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You're Not Caring For Him. You're Controlling Your Fear · Toxic Girls Zone

0:03
Speaker 1: Hey, welcome back. I'm glad you're here, and I'm going
0:06
Speaker 1: to need you to stay with me today, even when
0:08
Speaker 1: it gets uncomfortable, right? So let's talk about something I've
0:11
Speaker 1: been thinking about for a while now, something that showed
0:13
Speaker 1: up in my own life before I even had words
0:15
Speaker 1: for it. Today we're getting into a pattern I'm calling
0:17
Speaker 1: the manager, the woman who loves someone by running him.
0:20
Speaker 1: And here's the warning, delivered with love. You have probably
0:23
Speaker 1: heard a version of this before and kept doing it anyway.
0:26
Speaker 1: You called it being supportive. You called it caring. You
0:28
Speaker 1: called it love. Yeah, I know. Me too. And look,
0:33
Speaker 1: I want to say this right at the top because
0:34
Speaker 1: it's the thing the whole episode is built on. You
0:37
Speaker 1: are not holding him up. You are holding yourself together, right?
0:40
Speaker 1: That's the center of everything we're going to dig into today,
0:42
Speaker 1: so hold on to that. And also, just so we're
0:45
Speaker 1: being honest with each other, managing someone is basically unpaid
0:48
Speaker 1: project management without the job title or the free snacks.
0:51
Speaker 1: I'm not okay. But here we are. Okay, picture this.
0:55
Speaker 1: You're mid-text. It's maybe 7.30. You're already in pajamas. And
0:58
Speaker 1: you're typing a reminder to him that he did not
1:00
Speaker 1: ask for. Something like, hey, don't forget your mom wants
1:03
Speaker 1: you to call before the weekend. You hit send. Then
1:06
Speaker 1: you're softening the words in the text he's about to
1:07
Speaker 1: send her because the first draft felt a little cold
1:10
Speaker 1: and you just wanted to land right, right? And then
1:12
Speaker 1: you're at a dinner party the next night and you're bracing,
1:14
Speaker 1: physically bracing, right before he opens his mouth in front
1:16
Speaker 1: of a group of people. Your shoulders are up around
1:18
Speaker 1: your ears. Your laugh is ready, the bridging laugh, the
1:21
Speaker 1: one you do when you need to smooth something over
1:23
Speaker 1: before anyone else notices. You're not at dinner. You're at work.
1:26
Speaker 1: Sound familiar? Yeah. I thought it might. Here's the thing
1:30
Speaker 1: about what we're doing in this episode today. We're not
1:32
Speaker 1: here to villainize you. We're not here to make you
1:34
Speaker 1: feel bad for caring. I get it. I really do.
1:37
Speaker 1: The managing comes from somewhere real and somewhere loving. You
1:40
Speaker 1: should be proud of how hard you try. But I'm
1:42
Speaker 1: going to say what I need to say anyway, because
1:44
Speaker 1: that's why you're here. The managing feels like love. It
1:46
Speaker 1: looks like low-key control. And at some point, we have
1:49
Speaker 1: to ask the question, who told you love was a
1:51
Speaker 1: job you had to perform to keep? Right? Because somebody did.
1:53
Speaker 1: And we're going to find out who that was. You
1:56
Speaker 1: are not holding him up. You are holding yourself together.
1:59
Speaker 1: That's the thesis. That's the thing. And I want you
2:02
Speaker 1: to let that land somewhere before we keep going, okay?
2:05
Speaker 1: Just sit with it for a second. Not holding them up.
2:07
Speaker 1: Holding yourself together. Make sense? Good. Now let's get into
2:12
Speaker 1: the mirror because this is where it starts to sting
2:14
Speaker 1: a little. And I say that as someone who has
2:15
Speaker 1: been on the receiving end of this exact conversation with
2:18
Speaker 1: my therapist for, oh, I don't know, three years running.
2:20
Speaker 1: So here we go. You're already mid-conversation. That's where we're
2:24
Speaker 1: meeting you. Not at the beginning. Not at some clean
2:27
Speaker 1: starting point. You're already in it. He just said something
2:30
Speaker 1: to his friend, and before the friend even responds, you've
2:32
Speaker 1: translated it. Not out loud, maybe, but you've added context,
2:35
Speaker 1: softened the edge, framed it better in your head so
2:38
Speaker 1: the friend gets the version of him you want them
2:39
Speaker 1: to see. You're not even thinking about it. It's just
2:42
Speaker 1: what you do, right? Yeah. And here's the thing I
2:45
Speaker 1: want to validate first, because I mean it. You care deeply. Like, genuinely, actually,
2:50
Speaker 1: from the bottom of your chest, deeply. You want things
2:53
Speaker 1: to go well for him, for you, for the two
2:54
Speaker 1: of you together. You tell yourself you're being supportive. You
2:58
Speaker 1: tell yourself he'd fall apart without you. And maybe he would.
3:01
Speaker 1: Maybe in some small ways he actually would. But, babe,
3:03
Speaker 1: he did not ask for a co-pilot. He asked for
3:05
Speaker 1: a partner. And you're not his co-pilot. You're quietly, in
3:09
Speaker 1: the background, completely convinced the plane will crash without you.
3:12
Speaker 1: And that conviction, that is the thing worth looking at.
3:14
Speaker 1: You know? Your sister is at dinner with you two
3:17
Speaker 1: a few weeks ago, and she watches you rehearse what
3:19
Speaker 1: he should say to his boss... And he's sitting there
3:21
Speaker 1: looking at you half grateful and half confused. And your sister,
3:24
Speaker 1: newly engaged, glowing, ridiculous, goes, Wow, you're basically his publicist.
3:28
Speaker 1: She's laughing. You laugh too. But something tightens in your
3:31
Speaker 1: chest and you change the subject, right? Because she's not
3:33
Speaker 1: wrong and you know she's not wrong. And then later
3:36
Speaker 1: that night you mention it to no one. You just
3:38
Speaker 1: let the feeling pass because there's something else to manage.
3:41
Speaker 1: There's always something else to manage. You have a Google
3:44
Speaker 1: Calendar event called his dentist appointment. His name is not
3:47
Speaker 1: even in the title. I will die on this hill
3:49
Speaker 1: that this is the most telling detail in the whole episode,
3:52
Speaker 1: and I'm not even joking. That's not support. That's a
3:54
Speaker 1: full-time position you've created for yourself. Can we see this? Good,
3:58
Speaker 1: because that's exactly where we're going next. So now I
4:02
Speaker 1: want to ask you a question, and I want you
4:04
Speaker 1: to actually sit in it instead of answering it immediately, right?
4:07
Speaker 1: What would you have to feel if you stopped? Not
4:09
Speaker 1: what would happen to him, not what would fall through
4:11
Speaker 1: the cracks, not what conversation would you have to have.
4:14
Speaker 1: What would you feel? Because the real question in all
4:16
Speaker 1: of this is never why he needs managing. The real
4:19
Speaker 1: question is why you need to do it. Underneath that
4:21
Speaker 1: to-do list you've built for his life, underneath the calendar
4:23
Speaker 1: reminders and the translated texts and the pre-braced dinner party shoulders,
4:27
Speaker 1: there's a feeling you have been too busy to sit with.
4:29
Speaker 1: And staying in motion, staying useful, staying needed, that is
4:32
Speaker 1: the whole point. The managing keeps that feeling at arm's length. Yeah,
4:36
Speaker 1: I know that's a lot. Let it be a lot.
4:39
Speaker 1: It is genuinely easier to remind him to call his
4:41
Speaker 1: mom than to notice you are terrified. Like, structurally easier.
4:45
Speaker 1: Logistically easier. Emotionally safer. And your nervous system knows that,
4:49
Speaker 1: which is why the urge to manage shows up so fast, right?
4:52
Speaker 1: Like before the conscious thought even finishes forming, you're already typing.
4:55
Speaker 1: So what's the feeling you're out running? We're going to
4:57
Speaker 1: get there. But first I need you to see the
4:59
Speaker 1: full picture of what this pattern actually looks like in
5:01
Speaker 1: a week of your real life. Makes sense? Good. He
5:06
Speaker 1: sends you a one word reply, something like, that's it.
5:09
Speaker 1: Just cut to a plan. You spent 20 minutes organizing,
5:13
Speaker 1: moving things around in your head, Accounting for his schedule,
5:15
Speaker 1: his moods, his preference for not being on the east
5:17
Speaker 1: side on weekends. Okay. And you stare at it, and
5:20
Speaker 1: something cold moves through you that isn't quite anger, right?
5:23
Speaker 1: It's something underneath anger. Something more like dread. But you
5:26
Speaker 1: fix the plan anyway. You adjust the reservation. You make
5:29
Speaker 1: it work. And the next day at your status meeting,
5:31
Speaker 1: you tell a coworker you're fine, just a little tired.
5:34
Speaker 1: Then you rephrase his text to your friend so he
5:36
Speaker 1: sounds more engaged than he was, because you love him
5:38
Speaker 1: and you don't want her to think less of him.
5:40
Speaker 1: Which is also a form of managing, by the way.
5:42
Speaker 1: The reputation management. The external facing version of the project. Okay?
5:47
Speaker 1: That night, he forgets a detail you mentioned twice. Not
5:50
Speaker 1: a big detail, but you mentioned it twice and he
5:52
Speaker 1: forgot it. And you don't say anything. You just handle it.
5:54
Speaker 1: You quietly reroute. And by the end of the week,
5:56
Speaker 1: you are exhausted and he does not know why. He
5:59
Speaker 1: actually looks comfortable. He looks fine. And you're lying on
6:01
Speaker 1: the couch with the dog asleep on your feet, completely
6:04
Speaker 1: drained from a week of labor that he doesn't even
6:05
Speaker 1: know happened. And you haven't told him because telling him
6:08
Speaker 1: would mean admitting you needed something from him, right? And
6:11
Speaker 1: needing something from him would mean putting something down. And
6:14
Speaker 1: putting something down would mean feeling the thing underneath it.
6:17
Speaker 1: You have explained his personality to so many of his friends,
6:19
Speaker 1: you should honestly invoice them. Consulting rate, not cheap. Minimum
6:23
Speaker 1: six months of backstory included. I've done this. It's embarrassing.
6:26
Speaker 1: I'm telling you this because I did the whole thing
6:28
Speaker 1: before I recognized it. And I recognized it in my
6:30
Speaker 1: own apartment. Not with him, but with my partner now.
6:33
Speaker 1: When I noticed I was not doing it anymore and
6:34
Speaker 1: realized how much of my brain had been taken up
6:36
Speaker 1: by someone else's internal life. My partner left a sticky
6:39
Speaker 1: note on the coffee maker that morning and I just
6:41
Speaker 1: sat there with my mug thinking, oh... Oh, that's what
6:43
Speaker 1: available looks like. But that's a little later in the episode.
6:46
Speaker 1: Right now, let's stay with the couch, the dog, the
6:48
Speaker 1: cold feeling. Actually, picture this with me. You're lying there
6:52
Speaker 1: and the dog is on your feet, warm and unbothered.
6:54
Speaker 1: And your partner is in the kitchen doing something that
6:56
Speaker 1: smells like garlic and olive oil. And there's a sticky
6:58
Speaker 1: note on the coffee maker for tomorrow. Just something small
7:01
Speaker 1: and sweet. And you realize lying there that in your
7:04
Speaker 1: last relationship, you would not have been on that couch.
7:06
Speaker 1: You would have been up at midnight reorganizing something. Not
7:09
Speaker 1: because it needed reorganizing, but because the act of organizing
7:12
Speaker 1: something gave your nervous system the only version of calm
7:14
Speaker 1: it knew how to find. Right? You were making orders somewhere, anywhere,
7:18
Speaker 1: so that the inside of your chest felt less like
7:20
Speaker 1: a waiting room with no information about when they'll call
7:22
Speaker 1: your name. You have explained his personality to so many
7:26
Speaker 1: of his friends that you should invoice them. I already
7:28
Speaker 1: said that, I know. But I want to add, with
7:30
Speaker 1: a sliding scale, because some of them have been listening
7:33
Speaker 1: to this since year one, and frankly they deserve a discount. Okay.
7:37
Speaker 1: But here's where we stop for a second, because something
7:38
Speaker 1: more important is right underneath what I just described. The couch,
7:42
Speaker 1: the midnight reorganizing, the waiting room feeling. That is not
7:45
Speaker 1: about him. That is old. And we're going to go
7:48
Speaker 1: find it in the next part of today's episode. Because
7:51
Speaker 1: here's the question I want to leave you with right now.
7:53
Speaker 1: Who taught you that love was a job you had
7:55
Speaker 1: to keep or lose everything? Who's the first person you
7:58
Speaker 1: had to manage in order to feel safe? That answer
8:01
Speaker 1: is sitting somewhere in your body right now, and it
8:02
Speaker 1: has been for years. And that's exactly where we're going next.
8:06
Speaker 1: So let's go find it, right? That hum I mentioned,
8:09
Speaker 1: that low hum of alertness you carry into every room
8:11
Speaker 1: he is in. I want you to feel it for
8:13
Speaker 1: a second before we explain it. It's not anxiety exactly.
8:16
Speaker 1: It's more like a readiness, a scanning. Like your whole
8:19
Speaker 1: nervous system is a security camera that never actually turns off, right?
8:22
Speaker 1: You're tracking his mood, his tone, the half second pause
8:25
Speaker 1: before he answers, the way he holds his shoulders when
8:27
Speaker 1: he walks into a room. You probably don't even notice
8:30
Speaker 1: you're doing it anymore. You've been doing it that long.
8:34
Speaker 1: And here's what I want you to sit with. That
8:36
Speaker 1: hum is not about him. It's not new. It was
8:38
Speaker 1: running long before you showed up, right? It was running
8:41
Speaker 1: in your childhood kitchen, in your teenage bedroom, in the car,
8:44
Speaker 1: on the way home from somewhere, with someone you loved
8:47
Speaker 1: who felt just slightly out of reach. Take it back.
8:50
Speaker 1: Take it all the way back to the first person
8:52
Speaker 1: you had to manage in order to feel okay. Because
8:54
Speaker 1: that's where this started. For a lot of us, that
8:57
Speaker 1: person was a parent who was physically there, but emotionally
9:00
Speaker 1: somewhere else entirely. My dad was like that. Kind, genuinely kind,
9:05
Speaker 1: showed up, did the things. But emotionally, you could not
9:07
Speaker 1: quite reach him, right? And I'm telling you, I was
9:10
Speaker 1: reading that man from across the room at 10 years old.
9:12
Speaker 1: Was he tired? Was he almost reachable today? Was this
9:15
Speaker 1: going to be one of the good evenings? I was
9:17
Speaker 1: calibrating myself to someone who never asked me to. Make sense?
9:21
Speaker 1: That calibration, that scanning and adjusting and making yourself useful,
9:24
Speaker 1: it became my love language before I had any word
9:26
Speaker 1: for what love was supposed to feel like. And the
9:28
Speaker 1: thing about learning a language that young is you don't
9:30
Speaker 1: question it. You just speak it. So later, when I
9:33
Speaker 1: started dating, I found men who were fluent in the
9:35
Speaker 1: exact same dialect. Not mean men, mostly, just men who
9:38
Speaker 1: were elsewhere. Emotionally loading, buffering, present in the room, but
9:42
Speaker 1: not quite reachable. And I went straight to work, right?
9:45
Speaker 1: Because that's what you do when you know the language.
9:46
Speaker 1: You translate. You smooth. You calibrate. And it felt so
9:50
Speaker 1: natural that I called it love for years. I spent
9:52
Speaker 1: years dating men who had the emotional availability of a
9:54
Speaker 1: loading screen. I'm not okay about it, but I am healed,
9:57
Speaker 1: so we're fine. Okay, so here's a story I'm 17
10:01
Speaker 1: first boyfriend and I have already figured out that my
10:04
Speaker 1: job in this relationship is to manage the weather he's
10:06
Speaker 1: not mean he's just elsewhere I'm making myself smaller and
10:09
Speaker 1: more useful at the same time which is a real
10:11
Speaker 1: skill actually if it weren't completely exhausting I remember genuinely
10:15
Speaker 1: believing that if I got the conditions exactly right he'd
10:17
Speaker 1: finally like arrive you know Like the version of him
10:20
Speaker 1: that was fully present was just around one more corner
10:23
Speaker 1: and I was so close. Sound familiar? Yeah, I thought so.
10:28
Speaker 1: And then years later, I'm on the phone with my
10:30
Speaker 1: mom and she says something about my dad, almost off
10:32
Speaker 1: the cuff. She goes, he always meant well, he just
10:34
Speaker 1: didn't know how to reach back. And I'm standing there
10:36
Speaker 1: holding the phone and I don't say anything for a
10:38
Speaker 1: long moment because something shifted. That was the first time
10:41
Speaker 1: I felt grief about it rather than strategy. Not fixing thoughts,
10:45
Speaker 1: not how do I work around this? Just, oh, oh,
10:47
Speaker 1: that's sad. Oh, that's sad. Oh, I've been waiting for
10:50
Speaker 1: someone to reach back for a very long time. Right.
10:53
Speaker 1: And that was before the good therapy. So I went
10:55
Speaker 1: home and reorganized the drawer. I know. So let's name
10:59
Speaker 1: what's actually happening underneath the managing. Cause this is where
11:02
Speaker 1: it gets real. There's a concept called the shadow. And
11:05
Speaker 1: I want to be clear. I'm not talking about anything
11:07
Speaker 1: spooky or mystical here. The shadow is just a part
11:09
Speaker 1: of yourself. You don't claim consciously the need that's running
11:12
Speaker 1: the show invisibly while your conscious mind is over there
11:15
Speaker 1: making a Google calendar event for his dentist appointment. Right.
11:18
Speaker 1: It's not that you're lying to yourself exactly. It's more
11:20
Speaker 1: like you genuinely believe you're helping. You believe you're being
11:24
Speaker 1: loving and useful and supportive. And underneath that, your shadow
11:27
Speaker 1: believes something else entirely. Your shadow believes that if you
11:29
Speaker 1: can just get everything right, he will finally show up
11:32
Speaker 1: the way your dad never quite did. And the shadow
11:35
Speaker 1: does not announce itself, right? It just checks his calendar
11:37
Speaker 1: and calls it being helpful. It drafts the text for
11:40
Speaker 1: him to send to his sister and calls it knowing
11:41
Speaker 1: him well. It rehearses the conversation he's about to have
11:44
Speaker 1: with his boss and calls it caring about his career.
11:46
Speaker 1: It is doing all of this on your behalf while
11:48
Speaker 1: you're busy believing you're just a really devoted partner. Can
11:51
Speaker 1: we see this? Yeah, that's the shadow operation. And it's
11:54
Speaker 1: been running so long that stopping feels not just hard,
11:57
Speaker 1: but actually dangerous. Here's what happens when we go one
12:00
Speaker 1: layer deeper. Because the shadow isn't the bottom of this.
12:03
Speaker 1: The shadow is carrying something even older and even scarier, right?
12:07
Speaker 1: There's a part of you that formed very early to
12:08
Speaker 1: keep you safe. Let's call it the protector part. It
12:11
Speaker 1: watched you in that childhood kitchen, read the room, saw
12:14
Speaker 1: what kept things stable, and made a rule. Made a
12:16
Speaker 1: rule that has kept you running ever since. The rule
12:18
Speaker 1: is this. Make yourself indispensable and he cannot leave. Be
12:22
Speaker 1: useful enough, be organized enough, anticipate everything, and you'll be safe.
12:26
Speaker 1: That's the protector part's whole job description. And here's the thing.
12:29
Speaker 1: It worked. In the sense that staying busy kept the
12:32
Speaker 1: fear quiet. Kept the waiting room feeling manageable. You were
12:35
Speaker 1: too useful to fall apart. But the protector part started
12:37
Speaker 1: this job in your childhood bedroom and has not updated
12:39
Speaker 1: its resume since, right? It still thinks you're 10, reading
12:42
Speaker 1: your dad from across the room. It still thinks the
12:44
Speaker 1: stakes are that high. And so it keeps managing, keeps scripting,
12:48
Speaker 1: keeps bracing. Not because you're controlling, but because your nervous
12:50
Speaker 1: system was never trained for uncertainty. It was trained for usefulness.
12:54
Speaker 1: And uncertainty is exactly what a real relationship requires. Okay,
12:58
Speaker 1: picture this with me. You're on the balcony. You've got
13:00
Speaker 1: those half-dead plants out there, the ones you keep meaning
13:02
Speaker 1: to repot. And you're out there rehearsing a conversation. Not
13:05
Speaker 1: your conversation. His. He's got something coming up, a work thing,
13:09
Speaker 1: a family thing, something, and you're out there scripting his
13:11
Speaker 1: side of it because the silence in your head when
13:13
Speaker 1: you don't have a task feels like falling, right? The
13:16
Speaker 1: dog is chewing a sock inside. The succulent is doing
13:19
Speaker 1: its little survival routine, hasn't died yet. Honestly, that succulent
13:22
Speaker 1: is more resilient than some relationships I've been in. And
13:25
Speaker 1: you're out there writing someone else's lines to stop the hum. Yeah,
13:29
Speaker 1: that's the protector part clocking in. And here's what all
13:32
Speaker 1: of this managing costs you. And I need you to
13:34
Speaker 1: hear this part clearly. It costs you him, the real version.
13:38
Speaker 1: You've never actually met the man underneath your management. You've
13:40
Speaker 1: met the version of him that exists inside your project plan.
13:43
Speaker 1: You've pre-corrected him, pre-smoothed him, pre-translated him. And the version
13:47
Speaker 1: of him you interact with every day has your fingerprints
13:49
Speaker 1: all over it. You wanted a partner. Somewhere along the way,
13:52
Speaker 1: you hired yourself as his emotional facilities manager. And now
13:55
Speaker 1: you're confused about why the relationship doesn't feel like partnership, right?
13:59
Speaker 1: That's not a small thing. And it costs you attraction
14:03
Speaker 1: because you genuinely cannot be drawn to someone you're parenting.
14:06
Speaker 1: That is a physiological fact of how desire works. Managing
14:09
Speaker 1: someone puts you in the driver's seat in a way
14:10
Speaker 1: that eventually kills the spark. And you feel it, right?
14:13
Speaker 1: You felt it. That thing where you look at him
14:15
Speaker 1: and feel tired instead of interested, that's not him failing you.
14:18
Speaker 1: That's the system you built running its natural course. And
14:21
Speaker 1: it costs him too. He senses, even if he can't
14:24
Speaker 1: name it, that he's been pre-corrected, that there's a right
14:26
Speaker 1: answer he's supposed to have already arrived at. And he
14:29
Speaker 1: either shrinks to fit your management Or he starts to
14:31
Speaker 1: resent the shape of the cage, even if it was
14:33
Speaker 1: built with love. It took me three years of weekly
14:36
Speaker 1: therapy before I stopped calling it devotion. Three years. And
14:40
Speaker 1: I'm not saying that to scare you. I'm saying it
14:41
Speaker 1: so you know that the woman who finally put the
14:43
Speaker 1: clipboard down, she didn't do it overnight, right? She did
14:46
Speaker 1: it slowly and badly and with a lot of backsliding.
14:49
Speaker 1: My therapist said, who asked you to do that? And
14:51
Speaker 1: I didn't have an answer. And then she said it
14:53
Speaker 1: again three months later about a different thing. And I
14:55
Speaker 1: still didn't have an answer. And I sat with that.
14:57
Speaker 1: And I sat with my best friend going quiet on
14:59
Speaker 1: me on purpose for a week because she was tired
15:01
Speaker 1: of watching me rearrange his faults into a story that
15:03
Speaker 1: made me necessary. She didn't say anything dramatic. She just
15:06
Speaker 1: went quiet. And in that week, I had to actually
15:08
Speaker 1: feel the thing I'd been managing around. Yeah, that's what
15:11
Speaker 1: stopping feels like at first. So here's the truth. And
15:15
Speaker 1: I'm going to say it bluntly because I love you
15:17
Speaker 1: and we've been in this together long enough. He's not
15:20
Speaker 1: a project. And stopping treating him like one is the
15:22
Speaker 1: actual work, not the couple's work, your work, right? Because
15:26
Speaker 1: managing him lets you feel indispensable without being vulnerable. You
15:30
Speaker 1: are not holding him up. You are holding yourself together.
15:32
Speaker 1: That's the thing. That's the whole thing. The managing is
15:35
Speaker 1: not about his capability or his potential or how much
15:38
Speaker 1: he needs you. It's about what you need the managing
15:40
Speaker 1: to protect you from feeling. And stopping doesn't mean abandoning him.
15:43
Speaker 1: I want to be really clear about that, okay? It
15:46
Speaker 1: means finding out what he actually does without your scaffolding
15:48
Speaker 1: and then tolerating what that shows you. And I know
15:50
Speaker 1: that's terrifying. Both possible answers are terrifying, right? If he rises,
15:54
Speaker 1: that means you've been blocking a capable person this whole time.
15:57
Speaker 1: If he falls apart, that's data about whether this is
15:59
Speaker 1: actually a match. And you've been afraid of both answers,
16:02
Speaker 1: so you kept the question open. You kept yourself in
16:04
Speaker 1: the managing position because as long as the project isn't finished,
16:07
Speaker 1: you don't have to face the result. Make sense? Yeah,
16:10
Speaker 1: I know it does. And I'll say this once, because
16:13
Speaker 1: it matters. If the managing started somewhere much harder than
16:16
Speaker 1: a dad who was emotionally sealed... if it started in
16:19
Speaker 1: a place of real chaos or real instability or real danger,
16:22
Speaker 1: then this work right here is the kind of work
16:24
Speaker 1: that's worth doing with a therapist who can help you
16:26
Speaker 1: put the clipboard down without losing your footing. You don't
16:29
Speaker 1: have to do the heavy version of this alone. That's
16:31
Speaker 1: the one time I'll say it, but I mean it completely.
16:35
Speaker 1: Here's the thing about being afraid that if you stop
16:36
Speaker 1: being useful, he'll leave. The relationship that requires your management
16:40
Speaker 1: to survive is not the relationship you actually want, right?
16:43
Speaker 1: If the whole thing only holds together because you're holding
16:45
Speaker 1: all the pieces and That is not a relationship. That
16:47
Speaker 1: is flat pack furniture and you are the instructions and
16:50
Speaker 1: you deserve to be in something that stays together even
16:52
Speaker 1: when you step back and just exist inside it. The
16:55
Speaker 1: question is whether you're willing to find out if this
16:56
Speaker 1: is that and we're going to get there right after this.
17:00
Speaker 1: What would happen if you actually put the clipboard down?
17:03
Speaker 1: What would he do? What would you feel and what
17:05
Speaker 1: would be left? That's exactly where we're going next and
17:08
Speaker 1: I want you to stay with me because what's on
17:10
Speaker 1: the other side of this is the thing you actually
17:12
Speaker 1: came here for. Okay, so let's talk about the other side.
17:16
Speaker 1: not the fantasy version where everything is easy and nobody
17:18
Speaker 1: has feelings. The real other side, right? There's a concept
17:23
Speaker 1: I want to name here, and it's called earned security.
17:25
Speaker 1: And I'm not talking about the kind that comes from
17:27
Speaker 1: finding the right man who finally behaves himself. Earned security
17:30
Speaker 1: is something you build inside yourself. It's the learned ability
17:33
Speaker 1: to tolerate being a full person in a relationship, wanting things,
17:36
Speaker 1: feeling scared, saying so, without collapsing the relationship or yourself
17:40
Speaker 1: in the process. You don't arrive at it. You practice
17:42
Speaker 1: it over and over and over every time you choose
17:44
Speaker 1: not to manage the discomfort away. Can we see this?
17:47
Speaker 1: It sounds simple and it is genuinely one of the
17:49
Speaker 1: hardest things I've ever attempted. And I am a woman
17:51
Speaker 1: who reorganized her kitchen at midnight once for fun. So
17:53
Speaker 1: that's saying something. The other side is not a relationship
17:56
Speaker 1: with no effort. I want to be really clear about that, okay?
17:59
Speaker 1: It's a relationship where the effort is mutual and actually visible.
18:02
Speaker 1: You stop scripting what he says. He gets to speak
18:04
Speaker 1: in his own voice. Maybe it's imperfect. Maybe it's better
18:06
Speaker 1: than you expected. You stop bracing before he talks to
18:09
Speaker 1: his friends. He gets a chance to hold the weight
18:11
Speaker 1: of something and you get to find out if he can.
18:13
Speaker 1: You feel scared and you say so instead of managing
18:15
Speaker 1: the fear into a five-point action plan. That's the shift.
18:18
Speaker 1: Not less caring, caring and available at the same time.
18:20
Speaker 1: Because you're not burning every bit of your care on maintenance.
18:23
Speaker 1: Make sense? And here's what that actually looks like on
18:26
Speaker 1: a regular Sunday. Picture this. Mom hasn't called yet. My
18:30
Speaker 1: partner's in the kitchen. I can smell whatever they're making.
18:32
Speaker 1: Something with garlic. There's probably a sticky note somewhere I
18:34
Speaker 1: haven't found. The dog is dragging a sock across the
18:37
Speaker 1: floor with complete conviction. Like, it's a very important job.
18:40
Speaker 1: And I'm on the balcony, just sitting there. Not rehearsing anything.
18:43
Speaker 1: not prepping anyone for a conversation. I'm watching my nearly
18:46
Speaker 1: dead succulent decide whether or not it wants to live.
18:48
Speaker 1: And honestly, same. And that's it. That's the whole moment.
18:52
Speaker 1: That is what earned security feels like from the inside.
18:54
Speaker 1: It feels like almost nothing. And the first time you
18:56
Speaker 1: get there, you might think something's wrong because it's so quiet, right?
18:59
Speaker 1: You've been so loud inside your own head for so
19:02
Speaker 1: long that the quiet feels like a malfunction. It is not.
19:05
Speaker 1: It's the point. So what do you actually do? I'm
19:08
Speaker 1: going to give you four moves and I'm saying moves
19:09
Speaker 1: because this is active. You're not just thinking your way here.
19:13
Speaker 1: My love, this is a doing thing. First, notice the
19:15
Speaker 1: urge before you act on it. When you feel that
19:17
Speaker 1: pull to remind him, translate for him. Rehearse what he's
19:20
Speaker 1: about to say or soften something before it lands, you pause.
19:24
Speaker 1: You name it out loud or in a note on
19:25
Speaker 1: your phone. You say, I am about to manage. That's
19:28
Speaker 1: the whole first move. Just naming it. Not stopping yourself
19:31
Speaker 1: every time. Not being perfect. Just naming it so it's
19:33
Speaker 1: not invisible anymore. Yeah? Second, once you've named it, you
19:38
Speaker 1: ask yourself one question and you write the actual answer.
19:41
Speaker 1: Not the diplomatic version, the real one. What do I
19:44
Speaker 1: think would happen if I didn't do this? Write it down.
19:46
Speaker 1: He'd seem rude, she'd think less of him, he'd forget
19:49
Speaker 1: and something would go wrong. He'd need me less and
19:51
Speaker 1: I don't know what happens then. Write whatever comes up,
19:54
Speaker 1: because that answer is the data. That answer is where
19:56
Speaker 1: the shadow is sitting, waiting for you to look at
19:58
Speaker 1: it directly. Sound familiar? I thought so. Third, you let
20:03
Speaker 1: one thing be his without your hands on it. Not forever.
20:06
Speaker 1: Not a permanent policy. Just this once. He has to
20:09
Speaker 1: call someone and you would normally script it. Don't. He
20:11
Speaker 1: has to show up somewhere and you normally run him
20:13
Speaker 1: through it twice. Don't. Watch what happens. And here's the
20:17
Speaker 1: important part. The terror you feel while you're watching is
20:19
Speaker 1: not a sign you made the wrong call. The terror
20:22
Speaker 1: is exactly the data you've been organizing your whole relationship
20:24
Speaker 1: to avoid feeling. Let yourself feel it. That feeling is
20:27
Speaker 1: old and it's worth knowing. Right? Fourth, and this one
20:32
Speaker 1: is going to feel like the scariest thing on the list.
20:34
Speaker 1: You say one actual want out loud to him. Not
20:36
Speaker 1: something the relationship needs to function. Something you want just
20:40
Speaker 1: because you want it. You say, I would like you
20:41
Speaker 1: to plan something for us. Or you say, I want
20:43
Speaker 1: to feel surprised by you. You say it in a
20:45
Speaker 1: full sentence and you don't follow it with a tutorial
20:48
Speaker 1: on how you could pull it off. You just say
20:49
Speaker 1: it and you let it sit there. I'm not going
20:51
Speaker 1: to pretend this is easy. The fourth move is genuinely
20:54
Speaker 1: scarier than the night I reorganized our kitchen at midnight
20:56
Speaker 1: and my partner just appeared in the doorway holding a spatula,
20:59
Speaker 1: not saying a word, just standing there. We still don't
21:01
Speaker 1: talk about that night, okay? But you say the want anyway.
21:05
Speaker 1: You say it because saying it is how you find
21:07
Speaker 1: out if there's someone there to hear it. Now, I
21:10
Speaker 1: want to talk to you for a second about who
21:11
Speaker 1: you need to become, because that's the real question, isn't it?
21:14
Speaker 1: It's not just what you stop doing, it's who you
21:16
Speaker 1: are without the clipboard. And I'll be honest with you,
21:19
Speaker 1: my inner voice went straight to, she will not be needed,
21:21
Speaker 1: and then nobody will stay. That was the voice. Not loud,
21:25
Speaker 1: just low and certain the way old beliefs always are.
21:28
Speaker 1: You know the voice, right? The woman you need to
21:32
Speaker 1: become is not the woman who needs nothing. She's not
21:34
Speaker 1: some chilled out person with no feelings who floats through
21:36
Speaker 1: relationships unattached. She is the woman who trusts that what
21:39
Speaker 1: she is, without the managing, is enough to keep someone
21:41
Speaker 1: who is actually right for her. She's willing to know
21:44
Speaker 1: the truth about him, even if the truth requires a
21:46
Speaker 1: hard decision. She stops filling every silence with labor, and
21:49
Speaker 1: she lets the silence show her what's actually there. She's
21:52
Speaker 1: a little less busy inside her own head and a
21:53
Speaker 1: lot more present in the actual room. She's not easier
21:56
Speaker 1: to leave, by the way. She's finally here. And just
21:59
Speaker 1: as a bonus, she finally has room in her brain
22:01
Speaker 1: for literally anything else. Her plants might even survive the year, which,
22:04
Speaker 1: speaking from experience, would be a first. So here's where
22:08
Speaker 1: I want to leave you. The manager was never wrong
22:10
Speaker 1: to care. That is not the problem. She was wrong
22:13
Speaker 1: to think that caring had to look like running the
22:15
Speaker 1: whole operation. Like love was a job she had to
22:17
Speaker 1: perform correctly or she'd lose it. You are not holding
22:20
Speaker 1: him up. You are holding yourself together. And when you
22:23
Speaker 1: understand that the work stops being about him entirely, it
22:26
Speaker 1: becomes about you and what you're willing to feel and
22:28
Speaker 1: who you want to be in a relationship and whether
22:30
Speaker 1: you're ready to find out what's there when you stop
22:32
Speaker 1: managing the answer. That's the real question. And it's yours now, right?
22:37
Speaker 1: The closing question is this. When you stop managing him,
22:40
Speaker 1: what do you actually feel? And is that worth staying for?
22:43
Speaker 1: I want you to sit with that one. Don't organize it.
22:46
Speaker 1: Don't turn it into a list. Just feel it and
22:47
Speaker 1: see what it shows you. And if it showed you something,
22:50
Speaker 1: I want you to send this episode to the woman
22:51
Speaker 1: in your life who's been running someone else's life and
22:53
Speaker 1: calling it devotion. She needs to hear this. Follow along
22:56
Speaker 1: so you're here next time because we've got more of
22:58
Speaker 1: this work to do together. And I'll see you then.
23:00
Speaker 1: The sticky note my partner left on the coffee maker
23:02
Speaker 1: this morning said, have a good one. No instructions, no schedule,
23:06
Speaker 1: nothing to manage, and somehow the coffee was still there.
23:09
Speaker 1: Take care of yourself. This show is made by Oboe Media.