Dear Amy: I just got out of a nine-year relationship with a man who I am now realizing was manipulative and cruel. Unfortunately, he developed a drinking problem during our time together.
He interrupted things twice (against my will), and I was the one who had to move and lose my house and my dog, etc.
After I separated this time, I started to see some things that I had ignored before because I loved him so much. He is emotionally abusive at times, when we try to separate our items and when I try to buy his house. He said things like, “If you don’t let go, I’ll take everything and you won’t get anything.” Or playing in my face that he is happy that we never got married.
I started therapy and have been doing it for two years.
During that time, my therapist tried to guide me on what is healthy, but I think she knew that I was not ready to listen. I was so in love.
I now know that breaking up is a blessing in disguise, but I am fighting his behavior because I loved this man for nine years, unconditionally.
How do I navigate that? How do I deal with his behavior towards me while we find out? And how could I have loved a man who treated me like this?
– Fighting and hurting
Dear Fighter: As the old song says, “breaking up is difficult”, even when you know in your bones that it is the right thing to do.
Immediately after the breakup, your thoughts are still anchored in your ex, because being with him for nine years has conditioned him to automatically consider his thoughts and feelings before yours. That’s why his relationship was so unbalanced and why he disrespected it. His unspoken pact was that he mattered more than you did.
This impulse on your part is why it is important that you learn to differentiate his needs from yours.
Now you must work hard to stop “dealing” with it.
If you are dividing your family, think of these meetings as negotiations, not emotional encounters.
When your meetings and negotiations turn into name-calling or emotional manipulation, you must direct yourself back to the bloodless practicality of whoever keeps the bookcase.
In terms of the future: when you know better, you do better. And now you know better.
Dear Amy: I participate in several discussion groups based on Zoom. They have been a great way to stay in touch with people and to bring people together from near and far. The zoom didn’t take off until COVID hit. But what happens when things get back to “normal?”
I asked that question of one of my Zoom groups. The group had met for years in the back room of a local restaurant. With the arrival of COVID, we moved to Zoom meetings. Most, but not all, of the previous participants. However, over time, several foreigners joined the Zoom group, some from outside the US
My question to the group was: “What will we do as a group after COVID is gone, do we stop using Zoom and abandon the group members who cannot meet with us?”
Do we have parallel meetings, one in person and another in Zoom? Do we use face-to-face meetings with some Zoom connection that brings everyone back together in a hybrid way?
What’s the next normal?
– Zoom by
Dear Zooming: This is a great question. In my own community, where the number of face-to-face worship services has been greatly reduced by state mandates, we have developed a “hybrid” model of face-to-face meetings that can also be accessed via Zoom.
I believe that this will become the “new normal”, which, in the final analysis, is a good thing! Bringing together distinct groups via teleconference is a welcome consequence of navigating our “new normal”.
Dear Amy: I was disappointed in your response to “Anguished” when you described the 12-step groups as “focused on God”.
The twelve-step groups suggest finding and trusting a power greater than you, of your own understanding, has nothing to do with “god”.
A higher power can be anything from nature to a doorknob and more traditional religious deities. Whatever works!
– Agnostic 12 steps
Dear Agnostic, I believe 12-step programs work, which is why I recommend them. However, Debtors Anonymous, the 12-step program that I recommended to “Aflito”, mentions “God” specifically several times in its 12 steps, which is why I mentioned it.
(You can send an email to Amy Dickinson at [email protected] or send a letter to Ask Amy, PO Box 194, Freeville, NY 13068.