By

BARKHA BAJAJ

MA, Clinical Psychology

MA, Counselling Psychology

Director, Aks Counselling &

Training Agency, Pune

I burst out crying when the restaurant manager offered me the meal for two combo. I am losing control and you are my last resort,” blurted my client Anjana (name changed) as she walked into my office. I saw the desperation in her eyes and could almost feel the lump in her throat. Anjana had been seeing Karthik for seven years and although the relationship was always full of turmoil, she had held on to her hope.  But she realised that she was just being optimistic. And now that her hope was gone, she felt a void that was too large to fill. She said she wanted to quit the relationship but when it ended, she was left feeling numb — neither happy nor sad.

According to Anjana, Karthik and she had split several times because they had huge differences. Anjana came from a family where academics and career mattered a lot, and Karthik had never been able to keep a job. The couple always had money problems and due to lack of stability, Anjana had decided to put off tying the knot for a long time. Anjana had become the primary caretaker of the home and often struggled with the responsibilities that were put on her continuously. She reported that due to these reasons, she actually felt relieved that she was single again. She said that she had become emotionally detached from her partner several months ago and finally decided to call it quits when she started seeing clearly that there was no future; when she started losing respect for him.

But she was feeling guilty for calling off the relationship and was scared of being lonely at 32 and also angry with her partner for not working hard to make it work. So, the first step in therapy was to classify these mixed emotions and work on one emotion at a time.

We took a long time to work with the guilt. Anjana had blamed herself for the relationship not working and she constantly wondered if she could change something. Over time she felt emotionally distant from Karthik and in fact harboured so much anger that their physical relationship had also taken the brunt. Anjana kept repeating: “How could I give up on him...?” and we worked on these thoughts. I provided some psychoeducation to Anjana about relationships and their dynamics. Relationships don’t work if both parties are not working on them. In a relationship, one has to put the ego aside and work for the larger good of the relationship. If the ‘ME is too big, it clashes with the ‘WE’. From my analysis, Anjana and Karthik had become ‘Me-centric’ and the bond that had held them together was broken ages ago. It seemed as if they stuck around out of habit and fear.

Anjana agreed with the analysis of the relationship but had a hard time understanding it completely. With time, she was able to introspect and realise that she was in the relationship only because she feared starting another one. She did not know how to start a new one after so many years.

Anjana was smart, independent and working with a great future but she had a hard time seeing this truth. So as a therapist, I just had to be patient. I saved my opinion because this was something that had to come from her. I further normalised the anger and the betrayal she felt, and worked on acceptance with her.

It took several months before Anjana started to heal. As the emotions were dealt with one by one, and memories were shared, she learnt to keep the good memories and let go of the need for Karthik. Anjana chose not to keep in touch with him and although that was hard on both of them, it was one of the major reasons she was able to move on. Some relationships are like shoes... they bite and hurt us but we wear them because we are scared to be barefoot.... be barefoot sometimes... it is very liberating!