Are You Trying to Control Your Partner's Feelings?

Do you find yourself trying to do everything "right" and being helpful in order to get what you want from your partner? Discover how this might be causing your sense of aloneness and abandonment.

William and Sophia consulted with me because Sophia was ready to leave their marriage of 12 years. The only reason she hadn't already left was because of their two children.

"I feel trapped in this marriage," Sophia told me in our first phone session. "I think that I still love William, yet as soon as he walks into the house, I want to get away from him. Everything he says annoys me. I don't know what's wrong. I just know that I have to get away."

I spent some time learning about their backgrounds. William had come from a perfectionist mother whose love was conditional on his doing things "right." As I spoke with William, it became apparent that he had learned well to do things right, but that he was totally out of touch with his feelings. He operated from his head, constantly trying to say the right thing to control how others saw him - and especially how Sophia saw him.

The moment he opened his mouth Sophia felt pulled on to give him attention and approval. Her response to this was to resist by totally shutting down to him. She didn't want to be controlled by him.

William had completely abandoned himself and instead was making Sophia responsible for his feelings of adequacy and lovability. Sophia was also abandoning herself by withdrawing. Neither one was taking care of their own feelings - their own Inner Child. William was trying to control and Sophia was resisting being controlled, which created a completely stuck system.

I worked with both William and Sophia with Inner Bonding, helping them to learn to move their focus inside their bodies instead of staying in their minds. There was much pain within both of them from their inner abandonment - pain that they both believed was being caused by the other person.

Sophia agreed to stay in the relationship while they worked on themselves. Because they were both devoted to learning to take care of their own feelings, changed happened fairly quickly. William stopped pulling so much and learned to connect with himself when he felt insecure. Sophia stopped resisting when she did feel pulled at and instead started to take loving action for herself, disengaging and telling William that she didn't want to be with him when he was pulling on her. She was able to create enough space for herself that she no longer felt trapped.

Jacob and Emma consulted with me for a very similar situation. In this case, both Emma and Jacob were pulling for different things, and both were resisting. Jacob was pulling on Emma for sex, while Emma was pulling on Jacob to take responsibility for his feelings. Emma resisted having sex and Jacob resisted taking care of his feelings. Emma had her eyes on Jacob, constantly suggesting ways that he could think about things and do things to feel better. Her behavior toward him was highly controlling and invasive, and he responded by shutting down emotionally. At the same time, he would constantly do things for Emma, hoping that by care-taking her she would be turned on to him. Needless to say, they were completely stuck in their system.

I worked with both of them on completely accepting that they had no control over the other's feelings or behavior. Both were convinced that they were just trying to be helpful to the other person. It was very challenging for both of them to accept that their "helpfulness" was controlling, since both of them were very addicted to being helpful as a way to attempt to control each other. As each of them took their eyes off each other and started to take care of themselves, their relationship gradually improved.

Join Dr. Margaret Paul for her 30-Day at-home Course: "Love Yourself : An Inner Bonding Experience to Heal Anxiety, Depression, Shame, Addictions and Relationships."