Okay, I get what you're saying but it's kind of depressing, right? I hope/plan to have passion and intimacy in my next LTR.
Maybe we’re talking about two different things… not sure. When I say “a workable marriage does not HAVE to be completely healthy and functional” I mean that both people don’t have to be fully differentiated or have to maintain perfect boundaries or what ever criteria we use as an “ideal.” I think there are plenty of happy couples who have a good amount of enmeshment but have found a way to make it work.
I even see your point about how having a strong partner might help but I think the help is more found in mirroring or bouncing off the strength rather than being soothed or rescued.
No, I’m including the soothing and rescuing too. I suspect a lot of why working through trauma recovery succeeds better with a partner is the validation that the partner provides. I think Johnson even mentions this, that the validation from the partner legitimizes the trauma and makes it easier for the victim to process.
This is where I really started to question the value of striving for too much differentiation, especially in people who simply are not ready to handle it yet. It also explained to me why that interracial couple on the Schnarch Dateline TV show failed to reconcile. The W could not/would not validate the H’s issues and left him to hold onto himself alone. He could not do it so they split. Seems like a wasted opportunity to me.
