They do everything together: where one is, there is another. Life apart from a partner does not make sense for them. It seems like an ideal that many aspire to. But such an idyll is fraught with danger.
“We spend all our free time together, we always go together to visit friends and acquaintances, we go on vacation just the two of us,” says 26-year-old Katerina.
“I don’t exist without you” is the motto of inseparable couples. Maria and Yegor work together. “They are like a single organism — they love the same thing, dress in the same color scheme, even finish each other’s phrases,” says psychoanalyst Saverio Tomasella, author of The Merge Relationship.
General experience, fear and habit
The psychoanalyst believes that inseparable couples can be classified into three types.
The first type — these are relationships that arose very early, when the partners were still experiencing their formation. They could be friends from school, maybe even from elementary school. The experience of growing up together cements their relationship — in every period of their lives they saw each other side by side, like a reflection in a mirror.
The second type — when one of the partners, and possibly both, cannot bear loneliness. If his chosen one decides to spend the evening separately, he feels abandoned and unnecessary. The need to merge in such people is motivated by the fear that they will be left alone. Such relationships are most often reborn, becoming co-dependent.
Third type — those who grew up in a family in which the relationship was just that. These people are simply following the pattern that has always been before their eyes.
Fragile idyll
By themselves, relationships in which the lives of partners are closely intertwined cannot be called toxic. As with everything else, it’s a matter of moderation.
“In some cases, lovebirds still retain a certain amount of autonomy, and this does not become a problem,” says Saverio Tomasella. — In others, the merger becomes complete: one without the other feels flawed, inferior. There is only «we», not «I». In the latter case, anxiety often arises in the relationship, partners can be jealous and try to control each other.
Emotional dependence is dangerous because it entails intellectual and even economic dependence.
When personal boundaries blur, we stop separating ourselves from the other person. It comes to the point that we perceive the slightest disagreement as a threat to well-being. Or vice versa, dissolving in another, we stop listening to ourselves and as a result — in the event of a break — we experience an acute personal crisis.
“Emotional dependence is dangerous because it entails intellectual and even economic dependence,” the expert explains. “One of the partners often lives as if for two, while the other remains immature and unable to make independent decisions.”
Dependent relationships most often develop between people who did not have a secure, trusting relationship with their parents as children. “This already pathological need for another person becomes a way – alas, unsuccessfully – to fill the emotional void,” explains Saverio Tomasella.
From Confluence to Suffering
Dependence manifests itself in various signals. This may be anxiety even due to a short-term separation from a partner, the desire to follow his every step, to know what he is doing at a particular moment.
Another sign is the closure of the pair in itself. Partners reduce the number of contacts, make fewer friends, separate themselves from the world with an invisible wall. All who allow themselves to doubt their choice become enemies and are cut off. Such isolation can even lead to conflicts and rupture of relations with relatives and friends.
If you observe these signs in your relationship, it is worth consulting with a therapist as soon as possible.
“When dependence becomes obvious, love develops into suffering, but even the thought of a breakup seems incredible to the partners,” Saverio Tomasella comments. — In order to objectively look at the situation, partners must first of all realize themselves as individuals, learn to listen to their desires and needs. Perhaps they will choose to stay together — but on new terms that will take into account the personal interests of each.