abuse. I tried to please them, be perfect, and at times seem invisible so that they would not abuse me. This caused me to become a people pleaser, perfectionist, have OCD tendencies, and hypervigilance due to the fear of more abuse. Because the abuse went on for so long that hypervigilance turned into anxiety and depression because I saw no way for it to stop, and I felt so bad about myself for causing it. In my mind as a child, there was something wrong with me that caused my parents to be unhappy with me all the time. I created borders in my mind that I was a bad person, that I was unworthy, and that I couldn't do anything right. These behaviors and thoughts were strengthened over the many years of the abuse, and I carried these traits into adulthood. Not all children react to trauma this way. They likely still have the same feelings of low self-esteem, worth, and confidence, and the hypervigilance, anxiety, and depression. But instead of the people pleasing type and wanting to be perfect, they are more rebellious and show more anger. Their anger drives them to push the limits of the abuser, trying to get away from the abuse or acting out violently with others. They may develop traits of narcissism, controlling behaviors or aggression. These traits are also carried into adult relationships and affect the connections with others. Now I'm going to look at healthy friendships and romantic relationships. These traits are similar, so I will group these together. Healthy relationships have trust and safety. You feel secure, comfortable, and confident in your partner or friend, with no need for jealousy, possessiveness, or fear. You can be yourself without worry that the other person will judge you and you feel the same way about them. Healthy relationships also have open communication. Both partners can express their needs, feelings, and concerns without fear of retaliation or judgment. Each person listens to what the other has to say, accepts and respects what is said, and feels comfortable expressing their own thoughts and opinions. Another aspect of healthy relationships is mutual respect. This is not just valuing each other's opinions, but also their boundaries and individuality. Each person accepts the other person's personality, likes and dislikes, and their feelings without criticism or judgment. Healthy relationships, there's equality and teamwork. Decisions are shared, and both people work together to handle problems. It's us versus the problem rather than me versus you. People get defensive to protect their ego, self-esteem, or sense of safety when they feel criticized, threatened, or unfairly accused. In healthy relationships, they don't feel threatened and see the other person as a partner, not a competition. Both people in the relationship can also have independence in healthy relationships. Partners can have their own lives, friends, and space beyond the relationship, encouraging each other's personal growth. Each person in the relationship has their own activities, other relationships and interests outside this relationship, without feeling jealousy or competition with that other life. Healthy conflict and resolution strategies are strong in healthy relationships. Disagreements are normal, but they are handled by disagreeing fairly, avoiding insults, and aiming for compromise. Yelling, insults, and vengeance are not healthy ways to resolve conflict, and typically do not help the relationship. Both people should be able to discuss their feelings, wants, and opinions, and they should respectfully hear the other person, and then find a compromise where both people are happy with the result. And finally, in healthy relationships, there is support and kindness. Both partners offer encouragement and show genuine affection in varied ways. In healthy relationships, both people are happy for the other's accomplishments, support their goals, and do things for each other that brings them happiness. Healthy relationships feel calm, steady, and consistent rather than a volatile roller coaster of highs and lows. It should bring more peace than stress into your life. Because I didn't have healthy relationships at home as a child, I was attracted to unhealthy relationships as an adult. My first husband, friends, and some family members were in my life for over 20 years before I began healing and recognized that I was allowing unhealthy traits from my relationships. When children experience trauma, they typically develop certain unhealthy traits. These traits can impact how well they form relationships in their adult life. Some traits that can develop are people pleasing, perfectionism, and hypervigilance. People with these traits like to avoid confrontation at all costs. They will consider others' feelings before their own to keep the peace and keep others happy. This can cause them to eventually burn out from all the giving and develop depression because their needs are not met. These are the more empathetic types. Another set of traits survivors can develop is entitlement, attention seeking, aggression when they don't get what they want, and a lack of empathy. These people are wanting the attention and acceptance they were not given as a child. They expect others to provide for their emotional needs, but do not care about the needs of the other person. They can become aggressive, controlling, and manipulative to get their needs met. These are the less empathetic types. Both of these types of people will likely struggle with communication skills, conflict and resolution problems, and feelings of respect. The lack of example and supply of these skills from their parents leads to the child not knowing how to communicate effectively, work out problems in a healthy way, or have respect for other people's wants and needs as an adult. It just wasn't taught, so they don't know how to do it. It's no different than me asking you to speak Japanese to me. If you were never taught the language, you wouldn't know how or what to say. Often the empathetic type pairs up with the non-empathetic type people. The non-empathetic types need someone to care for them, support them, and provide for their emotional needs. This fuels their feelings of being okay or good because someone likes or loves them and shows it with their actions. The empathetic types are used to caring for others, making them happy and providing for their emotional needs. It's how they coped with their trauma as a child, so they continue these behaviors in adulthood. It becomes a problem when the empathetic type gets tired of doing all the giving and expresses this to the non-empathetic person. The non-empathetic one will become angry and frustrated that the empathetic one is not willing to fulfill their needs without reservations. Add to this the lack of communication skills and conflict resolution strategies, and an unhealthy and dysfunctional situation is sure to happen. Likely the non-emphetic one will complain, accuse, and possibly attack the empathetic one until they back down and result in using their learned behaviors of complying with others to keep the peace. This only reinforces both people's unhealthy behaviors and beliefs from their trauma, and does nothing to help either of them change to be happier and healthier people. Not healing from childhood abuse will make an unhealthy impact on our adult relationships. We were shown so many unhealthy behaviors from our parents, and we knew of no other ways to live our lives. We thought this is just what life was like. But that's just not true. We can have better lives if we learn about what is healthy and how we can make that happen for ourselves. For me, this happened when I started seeing a counselor at the age of 40. For 40 years of my life, I had huge borders in my mind of who I was and how relationships worked. I was shown the toxic side of this. And until I was shown differently by the counselor, I had no idea things could be different. It took a while for me to learn how to have healthy relationships, how to communicate with others, and how to solve problems without using toxic methods. But I can say it has been the best thing I have ever done in my life. Not only am I happier, I have healthier and stronger relationships. So, where should you start in creating healthier relationships in your life? I'm going to post a journal prompt that can get you thinking about whether you have healthy relationships and what is causing you to have unhealthy relationships. I also recommend seeing a counselor to help you work through your feelings, or listen to mental health podcasts or read self-help books on healthy relationships. Whatever method you decide to use, please figure out something that would work for you. Please also follow me on Facebook, TikTok, Instagram, or YouTube, and continue to listen to my podcast each week on your favorite podcast provider. Thanks for listening.