The marital crisis of Garry K.

With a Ex-Partner-Back-Strategy to success

Dear Guest,

the article with the issue “Partner gone – will I ever get him back • Separation” is the one of all of the texts on my website, which causes the most response. This is certainly not because of the text, but because of the many users, who search online for help and orientation due to a break-up problem.

It is not astonishing, because divorces and break-ups became a real mass phenomenon in the meantime – however the abandonee react as ever: with cluelessness and desperation. With that, the emotional misery can take on existential dimensions and sometimes even lead to suicide.

However: Hope dies last! All unlucky cling to this guiding principle and are ridden day and night by a single thought: Is there a possibility to win her or him back? What could I do that my ex-partner turns to me again.

On my internet site “Partner gone – will I ever get him back” I give quite a few tips regarding this issue, which I want to complete at this point with a practical example out of my activity as a counselor . The e-book “Partner gone…” is an orientation aid, meant for all of those who are in search of psychological armor to win back the ex-partner or to bring a partner, who is willing to separate, to turn around.

With this e-book I would like to bring the psychological spirit of a so called ex-partner-back-strategy visually to the advice seeking. I have decided to tell the story of Klaus K. true to life, to prompt the imagination of the readers – single passages get novel like features through this…

If you are a female abandoner, please read this story with reversed roles; they are, with smaller restrictions, also applicable to your situation – because men and women have practically an identical psychology in these separation scenarios.

I am not afraid to become unemployed due to such a guide book 😉 , rather – on the contrary – my work becomes easier and more successful due to it, because the advice seeking can read up on the topic prior to a consultation and are able to understand my behavioral tips and strategies much better after this.

Many of the advice seeking are also – despite extensive tips and guidance – unsure, if this or that strategy is applicable to their special issue. Sometimes there are truly individual characteristics given, which make a modification of the tactic necessary or even require a totally different strategy. All of the psychological particularities a separation has in its entourage cannot be packed into a guidebook anyhow – this is why there is enough work left for me with my consultation hours! 😉

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Should you take it into consideration to get professional help from me, it is very helpful for a successful outcome of the consultation, if you comprehend the “psychological spirit” hidden behind this ex-partner-back-strategy, which I find very effective and efficient by the way.

A psychological consultation is always oriented toward the rationality of the advice seeker – his or her sense of reason. This is more focused on emotions, unlike the psychotherapy. Hence psychological consultation has always something to do with learning and mental training. The better you memorize the “basics” and comprehend its psychological meaning, the easier it will be for you to put it into practice.

If I am supposed to accompany you somewhat through a coaching, then you should have understood the essential features of the ex-partner-back-strategy – in fact already prior to a consultation – because I cannot give overlong psychological explanations during a coaching session due to time reasons. My coaching, e-mails or phone calls are behavioral guides respectively strategic instructions, which are supposed to bring your partner to return to you – if a realistic chance exists.

Please try as much as possible to internalize the psychological background of this guidebook, then we will save time and money – and are more successful and effective.

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However – I have already mentioned it multiple times on my website: Often even the best ex-partner-back-strategy does not help, if that ship has sailed. You would then have to accept the inevitable – go through the mourning phase and close the painful chapter afterwards – it is no use.

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2009 did not work out well for Garry K…

This here outlined marital story really happened, and I hope it is ok for Garry K., if I use it as an example for an ex-partner-back-strategy. Certainly his name is not Garry K. and I have certainly changed essential parts of his story, so relations to real people cannot be established. However if you still know someone, whom this story seems to apply to, then it is for sure a coincidence.

I have integrated passages into the ongoing story, which contain psychological explanations, to make the controversy with this topic easier for you. Thus you get an impression what took place in the minds of Garry and Nicole K.; but you also get to know something about “my mind” – the mind of the psychological counselor at the consultation.

The marriage is not worse than others

Garry K. would not characterize his marriage a bad one; at any rate it was not worse than the marriages of his friends and colleges. There were no big dispute issues to poison the “atmosphere”; no bad mother-in-law; no piles of debts or long periods of unemployment; the children – a boy and a cute girl (9 and 7) – everything was fine and dandy. Garry K. had read somewhere once, that couples who were married for a longer period of time, would only talk to each other a couple of minutes a day in average – but that was not the case with them.

Garry and Nicole have been married for nine years and are a couple for ten years; they are 38 and 33 years old. Their relationship was not truly tingling and passionate anymore, but which relationship still is after ten years? After giving birth, sex was not at the top of the marital priority list for Nicole anymore. After Jasmin`s birth, there was a long period of sexual listlessness for Nicole, which only disappeared gradually. After that it had gotten better – not exciting – but better. Garry K. was forced to accept with time, that the vamp inside of her, from back then, had disappeared.

Nicole would often accompany her husband to go fishing in the early years of their marriage – his great passion. With the years it died out again and soon there was nothing mentioned anymore that Nicole wanted to make her fishing license. Instead, Nicole K. discovered her love for tennis: Whenever it was possible for her, she would spend time on the tennis court or at other social activities, new friendships practically built due to this. Basically the couple K. had already drifted apart a little bit, although enough similarities still existed.

Garry K. had a severe bicycle accident in April of 2009: He fell from his mountain bike and cracked a lumbar vertebra – he barely escaped paraplegia. The neurological deficiencies within the sciatic area soon regressed again. Hospital stays, rehabilitation and many weeks of physiotherapy influenced his life for months and also burdened his marriage.

But already weeks before his accident he had noticed a somewhat emotional withdrawal of his wife: Increasingly she avoided small testimonies of affection and small gestures of love – which always used to be important to her. The change on her birthday was especially noticeable to him: Nicole acted reserved and distanced – her delight over his great gift was strangely cold.

The next fiasco began, as Garry K. wanted to make love to her that night: She rejected him and started to cry. She could not give him a real answer to his question of “what he had done wrong”, her explanations left Garry K. perplexed and worried. Then the ill-fated bicycle accident happened a week later, naturally the concern about his health took priority from here on. Nicole took care of him affectionately, in her face you could see the worry of a wife, whose husband would come home from the hospitals and possibly would have to live with a disability.

The confession

However her loving care decreased rapidly, as it showed that he would not sustain any permanent damage. The better he was doing, the more melancholic she would become. Quickly this peculiar emotional isolation, which he already knew, took possession of her again. Garry K. felt for sure, that he could not reach his wife emotionally anymore. Often she appeared absent and not interested during their shared TV night, sometimes she stared pondering and absentmindedly into a corner.

There was something, which was bearing down on her. First he thought about an illness, which she might have kept a secret. But every now and then she appeared overly cheerful and exhilarated, especially when she was chatting with her girlfriend on the phone. One time her cell phone beeped in the bedroom: text message. She grabbed it like a streak of lightening and went outside. Garry K. became a bit uneasy and he decided to get assurance for himself.
The time had come after three days: He went through her purse and got her cell phone, as the neighbor asked her to come inside real quick. A minute later he was certain: There was a lover; his name was Kai; Garry K. knew about him, she had mentioned him once because of his awesome backhand; in the past he wanted to become a professional tennis player…

And now – the two of them had something going on, and very heavily. The vamp inside of her was back, but for another man. Garry K. felt like he would collapse at any moment. He put her cell phone away and retreated to his hobby room in the basement. As he passed by the mirror in the hallway, he saw that he was as pale as a ghost – she was not supposed to see him in this condition.

But what should he do now? To admit he took her cell phone? He was not willing to show that weakness. So at the next chance, he would grab the bull by the horns and ask her about her emotional condition, that something was not right with her, that she kept something from him, that he is suspicious of her concealing an illness from him…

She broke down really quick under the weight of his inquisitional interrogation and confessed her “illness”: She was in love with someone else, for quite a while; she does not why or for which reason It is good that all is in the open now, the emotional pressure was terrible, she still has feelings for Garry K., but there are not grand, she does not want to lose him, he is a good husband and father. The other man however is so strong, she cannot quit him and she is in a predicament. She does not know where to go from here. The words just came pouring out of her…

The other man drinks her fire

Garry K. was bewildered and desperate, crying fits shook him, followed by attacks of irrepressible, blind fury. Gruesome thoughts and images chased through his mind, as he wandered around on desolated forest trails. A whole pallet of negative emotions kept boiling up inside of him again and again and fueled his anger. The worst of all was his envy of the sex the two of them had – this feeling devoured his soul like cancer.

He himself had put his sexual needs on the back burner for years, because she did not want to or could not. He often thought, that others would not have been as patient in his place; many would have looked for something new a long time ago.

There were months without sex, months that he had to endure. He just loved her and often she just did not have any desire, she was not like that on purpose. He never wanted to persuade her to anything, never wanted to pressure her, so he waited. Eventually it had gotten better again, although not great nor exhilarating. He had cut back and condescended, because he loved her and did not want to lose her, and now it was likely that he had lost her anyway.

The thought, that a frenzied love affair possibly made her do things – with the other man – which were taboo for her in her boring marriage, drove him nearly insane…

The domestic situation was accordingly loaded with tension. He moved out of their bedroom and into the guestroom at her request. The children started to suffer under this situation, which spread throughout their world – safe and sound for them until then. The parents imparted to them in difficult talks, that Mom and Dad currently had problems with each other. Nicole made the suggestion, that they should just wait and let some time pass by. She did not want to change anything on her domestic situation – at the moment. She still wanted to meet with her lover and see how her feelings would develop.

However on the other side, she also wanted to give her marriage a chance, she did not want to throw everything away. She wanted to wait, and secretly she hoped, that something came up, which would take the decision of her hands. She asked her husband, actually literally begged him to just play along for now. With a heavy heart he agreed, because he wanted to fight for their love – no matter at what cost.

Garry K. fights for Nicole

A lot of strange scenarios happened at the house of Garry K. in the period that followed: To fight for Nicole meant for Garry K., that he gave his wife a lot of attention and to deliberately fulfill her alleged wishes. Garry K. paraded the good person and terrific husband: He brought her presents, took her to dinner at expensive restaurants, made plans for a winter vacation together, talked about problems, which were an issue for them in the relationship, wanted to cut back on his fishing hobby, to have more time for the family and so forth…

Nicole involuntarily had brought a breath of new life into their marriage, which turned the bottommost to the top, due to her “involvement” outside of the home. Ironically one could have said, that their marriage even got much better in order to that – as odd as this might sound, on one hand anyway. On the other hand Nicole’s feeling for her husband had not changed, she kept being chummy, friendly and comradely – but by no means erotically.

Fighting is no use

Naturally Garry K. was expecting results – longingly – because he mobilized everything to be the world`s best husband. He often thought about their early days. Nicole was idolized and much desired back then. With a lot of diligence and dedication he shook off the other two guys, who were also pursuing her. This is how he imagined it was like again: “It really would be a streak of bad luck, if Nicole would not change sides again, after all he did for her.”

Also Garry K. had let himself go a little bit during his marriage. For example, the fishing was very, very important to him and sometimes she was complaining about it. This he wanted to stop with strict persistency. He was not drawn to his beloved trout waters anymore, which he had leased together with two friends. He rather undertook something with her and the kids; there he saw a better investment of his time.

But then stupid thoughts overcame him again: Somehow his dedication did not find the fertile ground he was hoping for. He started having doubts; nights where he was brooding sometimes turned him to be agitated and nervous. Also no one could say that he looked radiant: Deep circles underneath his eyes and a despondent facial expression gave evidence to his inner fight, which his poor soul had to endure.

The worst of the whole thing was the gnawing uncertainty what would happen: “Does it really make any sense what I am doing?” He asked himself this question over and over again. “If I could only look into the future, if I knew everything would be alright again within half a year – to get through that time would be a walk in the park. But like this?” Once the four of them spent a beautiful Sunday afternoon together. For the evening Garry K. had organized a DVD, he knew she had wanted to watch for quite a while; and she was really pleased about it as well.

The slap in the face came, as he opened a bottle of red wine, sat next to her on the couch and casually laid his arm around her: “Oh Garry, we better not do this”. With those harsh words, she took his arm and laid it back onto the back of the chair. By that time it was over with his nonchalant attitude; jumping off the chair, he made severe accusations against her: “That the show she had pulled this whole time was absolutely outrageous. If she also played coy like this when the other man wanted to touch her; that she was unthankful and that she was the worst of the worst”… Nicole went into an intense crying fit and went to bed.

Explanation

Twosome relationships or the feeling the couples have for one another are dependent on how the emotional power balance is shaping within the relationship. With power, I don`t mean the right to exert the dominance of the physically stronger one – which certainly also happens – but the power of love. Most of the time this power makes one of the two “stronger” and the other one “weaker”.

Emotions certainly are intangible phenomenons, which won`t let themselves be quantified and measured. But we can subjectively identify them as strong, weak or as totally absent. Also are we able to assess and estimate the emotional state of others, through specific proficiencies of our brain; this also makes it possible for us, for example, to feel compassion.

When a man claims of himself, that he loves a woman more than she loves him, then he cannot proof his statement objectively, because there is no method of measuring or it. But he can tie his statement to certain behavioral patterns of his wife, which show him how she stands by him. Needlessly to say such statements are always speculative and succumb to misjudgments, out of which misunderstandings always could arise – it is always a thing like that with emotions…

Nevertheless pretty good assessments – unconsciously and subjectively – over way and strength of their mutual dependency, reign amongst couples, who have been together over a longer period of time.

Love and power

The one who loves more in a relationship, respectively the one who needs the other one more than vice versa, is the “weaker” one in the relationship. He is dependent on the mood swings and the behavioral patterns of the other one; more dependent, than it is the case the other way around. It would equal a catastrophe, if the partner would end the relationship.

It surely is not like this inversely: Would the one, who loves less, be abandoned (which does not happen as easily), he would certainly not jump off the next skyscraper.

Interesting is the psychological occurrence, that these unbalanced relationships – like following a law of nature – keep polarizing; which means, that the emotional ranges between the two keep getting bigger. One always loves more, the other one always loves less due to this – until the whole thing collapses and then falls apart.

These psychological sequences base – in the end – on the behavioral pattern of rivalry, which is completely normal amongst living beings of the same species; also between genders, and who have an evolutionary history behind them, which is hundreds of millions of years old. In other passages of my site, I went deeper into these evolutionary mechanism.

The conclusion of the whole thing is, that emotions of love are always negatively correlated with those of power. To have power and control over a relationship, will be inevitably paid with a disappearance of emotions.

This for example pertains also for forms of relationships, which are built on an S/M partnership. The dominant one “loves” his subdominant one and vice versa. Here is an uneven distribution of power in the relationship, the requirement for its coming about. But here it is about an “outer” power, which functions on the base of dominance and submission. This “outer” balance of power does not reveal something by all means about the “inner” power structure of such relationships, although the “inner” and “outer” power certainly interact.

The “true” balance of power can shift in those relationships as well as in “normal” relationships, namely when the masochistic part begins to love his dominant one less and finds him less attractive than the other way around. Then he automatically assumes the “inner” power over the relationship. Then he is the true powerful one, even though his partner can still be apparent as the strong and superior one toward the outside.

Garry K. loses power

It had fatal impacts on the emotional balance of the relationship, as Nicole`s libido drastically subsided after the birth of her children, because her tenuous desire for sex made her now the powerful one in the relationship.

Garry K. lost power, because he was sexually very strongly interested in his wife and because he suddenly found himself in the role of the needy pleader. Nicole could withstand long periods without sex and physical closeness, and it seemed that she was not missing anything – while he was on his last legs.

This is how he got into the awkward situation, that his physical wellbeing was depended on the mood swings of his wife. Nicole certainly did not precipitate all of this on purpose and consciously – it just happened that way.

Power is always applied for manipulative purposes in a relationship, just like for the rest of life. So Nicole`s weak and interference-prone libido collapsed regularly, if there were incidents in the relationship, which she was irritated about. Her subconscious punishment actions fulfilled many a time “their purpose” and “disciplined” Garry K., so that he would give in. Also many times it did not work and he pelted disappointed and angry to his trout waters and relaxed in his way…

Another time he laid emphasis on being nice and submissive and did everything she wanted – and a little bit more – to make up for lost ground. Nicole had, due to her dominance in the emotional-sexual area, the “inner” power over the relationship, even though she was not working and with that was in a certain dependent relationship with her husband.

This power solidified itself more and more with time. Also her tennis activities and the friendships she was making contributed to it. She became increasingly emotionally autonomic and self-sufficient, even though she was dependent on him financially – also because she took the accomplishments he made for the family entirely for granted.
An emotional drifting apart was basically predetermined against this background. And as this great guy Kai with his awesome backhand emerged, then it was all over for Nicole…

Her affair is now shaking the walls of her marital foundation thoroughly; emotionality wherever you look: She is aware of the fact, that she could also go belly-up and that she could possibly lose her lover and her husband in the end as well. In that case her children could be the victims – in a game, where no one is going to be the winner.

He is aware, that it is all or nothing now; that he still loves her like before; that he loves her very much, especially now – now, that he might lose her forever. This is why Garry K. wants to fight for her love – fight like a berserker. However this fight does not work – because this fight cannot work.

Garry K. cannot win like this

A strong male commitment promises success in the beginning, during the time of getting to know each other, during the courtship phase, when everything is new and uncertain. Because with this he signals stability and security – as trust building method so to speak – to his queen of hearts.

This way one can effectively face a woman’s uncertainty and fear to make a mistake. In doing so, one tends to ancient needs, which are deeply embedded in the female soul. Large flower bouquets and fancy restaurant help to banish her doubts, if she is interested but yet hesitant – because she does not know quite yet what to think about him. 😉

But all these means do not help with the situation which Garry K. is in, because Nicole has the power over the relationship and is emotional fixated on her lover. He increases the imbalance of power even more, if he is now “tearing himself apart” for her; admittedly, he would make himself more loveable, but not desirable. This is the fine, but all decisive difference: Literally she has him in the palm of her hand – and something, one is so sure of, is not worth much most of the time. The lover, however, stands for excitement, uncertainty and romance – thus it tingles and the butterflies are able to flutter…

One can find help on the web

Somehow Garry K. felt what, was said above and in his cluelessness and helplessness, he started to google online. For hours he trudged around questionable sites, which engaged in relationship issues. He found forums in which abandoned people posted their problems – to find advice and help within the forum community. Garry K. saw that he was not alone… In one of the threads he was made aware of a site, which was supposed to offer information regarding the issue of “separation”. Garry K. clicked on the site and – wow – strike! This was exactly what he had been looking for in so long.

The site operator, a behavioral biologist, looked at the human relationship behavior from an evolutionary aspect and thereby came to an interesting conclusion. He described problems of a separation situation so conclusively, that Garry K. immediately recognized some of the mistakes, which he had already made. Garry K. was delighted and felt something like hope again for the first time. And he wrote an e-mail, an e-mail, which should change his life: Garry K. wanted to get advice; he wanted to get coached; he wanted to find a way with help from the outside, to free him from this nightmare – because slowly he had no more strength to fight; he was in way over his head; he slowly became desperate.

The internet consultant, like expected, made Garry K. aware of some of the misconceptions, which he had been taken by: The most important one was the one, that he would have no chance to win his Nicole back, if he would “fight”, like most would comprehend this word, for his relationship.

The next thing he was made aware of was the staying power, which he most likely would have to have, to be successful.

And last but not least: Regardless a success was rather unlikely – with such a fierce romance like his wife had going on. Garry K. deviated from his initial euphoria very quickly again; the e-mails of the consultant did not sound really optimistic and were quite sobering. Of course he understood what the gentleman meant, namely that this being-in-love phase of his wife could at the very most be eliminated by magic; but however magic was not in the line of work of a professional consultant. According to whose opinion there might be a chance that the affair of his Nicole would not end up in a regular relationship; that it would turn out to be only a fling, or that it would shatter on the demands of reality.

Ex-partner-back-strategy

Garry K. could not directly influence these sequences, but perhaps indirectly. The consultant looked at this indirect way of influence as his domain; thereby he could support Garry K. – with an ex-partner-back-strategy. However, and this once again expressed unambiguously, that the failure of all these efforts would be more likely than a success. The internet counselor absolutely wanted to avoid with his rather pessimistic sounding statement, that Garry K. would be carried away by overly exaggerated hopes.

This worked out well, because his resignation and sadness spread again immediately – the outset enthusiasm was now completely gone. But what was he supposed to do? But he did not have any alternative either and he was not as stupid – not even in his greatest misery – as to blow his money on some spiritual healer somewhere on this earth, who would “disenchant” his Nicole. Plus he thought the counselor was kind of pleasant; and Garry K. did not believe that he could be a hustler, because for this, his statements were way to pessimistic. So he made the deal and transferred him a reasonable consultation fee.

From this point on we will unfortunately have to take a fee

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