By Paul Schellenberg, LLC, MA, LCPC
When you try to prove you can live without someone, you are teaching them they can live without you!
People play games all the time. Video games, board games, cell phone games, and unfortunately, emotional games. When it comes to relationships, everyone plays a game to a certain degree. This can be called flirting, courting, dating, etc. These games are pretty harmless and could have minor effects on your emotional life if the game plays out unfavorably. There’s other games people play that can cause serious mental health damages.
The games that can cause emotional damage are the ones which deal with the survival of relationships. After a relationship is started and is in a healthy place, there will be unavoidable bumps in the road. This is when a healthy-minded person needs to remain “game free” and deal with these small problems. A small bump in the road that happens today, if not dealt with properly, can result in a mountain of emotional pain years from now.
How to avoid the emotional mountain is a simple but difficult task. The simple part is not playing games. The difficult part of this task is to fight the instinct to ignore problems. One of the most dangerous games I see people play is love withdrawal. Love withdrawal is when a person upsets you and you punish them by withdrawing yourself and your love for them. This is a common, dangerous, and destructive game. Not only is the original problem unsolved, but a new problem is developed. The new problem is the hurt feelings that have occurred due to the love withdrawal. Now everyone in the situation has two problems to deal with. The longer the love withdrawal punishment continues, the worse the problems become.
If you are a person who is suffering from a family member or close friend that is playing the love withdrawal game, then it is key to understand that this is passive-aggressive abuse. If you are being passive aggressively abused, then I recommend seeking professional help to deal with the pain and hurt feelings. Love withdrawal abuse is just as damaging as other more common forms of abuse. If you are the person who is withdrawing your love from someone to punish them, remember one thing. As you punish them by staying away, you are also teaching them how to live without you. So, take a long, hard look in the mirror and ask yourself if this is a game that you are willing to lose. Once someone has realized they can live without you, you have lost.
Paul Schellenberg is a licensed Clinical Professional Counselor. He specializes in sports and student anxiety, trauma, and mood disorders, emotional barriers, coping skills, depression, and works with both children and adults. For more information, please visit
www.pschellenberg.com or call 309-696-0267.