Are you in a relationship where the other person is often trying to make you feel guilty? If you do something wrong, does the other person stop talking to you or won't explain why they are upset and say that you should know by now? Does the other person often make veiled or direct threats to leave you if you don't feel good? Are you often feeling anxious and insecure because you believe you can't live without them and are often very afraid of confronting them or making them upset? Are you being accused regularly of being “too sensitive“?
.jpg)
If you answered yes to one or even two of these and it occures on regular basis, this is actually an example of situation of emotional blackmail through making you feel guilty, feel unsafe, and making you feel like they will leave you if you make one more wrong move.
This type of emotional leverage or blackmail in a relationship is a very unfortunate and dysfunctional way of relating to another person. It often has roots into a person's childhood and is related to attachment, usually you have somebody with an anxious attachment style along with an avoidant attachment style and it creates a lot of drama, conflict, misunderstanding and anxiety.
These type of relationships have a situation in which both participants of the relationship had their own, unique relationship and mental health challenges. The anxious person, who has difficulties setting boundaries. They often don't believe in their own self-worth and have a deep emotional belief that they cannot live without their partner, even though they often are successful.
They will be attracted to this kind of person who has issues with understanding healthy boundaries and low self-worth issue, even though they may superficially seem confident. The insecurity of the person leads to a lot of drama in the relationship in the form of creating negative feelings around jealousy, guilt and fear.
This type of relationship, which unfortunately is a very common situation that comes into my office, takes time to heal. And it does heal! It requires both people to grow and develop and learn healthy skills around relationship, boundaries, self-reflection, emotional regulation, emotional tolerance, updating some of their beliefs about people, human behaviour and how relationships work.
If you would like to learn how to have a better relationship, you can do that even if your partner doesn't want to come in. You can work on your half of the relationship. By making your changes you can bring change about within the relationship and your partner may or may not want to join you in the future, which they can.
All in the Family Counselling Centre can be found at www.allinthefamilycounselling.com. All in the Family Counselling Centre has been serving Southeast Asia and Singapore for just under two decades. We provide therapy and online portal www.mynewbeginnings.com, as well as educational training, intensives and retreats. Please contact us to learn more.
Ms. Fontana is a relationship counsellor specializing in helping people with their relationships whether it is dating, marriage, parenting or with their extended family. Her clients call her approach practical and found solutions to their problems. Ms. Fontana has obtained her Master Degree in Mental Health counselling from the United States and is a USA Nationally Certified Counsellor. She is also a Certified Choice Theory Reality Therapist and is USA trained Sex Therapist.