Healing codependent feelings in romantic relationships
3rd February 2022
Last night I had a very vivid dream. It was the kind of dream that is not only visual, but that you also get immersed in how you would feel if the dream was true.
The dream was about my husband not loving me any more. It was so realistic. He wasn’t nasty about it or anything, but the feelings had completely gone, and so he didn’t see me in the same way any more. It felt crushing.
It’s funny that I would have that dream just last night, as the last few days and weeks I’ve been working with my internal patterns surrounding this exact situation. I tend to have codependent tendencies and to behave in a needy way when I feel like I need attention. Strangely, these feeling seem to get worse at key points in my monthly cycle.
So the dream I had has given me the extra motivation to keep working on this and to lose those codependent patterns, as my absolute focus is on healing this part of me and become emotionally healthy.
In order to continue growing in this area, I thought I would write down exactly what I do when I want attention and what I should do instead when those behaviours arise:
What not to do: - Give time and energy to the thoughts that tell me that he is a bad husband for not giving me attention. - Withdraw and pretend I don’t care about the lack of attention but seethe inside. - Create an argument as a way to get his attention, even if it’s negatively. I don’t do this consciously, but it does happen.
What to do instead: - When I first feel the scary and intrusive thoughts about how much attention he gives me, I’ll be honest and vulnerable with him and talk to him frankly. - To take some time to give myself some attention. Sometimes it may be that I’m tired or need some self-care, and I’m confusing that with needing his attention. - Recognizing earlier the thinking and feeling patterns when they first arise, so I can nip them in the bud and not move on to the argument phase.
I decided to write this blog post in case anyone has any similar emotional patterns that they want to work on. If it helps one person to heal, then it’s been worth being candid and vulnerable about it.