11 Accept it. Change it. Move away from it!

Met up yesterday with a young friend of mine who moved up to London a few months ago. I was in London for a conference and we met up for a coffee at Victoria as I was on my way back to Brighton. Peter is getting over a difficult relationship break-up with the first guy he's ever fallen in love with. He had had a lot of issues about his self esteem from the past and ongoing difficulties in his relationship with his father meaning that generally he finds it difficult to feel safe with and trust others. Consequently these issues were played out in his relationship with Marco. He found himself behaving in the way his dad behaves towards him in his own dealings with Marco. Consequently he became controlling and manipulative in his attempts to extract the emotional contact he so desired. Marco, having his own baggage from the past , was disinclined to get into emotional displays and would get frustrated at Peter's emotional demands on him. Peter would blame Marco for for being just like his father, lacking emotional warmth and invalidating him whenever he tried to articulate his feelings. The relationship officially ended a few months after it began but continued subliminally for what seemed like years afterward because they rented a house together.

Peter would say that he loved Marco 'like a brother' but continued making the same emotional demands on him. Marco valued some aspects of his relationship with Peter but continued to be frustrated and angered by his emotional demands and jealousies. They seemed to continually make each other unhappy but finally, after a few months of therapy Peter summoned up the courage to crystalise a plan to make things better. He had to get out of Brighton and start afresh in London. His initial plan was to take his business up with him, which worked for a while, but he's finally settled for taxi driving which gives him a nice steady income and helps him pay off some of his debts.

It was lovely seeing him for the first time since he's moved. His skin was radiant and his eyes were full of life. He was energetic and felt empowered by having made a success of his brave decision to to move. He must have feared at times that he was jumping out of the frying pan into a fire.

Generally we're discouraged from making big changes in our lives. The idea is that if you've run into problems, it's better to work on them where you are rather than keep running away because you'll always find that your baggage follows you around like a bad smell!

But there are times when, for whatever reason, you're continually locking horns with someone and can't seem to shake them off. Something complementary in your psychopathologies makes things worse or at least as bad as ever they were as time goes by. If that happens for you then do what Peter did-get some independent advice. Get a handle on whether it's to do with you or the situation. And if it's the situation then make your mind up. Can you continue to accept being crippled by it? Is there something you can change about yourself to move it on? Or, if not, then move away either emotionally or, if you have to, geographically!

Until yesterday I had felt sad that Peter had moved away because I missed him. Having seen how happy he is, I'm now really happy for him.

Peter's story illustrates well that great advice for if you're ever in a pickle. Work out if you can accept what's going on. If you can't accept it see if you can change it. If you can't change it then move away from it!