English Speaking Therapist | Forward Therapy Stockholm

Tag: gaslighting

  • Lonely in Relationship with an Emotionally Unavailable Partner

    Lonely in Relationship with an Emotionally Unavailable Partner

    Moving to a new country to be with your overseas-born partner can be an adventure. But it’s not always possible to foresee the difficulties and challenges ahead. Feeling lonely in relationship with an emotionally unavailable partner often creates a sense of neglect, particularly when dealing with the stress of unfamiliar culture. You might start feeling unloved if the person you thought was the love of your life turns out to be emotionally distant.

    It isn’t easy to manage these emotions while isolated. You can’t control other’s actions but it is possible to prioritise your own emotional well-being and decision making. Professional support can offer a path to recovery, empowerment and renewed motivation while acknowledging the importance of focusing on personal healing.

    Feeling lonely in relationship with an emotionally unavailable partner is common when moving to a new country.

    Understanding Cultural Differences

    Getting used to a new culture means more than just learning the language and customs. The nuances of communication, social norms and how people relate to each other can vary significantly from place to place. In many Latin countries kissing on the cheek is common whereas this isn’t so acceptable in northern Europe. When I first moved to Stockholm, I was surprised to find that people generally introduced themselves. In Australia and in British culture, we tend to wait to be introduced.

    This adjustment process, in addition to not understanding the language, can leave newcomers feeling isolated and misunderstood. Developing cultural competence takes time and patience. This can impact existing intimate relationships. It is not unusual to experience a sense of disconnection after moving overseas to live with a partner in their home country. This is an additional stressor, intensifying feelings of loneliness. But the stress of relocation itself can physically manifest as hair loss, insomnia, body tension, irritability, digestive issues and mood swings. When empathy from a partner isn’t forthcoming, support from a professional coach who understands the cultural landscape can provide insights and strategies for navigating these challenges and managing stress.

    Dealing with Relationship Problems with an Emotionally Unavailable Partner

    Perhaps you only recently became aware of unresolved conflict in your relationship? Relocating to a new country has a way of amplifying existing partner problems. Communication breakdowns, avoidance and differing expectations all contribute to feelings of loneliness and emotional neglect.

    You might have already tried, unsuccessfully, to change your partner’s behaviour. You might have found they are resistant to any requests for change. Or you might actually be experiencing subtle or overt abuse or manipulative behaviour like gaslighting or other forms of coercive control. If you are doubting yourself or feeling confused there isn’t necessarily anything wrong with you. Anger and frustration are ways your body informs you that something is going wrong. Listen to your body and reach out for help.

    Make an appointment to discuss an emotionally unavailable relationship

    Communication breakdowns, avoidance and differing expectations all contribute to feelings of loneliness and emotional neglect

    Regaining trust in yourself is important if you are going to survive a toxic relationship. Counselling offers a safe space to explore these difficulties openly and constructively. You might not be able to influence your partner but you can work on your own assertiveness and boundary-setting within the relationship. If you reach a point where you realise you are feeling lonely in relationship with an emotionally unavailable partner, professional support can assist. Online counselling can support you in marital separation, the grieving process and provide a means to plan the way forward.

    How to expose covert abuse, coercive control and gaslighting

    Cultivating Self-Compassion and Resilience while Feeling Lonely

    An emotionally unavailable partner can trigger feelings of loneliness which can, in turn, erode your trust in yourself. In my work as an English speaking coach and counsellor I’ve met many people who have disclosed low self-esteem. I call it having a bad relationship with yourself. Low mood can cause you to struggle with managing everyday life in a new country. Prioritising your well-being is a better starting place than treating normal human difficulties like a mental health disorder.

    Cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) and mindfulness-based practices can be applied to increase awareness and feelings of self-control. Self-compassion is an approach to that builds resilience, increases your ability to cope and fosters healing. If you are self-sabotaging with criticism and behaviour you later regret, there is a way forward that doesn’t involve pulling yourself down.

    If you are self-sabotaging with criticism and behaviour you later regret it could be that you are feeling lonely in relationship with an emotionally unavailable partner.

    The role of a self-compassion coach or counsellor is to encourage you to be a friend, not an enemy, to yourself. Feeling lonely in relationship with an emotionally unavailable partner is not uncommon. You are not alone in what you are experiencing, others have navigated through similar problems and there is much to be gained from their stories. And however overwhelming it may seem, you are also more than the emotional state you happen to be experiencing right now.

    Finding Professional Support and Making Connections in a New Country

    Loneliness evolves from a lack of meaningful connections and support. Cultivating a social network does takes time and sometimes it can feel too hard to begin. You can take smaller steps which are easier. It helps to have encouragement and guidance on the way.

    Feeling abandoned or neglected by an emotionally unavailable partner need not determine your identity. If you have relocated to a new country and would like to talk through the problems in your intimate relationship, send an enquiry today. As an English-speaking Australian therapist I offer online therapy with people not only in Swedish cities like Stockholm and Gothenburg but in cities around the world including Hong Kong, Tokyo, Seoul, Shanghai, Sydney, Buenos Aires and Rio de Janiero. You’re welcome to contact me and take the first step in recovering your motivation and enjoyment of life.

    Book an online counselling appointment

    Loneliness evolves from a lack of meaningful connections and support.
  • How to Expose Covert Abuse, Coercive Control and Gaslighting

    How to Expose Covert Abuse, Coercive Control and Gaslighting

    The red-flags for covert abuse, coercive control and gaslighting in a toxic relationship usually take time to notice. We enter into coupledom in a state of vulnerability, with an open heart, and assuming our partner has the best intentions. When things go wrong, we might blame ourselves or start thinking we are unwell. Then we notice the warning signs in the form of patterns of dominating conduct. Becoming aware of manipulation and controlling behaviour in intimate relationships is the first step in managing and ultimately refusing it. Recovering and healing from the psychological harm inflicted by an abusive ex-partner can be better helped by counselling and other professional support.

    Manipulation through Deception and Abuse Erodes Self-Worth

    As an online therapist for English-speaking expats in Sweden and around the world, I work with many individuals struggling with coercive control and gaslighting. Sometimes clients contact me for couples therapy when they are actually looking for a referee or help in escaping the relationship. Often, in their initial emails, my counselling clients outline problematic behaviour by their spouse, sambo or lover that is clearly inconsistent with the signs of a healthy relationship. I’m referring here to the trust, respectful communication, mutual support, shared decision making and commitment to each other’s growth. Most of us are seeking those when we start sharing a life with someone.

    Examples of controlling behaviour in relationships are abundant. Gaslighting, for example, is a specific type of manipulation that leads a person to self-doubt. It could be via outright deception or ‘crazy-making’ (pathologising). I often hear stories from people who arrive in Sweden from to start a new life only to find themselves pseudo-diagnosed by their partner as depressed, anxious, ‘bipolar’, obsessive compulsive disorder, or ‘ADHD’ or as suffering from borderline personality disorder. The effect on my English speaking clients is to undermine their sense of self and distort their reality. They feel sick, wrong or broken. Covert abuse, consistent coercive control and gaslighting can make a person mentally ill.

    Covert abuse, consistent coercive control and gaslighting can make a person mentally ill.

    Self-Worth and the Adjustment to Swedish Culture

    In other cases the controlling behaviour is more subtle. It might include prioritising friends or family over a partner, consistently making unilateral decisions or demanding particular outcomes without any offers or negotiation (also known as ‘my way or the highway’). Some clients are repeatedly infantilised. Their partners are not prepared to accommodate the time it might take a new immigrant to adjust to Swedish culture. In some cases my clients are being ‘abandoned with care’: made important but worthless at the same time through the provision of limited financial support but a disregard for emotional needs. These are all situations that result in an erosion of self-worth.

    What to do when your partner refuses to attend couples counselling

    More obvious abusive relationships involve the denial of autonomy, or monitoring and surveillance of activity. Name-calling, mockery, put downs and other forms of bullying are further examples. Threatening harm to pets, or children, or even violence to the person themselves might be accompanied by a suggestion that the victim would somehow be responsible for the abuser’s behaviour. These are clear signs of abuse that will have a person living in fear. The turning point for my talk therapy clients in Sweden is often the realisation that they can choose not to live in fear and that everyone has a right to an intimate relationship free of dread, coercive control and gaslighting, even when socially isolated in an unfamiliar country.

    Book online for a Skype, Zoom or phone consultation

    Vulnerability to Coercive Control and Gaslighting for Expats in Sweden

    Abusive and controlling behaviour in expat relationships arises in combination with a number of factors. Moving to a new country can be stressful and the person immigrating often leans into their partner for more support in the initial months and years. There are sometimes massive Swedish cultural differences not always apparent when first arriving. Language and communication difficulties can erode a person’s confidence and lead to further reliance on the native partner. Social isolation and financial dependence can play a part in ceding to a domineering spouse or lover. When one partner starts disregarding or disrespecting the other, it often leads to loneliness within the relationship.

    But these instances don’t explain every situation. What about so called Third Culture Kids (TCKs), adults who spend a good deal of their childhood moving countries with their parents? I assist many TCKs via webcam therapy sessions from Sweden other countries. They also often report symptoms of toxic relationships despite often being adept at adjusting to new countries and cultures and having advanced language skills. So what might be happening for TCKs?

    Third Culture Kids (TCKs) often report symptoms of toxic relationships despite often being adept at adjusting to new countries and cultures.

    The acceptance and tolerance of controlling behaviour often relates back to past relationships. It can evolve due to or childhood experiences or religious trauma. Often my clients realise they have a pattern of abusive relationships that defy transnational migration and transcultural relocation. Interpersonal conflicts re-emerge. The emotional support yearned for is distinctly absent. The awakening to a relationship as controlling is a shock. But moving to a new country represents a new start, a way of leaving a difficult or shameful past behind. Unfortunately it can also mean a replication of the enmeshment or co-dependence that occurred in the family of origin or church along with similar abandonment, isolation, loneliness, and neglect.

    Toxic Relationships: A Pattern from Childhood and Family

    We are usually drawn to people who offer the promise of a missing experience, something we seek in childhood but never receive. Yet the person who attracts us can also be somewhat familiar. Ever heard the expression ‘They married their mother / father’? For those with backgrounds of neglect, abuse or abandonment, where a parent is distant, absent, critical or authoritarian, it can be easy to slip into yet another unsatisfactory and abusive relationship. But if you start to recognise a pattern in your relationships, that they are abusive or mirror somewhat the relationship you had with a parent, it’s important not to give yourself a hard time. Now you can use self-compassion.

    Some clients report a kind of low mood that persists since childhood. They manage go about their lives, appearing somewhat functional, but never feel particularly happy for long. The trauma therapist and Licensed Independent Clinical Social Worker (LICSW) Patrick Teahan refers to this as Refrigerator Buzz Depression. You live with it for so long that it becomes background noise. Processing childhood trauma, and awakening to how bad it is, are integral to recovery but can initially inflame mood disturbances. At the same time, changing one’s life by moving to a new country like Sweden can also bring the realisation that you no longer have to put up with the sadness you have lived with for so long.

    Moving to a new country like Sweden can bring the realisation that you no longer have to put up with the sadness you have lived with for so long.

    Treatment, Healing and Recovery from Coercive Control and Gaslighting in Relationships

    Finding your way out of a controlling relationship involves awareness, accessing support and taking practical action. But it also means trusting yourself. We evolve with emotions for good reason. Noticing your anger, shame, fear or sadness is part of realising that something is wrong. Developing a kinder and less critical relationship with yourself can be the key to accessing a way out.

    The isolation of being in a foreign country like Sweden can cause confusion. If you are struggling to understand how to cope in your relationship, an individual consultation might be better help than couples counselling. For a relationship beyond repair, couples therapy can only involve supporting the relationship to end. An individual session might reveal you have been over-tolerating bad behaviour. You could be in a state of self-blame or toxic shame. You may find it difficult to navigate relationships and deal with coercive control and gaslighting. Getting good with yourself through the encouragement of an English speaking therapist can assist you to manage emotions and develop a course of action. If you are in danger, go to the police.

    Therapy for Managing Controlling Relationships

    Therapy for those experiencing manipulation by their intimate partners can involve:

    • Stress management techniques;
    • Problem solving around boundaries, risk and managing safety;
    • Psychoeducation to understand the signs of coercive control and gaslighting and other forms of covert abuse;
    • Strategies for de-escalating, responding to and eliminating abusive behaviour;
    • Development of a plan around financial independence and social and emotional support;
    • Grief counselling, particularly around the sense of betrayal and emotions that accompany separation.

    Good talk therapy is not simply about venting or offloading your feelings. Being able to talk and be heard are important but an experienced therapist will not only listen, they will assist you to develop your self-agency or your capacity to change your circumstances. They will encourage and support you to take action and reach a turning point. This might involve practising self-compassion, assertiveness or prioritising new habits over fast gratification. In any case, a willingness to take new steps is part of recovery. Even the best psychologist in Stockholm will not be influential if you are not willing to do something yourself about the situation.

    Identifying, dealing with and recovering from a relationship involving coercive control and gaslighting can take time. This is particularly true for those who find themselves isolated in toxic partnerships that resonate with abusive childhood experiences. In the beginning, it can feel overwhelming. But with the right support, it is possible to change your circumstances and recover both a sense of safety and a nurturing relationship with yourself.

    Make an appointment now for therapy online with Ash Rehn