Is It Really Possible to Break Unhealthy Relationship Patterns and Be Happy Together?
One of the most common questions I receive is whether it’s possible for two people who’ve never had a healthy romantic relationship to create one together—especially when they’re not sure what makes a relationship healthy or how to recognize signs that it isn’t.
India wrote to me with this question:
“I’ve been dating someone for three months and it’s going really well so far. I’m trying not to get my hopes up, because I’ve never had what I’d call a healthy relationship before. I feel like I’m just waiting for the other shoe to drop. I don’t know if it hurts or helps that my boyfriend has never had a healthy relationship either. We each spent over a decade in marriages that could not be called happy or healthy. His marriage involved a wife who constantly criticized and berated him, until his self-esteem was in the dust. My ex-husband and I fought all the time and basically destroyed our marriage by saying mean things that couldn’t be forgotten. So, needless to say, this new relationship feels very foreign to both of us. My boyfriend asked me if I thought it was possible for us to have a healthy relationship, given our lack of experience in this area. I want to believe it’s possible. I can’t imagine treating him the way I sometimes treated my ex, but I guess I don’t know for sure. What do you think?”
Dear India,
When you’ve gotten hurt in the past, sometimes it can feel unbearably vulnerable to open yourself up to hoping that things can be different. Trying to keep our hopes in check and bracing ourselves for the inevitable drop of the other shoe can feel like a way to protect ourselves from disappointment.
Nearly anyone who’s been through heartbreak can surely relate to the desire to hold yourself back and stay just a little guarded in order to not be taken by surprise if things go wrong.
In other words, it’s hard to hope without wondering if we’re being naive or overly optimistic. And yet, research in this area has consistently shown that avoiding getting our hopes up doesn’t actually protect us from disappointment.
Instead, it just makes it harder for us to savor life experiences.
Believing that a good relationship is possible, even though your past relationship experiences don’t confirm this belief, requires taking a leap of faith. It means choosing to trust, even when you don’t have anything solid on which to base that trust.
You and your boyfriend are entering into something that’s foreign to both of you. It’s bound to be scary and a little intimidating. The good news is that you’re not doing it alone.
You’re together, stepping into uncharted territory, hand in hand.
While we can never know exactly where we’re heading, from my perspective, doing it together is as good a beginning as any I can imagine. There are solid reasons to hope that you two can create something beautiful together, even though you don’t yet know how to do it or what it’s going to look like.
In other words, the past doesn’t have to repeat itself, and you can create a future together that is very different from anything either of you has experienced before.
Healthy intimate relationships require a few basic things:
They require two individuals who want to have a good relationship together. They require having (or learning) solid relationship skills. And they require being willing and able to work together to figure out relationship issues that will inevitably arise along the way.
It’s never too late to develop the skills for having a healthy romantic relationship, so as long as you have a partner who is in this with you, the odds are in your favor.
That’s not to say that there won’t be challenges along the way.
Developing the skills for healthy relationships takes time and practice. And there are bound to be many moments when things go off-track and you find yourself either repeating patterns from your past relationship or reacting to your partner as though they’re like your former spouse. If (or perhaps I should say when) that happens, don’t panic.
Slipping into old, unhealthy relationship patterns is inevitable, which is why breaking those patterns requires learning how to notice what’s happened, pause, take a deep breath, and then decide how to take a step in a new, unfamiliar relationship direction.
To put this another way, giving your relationship the best chance for being different will involve being intentional about how to navigate situations where things are going—or have already gone—off track.
Especially in the beginning, it’s far more important to learn to work together to repair after old patterns have reared their ugly heads than to try to prevent these things from happening altogether. Working together in this way builds trust in each other and in the relationship as a strong container for healing the past.
So what does it look like? Let’s fast-forward your relationship with your boyfriend and imagine that you’ve now been together for nine months. Things are going well and you’re both feeling more at ease in the relationship.
Then something happens that stirs up difficult feelings for both of you, and suddenly there’s rising tension. Something about this situation feels familiar from the past. And before you even realize it, you snap at your partner and make a cutting remark in the way you would have with your former husband.
Maybe your boyfriend reacts the way he would have with his former wife. And maybe then you’re both reacting to each other and going down a road that you never, ever wanted to go down. Maybe it takes five minutes or two hours or three days to realize what’s happened.
That’s absolutely okay.
The important thing to know is that as soon as you become aware that you’ve slipped back into unhealthy relationship dynamics, you have the power to make a different choice.
Instead of continuing down that unhealthy path, you can change direction and turn toward the kind of relationship you want to have with your boyfriend.
Even better, you don’t have to do this alone.
You can invite your boyfriend to join you in turning toward the relationship you want to have. If you become aware of what’s happening while you’re in the middle of re-enacting those old familiar patterns, you can say something like, “Whoa. Pause here. This is not how I want to be interacting with you.” And then you can take a break.
Because your old pattern involved destructive conflict with your partner, it’s very likely that changing old patterns will require learning to take breaks when you get angry so you can calm down and regulate your emotions so you don’t say or do anything you’ll regret later.
Because your boyfriend’s past relationship involved being the target of constant criticism, he might need to do some individual work around regulating himself during conflicts so that he doesn’t hear any feedback from you as though it’s intended to cut him down.
Building new relationship skills—including skills for healthy conflict and effective communication—takes time and a lot of practice.
This is true for couples when neither has previous experience with healthy relationships. It’s also true for couples who are working to break unhealthy patterns in their relationship with each other. Approaching this process as one in which you’re working together and supporting each other in growing and making positive changes is vital.
While individuals certainly can do this work without the support of a partner, it’s so much more rewarding when it is something you’re doing together.
Not only is it important to be encouraging to your partner as he’s working on developing relationship skills, it’s equally important to be kind and compassionate with yourself. As with all other areas of life, when it comes to relationships, perfection is never the goal.
Working together imperfectly, with a spirit of mutual generosity and empathy, is all that’s needed.
Here’s my recommendation for where you might begin with your boyfriend. Take some time to create a vision for what you want in your relationship. As a starting place, consider everything that happened in your previous relationships that you don’t want and think about what you want instead.
For example, in your marriage, you often found yourself saying hurtful things to your spouse, presumably when you were very upset. If that’s the case, what do you want in this relationship? To answer that question, take it as a given that sometimes you are going to be very upset with your partner.
Now, instead of lashing out and saying things you’ll regret later, what do you want to do instead?
As each of you reflect on what happened in your previous marriages that you don’t want to repeat, you will start getting some clarity about your shared vision for this relationship.
To take it a step further, also think about what was missing from your previous relationships that you might want to include in your vision for this new relationship.
One positive aspect that you’ve already identified about this partnership is that you’re with someone who is equally committed to building a healthy relationship, and who understands that this will take some ongoing effort.
While every couple’s vision for their relationship is unique, when it comes to building a healthy relationship after being in unhealthy ones, one potential element of your shared vision might be making a commitment to give each other grace when old patterns suddenly show up in your relationship.
When someone is accustomed to going head-to-head in arguments with a partner, it’s easy to unconsciously react to conflict by using harsh words in an effort to gain the upper hand.
Similarly, when you’ve spent years as the target of a partner’s criticism, immediately going on the defensive when a partner brings up an issue is understandable. It will take time and effort to break some of these patterns.
Supporting each other means normalizing these reactions and not taking them personally, even while reaffirming your commitments to leave these unhealthy relationship behaviors in the past where they belong.
Because this work takes time and a fair amount of effort, remember that you’re both in this together and that unlearning old patterns is not a quick or linear process. There are going to be missteps. And there are going to be ups and downs.
So here’s my wish for you, India, that you give yourself permission to hope for good things and that you continue to approach this relationship as something that you’re building together, rather than something either of you has to figure out alone.
~Angela
Ask Angela is an advice column dedicated to the topic of having fulfilling relationships after trauma. Click HERE to submit a question for Angela.
DISCLAIMER: this content is intended for informational purposes only and does not constitute professional medical or psychological advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other licensed health care provider with any questions or concerns you may have regarding a medical condition.
about angela Amias, LCSW
Angela Amias, LCSW is a relationship therapist and nationally-recognized expert on trauma and relationships. She’s the co-founder of Alchemy of Love, which provides trauma-informed relationship programs and resources. She’s also the founder of the Institute for Trauma Informed Relationships, which provides training and education to therapists and coaches who want to help their clients heal past wounds and create more fulfilling relationships.
As an expert on trauma and relationships, Angela has been featured in numerous publications, including Today, Oprah, Cosmopolitan, The Independent, Well + Good, Inc., Forbes, Business Insider, Salon, MSN, Women’s Health and the Toronto Sun.
